![]() ![]() The flooding killed 134 people and destroyed the livelihoods of thousands. Intense rainfall turned the small Ahr River into a torrent with flows rivalling the Rhine. To understand the issue, we examined a devastating flood in Germany in 2021. Our research brought two dozen researchers from diverse disciplines together to debate what social tipping points are and how we can respond to them. How can natural disasters cause social tipping points? ![]() The New Zealand government created a recovery agency tasked not only with building back better, but also making sure community wellbeing was taken into account. That’s because natural disasters can change how we allocate resources and our expectations of what governments should do.įor instance, the devastating earthquakes in Christchurch in 20 drove a new approach to disaster response. Social science tells us natural disasters can provide opportunities for social tipping points. Changing back to working in the office every day is turning out to be much harder than first thought.Īustralia's Black Summer of fire was not normal – and we can prove it Three years ago, many of us shifted to working from home – and the change happened remarkably quickly. ![]() The status quo is very well entrenched and shifts away from it rarely happen without significant pushback.īut it can happen – especially in times of crisis, as the COVID pandemic demonstrated. Humans and our societies are much less predictable than nature. Studying social tipping points is hard and messy. Rick Rycroft/AP Understanding social tipping points This photo shows Lyle Stewart at the ruins of his house in New South Wales after Black Summer fires. When climate-linked disasters strike, we’re more likely to support rapid changes. Coastal communities that have experienced significant coastal erosion are much more supportive of coastal protection policies than those that haven’t. We can see this in planning for sea-level rise. But until then, we’re often unlikely to support policies which may radically change everyday life. Social science shows we’re more likely to be concerned about an issue when we have experienced it, such as being directly affected by fires or floods. We need to use this knowledge to overcome our long dependency on fossil fuels before climate change causes irreversible social upheavals. As our new research shows, climate change is causing social tipping points: fast, fundamental changes in human values, behaviours, relationships, technologies and institutions that are hard to undo. Such upheaval can also lead to marked changes in society. If heating continues, the climate could reach tipping points and enter new, dangerous states. Scientists are concerned changes such as these are rapid and irreversible. Europe and North America are experiencing record-breaking heat waves while Antarctic sea ice levels have fallen to record lows. The United Nations has declared an era of global boiling. It’s impossible to turn on the TV, listen to the radio or scroll social media without hearing about real-world climate impacts. ![]()
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