Media and Communication (ISSN: 2183–2439) 2020, Volume 8, Issue 2, Pages 376–386 DOI: 10.17645/mac.v8i2.2862 Article Rezo and German Climate Change Policy: The Influence of Networked Expertise on YouTube and Beyond Joachim Allgaier Chair of Society and Technology, Human Technology Center, RWTH Aachen University, 52062 Aachen, Germany; E-Mail: [email protected] Submitted: 31 January 2020 | Accepted: 20 May 2020 | Published: 26 June 2020 Abstract Just before the European election in May 2019 a YouTube video titled The Destruction of the CDU (Rezo, 2019a) caused political controversy in Germany. The video by the popular German YouTuber Rezo attacked the conservative Government party CDU (Christlich Demokratische Union Deutschlands) mainly for climate inaction. As a reaction to the subsequent at- tacks on Rezo and his video from the political establishment an alliance of popular German YouTubers formed to release a second video. In this video, the YouTubers asked their followers not to vote for the Government or the far-right parties, because they would ignore the expertise of scientists and the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change and therefore be unable to provide sustainable solutions for the future. This debate started as a YouTube phenomenon but quickly evolved into a national public discussion that took place across various social media channels, blogs, newspapers, and TV news, but also e.g., in discussions in schools, churches, as well as arts and cultural events. The focus of this contribu- tion is on the formation of the heterogeneous coalition that emerged to defend and support the YouTubers. It prominently involved scientists and scientific expertise, but other forms of expertise and ‘worlds of relevance’ were also part of this coalition. The conceptual tools of ‘networked expertise’ and ‘ethno-epistemic assemblages’ are employed to explore ex- pertise and credibility as well as the associations and networks of actors involved which illuminate how a single YouTuber was able to contribute to the unleashing of a national debate on climate change policy. Keywords climate change; controversy; Germany, global warming; influencers; networks; science communication; YouTube Issue This article is part of the issue “Health and Science Controversies in the Digital World: News, Mis/Disinformation and Public Engagement,” edited by An Nguyen (Bournemouth University, UK) and Daniel Catalan (University Carlos III of Madrid, Spain). © 2020 by the author; licensee Cogitatio (Lisbon, Portugal). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribu- tion 4.0 International License (CC BY). 1. Introduction ferent ‘worlds of relevance’ meet. For Limoges, all par- ticipating groups are fully-fledged actors in this space Scientific and other forms of expertise are key resources thus expertise per se does not count more than the view in public health and science controversies. However, in of any of the other involved actors and in most cases, general, there are various forms of relevant expertise expertise is provided in plural and often contradictory. in public controversies. Often they oppose one another In media coverage of debates, journalists generally me- and the way in which credibility and trustworthiness are diate controversies and select the (expert) voices they assigned varies among the public. For a better under- think should be represented. This process, however, is standing of this matter, Limoges (1993) offers a proces- less straightforward for public science and health contro- sual understanding of expertise in controversy contexts. versies in the digital world as there are no gatekeepers Limoges describes controversies as ‘controversist spaces’ and a great variety of new actors and experts struggling in which various actors and experts with completely dif- to have their voices heard. Media and Communication, 2020, Volume 8, Issue 2, Pages 376–386 376 Limoges asserts that the actual issue during a contro- and connected in the unfolding debate. My account versy is the negotiation of the associations established is based on an online ethnographical approach follow- between the different ‘worlds of relevance’ mobilized by ing the Rezo video and the subsequent debate through different participants. Such associations are not defined various digital spaces (social media platforms such as a priori but emerge as outcomes of the interactions be- YouTube and Twitter, online news sites and blogs) from tween the participants. In other words, the representa- May 18, 2019, to January 31, 2020. In this process, key tion of expertise develops through the course of contro- documents of the debate were selected and archived for versies. How powerful and credible experts become in a further analysis and a chronological archive of YouTube controversy depends, in this view, on their ability to net- videos and comments, Tweets, blog entries, and news ar- work and form associations. ticles were created, which serve as the basis of my inter- In this view, the credibility of expertise needs to be pretative account. developed within a controversy context and it is there- fore not an individual but collective process. For Limoges, 2. YouTube and Science Communication the credibility of expertise stems from the strengths of the networks that actors are associated with in the con- YouTube is extremely popular in Germany. A represen- troversy. Expertise is, therefore, a collective learning pro- tative study (Rat für kulturelle Bildung, 2019) among cess which provides actors and experts with credibility if young citizens in Germany has found that 86% of youths they are successful in addressing the articulations of vari- between 12 and 19 years use YouTube and that 93% ous ‘worlds of relevance.’ In this sense, expertise is a pub- of youths between 18 and 19 years in Germany use lic process which creates the conditions of credibility of YouTube for entertainment, information, and education. expert performance (Limoges, 1993). 91% of young people questioned said that it is very This understanding of networked and collective important what their friends recommend watching on forms of expertise in controversy contexts was further YouTube. 65% of the young people questioned also fol- developed by Irwin and Michael (2003). They proposed low recommendations from YouTube influencers. Such the notion of ethno-epistemic assemblages as a heuris- influencers are particularly influential among the 12–15 tic tool with which heterogeneous groupings could be age group (Rat für kulturelle Bildung, 2019). analysed. ‘Epistemic’ here refers to the production of Another representative study on the use of online truth or truth claims; ‘ethno’ connotes the idea of lo- media among young people in Germany has found cality and situated-ness of knowledge; and the concept that the use of YouTube has further increased in re- of ‘assemblage’ is used to grasp the interweaving of lay- cent years (Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund people and experts (Irwin & Michael, 2003, pp. 119–120). Südwest, 2019). While in 2016, 42% of young people These assemblages are not static, they are dynamic and questioned said that they used YouTube daily or al- processual, and different actors with a variety of back- most daily in 2018, 60% of the respondents said that ground knowledge, expertise, and experience can join they used the site daily or at least several times a such groups. This concept is proposed for a better under- week. YouTube has become one of the most popular standing of the way in which controversy, debate, and Internet sites in Germany for all age groups. The study negotiation are played out in public. Instead of strug- also investigated information and knowledge seeking be- gles conducted between experts and (lay) publics, Irwin haviour online and found that YouTube is the second and Michael (2003) propose that struggles over truth most popular site for acquiring knowledge and informa- claims are conducted between assemblages made up of tion after Google. Also, more young people search for different combinations of experts and publics. The con- things they want to know via YouTube rather than the cept of ethno-epistemic assemblages, therefore, blurs online encyclopaedia Wikipedia (Medienpädagogischer the boundaries between experts and non-experts but Forschungsverbund Südwest, 2019). also between public, government and governance, as This is also the case when it comes to science, tech- well as between science and society. nology, and research—not just among young people. In this contribution, I offer a close reading of a pub- A German representative study on science and research lic controversy about climate change policy that was ini- in society (Wissenschaft im Dialog, 2015) found that tiated by, and mainly revolved around, a YouTube video more than two thirds (69%) of young people questioned released by the popular German YouTuber Rezo in May between 14 and 29 years said they use YouTube (and 2019 (Rezo, 2019a). This video mainly attacks the fail- other online video platforms) to get information about ing climate policy of the German government and has science and research. Among those between 30 and 39 received national and international attention. In this in- years, still more than half (55%) said the same and among terpretative account, I use the perspective of networked those between 40 and 49 years, it is almost half (46%) forms of expertise and ethno-epistemic assemblages as who are informed via YouTube. introduced by Limoges (1993)