Published
April 29, 2026
We Need to Restore Our Belief in the Future
Simon Glynn
Founder at Zero Ideas
How do we turn people's widespread concern about climate change into similarly widespread support for the policies and actions needed to prevent it?
This is a critical question. Concern about climate is plentiful. It is the majority position worldwide, and even across the political spectrum (https://doi.org/10.70272/qzus). And yet popular support for climate policies is insufficient for governments to do what it takes.
It is a question that we began to discuss in a session at Terras Tuscany 2025 last June (see picture), and that I have since explored in depth for a report recently published by the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, Restoring Human Progress: Winning citizens' support for action on climate and nature.
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At one level, the problem is clear. One of the observations made at Terras was that 'we must not put ourselves in the position of saying who has to do what'. And with climate change, there are many choices about who should do what in order to meet an emissions target.
As we put it in the Cambridge report, it is easy for people to argue—even those concerned about climate change—that 'we don't have to do this'. There is always somebody else: a richer person, or a country with higher emissions, or with more historical emissions. And there is always another way, if I am particularly partial to red meat, or driving, or flying on holiday, or if I am opposed to nuclear energy or genetically modified foods.
This is why the direct rebuttal—we do have to do this—is a losing argument. It works for our species and the world, but not where it's needed, at the scale of specific people, places, and policies. Because it's true that someone and somewhere else can always carry the burden.
This evasion is overcome if citizens want to support something, rather than being told they must. That shift, from obligation to desire, is the heart of the argument.
People care about climate change because they want to protect what they have and care about. When they are handed burdens and obligations, it feels as if they are being asked to sacrifice their way of life to protect it. People do care, but their appetite for sacrifice is limited. We won't get there without desire and aspiration.
As we concluded in the Terras Tuscany discussion, 'we need a positive story—not about how people will lose their status, or that everything will be worse and more expensive.'
But this is not a call for superficial optimism. We need the substance, not just the story. And that's the challenge.
Our research across 23 countries shows that the richer the country, the more despondent its people tend to feel about the future: not just more pessimistic (believing the world will be worse for their children than for them), but also less open to change. This combination is dispiriting: we feel the world will worsen, yet we resist the actions needed to improve it.
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When societies are this pessimistic, we live for today and don't invest in tomorrow. We resist change to protect ourselves from the future. We care about the future, but we don't attend to it.
With that attitude, why would we support climate policies? If winning support for climate action requires people to aspire to a desirable future, then we first need to tackle our despondency. We need to move from a mindset of conservation and preservation to one of transformation. We need to restore an expectation of and enthusiasm for human progress.
Climate action might seem a big enough challenge already, without adding this prerequisite. Restoring human progress is certainly a tall order, but it can be helpful in both practice and theory. President Eisenhower is supposed to have said, "If you can't solve a problem, make it bigger." Although the quotation is apocryphal, the idea of generalizing to establish common ground is real.
The opportunity here is that it's not just climate action that is held back by our despondency. Risk-taking, innovation, and investment all require belief in the future and openness to change. Without these, how do we respond to the transformational innovations of artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and bio-digital convergence?
Mainstream politics also depends on people believing in a better future; when we don't, we are more easily attracted by populism. So mainstream political leaders facing electoral apathy at home, as well as business and finance leaders facing competition from more dynamic economies abroad, share with the climate community a self-interest in rebuilding citizens' belief in the future.
A quest for human progress opens up new policy approaches.
First, people need inspiring visions and tangible goals that they relate to, find worth striving for, and will be proud to see achieved. Inspiration is never going to come from a financial number or a carbon number: growth in GDP and reduction in carbon emissions are not goals people can feel. But can we get more excited about shaping the future of our cities, countryside, buildings, or travel? These are more engaging issues for citizens than the question of how we share the burden of emissions reductions.
Second, to build people's confidence in and excitement about the future, leaders need to focus on where their countries can thrive, lead, and win. This is what China has been doing so effectively in solar, wind, batteries, and electric vehicles, building on not only its natural endowment of rare-earth minerals but also its unmatched manufacturing capabilities and learning curves. It is what Germany could be doing in industrial electrification, heavy transport, and non-fossil chemicals; or what France could be doing in nuclear energy and sustainable aviation; or what Japan could be doing in high-efficiency and precision technologies. Every country has familiar strengths to build on.
Finally, people need to believe in better: to feel part of something bigger, recognizing and celebrating the progress that we are making. Today, many people share a sense that we are not making progress. GDP growth is historically low across most G7 countries, and the world is missing its climate targets by a wide margin. But global carbon emissions statistics hide serious progress made in individual sectors and countries. In the UK, only 26 percent of people agree that 'Britain's policies to tackle climate change have made a meaningful difference to reducing Britain's emissions'; 41 percent disagree. And yet in reality, the UK has already reduced its territorial emissions by half. When people so substantially underestimate what has been achieved, they also underestimate what the world is capable of.
The goal, in short, is a shift from burden to desire - from obligation to aspiration. That is how concern becomes action.
This conversation continues at Terras Tuscany 2026, June 2-4.
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Simon Glynn is the founder of Zero Ideas and a By-Fellow at Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge. The research report, Restoring Human Progress: Winning citizens' support for actions on climate and nature, is published by the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.
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