Why the World Is Watching Young Climate Activists Researchers Break Down Why the Movement and Its Message Are Gaining Ground

NEWS IN FOCUS SOCIETY Scientists join youth CLIMATE CHANGE Biggest-ever GENETICS First glimpse MEDICINE Japan’s policies on activists at global climate Arctic expedition sets of ancient Denisovans stem-cell treatments raise strikes p.472 sail p.473 drawn from DNA p.475 concerns p.482 JAMES VEYSEY/SHUTTERSTOCK JAMES

Millions of people participated in youth-led climate protests on 20 September.

SOCIETY Why the world is watching young climate activists Researchers break down why the movement and its message are gaining ground.

BY EMMA MARRIS Jamie Margolin founded the protest group on 20 September that was probably the largest Zero Hour in Seattle, Washington, in 2017, climate protest ever. rom Jakarta to New York City, children when she was just 15. Half a world away, Young people have been talking about and teenagers are walking out of class and 15-year-old Greta Thunberg started skipping climate change for decades. But the latest marching in the streets to demand action school in 2018 to strike for climate action out- generation of protesters is louder and more Fon climate change. And the world is taking side the Swedish parliament in Stockholm. coordinated than its predecessors, says Dana notice. Communications researchers say these The movement quickly went global. An esti- Fisher, a sociologist at the University of young climate activists are using their moral mated 1.6 million kids in 125 countries hit the Maryland in College Park who studies activ- authority as children, and their social-media streets for a protest in mid-March. That was ism. The movement’s visibility on social media savvy, to surf a rising tide of adult concern. dwarfed by a global youth-led demonstration and in the press has created a feedback

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loop. “Young people are getting so much message. “The older generation messed things generations as they were to protect themselves attention that it draws more young people into up,” she says. “We are doing the clean up.” (L. Everuss et al. J. Sociol. 53, 334–350; 2017). the movement,” she says. Adults are listening. Media around But adults don’t just see teens and young Thunberg, now 16, was inspired to start her the world covered Thunberg’s journey across adults as victims who need to be protected weekly climate strikes by students in Park- the Atlantic. And UN Secretary General from climate change. Thew’s research on land, Florida, who organized a national school António Guterres has endorsed the school the role of youth participants (those aged 16 walkout in 2018 to fight for stricter gun laws strikes, saying: “My generation has failed to to 24 years) at UN climate negotiations has after a mass shooting at their high school left respond properly to the dramatic challenge revealed that adults perceive these activists 17 people dead. Earlier this month she made of climate change. This is deeply felt by young as having greater moral integrity than others headlines worldwide when she sailed to New people. No wonder they are angry.” attending the talks — “because they are not York City in a solar-powered yacht to attend Connie Roser-Renouf, a climate- being paid to be there”, she says. the United Nations climate summit. “It feels communication researcher at George Mason like we are at a breaking point,” she said. University in Fairfax, Virginia, says that data SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER Thunberg and other young climate from a long-running survey of US adults con- Because young climate protesters don’t repre- campaigners aren’t conventional, tree-hugging ducted nearly every year since 2008 reveal an sent someone else’s agenda, their message is environmentalists, says Harriet Thew, an envi- audience that has grown more receptive to the strikingly direct and unvarnished. “They can ronmental social scientist at the University of strikers’ message. “The adult population has say a lot of things that older activists can’t say,” Leeds, UK. Many see tackling climate change been getting increasingly concerned, and that says Matthew Nisbet, who studies environ- as a matter of global justice — a framing that has been trending since 2015,” she says. mental communication at Northeastern Uni- Thew says is more effective than a purely Some of their concern is related to natural versity in Boston, Massachusetts. “They don’t environmental message. disasters thought to be exacerbated by climate have careers yet. They don’t have filters that “More and more, they are talking about change — such as the record-breaking forest adults might have.” the problems for people and really recogniz- fires in the western United States last year, and He points to videos online of teen climate ing that human–environment connection,” Hurricane Maria, which slammed into Puerto protesters confronting members of the US she says. Their message isn’t about saving the Rico in September 2017. Congress or otherwise taking adults to task. rainforest or saving whales; it is about saving But Roser-Renouf says that about one- “Maybe you are simply not mature enough to the most vulnerable people on Earth. quarter of the adults in the 2018 survey said tell it like it is,” Thunberg says to the French that the most important reason to act on cli- National Assembly in Paris, in a video with A MOVEMENT COMES OF AGE mate change was “to provide a better life for 3.7 million views on Facebook. “Even that Oladosu Adenike, a 25-year-old protester in our children and grandchildren”. burden you leave to us children.” Abuja, Nigeria, says that she can already see the Research has revealed a similar pattern in “They are being viewed millions of times effects of global warming. “Internally displaced other countries, says Christopher Shaw, a com- and then they end up being embedded in news peoples, farmer–herdsmen clashes, insecu- munications specialist at Climate Outreach in stories,” says Nisbet. “It is drama, it is novelty, it rity — all driven by climate change,” she says. Oxford, UK. “We find again and again that it is authenticity, and it is catastrophe.” “Also the increase in food price, floods sweep- is the impacts on children and grandchildren Still to be seen is whether the movement’s ing away farmers’ land, droughts affecting the that are of great concern,” he says. participants maintain their enthusiasm as they yield of crops, and excessive rainfall.” A 2016 survey of 1,860 people in the United grow older. The demands of finding employ- Then there is 22-year-old Vanessa Nakate, Kingdom found that 61% were willing to pay ment in a difficult global economy might who spends 66 hours a week selling solar bat- up to £20 (US$25) a month to prevent climate- leave less time for activism, Shaw says. Teens teries in her father’s shop in Kampala, Uganda. change related deaths in 2050, 2080 and 2115 have more support and time to protest. “Your She worries about the effects of climate change (H. Graham et al. Public Health 174, 110–117; dinner is still on the table at home,” he says. on the rain-fed agriculture that supports most 2019). And participants in a 2017 study con- But when the current youth leaders grow up, Ugandans. Although Nakate often protests ducted in Lisbon and in Adelaide, Australia, a new cohort of climate campaigners might be alone, social media connects her to activists were willing to spend just as much money to ready to rise. Some of today’s activists are as around the world and amplifies their common prevent negative climate impacts on future young as 11. ■

ACTIVISM Scientists join climate strikes Biggest-ever rally against global warming drew millions of protesters worldwide.

BY QUIRIN SCHIERMEIER, KATE ATKINSON, ago, took place as government and business important for him to grow up participating in EMILIANO RODRÍGUEZ MEGA, T. V. PADMA, EMMA leaders arrived in New York City for the United these events,” she says. As a population geneti- STOYE, JEFF TOLLEFSON & ALEXANDRA WITZE Nations Climate Summit this week. cist at the Botanical Garden of the National Nature spoke with striking scientists world- Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico cientists around the world joined the wide about their motives and expectations. City, Wegier is most worried about the “silent” millions of people who walked out of consequences of a warmer planet. These include workplaces on 20 September to urge MEXICO CITY a reduction in the genetic diversity of crops and Sstronger action on climate change. The event, Instead of carrying a sign, like most climate plants on which millions of people depend. inspired by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg strikers in Mexico City, Ana Wegier was hold- “What we’re losing is the opportunity to survive who began a ‘school strike for climate’ one year ing her three-year-old son. “I believe it’s super many of the changes to come,” she says.