Climate change in Italy: Towards the politicization of an issue

Abstract

Climate change has emerged as a critical global challenge, recognized for its significant impact on the environment and societies worldwide. Nonetheless, for a long time, the Italian political system has devoted limited attention to climate change issues. Within such a framework, this article aims to answer the main research question addressed in the contributions of this special issue: is the politicization of climate change taking place in contemporary Italy? We answer this question by analyzing the three dimensions of politicization – salience, actors’ expansion, and polarization - in light of the contributions to the special issue. These studies investigate whether climate change is becoming a politicized issue by analyzing Italian parties, media, social movements, interest groups, and public opinion. Overall, the findings suggest that we are observing a partial politicization of the climate change issue in Italy. Indeed, there is evidence of an increase in salience over time in the spheres analyzed and an expansion of actors involved. Also, there are some signals of polarization, and consistent with previous research, the climate change issue largely appears positional. Nonetheless, the number of protests has substantially decreased in comparison with 2019, the approach of some actors tends to depoliticize the issue, and patterns of polarization are not unanimously detected.

Keywords

• climate change
• politicization
• Italy