"While policymakers around the world appear to be taking the imperative of climate action seriously and citizens tend to agree that climate change is an important problem, often consensus on which policies to support is lacking. In this paper, the authors seek to understand what drives support for or opposition to important climate policies across the world. Their goal is to offer new cross-country evidence on people's perceptions of, understanding of, and attitudes toward climate change and climate policies.

From the results of a new survey of more than 40,000 respondents in 20 countries, together accounting for 72% of global CO2 emissions, the authors show that support for climate policies hinges on perceptions in three key areas: their effectiveness (do respondents believe the policy will reduce emissions?), their impacts on inequality (do they believe they will negatively affect low-income households?), and their expected impacts on the respondent's own household. They find that providing information specifically addressing these key concerns can substantially increase support for climate policies in many countries."

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