Sensemaking and Media Logic of Filipino Environmental Activist Groups in Communicating Climate Science and Action

¹ Renz Kevin M. Alcazar and ² Santosh K. Digal

¹ Department of Communication, Cavite State University, Philippines
² Graduate School, Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Philippines

Climate change is a reality felt across all sectors of society and in many countries. The Philippines, a developing country, has been cited as one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change even though several reports point to developed countries as major contributors of historical greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. With the release of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), it was concluded that the global surface temperature will continue to increase and may exceed the 1.5-degree Celsius threshold. This makes climate change the most serious issue among other environmental problems and requires concerted effort from all levels of government, public and private sectors, and civil society. One of the crucial voices in the climate change discussions is the environmental activist groups. Multiple case studies of three mainstream and three grassroots environmental activist groups based in the National Capital Region (NCR) and provinces showed that they consult science and use media to communicate climate action in their online and on-the-ground campaigns. Their understanding of climate science allows them to perform their roles and functions and communicate effectively with other change agents such as the government, scientific community, industry, media, and ordinary citizens. They likewise use social media accounts to meet where their audiences mostly are and produce creative multimedia materials imbued with specific climate action messages. This study proves that environmental activist groups are critical sources of climate change-related messages. They demonstrate high value for research and social media as foundations for their communication strategies.

Keywords :   climate change, communication strategies, environmental problems, media logic, science communication