Social Media Disinformation and Climate Change Mitigation Efforts. A configurational narrative

Social media holds immense potential to contribute to achieving sustainability goals by facilitating climate actions. However, the growing threat of disinformation on these platforms challenges climate change mitigation efforts. The political motives underlying the orchestration of such disinformation campaigns disseminate falsehoods about scientific consensus, sow ambiguity, and undermine scientific progress. Despite its adverse effects, comparative perspectives on social media disinformation from various entities have received minimal attention in the existing literature. Acknowledging the complex dynamics of disinformation operations and the diverse range of threat scenarios they create, this study utilizes the theoretical framework of agenda-building and qualitative comparative analysis to conduct a comprehensive cross-country assessment across 167 countries. Two sets of analyses with various time lags reveal the decisive influence of social media disinformation operations by governments and political parties on climate change mitigation initiatives and shed light on the diminishing significance of foreign disinformation. Overall, the findings indicate how multiple disinformation campaigns interact to undermine the effectiveness of climate actions. Implications to research and practice are discussed