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In this photo taken Friday Oct. 10, 2014, a dilapidated rice box, normally used to control the flow of water between two rice fields, sits idle on a field that has been fallowed due to the drought, near Davis, Calif.

AP

News - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Climate Change: Voters Will Be Hot Under the Collar by 2099

| October 26, 2016

By 2099 the nature of democratic politics could change in costly ways for politicians because of climate change, according to Nick Obradovich, research fellow with Harvard Kennedy School’s Science, Technology, and Public Policy program. Leveraging a century’s worth of political science research, he predicts in an article in Springer’s journal Climatic Change that voters’ disgruntlement about the societal effects of climatic extremes and weather-related disasters they experience will translate into more frequent turnover of political parties elected in and out of office, and will keep politicians of especially warmer, poorer countries more on their toes than is currently the case.