Bursting bubbles & building bridges: Tracking the global climate change conversation
- 1. Bursting bubbles & building bridges: Tracking the global climate change conversation Alberto Abellán Gavela, Gabriele Colombo, Sarah Oates, Francesca Arcostanzo, Maya Livio, Jonas Kaiser, Paolo Gerbaudo, Soenke Lorenzen, Tobias Buerger, Frederik de Grove, Saskia Kok Digital Methods WINTER SCHOOL 2015 12 - 16 JANUARY 2015
- 2. Introduction • COP20 took place in Lima in December 2014 • People’s Climate March took place on 21 September 2014
- 3. Research questions • Have the meta-narratives disseminated by climate action network stakeholders, particularly those about the fossil fuel phase-out, gained traction in the overall discourse surrounding two major climate-related events: the Lima COP20 and People’s Climate March. • Which meta-narratives have resonated, and with which actors? Are those actors from within the ‘bubble’ of committed environmental organizations, or has the key meta- narratives moved beyond the bubble? • If so, who are the key bridge actors responsible from moving the meta-narratives from inside to outside the bubble?
- 4. Method • Cross-platform: Twitter and Facebook • Twitter: COP20 data + People’s Climate March • Facebook: dataset Filtered by @LimaCop20 OR COP20 OR Peru • Timeframe for both platforms: 23 November 2014 – 19 December 2014
- 5. Method: Twitter 1. We utilised two datasets cop20 and globalwarming. 2. The globalwarming dataset was filtered for #peoplesclimate 3. We performed co-hashtag analysis on both datasets to identify shared and dominant discourses 4. We searched for the most engaged actors in the conversation and manually categorised according to their type (CSO/GOV/COM/etc.) 5. We used Tcat, Gephi and Excel, and Illustrator to analyse and visualise our findings 6. We drank white wine... a lot
- 6. Findings: Twitter 1. Substantive difference between two events (political narrative vs. civic society) 2. There is a lack of science in both datasets 3. There is a relatively large amount of users engaging in both events (10.000 overlap) 4. Narrative takes place in the ‘bubble’
- 7. • Discourse is dominated by a “bot” that retweets informa6on on climate change • @Theearthnetwork also retweets informa6on which is curated by @johnlundin • However, number is not a valid indicator for “impact”…
- 8. • @peoples_climate is the account men6oned most oCen • (Non)-‐governmental organisa6ons such as @amnesty, @350, @sierraclub, and @greenpeace are prominent in the discourse • Also journalis6c source such as @thena6on and @mashable are influental
- 13. Using “globalwarming” data Filtered by #peoplesclimate
- 16. Method: Facebook 1. Derive most-engaged-with posts of dataset (20.000 posts) 2. Perform qualitative content analysis on posts: which themes emerge. Use word count/cloud to generate list of words. 3. From content analysis/list of words, create themes or labels. 4. Associate words with these themes. 5. Search all Facebook posts relating to COP20 over set time period to create graphic representation of how users engage with these themes. 6. Identify the most relevant actors.
- 17. Findings: Facebook 1. Top engagement generated by celebs – Emma Watson 2. The most engaged with content and topics of interest were labeled as ‘action, ‘venue’, ‘global community’ 3. More meaningful messages appear to get ‘lost’ in Facebook 4. Need to establish ‘islands’ of engagement. Bring people to the bubble
- 18. Theme label key words to use for search in FB content Celebrity Watson, Kardashian, Beyonce, Bieber, Cyrus, Swift, Jolie, Diego Muñoz, Wilfred Dass, Jason Day Politicians Barack Obama, Ki-moon, Morales, Humala, John Kerry, Gore Venue Peru, London, Paris Indigenous indigenous, indians Weather tornado, hurricane, typhoon, temperature, rubyph, droughts, storms, floods Economics trade-offs, cost, economy, jobs Action strike, demonstrate, protest, arrest, watch, defenders, action, savetheartic, climatejustice, nownottomorrow, idlenomore, rubyph, “climate action”, justice, hunger, Amazon COP20 events speech, meeting, announcement Anti lies Greenpeace Greenpeace Global Community NGO, United Nations, WWF Renewables renewables Nazca Nazca
