Jessica Haak quoted in The Guardian's Articles

6 June 2024

In two recent articles by the prestigious British news magazine “The Guardian”, Jessica Haak, a Research Associate in the Comparative Political Sciences team at Universität Hamburg, was quoted.

The article "Why Green Parties are Polling Badly in European Elections" explores the reasons behind Green parties' predicted poor performance in this week’s European elections. Despite growing environmental awareness, political support for Green parties appears to be declining. Different explanations, such as voters’ shifting priorities and party competition, are discussed.

On the day after the European elections, the article "Fears for Green Deal as number of MEPs from climate-denying parties set to rise"  discusses concerns about the Green Deal given the expected rise in MEPs (Members of the European Parliament) from climate denialist parties. It mentions that while the far-right gains are unlikely to jeopardise the Green Deal, they could affect support for EU adaptation to the 1.5°C limit. It discusses how centrist decisions will be crucial to the future of the Green Deal, while challenges and political battles related to climate policy and environmental protection, particularly with regard to emissions targets, exist in Europe. Furthermore, it is mentioned that the election could also highlight the importance of investing in clean energy and striving for a climate-neutral future.

Jessica Haak offered insights into the reasons behind the low polling numbers for the Greens. "Recent studies suggest Green parties’ success is closely tied to economic conditions", says Jessica Haak. “Taken together, economic concerns overshadowing environmental issues might be a contributing factor to a potential decline in Green party votes.”

“In previous European parliamentary elections, climate protests had pushed environmental concerns to the forefront of the political agenda across most of the EU,” she said. “Although voters in some western European countries still consider climate issues important, they prioritised economic concerns, migration and war.”

In her dissertation, Jessica Haak explores the effects of exposure to extreme and abnormal weather on climate policy preferences and political behavior, particularly voting patterns. Her recent working paper “Everywhere you vote, you always take the weather with you” examines the influence of temperature anomalies on voting for Alliance 90/The Greens in Germany. By linking geo-referenced individual-level panel data from over 20.000 German voters with objective data from more than 470 weather stations, she found that individuals were more likely to support the Greens from 2017 to 2021 when experiencing temperature anomalies. These findings encompass various indicators of extreme weather, such as heat, storms, and droughts.