Tracking the State of Climate Disinformation in Canada: A New Research Study from the Centre for Media, Technology, and Democracy
In Fall 2023, the Centre for Media, Technology, and Democracy will publish its newest research study on the state of climate disinformation in Canada, including and especially its spread on online platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Using a survey of over 3000 Canadians, and quantitative data scraping from social media platforms, the report will address the consumption, distribution, and engagement about climate change on social media. Overt forms of climate denial on social media have evolved toward subtler narratives arguing for the “delay” of climate action and policy, making it harder to track. The study, led by Deputy Director, Sonja Solomun, aims to map the prevalence of established delay narratives in Canada and measure their influence.
This research will in part analyze whether paid advertisements by fossil fuel companies and industry groups, media channels, or influencers outnumber the volume and engagement of verified, pro-climate content online, and how climate denial, deceit, or delayism may be reinforced by the circulation of such content. It will likewise determine how Conservative and right-leaning media outlets continue to amplify climate obstruction by continuing to frame climate change as a political rather than environmental issue.
Consistent with the industry at large, Canadian oil and gas actors have shifted from climate denial to tactics of deceit and delay. While these corporations have always sought to shift responsibility for climate change, now industry coalitions like the Pathways Alliance promote the continued use of Canadian oil as a part of a “net zero” emissions strategy. This “pay-to-play” influence over public discourse becomes even more complex to address online because social media has given the public new ways to consume, distribute, and engage on climate change. The illusion of a digital public square can distract from the networked structure and volume of online discourse that ensures that sympathetic publics are flooded with industry narratives.
These networked efforts, characterized more broadly as climate obstruction, aim for inertia and inaction by framing extractive practices as “green,” appealing to free market logic and fiscal conservatism, and echoing the language of individual liberty. Obstructionism or delayism can manifest by attempting to shift the responsibility of climate action, arguing that the results of climate change are inevitable, demonstrating that climate action has negative effects, or generating solutions that lack transformative power.
As Canada works toward holding platforms to account for the systemic inequalities built into the design of their platforms, climate change obstruction remains a key yet underexplored area of concern.