Fighting for Our Future: Bridging Perception and Reality to keep Stakeholders Accountable

18 min readApr 29, 2019

On the 15th March 2019, students from more than 100 nations, 1,700 towns and cities had rallied together to go on a school strike in a bid to compel the authorities to take more drastic climate action. All it took for the global youth movement to be kick-started was the brave actions of Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg.

*Protesters at the United Nations University in Tokyo. Photograph: Damon Coulter/Barcroft Images*

There was no straw to break the camel’s back. Instead, it was arguably a culmination of frustration with respect to the glacial pace of climate action and decades of failure by policymakers to take bold action on climate change. Today, most international agreements and national policies are either non-existent, unbinding, or merely conciliatory. Herethen, the united voice of our youths cannot be denied: we care for climate change and we desire accountability, commitment, and further action from policy and corporate stakeholders.

Some of the 30,000 protesters in Sydney. Photograph: Saeed Khan/AFP/Getty Images

Singapore’s Climate Strike — A Digital Demonstration

In Singapore, we have strict regulations on public protests under the Public Order Act. Hence, due to our unique governance context where civic culture is based on consensus and not conflict, the climate strike took a slightly different form. It was a digital demonstration.

The desired intentions of the demonstration remains the same and stands together with the rest of the student protests. In the words of one of the students who led the charge, under the banner of Fridays for Future SG, Ms Pamela Low said, “With climate change undermining our future, knowing that better climate policy can arrest the trend has empowered us to make our voices heard.”

If you would like to know more about the makings of the digital campaign, head onto Seastainable (https://www.seastainable.co/blogs/seastainable-blog/lessons-from-singapore-s-first-climate-change-strike-was-it-really-a-strike-though) .

The author had received inputs and insights from the organisers Pamela and Qiyun regarding the conceptualisation of Singapore’s version of the Climate Strike and the creation of the entire digital toolkit for interested participants.

Here’s a short background on the digital demonstration and some pictures of how the collaterals looked like :) The diversity of graphics allowed the individual to pick the one they found that most resonated with them. Youths would then share the post on Instagram as stories or posts to voice their thoughts on why we need climate action and climate policy. The timing of this digital demonstration was matched with the Climate Strike happening world wide from 12 to 1pm.

It was a resounding success with celebrities like Paul Foster, Prettipls and Denise Keller jumping on the bandwagon to show their support for environmental stewardship as well. If people were concerned about the apathy of our generation, Singapore’s own little twist on the Climate Strike showed that youths cared.

So, what exactly do youths care about?

Alongside the stories and posts on social media, 260 youths also participated in a short survey crafted by the organisers @tingkat @weirdandwild. Perhaps unsurprisingly, while some recommendations were suggested by the youths who participated in the survey, most of their responses (a whopping 89% of the respondents!) centred on their perceptions on why they cared about climate change and climate action.

In the next section, I will analyse the survey responses and review the common perceptions among youths in the Climate Strike poll in light of our national and global context.

Understanding the Context of Opinions (and bridging Perception & Reality in the process!)

You may ask, what is my reason for contextualising Singaporean youths’ perceptions about climate change and action?

Well, I was inspired by a book that I had read in a class written by renowned data scientist Hans Rosling and his son and daughter-in-law called “Factfulness: 10 Reasons Why We Are Wrong About the World — And Why Things are Better Than You Think.” In this paradigm-changing book, Rosling had elaborated extensively on our dramatic instincts and over dramatic worldview which erodes a fact-based worldview.

It is easy for stakeholders in power to dismiss perceptions. In our data-driven world, it seems like a no-brainer to prioritise fact over opinion, and especially so when these opinions seem dramatic. In the little red dot I live in, our pragmatic government carries a similar sentiment and is known for easily dismissing what they perceive as opinions. But, is perception and fact really mutually exclusive?

In my own opinion, and perhaps respectfully diverging from Rosling, I do believe some drama, some emotion, some value judgement added to to our worldview is a good thing. This is especially so for such a long stagnant and un-moving issue such as climate change which suffers from the incredible tragedy of the commons (with global implications).

