Abstract The world is increasingly experiencing the destabilizing effects of climate change, yet we know surprisingly little about how these dynamics affect the quality and resilience of democratic governance. We argue that climate shocks, through their growing frequency and tendency to compound, trigger cascading economic and social disruptions that place sustained pressure on democratic institutions. When repeated climate-induced disasters overwhelm governments’ capacity to address citizen grievances, civil and political unrest becomes more likely. In democratic settings, these pressures increase the likelihood that governments respond to instability through repressive measures, such as prolonged states of emergency and restrictions on participation, which incrementally erode democratic resilience. To evaluate this argument, we examine whether democracies exposed to more frequent climate shocks are more likely to experience declines in democratic governance than otherwise similar democracies facing fewer shocks. Our findings support this expectation and underscore the growing risks climate change poses to democratic resilience in an era of accelerating environmental disruption. The world is experiencing the increasingly destabilizing effects of climate change, but we currently know little about its effects on the quality of democracy. We argue that climate shocks trigger a cascade of environmental, social, and economic effects that negatively impact democracy. The accelerated frequency and severity of climate-induced natural disasters and weather shocks, and their devastating economic and social consequences, increase the frequency of civil and political unrest, especially in contexts where climate-induced disasters compound and the government is unable to address citizen grievances. The pressures to respond to political instability increases the likelihood that governments rely on repressive measures that reduce democratic resilience. To test this argument, we explore whether and how countries that experience more climate shocks have an increased likelihood of experiencing a decline in democratic governance, compared to countries with fewer climate shocks. We find that the effects of climate change significantly reduce the quality of democracy within a country, and that this is driven by increased instability and repressive measures in response. These findings have important implications for the future of democratic governance in a world increasingly confronted with the negative effects of climate change.
Beacham et al. (Fri,) studied this question.