Elites Underestimate Public Support for Climate Policies: The Case of Meat-Free Days

Despite the urgent need for climate policy to avoid the most devastating scenarios of climate change, the political supply of climate policies remain inadequate. Most liberal democratic countries in the West are not en route to fulfil the 45 percent emissions reduction target set out in the Paris agreement. We suggest that part of this inadequacy can be explained by elites' underestimation of citizens' support for more radical climate policies. Through an innovative survey design focusing on a policy proposal to introduce meat-free days in canteens, we study citizens', political elites' and bureaucratic elites' own opinions and their ability to accurately identify the majority position of citizens. We find that all three groups underestimate the level of policy support. Through rigorous analysis we show that elected elites are significantly more likely to underestimate public support for a meat-free day compared to citizens and unelected elites. This underestimation of citizens' support for climate policies further complicates an already challenging policy area.