Residents of small-island states want an “all-hands-on-deck” approach to addressing the climate crisis

Based on Mildenberger, M., Constantino S., Mahdavi, P., Bergquist, P., De Roche, G., Franzblau, E., Martinez-Alvarez, C., and Sturm, I. (2025). How publics in small-island states view climate change and international responses to it. PNAS. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2415324122

The first comprehensive survey of small-island states and territories finds residents are deeply worried about climate change and want action by all governments, including their own.

The Policy Problem

Climate-vulnerable countries and territories around the world have been systematically excluded from public opinion surveys that ask about climate change. A recent comprehensive review of all cross-national climate opinion data (consisting of over 100 surveys of 3.5 million respondents across 164 countries) found that 30 countries and 50 subnational units have never been included in systematic cross-national public opinion samples. Nearly all missing countries are small-island states in the Pacific and Indian Oceans and nearly all missing subnational units are either Arctic or desert regions. As a result, the very places that are most at risk of climate change are also the places whose opinions about the climate crisis have been the least considered. The preferences and perceptions of publics in these threatened small-island states and territories are critical for developing successful climate adaptation and resilience efforts in vulnerable regions and for playing a pivotal role in international climate governance. 

Key Findings and Proposed Solutions

  • We found near-universal acceptance of human-caused climate change, ranging from a low of 89% in Anguilla to 100% in Marshall Islands, Turks and Caicos.

  • Large majorities in every country or territory we surveyed were worried about their personal vulnerability to climate impacts, including extreme weather, sea-level rise, and coastal erosion.

  • Climate-vulnerable residents perceive that residents of rich countries will also be impacted by climate change, seeing the problem as universal not particularly severe for their countries

  • Respondents generally favor an “all-hands-on-deck” approach to the climate crisis, with responsibility for solving climate change falling on major historical and present emitters, as well as former colonial powers and home-country governments.