Hope’s Role in Responding to U.S. Climate and Environmental Policy

The climate crisis has been a source of anxiety and grief for decades. The 2024 U.S. presidential election dramatically altered U.S. environmental and climate policy, worsening the crisis and its attendant emotions such as depression, anxiety, grief and anger. This essay reviews the critical role that hope plays in channeling these emotions into strategic actions, new connections, and individual and collective paths forward. It reviews the concept of Active Hope and identifies specific steps for creating individual action plans. Special attention is given to the role activism might play in such plans and the imperative of charting actions which look forward, creating new institutions, legal frameworks and solutions rather than simply returning to the pre-Trump status quo.