This website has been developed by Don McArthur and draws on PhD research at Monash University on the role of cultural power in the Australian climate movement.
It reflects on aspects of the work of the climate movement and offers a perspective on questions such as:
• “how do images and narratives feature in the climate movement’s work?” and
• “How are stories and images important for achieving social movement goals?“
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Comments, critiques, suggestions and feedback are all very welcome.
You can reach me by using the contact form below.
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About the research that informed this website:
The PhD research that this site draws on involved interviewing participants in the Australian climate movement and studying the role of cultural power in movement strategies and how it contributes to achieving the movement’s goals.
The thesis argued that narrating climate change, picturing it and dramatising it are central to the ways in which we understand it. Yet taken together, these tasks lack a central place in
- prevailing approaches to political communication and
- formal strategic frameworks that the climate movement applies.
The focus was on how these forms of ‘cultural power’ figure in the work of the Australian climate movement and how they are important for achieving political change.
The thesis argued that cultural power is significant in three key ways:
- it shapes how climate change is understood and ‘imagined’
- it generates momentum and energy for the climate movement
and - it thus influences the ‘climate of opinion’ and the overall ‘political climate’, creating conditions that are often essential for achieving broader change.
Site icon source:
Antarctica – Neko Harbour (Rita Willaert)