Consequently, the relatively little action in both immediacy and scale in spite of the vast amounts of data available on the warming of the planet, many other significant correlations with other environmental effects, and the global scientific consensus (97% of the scientific community) on the reality of climate change reveals one thing: fact has not led to action.

Drama, emotion, value judgements… These seemingly irrational perceptions that colour our worldview are here because we care enough about the world. Without fact, perception is unmoored and potentially dangerous. Without perception, fact is without hope or drive for change. But the intersections between perception and reality? That’s where the magic is.

**Opinions may seem trivial. But it is important to remember that opinions come from somewhere. And, it is this search of ‘somewhere’ that I am interested in.**

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I have detailed the Top 10 most common perceptions that youths have regarding the need for climate action in the below figure:

Notably, the top 3 perceptions is very much aligned the sentiments of the Global Climate Strike. As noted by Mr. Daniel Driscoll, a PHD Sociology candidate analysing climate change social movements at the University of California, “Simply put, many young people feel they are inheriting a damaged world and time is running out.”

The sentiment that stood out to me the most was “There is a need to hold relevant stakeholders accountable.”

As a Global Studies student, the question of accountability is of the most interest to me.

The Intractable Problem of Accountability for a Global Issue like Climate Change

Political science researchers have discussed at lengths how Climate Change is a complex issue in which securing a solution is difficult. As a problem of the global commons, domestic solutions are increasingly seen to be inadequate to tackle it, and yet our existing global institutions appear to have limited capacity in tackling key questions of global governance.

This limited capacity for global institutions to hold stakeholders accountable has been attributed to the following factors:

Varying interest of key countries. Some countries may actually benefit from the problem, and there seems to be little to gain from cooperation. For example, United States of America did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol as it is deemed reducing its emissions as contrary to its economic goals.
Free-rider Problem. While national level policies are enforceable, international level mandates like emission reduction are not enforceable
Efficacy vs Legitimacy. It has generally been agreed that global governance is stuck in a catch-22 situation.The more consensual a decision-making procedure, the more legitimate the outcomes, and yet the less likely we reach an agreement.Worse still, achieving consensus (75% of resolutions) has been criticised as a mark of failure due to the ‘need’ for weak or ambiguous wording and lack of enforcement mechanisms to achieve this consensus and widespread support among countries in the first place.

Hence, a seeming paradox remains, states appear to be increasingly helpless against global issues, and yet only domestic governments have the capacity to implement and enforce global solutions.

With such a conclusion that suggests a sense of paralysing powerlessness, getting stakeholders to be accountable seems like a fruitless endeavour (?)

At this juncture, I recall Rosling’s Urgency Instinct. To him, insisting on relevant and accurate data is important as it helps us take the necessary small steps to combat the desire for urgent, and dramatic but less effective solutions.

Perhaps, we can regain some control and semblance of agency by analysing what things can be done on a national level and/or smaller scale.

The Climate Action Tracker & Fair Share As Measurement of Accountability

In my efforts to understand Climate Action using relevant and accurate data, I chanced upon this wonder tool — the Climate Action Tracker (CAT), an independent scientific analysis that quantifies and evaluates climate change mitigation commitments. CAT tracks 32 countries and covers around 80% of global emissions and approx. Helpfully, it aggregates national action to the global level, thereby enabling us to see just how measured our sense of urgency needs to be, and allows us to manage the fear that comes with Climate Change by narrowing our scale of enforcement through the tracker’s comparison of national performance to a globally standardised metric.

The national actions CAT tracks are:

Effect of current policies on emissions: The policies a government has implemented or enacted and how these are likely to affect national emission over the time period to 2030, and where possible beyond.
Impact of pledges, targets and (I)NDCs on national emissions over the time period to 2030, and where possible beyond.
Fair share and comparability of effort: Whether a government is doing its “fair share” compared with others towards the global effort to limit warming consistent with the Paris Agreement.

Notably, CAT’s definition of fair share operationalised accountability in ways that reminded me of another of Rosling’s factfulness principles to control the Size Instinct, our tendency to get distracted by lonely numbers, through looking at things in proportion. Crucially he names two ways to do so: (1) comparison, and (2) division as rates are typically more meaningful when comparing between different-sized groups.

