Peoples' Climate Vote team recognized in the O2RB Excellence in Impact Awards 2021
Dr Stephen Fisher and team highly commended for increasing public and government awareness of public concern about the climate emergency
Congratulations to Dr Stephen Fisher, Mr Dan Snow, Ms Martha Kirby and Dr Zack Grant, who have been highly commended in The O²RB Excellence in Impact Awards for influencing public and government awareness of climate change attitudes through global media engagement.
Dr Fisher’s team undertook the world’s largest survey of public opinion on climate change in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme. The ‘Peoples' Climate Vote’ questioned over half a million people under the age of 18 in over 50 countries, some of which had never before conducted large-scale polling of public opinion on the topic of climate change. Sixty-four percent of people surveyed believe climate change is a global emergency, despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Results show that people often want broad climate policies beyond the current measures.
The People's Climate Vote attracted much international media coverage including The Guardian, CNN, BBC, Al-Jazeera, Associated Press, Reuters, El Pais, AFP, New York Times, and Die Zeit.
The O²RB Excellence in Impact Awards, supported by the University of Oxford’s ESRC Impact Acceleration Account, recognise and reward social scientists whose research has achieved excellent economic and social impact.
Speaking of his team’s commendation, Dr Fisher said, “The Peoples’ Climate Vote was all about bringing the voices of people around the world to the attention of global policy makers. It was wonderful to work with the United Nations Development Programme on the world’s largest survey of attitudes to climate change. I’m delighted by the support and recognition from the O²RB Excellence in Impact Awards 2021, and I encourage other academics to work with non-academic partners to try to help solve social problems.”
The Highly Commended awardees will join the overall Winners, including Professor Melinda Mills, Dr Jennifer Beam Dowd and their team at the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science, in a celebration of social sciences research impact at the O²RB Excellence in Impact Awards ceremony on 19th October 2021.
To join the celebration and to hear our winners’ inspirational stories, register to watch the Awards ceremony, live-streamed from Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History on 19th October 2021, from 6pm: https://www.socsci.ox.ac.uk/o2rbawards
