involvementinclimateprojectsacriticaldiscourseanalysis.docxVIP

IntroductionIn recent years the public awareness of climate change has been raised and caused the climate to be a tope issue for many people. The climate issue has gone from being a somewhat low level priority to a top priority for most of the countries in the world. Moreover, climate change not only takes up the time of the top leaders of the world, it hasalso become an important issue for the public. The debate of climate change has gained strength from movies, expert statements etc. However, the debate has many views, as an example, on one hand the former Vice President of the United States Al Gore’s movie ‘An inconvenient truth’ raised the question of how the world would survive, if action was not taken and that action must be taken immediately, and on the other hand, the Danish scientist Bj?rn Lomborg represents a calmer approach to the climate debate. Lomborg acknowledges the fact that climate change does occur but it should not be favored over e.g. AIDS problems or malnutrition in the third world. Although there are different views on the importance of the climate change, the common denominator is that both ‘sides’ acknowledges that action needs to be taken in order to reduce the climate change. However, the difference is that one side advocate for immediate action and gives climate change top priority and the other side calls for composure and does not give climate change priority over other problems in the world. These voices of contestation have dominated the scene in recent years, but there is no doubt that the climate debate has gained impetus over the past five years. The ongoing climate debate occurs not only on a national political level but also on the local political level and public levels. At the local level, several cities around the world have taken action to prevent climate change by for instance reducing their CO2 emission. One of the first cities to declare itself ‘climate-friendly’ was the town of Totness in the UK. Totness is a small town