The political feasibility of sufficiency: analyzing the nexus of food and climate governance
Around 14.5 percent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) are associated with animal products – a number comparable to total global transport emissions. However, the food sector has been largely overlooked in the global climate governance discourse.
Improvements in production efficiency alone would be insufficient to meet rising food demand without increasing the total environmental burden of the food system. A transition to ‘sufficient diets’ that have less impact on the environment and human health is a necessary prerequisite for production efficiency to keep pace with growth in human food demand.
As part of my cumulative PhD thesis, I conduct several research projects to determine to what extent citizens and stakeholders accept policy measures to reduce the production and consumption of animal-products. Sufficiency-oriented measures, i.e. measures that aim at reducing the absolute consumption of unsustainable products, are a politically risky strategy.
The debate around the veggie-day shows that politicians face high political risks if they seek to infer with food consumption and perceived personal freedoms. In essence, voters and stakeholders perceive these policies as utility decreasing. Therefore, many politicians refrain from enacting stringent policies, like tax increases, to reduce the consumption of unsustainable products.
Yet, are political risks of introducing sufficiency-oriented policies indeed as high as decision-makers perceive them to be? Which factors influence citizens’ and stakeholders’ acceptance of these policies?
Theoretically, I want to contribute to the political psychology, public choice and political economy literature. In my four research projects, I concentrate on the acceptance of adopting and implementing measures to reduce the consumption of meat products.
The first project focuses on public attitudes towards different types and bundles of policy instruments that aim at reducing the consumption and production of animal products. Building on modern public choice and political psychology theory, I model public support for sufficiency-oriented policy proposals as a function of policy design and framing. I conduct representative framing and conjoint survey experiments with a total of ca. 20.000 respondents in three countries, China, Germany and the United States.
The second project builds on the first project and focuses on stakeholder attitudes towards different types and bundles of policy instruments that aim at reducing the consumption and production of animal products. Comparing the results to the findings of the first project enables me to discuss politically feasible transition pathways that reconcile the interests of different stakeholder groups and citizens.
The third project, analyzes the relationship between populist rhetoric and citizens’ attitudes towards climate-food policies. I use a representative survey to conduct framing experiments in the United States in order to scrutinize this relationship.