How Climate Actions by Other Countries Affect Policy Support in the United States: The Role of Perceived Public Opinion

Abstract Addressing climate change requires international cooperation, yet how residents of one country react to climate actions by other countries is not well understood. Building on research into perceived public opinion and environmental policy support, we hypothesized that learning about a foreign government’s pledge to achieve carbon neutrality would increase the perception that its citizens hold pro-climate positions, which, in turn, would predict greater support for an international climate treaty. Two survey experiments (N = 1,475 total) partially supported this prediction. In Study 1, U.S. respondents read about a carbon neutrality pledge by China or the E.U., or about climate neutrality in general (control). Relative to the control condition, respondents in the China pledge condition perceived the Chinese public as more supportive of climate action, which mediated higher support for a U.S.-China climate treaty; the E.U. pledge condition, in comparison, did not show this effect. Study 2 again revealed an indirect effect of reading about China’s carbon neutrality pledge on treaty support via perceived Chinese public opinion. Results extend recent research on the effects of perceived or “second-order” beliefs in environmental policy support by exploring the conditions under which foreign governments’ climate actions affect perceptions of the pro-environmental stances of their citizens.