Wildfire Exposure Increases Pro-Environment Voting within Democratic but Not Republican Areas

One political barrier to climate reforms is the temporal mismatch between short-term policy costs and long-term policy benefits. Will public support for climate reforms increase as climate-related disasters make the short-term costs of inaction more salient? Leveraging variation in the timing of Cal...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The American political science review 2020-11, Vol.114 (4), p.1359-1365
Main Authors: HAZLETT, CHAD, MILDENBERGER, MATTO
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Attitudes
Beliefs
Censuses
Climate
Climate change
Climate policy
Elections
Environmental policy
Feedback (Response)
Initiatives
Landsat satellites
Political behavior
Political science
Politics
Referendums
Voter behavior
Voters
Voting
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Summary:One political barrier to climate reforms is the temporal mismatch between short-term policy costs and long-term policy benefits. Will public support for climate reforms increase as climate-related disasters make the short-term costs of inaction more salient? Leveraging variation in the timing of Californian wildfires, we evaluate how exposure to a climate-related hazard influences political behavior rather than self-reported attitudes or behavioral intentions. We show that wildfires increased support for costly, climate-related ballot measures by 5 to 6 percentage points for those living within 5 kilometers of a recent wildfire, decaying to near zero beyond a distance of 15 kilometers. This effect is concentrated in Democratic-voting areas, and it is nearly zero in Republican-dominated areas. We conclude that experienced climate threats can enhance willingness-to-act but largely in places where voters are known to believe in climate change.
ISSN:0003-0554
1537-5943
DOI:10.1017/S0003055420000441