Climate Bullying – A Deviant Behaviour

During and after every cyclone, flood and fire, the main push is to tell us that we are resilient. I’m sick and tired of being resilient when the Government, as perpetrators enable natural disasters and devastation to wreak havoc on us! I seek to introduce a new concept of climate bullying for discussion.

Climate Bullying

We often speak in terms of climate denial and climate activists, in doing so we merely point out a difference of opinion. Importantly, we fail to frame the problem in human terms, as one of perpetrators and victims. However, using concepts from Workplace Bullying literature, we can see there are antecedents and consequences of climate bullying.

Climate bullying similar to workplace bullying can be defined as:

Repeated and persistent negative acts towards communities and individuals, which involve a perceived power imbalance between Government and targets and create an environment conducive to natural disasters of which the negative consequences are felt by the target.

Adapted from Salin, 2003 and Einarsen, Hoel and Cooper, 2000

For many years, research has shown us that climate change will have a significant impact on the frequency and intensity of natural disasters. Within each community, disasters have devastating impacts of lost homes, lost infrastructure, isolated communities and economic and business losses.

For the victims of natural disasters, the personal impacts are mild to severe psychosomatic disorders. These include, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression and suicide. In addition, economic loss, homelessness, poverty, hunger and death as a direct impact of natural disasters. In addition, direct health impacts that may result in severe discomfort, disease and death.

Climate Bullying is the act of intentionally enabling an environment that is conducive to natural disasters.

Climate Bullying is a Deviant Behaviour

Deviant Behaviour is just one construct of workplace bullying. This is because deviant behaviour may also attack an organisation and not just a victim or target.

Similarly, the Government does not intentionally cause harm to the Government with this behaviour. They have a set of mechanisms and structural supports via the media to excuse such deviant behaviour.

However, Climate Bullying by the Government does share similar factors with Workplace Deviance:

It is voluntary behaviour

It violates the norms and beliefs of the country

Threatens the well-being of the country and its citizens

Dimensions of Climate Bullying

Climate Bullying as a form of deviant behaviour, also shares the same dimensions as workplace deviant behaviour (Sharma, 2019). These are:

Perpetrator/s

Intention

Target/s

Action

Consequence

Inside and Outside Perpetrators

Perpetrators of Workplace Deviance are both insider and outsider perpetrators. That is people who work for the organisation and those who are outside of the organisation.

Similarly, the deviant behaviour of Climate Bullying has inside perpetrators of Government. These are the leaders, speakers, policy developers. The outside perpetrators are other political parties, the media and those with vested interest in energy resources.

Intentional and Unintentional Harm

Intention may be to cause harm intentionally or unintentionally. An intentional motive is for any political party or independent to willingly reject legislation that will have a positive impact on reducing climate change. This is because they do not believe that climate change is real and there is no need to act on climate change.

An unintentional consequence of harm may be for any political party or Independent to willingly reject action on climate, for either a political motive to gain relevance or sustain power. This may be to insist on changes and demands that are perceived as stronger action, but are not practical, or will not be accepted by the public, because of the perceived hardship caused by the perceived stronger policy. It is an unintentional consequence of harm, if the political party who sustains power by popular vote, is the party who does not believe action is needed, because the public reject the hard-line demands of alternative parties.

Community, Political and Individual Targets

Targets are both Organisational and Interpersonal in Workplace Deviance. In Climate Bullying, Targets are communities, political rivals, individual citizens, individual activists, the science community and anyone advocating climate action. The aim is twofold. To discredit the notion that climate change is real and requires action and secondly, to discredit those who seek action.

Action

Action is the process of participation. However, action may be active or passive. An example of Active Action is a rejection of climate action. Passive Action impacts on quality of life. An example is Liberals removing Labor’s qualifications for disaster recovery funding. Another is refusing to meet with the Fire Chiefs or call an emergency COAG meeting.

Action may be direct or indirect. Direct Action intends to cause harm to a target. This is normally interpersonal. An example is the campaign to discredit action on climate change by the Liberal Party and media trying to discredit the then Labor Government by creating a ‘Carbon Tax’ scare campaign, when it was not a tax at all. Another example is the attacks on youth climate activist Greta Thunberg.

Outside perpetrators also use direct action to create scare campaigns to discredit political opponents, with similar deceitful campaigns. Such as the Greens political party and media promoting Stop Adani and the Climate Convoy to regional Queensland. That is, despite the fact that such parties were knowledgeable that one mine is not the panacea to climate action, and that there are significant and complex challenges to ‘stopping Adani.’

Indirect Action has an unintended consequence on others. An example of indirect action is one region suffering the consequence of a natural disaster, due to climate inaction. This is although their geographic boundaries do not have necessarily high carbon emissions (i.e. a rural community).

An example of an external perpetrator indirect action is former Labor Leader Bill Shorten, unable to lead action on climate change by assuring blue-collar workers of security, among the fear of job losses, political opponents were inciting and the competing demands of city progressives; resulting in the election of a climate denialist Government.

