What is Public Engagement?
What do we mean when we talk about public engagement?
Public engagement is how leaders involve people in tackling big challenges that affect everyone. Things like conflicts, health crises and the climate crisis affect and involve everyone.
There are two really important principles:
- Great climate communication and storytelling. Everyone should be included in the climate story. We all need to hear climate stories that speak positively to us about the future and the things we care about, and where taking action feels normal and useful.
- Meaningful involvement. People should get a say in how policy is designed and implemented. This leads to better and fairer policy, and active public consent. There are a range of ways to do this, from face-to-face consultation, conversations in the workplace, citizens assemblies and more.
Why is public engagement so important?
We believe public engagement is essential to a thriving democracy. To unlock action and progress, governments need to put people at the heart of everything they do.
Until now most governments haven’t prioritised communication around climate change. People are crying out for trusted information. They want to have informed conversations and they want more opportunities to get involved. That’s what public engagement is all about.
What we want to see now
Public engagement ranges from mass advertising campaigns to 1:1 conversations. Councils, companies, sports clubs and more can all play a huge role in engaging people they speak with about climate change.
Governments have the most important role of all. In the UK, we want to see a national, resourced public engagement strategy on climate change.
All governments who have signed up to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change have committed to engaging their citizens on climate change. This covers
- climate change education
- public awareness
- training
- public participation, including in decision-making
- public access to information
- international cooperation on these issues