Introduction
In his article on Climate change denial, freedom of speech and global justice, Trygve Lavik, a Professor of Philosophy at Bergen University in Norway, paints a hypothetical scenario to explain the nature of climate change denial. Imagine this: the pharmaceutical industry invents a medicine to help pregnant women with morning sickness. There is no immediate indication that this medicine affects the baby. However, several scientists begin researching this medicine and note that a potential long-term effect is that the children may be born with paralysed legs and after years of research, they are certain that the medicine has extremely adverse effects. The pharmaceutical industry, however, creates a counter-narrative by establishing quasi-research institutes and funding research to deny any side-effects. They also pay scientists to advocate for the medicine. In this case, if many pregnant women continue to take the medicine and give birth to children with deformities, will the action of the pharmaceutical industry qualify as their right to free speech? Or should they be sued for misleading the public? Lavik uses this well-crafted example to draw parallels with how the right to free speech is being abused by oil, gas and the fossil fuel industry to deny climate change.
Over 97% of climate scientists agree that climate change is a human-induced 'catastrophic' phenomenon. However, there are certain well-funded research organisations which reaffirm untrue, damaging and imbalanced notions about climate change to tilt the narrative in favour of their funders – often to the tune that climate change is not a reality. At the outset, climate change deniers are different from sceptics. Sceptics look at scientific evidence to rethink notions. However, as per climate scientists Hodgetts and McGravy, denialists cause harm by blocking necessary action on climate change. They primarily harm future generations and people in developing countries.
Climate Change Denial Litigation
Fossil fuel companies have had a history of funding research that denies the impact of climate change. Lately, governments have been taking action against this by seeking funders’ details from research organisations denying climate change. For instance, in the USA, fossil fuel companies are being scrutinized under the Racketeer Influences and Corrupt Organisations Act (RICO). Ironically, this is the same law that was used against the tobacco industry to investigate misinformation being spread about the alleged ‘benefits’ of smoking.
In 2015 and 2016, ExxonMobil, one of the world’s largest international oil and gas companies, was tangled in a lawsuit over concealing information about the risks of the products it dealt in. The corporation was ousted by various print media for misleading the public and investors by providing false assurances about tackling climate change-risks. Evidence came to light that suggested that the companies own scientists had been alerting the corporation for over 40 years about the climate-change harms being caused by their actions. ExxonMobil, however, combated this by investing millions of dollars into disinformation campaigns that denied climate change. Studies found that the climate-change-denying organisations that were funded by the fossil fuel industry were most successful at inserting the notion of climate denialism into media stories.
Attorney Generals of various states in the USA have taken ExxonMobil to Court demanding that ExxonmMobil be held accountable for spreading disinformation and defrauding investors. They alleged that ExxonMobil ran a ‘tobacco industry-style campaign to sow doubt and confusion among the public”. In response, Exxon’s countersuits centred around its right to free speech and to disagree with the climate change consensus. The corporation argued that the American Constitution granted them the right to ‘speak’ or ‘not speak’ about climate change in whichever way it liked and that curbing this right led to a chilling effect on their right to free speech. In December 2019, in the case instituted by the Attorney General of New York, the Court found in favour of ExxonMobil on the ground that the AG had not produced sufficient evidence to substantiate its claims. However, several other claims made by other cities and counties against the corporation remain pending. This case has spurred several debates about how lying about climate change is not ‘free speech’ and that corporate speech rights do not protect fraudulent statements.
Climate Change Scepticism v. Funded Climate Change Denial
Lavik has argued that climate change denial should be considered illegal. In saying this, he argues for a statutory ban on climate denialism. While there certainly is merit in this argument, it may be somewhat far seeking as an immediate response to combat the pressing issue. Instead, a starting point would be to differentiate between the exercise of free speech and fraudulent attempts being made by corporations to mislead the public and its investors. For instance, scientists independently researching and questioning assumptions about climate change and discussing the results of their experiments, regardless of the nature of such results, should certainly be protected through their right to free speech. However, funding research on the pretext of biased outcome must be avoided at all costs – especially in the case of climate change, due to the urgency involved. This is because even though denial of scientific evidence is no new phenomenon, the reality of climate change is a ticking time-bomb that needs to be addressed for the benefit of future generations and the developing countries – that suffer from the unequal effects that climate change has on them.
Conclusion and the Way Forward
Climate change denial is certainly not the only denialism that exists, however, it needs to be addressed more acutely because it is not one of the many other socio-political problems. Instead, it has the potential of bringing harm to mankind at a scale that would be unlike any other in human history. The world has already witnessed some of its consequences including mass migration, starvation, drought and flooding. This makes the reality of human-induced climate change an important discussion that can trigger policy-making and positive action. Scientists have noted that the policy choices made in the next few years will have strong implications on life on the planet itself. Hence, building a global narrative around the need for policy-making to combat climate change is vital. For this narrative to take shape, misinformation regarding the realities of climate change must be combated.
Social media platforms like YouTube and Google have taken a positive step in creating awareness regarding such misinformation associated with climate-change denials by flagging videos propagating the denial with Wikipedia entries about global warming caused by human emissions. However, the same platforms have also been accused of generating revenue through ads that provide misinformation by denying climate change. This is a depiction of how ethical considerations take a back seat for commercial entities and their primary interest lies only in profit-making. In light of these realities, there is an urgent need for finding a balanced voice that meets consensus and can be used for combating climate change through advocacy and policymaking.
Shreya Tiwari
Author is an Indian qualified lawyer and a legal researcher for Columbia Global Freedom of Expression. She has pursued her LLM in Information Technology, Media and Communication Laws from The London School of Economics and Political Science.
In the past, she has collaborated with organisations such as Internet Freedom Foundation, India and Digital Freedom Fund, Berlin to research and advocate on issues of digital rights and free speech.
Comments