Consequences

Consequences can be both constructive and destructive. Constructive deviance may be a politician crossing the floor or a traditionally supportive cross bench rejecting support to the Government and breaking with norms and behaviours that exist. Another example is compliant media organisations that have traditionally provided free campaigning for climate denial parties, criticizing the Government’s inaction. This type of constructive deviance may push the Government into action.

Destructive Deviance is any actions that results in harm to the country and citizens, as a negative consequence of climate inaction.

Enabling Climate Bullying

The enabling factors of climate bullying are adapted from Salin’s (2003) Enabling Factors and Processes of Workplace Bullying. The enabling factors for climate bullying are motivating structures, precipitating processes and enabling structures and processes.

Enabling Factors of Climate Bullying (Adapted from Salin, 2003)

Enabling Factors of Climate Bullying, as you can see from the framework above, are complex. I will briefly outline each area. However, each individual factor requires much deeper discussion.

Motivating Structures

The motivating structures for enabling an environment of climate bullying essentially revolve around power. The desire for political power. The bowing to the powerful media moguls who deny climate change, that can make or break a Prime Minister. The power of the financial benefits of corporate donations.

The rewards and benefits of appeasing climate denialist media moguls and corporate donors is of course the ultimate power of Government.

With a supportive structure of a compliant media, a climate denialist Government can effectively campaign using propaganda about the negatives of climate change to using voter complexity as the basis to divide and rule. On the flipside, outside perpetrators can also use climate change to divide and rule, as we have seen at the last election with the noted regional / city divide between blue-collar workers and progressives. More on that later.

Precipitating Processes

The decision to not act on climate change is underpinned by a number of events or existing structures. The existing structure of coal mining is one factor. Coal mining is heavily concentrated in multiple regions. Australia is the largest exporter of coal mining in the world. Local communities and entire regions are heavily impacted by the existence of mining. Coal communities are targeted to wear the entire burden of climate change. This then creates another event where competing political interests compete over the approach to change.

Due to a high concentration of mining jobs in multiple regions and the national and local economic impacts; moving away from coal, creates fears of joblessness and poverty and economic instability.

Politicians and compliant media enable a jobs versus climate action argument. This is where the argument for a complex scenario is reduced to black and white. The Liberal Government’s argument is that we must not act as it will kill jobs.

The climate activist side is that must kill existing jobs and destabilize communities and transition them to something else. The first idea is idiotic and dangerous, and the second idea is privileged. As Labor leader, Shorten tried to straddle both idiotic and privileged arguments. If we return to indirect action discussed earlier, this straddling just caused confusion by angering progressives and leaving blue-collar workers feeling insecure.

It appears that Labor now has taken the pathway that is aimed to unite the interests of both blue-collar workers and progressives. This proposal uses our strengths in regional communities and utilises our blue-collar workers to transform communities and tackle climate change domestically and also globally. How that is received is yet to be seen. As I have written about previously, it will be a hard sell to progressives.

Enabling Structures and Processes

Climate Bullying exists due to the perceived power imbalance between Government and people. The Government also supported by compliant, climate denialist media moguls creates a further power imbalance. Opposing opinion is barely given the light of day. In addition, the Government, media and other vested interests can use social media to further ingrain climate inaction. On the flip-side, external perpetrators of activist groups and supportive mainstream and social media, can inflame the need for radical action and workers are ‘just a consequence’ or climate denialists can inflame fears about joblessness.

The cost to a climate denialist Government, so far, has been a low cost. Through simple slogans and the support of the media, the Liberal Party has won office in 2013, 2016 and 2019. This has further legitimised for the Liberal Party, that they have a ‘mandate’ to not take any urgent action on climate change.

Dissatisfaction and frustration relate to the environment that victims of bullying exist in. In comparison to workplace bullying literature, this can be summed up as the competing interests between economic stability and climate action.

Climate action policy instability, unclear goals, and a complete lack of worker centric climate action debate, has fostered an anxious and aggressive environment within this policy area.

Mining regions rejected the Labor Government at the last election. This has now created an environment where some are now calling for the Labor party to abandon blue collar workers in regional communities. This will just reinforce both motivating and precipitating structures discussed above and further enable a culture of climate bullying.

Prevention of Climate Bullying

With the greatest natural disaster in our history burning around us; it is of the very positive assumption that we must do all we can to prevent climate bullying. To do this, it is important to bear in mind the dimensions of deviant behaviour and also the factors and actors within these frameworks, that enable a culture of Climate Bullying to occur.

I have adapted Einarsen et. al.’s (2018) workplace bullying model of systems we can use to prevent Climate Bullying and enable positive action.

Ethical Infrastructure

It is a reasonable argument that climate bullying is an unethical practice. Ethical infrastructure are systems and processes designed to stamp out unethical practices. Essentially, this framework details how we, as the people, can use resources and systems to destroy the culture that enables climate bullying and the perpetrators who inflict it upon us.

The resources available to us are a Government majority, Financial Resources (including in-kind) and the level of commitment we have. This includes a shared vision.

