When conflicts get heated, so does the planet: social-climate dynamics under inequality

Abstract

Climate dynamics are inextricably linked to processes in social systems that are highly unequal. This suggests a need for coupled social-climate models that capture pervasive real-world asymmetries in the population distribution of the consequences of anthropogenic climate change and climate (in)action. Here we develop a simple social-climate model with group structure to investigate how anthropogenic climate change and population heterogeneity co-evolve. We find that greater homophily and resource inequality cause an increase in the global peak temperature anomaly by as much as 0.7{degrees}C. Also, climate change can structure human populations by driving opinion polarization. Finally, climate mitigation achieved by reducing the cost of mitigation measures paid by individuals tends to be contingent upon socio-economic conditions, whereas policies that achieve communication between different strata of society show climate mitigation benefits across a broad socio-economic regime. We conclude that advancing climate change mitigation efforts can benefit from a social-climate systems perspective.