Climate policy cycle: why hasn't humanity's most serious problem become the nº 1 policy problem?

Abstract

The current climate changes constitute the most serious problem humanity has ever faced, which puts at risk the quality of life and the very survival of the species in the near future. The text addresses the climate issue from the methodological perspective of the public policy cycle, aiming to answer the following question: why has the most serious problem facing humanity not yet become the number one political problem? The facts - scientific findings, conferences, international agreements, legislation and (un)adopted measures - are relatively well known, but the political process, less so. The political process is chronicled from the scientific discoveries about the greenhouse effect in the 19th century, the awakening of society's and governments' attention in the 1980s, the United Nations debates and international agreements from the 1990s on, the policies implemented in different countries, the results of which are being measured and monitored by the IPCC and other institutions. In the different stages, the cycle of climate policies unfolds as a scene with multiple agents, who use varied resources, adopt divergent positions and decisions for economic and political reasons. Denialism, the obstructions created by the oil industry, neoliberal forces and the extreme right, and the absence of a sense of urgency in society are pointed out as factors that prevent the climate issue from being elevated to the condition of the number one political problem of humanity. The research technique is a semi-systematic literature review.