Framing climate policy around energy independence enhances acceptance and perceived effectiveness: evidence from a Finnish survey experiment

Sami Ahonen (), Mikko Leino () and Aino Tiihonen ()
Additional contact information
Sami Ahonen: University of Turku
Mikko Leino: University of Turku
Aino Tiihonen: University of Turku

Climatic Change, 2025, vol. 178, issue 2, No 13, 19 pages

Abstract: Abstract We investigated the impact of three justifications for implementing a road traffic emission trading system on policy acceptance and perceived effectiveness. One frame is based on increased energy independence from non-EU countries, another on potential economic benefits, and a third on ensuring efficient greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation. The data utilized originated from an online survey experiment (n = 1504) administered in Finland in the spring of 2024. We found that the justification referring to energy independence marginally increased the acceptability of the policy, whereas the justifications appealing to potential economic benefits and effective emissions reductions did not. The energy independence frame particularly influences those who perceive climate change as a moderate risk. The results regarding perceived policy effectiveness are similar, indicating a strong association between these evaluations. It is likely that, at least in the Finnish context, the link between climate change mitigation efforts and energy independence has become more pronounced following the Russian attack on Ukraine.

Keywords: Climate change policy; Policy acceptance; Framing effects; Mitigation; Survey experiment; Crisis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-025-03859-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:climat:v:178:y:2025:i:2:d:10.1007_s10584-025-03859-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10584

DOI: 10.1007/s10584-025-03859-x

Access Statistics for this article

Climatic Change is currently edited by M. Oppenheimer and G. Yohe

More articles in Climatic Change from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().