- 19. n° of posts per LABEL and keyword ACTION (11629) action (4277) watch (2310) protest (1372) arrest (954) climate action (950) justice (668) Amazon (534) demonstrate (154) strike (101) climatejustice (93) hunger (64) idlenomore (58) defenders (50) nownottomorrow (44) savetheartic (0) VENUE (7322) Peru (4178) Paris (2868) London (276) GLOBAL COMMUNITY (3376) United Nations (1598) NGO (936) WWF (842) Economics (2518) cost (1753) economy (543) jobs (219) trade-offs (3) COP20 EVENTS (2045) meeting (1696) speech (225) announcement (124) WEATHER (1596) temperature (694) typhoon (211) storms (160) droughts (135) floods (107) hurricane (93) rubyph (68) rubyph (68) tornado (60) GREENPEACE (1557) Greenpeace (1557) POLITICIANS (1550) Obama (583) Ki-moon (341) Gore (183) Morales (164) Humala (150) Kerry (129) INDIGENOUS (1285) indigenous (1253) indians (32) NAZCA (109) Nazca (109) ANTI (600) lies (600) CELEBRITY (557) Diego (455) Swift (64) Watson (28) Bieber (5) Cyrus (4) Beyonce (1) Kardashian (0) Jolie (0) Muñoz (0) Wilfred Dass (0) Jason Day (0) RENEWABLES (126) renewables (126)
- 20. ACTION ANTI COP20 EVENTS ECONOMICS GLOBAL COMMUNITY GREENPEACE INDIGENOUS NAZCA PERSONALITIES POLITICIANS RENEWABLE VENUE WEATHER 23/11 24/11 25/11 26/11 27/11 28/11 29/11 30/11 01/12 02/12 03/12 04/12 05/12 06/12 07/12 08/12 09/12 10/12 11/12 12/12 13/12 14/12 15/12 16/12 17/12 18/12 19/12 overall engagement engagement of posts with keywords
- 21. 23-11-14 24-11-14 25-11-14 26-11-14 27-11-14 28-11-14 29-11-14 30-11-14 01-12-14 02-12-14 03-12-14 04-12-14 05-12-14 06-12-14 07-12-14 08-12-14 09-12-14 10-12-14 11-12-14 12-12-14 13-12-14 14-12-14 15-12-14 16-12-14 17-12-14 18-12-14 19-12-14 19-12-14 Diario La Republica wattsupwiththat Diario La Republica SuperProfs.com for CA, CS e CMA COP20 Lima Moms Clean Air Force Front Line Action on Coal Bosch Global 1 Million Women Campaign Greenpeace Australia PacificCOP20 LimaDiario El Comercio (Peru) Diario La Republica Friends of the Earth U.S.Amazon Watch Friends of Science Greenpeace New Zealand Diario La Republica Diario La Republica Diario La RepublicaCAspot.com Greenpeace UK TuTeve Greenpeace Italia Diario La Republica Diario El Comercio (Peru) TuTeve Diario La Republica Indigenous Environmental Network Diario La Republica AFD Bosch Global GreenpeaceUSA Amazon Watch CNNGreenpeace UK TuTeve Friends of the Earth International UNESCO en espanol Diario La Republica Greenpeace USA Diario La Republica Bosch Global TuTeve Diario La Republica Elizabeth May Diario El Comercio (Peru) Democracy Now Diario El Comercio (Peru) Democracy Now Avaaz Diario El Comercio (Peru) Avaaz 350.org rfi Diario La Republica Christine Milne Pia Olsen DyhrTuTeve l'Humanite Marina SilvaDemocracy NowIPS Agencia de Noticias Greenpeace USAMarina SilvaDiario La Republica Marina SilvaCAspot.comKlimaschutz-Netz CAspot.com CAspot.com Chemtrails Project UK The White HouseBold Nebraska Gurukul Les Editions Ariane U.S. Department of the InteriorCAspot.com Diario El Comercio (Peru)Diario La Republica Greenpeace Philippines engagementdate 1,000 2,000 3,000 4,000 5,000 6,000 7,000 Top 3 actors per day
- 23. Ref: h'p://thepoli.csofsystems.net/2012/10/the-‐new-‐york-‐.mes-‐vs-‐the-‐wall-‐street-‐journal-‐on-‐facebook/ User Post_Page: COP20 Lima Post_Page: People's Climate March
- 24. Ref: h'p://thepoli.csofsystems.net/2012/10/the-‐new-‐york-‐.mes-‐vs-‐the-‐wall-‐street-‐journal-‐on-‐facebook/ User Post_Page: COP20 Lima Post_Page: People's Climate March ß 68 à users
- 25. Conclusions: most significant findings • Climate change narrative is ‘bubbled’ – on Facebook as well as Twitter.. • Celebs and media capitalize most of the engagement.. • Consider platform specific properties – engagement with users as opposed to imposing a specific narrative..