SDG Detail

EARTHSYS 243: Environmental Advocacy and Policy Communication

Postgraduate course

Project description

Although environmental science suggests that coordinated policy action is critically necessary to address a host of pressing issues - from global climate change to marine pollution to freshwater depletion - governments have been slow to act. This course focuses on the translation of environmental science to public discourse and public policy, with an emphasis on the causes of our current knowledge-to-action gap and policy-sphere strategies to address it. We will read classic works of environmental advocacy, map our political system and the public relations and lobbying industries that attempt to influence it, grapple with analytical perspectives on effective and ethical environmental policy communication, engage with working professionals in the field, learn effective strategies for written and oral communication with policymakers, and write and workshop op-eds.