What is “Fair Share” in light of Climate Action?

Although there are no agreed guidelines to what would constitute a fair level of contribution to the global effort, beyond the general understanding of it to reflect the “highest possible ambition” and “common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances” (Paris Agreement, Article 4.3), governments are expected to provide some rationale for their proposed efforts.

As CAT’s methodology rightly points out the difficulty in coming up with a framework on the definition of fair share, “Assessing what is fair depends on the viewpoint and interests of governments.”

Notably the range of perspectives that governments tend to take regarding considerations of what could be fair tend to revolve around these three factors: historical responsibility, capability, and equality. This is very much aligned with a supporting sentiment found in the TOP 10 Perceptions, where some have opined that those who have more resources have the normative obligation to contribute more. Below is a more detailed breakdown of these factors that constitute the composite indicator of ‘fair share’.

Categories of effort sharing approaches (Höhne, den Elzen, & Escalante, 2014). Note: cost effectiveness is a concept included in the capability/costs category, but isn’t a stand alone category. Source: CAT

Each category puts an emphasis on one particular aspect of effort-sharing and can therefore result in (very) different outcomes from the other categories:

Responsibility: emissions reductions below a reference are determined by the level of a country’s historical emissions. This was first proposed by Brazil in the Kyoto Protocol negotiations (UNFCCC, 1997)
Capability/Need: emissions reductions below a reference are determined by a country’s level of economic capability, often measured by GDP/capita or the Human Development Index.
Equality: emissions per capita converge to, or immediately reach, the same level for all countries, e.g. (Chakravarty et al., 2009; GCI, 2005)
Equal cumulative per capita emissions: emissions need to be reduced so that cumulative emissions per capita reach the same level, e.g. (Pan, Teng, & Wang, 2013; WBGU, 2009)
Responsibility/capability/need: a range of studies have explicitly used responsibility and capability as the basis for distributing emissions reductions e.g. (Paul Baer, Athanasiou, Kartha, & Kemp-Benedict, 2009; Winkler, Jayaraman, et al., 2011)
Capability/cost: a range of studies use equal costs or welfare loss per GDP as a basis. This is essentially a combination of mitigation potential and capability.
Staged: a suite of studies have proposed or have analysed approaches where countries take differentiated commitments in various stages. Categorisation to a stage and the respective commitments are determined by indicators using many equity principles, e.g.(Michel G J den Elzen & Meinshausen, 2005; Höhne, Gardiner, Gilbert, Hagemann, & Moltmann, 2008).

CAT has then divided the Fair Share range into three sections:

Insufficient,
2°C compatible
1.5°C Paris Agreement compatible (orange, yellow and light green bars in Figures 1 and 2).

Each section corresponds to the temperature outcomes that would result if all other governments were to put forward emissions reduction commitments with the same relative ambition level.An “insufficient” rating therefore means that although the commitment could be considered fair by some approaches, it is not sufficient to hold warming below 2°C, much less 1.5°C, unless others do substantially more.

More notes on CAT’s methodology can be found here: https://climateactiontracker.org/methodology/comparability-of-effort/

So how then is Singapore doing on the Climate Action Tracker?

Singapore’s efforts can be seen to be deemed highly inadequate with our commitments falling far outside the fair share range and inconsistent with the Paris Agreement commitment to hold global warming below 2 degrees celsius.

If other international countries targets followed Singapore’s actions, global warming would reach between 3 degrees Celsius and 4 degrees celsius.

Our main focus for climate mitigation has been on energy efficiency programmes like Green Mark standards for buildings, green procurement, public transport, fuel efficiency standards, home appliance efficiency standards, industrial energy efficiency, and waste management.. Needless to say, there been little regulation on energy demand from the industry and building sectors.

