3.3 Lack of positive political influence and communication

The demands on politicians have always been complex: they represent the interests of their electorate, are at the same time committed to the common good and have to justify their decisions and communicate them appropriately. They operate within an institutional framework that enables them to do their work, but also makes it difficult at times. On top of all this, they have to ensure that this regulatory framework is further developed in line with the times. Global challenges such as climate change make these tasks even more complex and make human weaknesses as well as inadequacies of the political system even more obvious. Also in view of the limited reaction time, many ask whether democracy is too slow and inert to bring about the necessary reforms in the required haste and with a long-term perspective.

In the literature, the following main problems are traditionally discussed, all of which contribute to the problem of "political short-sightedness": (1.) the difficulty of defining the presumed interests of those who will be (potentially) affected in the future and of adequately incorporating them into the current political opinion-forming process, (2.) selection and qualification problems of political personnel who are not willing or able to promote the common good, (3.) unfavourable incentive systems for political personnel, and (4.) a lack of room for manoeuvre due to the fragmentation of decision-making power.⁴⁷ In addition, the difficulties of (5.) integrating all interest groups and information into the political decision-making process in a timely and orderly manner and (6.) guaranteeing the necessary transparency and accountability during the discussion and implementation process are complained about.⁴⁸

In times of crisis, when more people fear losses – mostly in the form of restrictions on their accustomed standard of living or in terms of security and the ability to plan their personal life – there is another challenge: populist simplification and denial. Political populism profits from these fears of loss and therefore deliberately reinforces them, usually by shifting the responsibility for complex problems and thus also the individual's own responsibility to global enemy images and by offering temptingly simple, often nationalistic answers. Particularly populists derive their strategic strength from focusing on a few issues such as chauvinist identity politics, exclusive solidarities or the demarcation against the so-called "establishment" in politics, business, culture, science or the church.

Since it is part of the self-image of sustainable politics to include all those affected and to give their doubts and concerns adequate space in the public debate, populism poses great challenges to the democratic culture of debate. Here, it is helpful to reveal the contradictory attitudes, e.g. of right-wing populism with regard to climate change: "deniers" deny the fact of anthropogenic climate effects, "doubters" usually question the viability or reliability of scientific-empirical evidence. Hence, "doubters" acknowledge climate change, but express scepticism about climate policy goals and instruments. What they all have in common is the rejection of multilateral agreements, even if individual right-wing populist movements are now calling for national climate protection policies, either to secure national "energy and resource self-sufficiency", to preserve indigenous nature or out of a fear of so-called "climate refugees".

If populism succeeds in making the socio-ecological reforms appear as foreign-controlled interest politics, overextension of the individual and threat to cultural identity, and in portraying the transformation per se as unjust, dangerous and actually superfluous, it will be significantly more difficult to achieve the climate goals. Therefore, a successful transformation policy is also an openly communicating policy of imposition that strives to present the opportunities and burdens associated with it as clearly as possible and to distribute them fairly (cf. Chapters 4.2 and 4.3).