Systems

The systems we can use are:

Climate Action Legislation

Insist every single day for climate action legislation. Moreover, Labor’s Anthony Albanese has delivered a policy direction speech that will act on climate and mitigate joblessness and poverty and create security for blue collar workers. This will unite blue-collar workers and city progressives.

Regardless of whether you have points of difference, it is essential to support Labor’s plan as the major party, so the left can unite, instead of fight on this issue.

The Greens Party must cease combating Labor as their major threat and seek unity in the way forward on legislation, well prior to an election. The fight can occur in Parliament once the Liberal Party are removed from power.

Education

Education about Climate action must be ongoing. However, as I have tried to implore people for the last four years to do so; climate action education must be worker centric.

We can no longer to afford to allow ignorance of the impacts of the structural changes to coal regions to continue unopposed. Every single person must make a commitment to educate themselves on the impacts of structural change in regional communities.

We do not have the time to insist on perfectionist policies. Clearly, we are too desperate for change to insist on our idea of perfect policy. We must look to the most likely Left party to form Government and absolutely insist that Labor policy is promoted and not rejected as imperfect.

The luxury or privilege of denying regions targeted to carry the entire burden of change, agency as participants of change, we can no longer accept. We must actively listen to regional workers and work with them to find solutions.

Education about climate change and required action should be inclusive of regional, city and rural communities. It should unite farmer and worker, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, the wealthy and homeless. We can no longer tolerate the narrative of pitting worker against worker and community against community, as has been the narrative now from climate activists for so long.

Education must also share the burden across the entire country, instead of just on regional Australia. Education about reducing impacts in cities and structural changes required in cities, is urgently required.

Unified Communication

With the outcome of the last federal election where regional communities voted strongly against ‘the Left’ and re-elected a Morrison Government. It is essential for ALL Climate action communication to be unified with the worker central. If Party Leaders and Activists are unable to find a way to unify workers at risk of joblessness and action on climate change; they should hand the conch to someone else.

Sanctions

I cannot reiterate enough how imperative it is to heal the divide between regions and cities to stamp out climate bullying. Parties and Organisations must impose sanctions on any leader or speaker who is unable to unify blue-collar workers and the communities of coal regions and action on climate change. They must formalise a strict penalty and replace leaders who exacerbate and thrive on division.

Voters must impose sanctions on any political party who attacks Labor as the main opposition party, who is in the most likely position to implement climate action. We must speak out loudly and clearly against any party who focuses their activism and campaigns against the party who can replace the climate denialists and indeed, those who are not focusing every last bit of energy on the climate denialists in power. No longer should we tolerate division on the left of politics. We must recognise that it is Labor as the major Left party who will implement action on climate change; and the points of difference can be debated, once Labor is in Government.

There must be sanctions within the Media. High-profile journalists must unify and rebel against pressures to conform to promoting political parties not committed to climate action. They must call out amongst their own cohort any journalist who promotes inaction on climate change, or who makes apologies for ineffective leaders.

The ultimate sanction is against the Government. A commitment from voters to formalise the removal of the Liberal National Party Climate Denying Coalition, who perpetrate Climate Bullying.

Resources

A Government of climate denialists is the major barrier to overcome. We must commit today to elect a Government that has the power to implement climate action. We must aim to wipe out the Liberal Party, National Party, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party, The Katter Party and any other minor or Independent supporting a climate denialist Government. This needs to be done at every level of Government.

We must continue to build financial resources. So, this means a commitment of personal donations to any party or Independent that supports action on climate change.

Importantly, In-kind donations are also priceless, so therefore, make a commitment today to join a political party. My personal preference is the Australian Labor Party who can make a real difference as the major party. Issues based activism is fine; however, it is Government that implement legislation, not activist groups. Volunteering in campaigns is crucial for success.

As we know, the election is two and a half years away. However, this means that there is plenty of time for the Government and the compliant media to implement scare campaigns on every other topic to divert our attention away from the disaster that is burning around us and taking precious lives.

Importantly, the commitment must be made today, that you will never waver. That you will remain resilient to campaigns and propaganda from the right. Above all, even if you are a generational voter of the Liberal or National Parties, that you will commit today to remove them.

Put the Liberals and Nationals Last. It’s where they put You

To stamp out climate bullying that prevents action on climate change, which then results in the most devastating consequences, it is critical, for every single person in the country must make the commitment today that they will put the Liberal and National Parties LAST on their ballot.

Our future depends on it.

 

References

Einarsen, Kari et al., (2019). Antecedents of ethical infrastructures against workplace bullying: The role of organizational size, perceived financial resources and level of high-quality HRM practices. Personnel Review, Vol. 48 No. 3, pp. 672–690.

Salin, Denise. (2003). Ways of Explaining Workplace Bullying: A Review of Enabling, Motivating, and Precipitating Structures and Processes in the Work Environment. Human Relations, Vol. 56 No. 10, pp. 1213-1232.

Sharma, Naman. (2019). Analyzing Workplace Deviance in Modern Organizations. IGI-Global, Pennsylvania, USA.