Source: National Climate Change Secretariat

Singapore’s emissions intensity decreased by 37 per cent from 2000 to 2014, while energy intensity decreased by 33 per cent. Much of this decrease is a result of the key policy initiative implemented during this period — a switch in fuel mix from fuel oil to natural gas which is a cleaner fuel source. Singapore has met most of its GHG emissions reduction through this switch with 95% of our electricity generated from natural gas. However, it is worth noting that even if we have switched our dependence to the cleanest form of fossil fuel, we are still having a prolonged dependence on fossil fuel for energy. Furthermore industry demand would still likely continue to increase and result in rising emissions.

Not only that, Singapore’s Nationally Determined Contribution emissions target (a 36% reduction of emissions intensity below 2005 levels by 2030) is a weak one relative to its currently implemented policies. Even without additional action taken, Singapore would over achieve its arguably conservative target and reach a reduction of 46% below 2005 levels by 2030, with absolute emissions still continuing to rise.

The Singaporean government had also designated 2018 as its Climate Action year following a series of climate-related policy changes in 2017, such as the carbon tax announcement, and enhancements to the Energy Conservation Act. However, the approach has been less than ideal, with mixed signals such as a new coal gasification plant being given the go ahead.

The incoming carbon price tax may be a good sign of the government’s direction. However, the low starting level of the tax, 5 SGD/tCO2e from 2019 to 2023, is unlikely to generate the right incentives for a large-scale switch to a carbon-free power sector that would truly set emissions reductions on a trajectory compatible with the Paris Agreement in the medium term.

Which stakeholder was perceived to have the most impact by Singaporean youths?

Out of all the responses which mentioned a stakeholder who they discerned to have the most impact, the majority wrote about corporations, followed by governments, and then individuals. (c.f. Fig. 1) This framework was perhaps also prompted by the social media campaign which had templates on business and policy action.

The Focus on Corporations and Government is A Win

Interestingly, the SG Climate Strike has yielded vastly different results from the NCCS Public Perception Survey in 2011 on Climate Change in Singapore. The survey results had shown that 56.3% of 1,010 Singaporeans aged 15 and above think that individuals are mainly responsible for taking action on climate change, followed by government (26.3%) and businesses (10.6%) This perhaps suggests that awareness about what individuals can do for climate change has shifted amongst Singaporean youths, with a greater desire to encourage government and businesses to take action and create larger impact.

This shift in perception is also aligned with global findings. According to a a 2017 “Carbon Majors” report by the Climate Accountability Institute.just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global industrial emissions since 1988. Incredibly, a mere 25 corporations and state-owned entities were responsible for more than half of global industrial emissions in that same period.

It is important to remember that rather than to depend on appeals to individual virtue and responsibility, we should be giving greater pressures on stakeholders like corporations and governments as well. Climate-conscious governments have the power to enact legislation which could regulate corporate actors to remain within sustainable emission limits and adhere to environmental protection standards.

In Singapore, it was found by a KPMG Poll that survey that 75 per cent of the top 100 companies in Singapore have yet to address the financial risks stemming from climate change in their annual financial reports. In addition, only 17 per cent of local firms have set carbon reduction targets, faring lower than the global rate of 50 per cent. This trails behind: Taiwan (88 companies), France (76 companies), South Africa (61 companies), the United States (53 companies) and Canada (52 companies). This indicates that more opportunities can be uncovered with regards to integrating Singaporean firms’ overall corporate strategy with climate action efforts. Furthermore, while Singapore financial services group DBS has announced that it would stop funding new coal power after 2021, DBS is still funding a 2,000 MW coal-fired power station in Java that is pollutive and financially risky. The government too has the responsibility of establishing a legal framework with ambitious objectives and set rules, while at the same time providing investors with confidence and stability.

But Perhaps the Bigger Win is Systemic Change?

As Richard Heede puts it,

But we all need to participate. We can’t just screw in an energy-efficient lightbulb and say, “That’s all I’m doing.” We need to make the right voting choices. The household sector and personal consumption are big components, globally, but it won’t solve the problem to the degree that we need. We need leadership that puts a price on carbon. We need leadership that supports sane energy policies.
I think it’s better to be hopeful and optimistic about our future than pessimistic and gloomy about it. We have the most innovative, intelligent, compassionate humans on this planet that we all share. If we exercise intelligence and compassion, we will collectively help solve this problem — or at least avoid the worst of what climate change has to offer.

Systemic change involves not just the government, not just the corporation, and not just the individual but all of working together. The easy thing to do is play the blame game. The harder, but more necessary thing is to keep pushing for learning and for more solutions with regards to climate action. Recalling Rosling’s Blame Instinct, he had suggested looking for causes and not villains, and looking for systems, not heroes. To him, the blame instinct impels us to attribute more power and influence to individuals that they deserve, for bad or for good. The instinct to find a guilty party then obstructs our learning because once we have decided who to punish, we do not continue looking for solutions or explanations elsewhere.

While I do believe that there is a data-driven need for accountability and ‘fair share’ as my above essay has demonstrated, I also believe that it is important to not just stop at holding stakeholders culpable.

The road to system change is a long one, but we are moving forward with each policy change and each awareness-driven campaign.

If there is anything to give us hope, perhaps one day, these policy tweaks may lead to a fundamental reworking of the capitalist system, which is a potentially more daunting prospect, and with much fewer defined roads to get there, but likely the largest change in system that has the most impact on climate change.

Well, a girl can hope.

Conclusion

In the words of Pamela Low, “We are hopeful and committed about change. We still see hope, that’s why we are fighting for it.”

If anything, the demonstrations, digital or offline, has shown that the torch of indignation that has framed and fuelled one teenager’s activism has lit a fire of impatience that carries the weight of change globally.

Youths opine because we care, we care because we value this Earth, and we fight because we hope that change for climate change is possible.

In the previous article of this series, my collaborator @rongyiang reviewed the popular recommendations of Singaporean youths in the Climate Strike survey regarding what form climate action should be taken in Singapore, and focused her discussion on the debates on plastic consumption. You can read her article haree: https://medium.com/@rongyiang/let-the-youths-of-the-world-strike-you-with-their-voices-8895fd34e8f4 to find out more.

Reflection about Process;

Also, major props to my partner for coding the qualitative survey results together. We went through at least 2–3 iterations of the codebook till we were satisfied with the compactness of our labelling. To me, this assignment was not just valuable in the research insights it generated, but that it is also an issue of current relevance. Furthermore, the fact that our data visualisations has real world impact (we handed them over to the team in charge of the campaign so they can write their report) reminds me of why we need data in the first place. To make values and perception compelling. It has been a real joy to be a tiny part of the environmental activism movement in Singapore and we wouldn’t have gotten this opportunity without this class. :)

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Here, I have summarised the three of Rosling’s perspectives about factfulness identified in this essay:

The Size Instinct. Rosling suggests getting things in proportion by (1) comparison, and (2) divide — rates are typically more meaningful especially when comparing between different-sized groups. “Factfulness is recognising when a lonely number seems impressive and remembering that you could get the opposite impression if it were compared with or divided by some other relevant number.”
The Blame Instinct. Rosling suggest looking for causes and not villains, and looking for systems, not heroes. He suggests that the blame instinct impels to attribute more power and influence to individuals that they deserve, for bad or for good. To him, the instinct to find a guilty party obstructs our learning because once we have decided who to punish, we do not continue looking for solutions or explanations elsewhere.
The Urgency Instinct. Rosling suggests insisting on relevant and accurate data and taking small steps when we recognise that a decision feels urgent so as not to rush into dramatic but less effective solutions.

Relevant Story from Factfulness

It is not necessary to look only at the worst-case scenario to see that climate change poses an enormous threat. The planet’s common resources, like the atmosphere, can only be governed by a globally respected authority, in a peaceful world abiding by global standards.
This can be done: we did it already with ozone depleters and with lead in gasoline, both of which the world community reduced to almost zero in two decades. It requires a strong, well-functioning international community (to be clear, I am talking about the UN). And it requires some sense of global solidarity toward the needs of different people on different income levels. The global community cannot claim such solidarity if it talks about denying the 1 billion people on Level 1 access to electricity, which would add almost nothing to overall emissions. The richest countries emit by far the most CO2 and must start improving first before wasting time pressuring others.