Climate Policies: How to Convince Centrist Voters and Secure Majorities?

Source: French to English Tester   Published on: 2026-04-06

Source: The Conversation – France in French (3)– By Loïc Berger, CNRS Researcher, LEM (UMR 9221), IÉSEG School of Management

In Europe, climate debates often pit two camps against each other. However, a vastinvestigationcarried out in 13 European countries tells a different story. Between support and rejection lies a decisive group: one third of voters, whose adherence depends mainly on the way policies are designed.

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Wehave questionedNearly 19,000 adults in 13 countries of the European Union (EU) on 15 climate policy proposals. Our results show that public opinion is not divided into two fixed blocs “for” and “against”. A significant portion of the population is situated in the center, in what we call the “conditional middle.” These voters are neither apathetic nor disengaged. Their opinions evolve based on the design of policies, their perceived fairness, their actual costs, and their degree of intrusion into their daily lives. Since this “conditional middle” group represents 33% of voters, their support can tip a policy towards (or away from) obtaining a majority.

Three lessons to convince swing voters

If the goal is to build sustainable majorities for climate action, the solution is not to avoid difficult policies. It is to design them well.Three lessonspractices emerge:

• Highlight individual benefits. Voters react strongly to how climate policies are designed and to the question of who pays and who benefits (and whether support for vulnerable groups is credible). A measure will be widely supported if it is perceived as advantageous to them, and rejected if it threatens their purchasing power or seems to complicate their daily lives.

• Design political instruments as levers of acceptability. Taxes, bans, subsidies, or exemptions are not mere technical tools: their design determines whether a policy will be perceived as fair, flexible, or restrictive, and whether it will gain support.

• Do not confuse noisy opposition with public opinion. A large portion of Europeans are not hardened opponents. While swing voters are often silent, they can tip a majority.

What influences the conditional environment: costs, constraints, and the policy instrument itself

This group acts primarily according to an individual cost-benefit logic.Our results) confirm it: policy design and their perceived impacts (on purchasing power, well-being, or the national economy) are the main determinants of their preferences, much more than their country of origin, attitudes, or sociodemographic profile. In other words: they do not follow an ideology, but their wallet. To win them over, it is therefore necessary to favor concrete mechanisms perceived as fair, rather than moral or collective arguments.

Let’s take the example ofautomotive policiesA: a pure and simple ban on new cars with thermal engines after 2035 faces strong resistance among swing voters, with only 15% support. But adding an exemption forsynthetic fuels, an alternative perceived as less restrictive, causes this support to jump to 42%. This example reveals a key logic: this group reacts less to the final goal of a policy than to the way it is concretely applied to their situation.

Some policies are systematically more feasible than others

Among the 15 proposals thatwe studied), support levels vary considerably. Measures imposing visible and direct costs on consumers (taxes or consumption bans) tend to encounter difficulties.

Conversely, policies presented as shared investments, subsidies, or regulations accompanied by protections for vulnerable households achieve better results.

For example, the creation of a European railway fund, intended to extend the railway network and reduce train ticket prices, enjoys broad support with 77% backing, seen as a collective investment yielding shared benefits. Conversely, the idea of a tax on beef, although aimed at encouraging more sustainable consumption habits, convinces only 11% of respondents, considered too costly on an individual level and hardly acceptable in the current economic context.

How this group can tip the majorities

People belonging to the “conditional middle” group represent a decisive electoral weight: 71% of them participated in the2024 European elections, which underscores their commitment to the democratic process. Their influence extends particularly within centrist parties, whichplay a key rolein the formation of political majorities.

If these pivotal voters, currently neutral, switched in favor of climate policies, the number of measures supported by a majority would increase substantially, rising from 4 to 10 out of 15. Thus, in the current situation where a majority of respondents support the European rail fund, the ban on private planes, mandatory insulation standards, and the tax on profits of fossil fuel companies, there would be added support for:

• a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM),

• the ban on advertisements for highly polluting products in the EU,

• the extension of the emissions trading system (EU ETS) to transport, agriculture, and heating,

• the ban on the sale of thermal engine vehicles with exemptions for synthetic fuels.

In Europe, five additional countries would then see a majority of their citizens support at least 7 of the 15 climate policies studied.

Where should the climate money go?

Swing voters show clear preferences regarding the use of climate revenues (those derived fromEU emission trading system, for example). They primarily favor adaptation projects such as investments in green technologies or low-carbon transport, seen as concrete and collective benefits. Support for the most vulnerable households, in the form of compensation measures, ranks second, as it mitigates inequalities and reinforces the social legitimacy of this funding. In contrast, assistance to workers in fossil fuel sectors threatened by the transition is considered much less of a priority.

To maximize the adherence of the “conditional middle” group, it is crucial that these revenues be allocated to uses perceived as legitimate and useful to all. Communication plays a key role here: it will be more effective if it is transparent, concrete, and focused on individual or local benefits (public services, infrastructure). For example, a message like “your contribution funds dikes to protect your region from flooding” will have a much greater impact than a generic phrase such as “your tax supports the ecological transition.” It is about showing how the measure directly improves daily life, and not simply describing its environmental or social purpose.

As the EU finalizesnew climate measures for 2040, our study shows that the ecological transition is not a matter of ideological conviction, but of design. In Europe,A silent majority is ready to act, provided that we offer her the arguments to which she will be sensitive.

Loïc Berger received funding from the European Union under the Horizon program (CAPABLE project, No. 101056891)

Thomas Epper received funding from the European Union under the Horizon programme (CAPABLE project, No. 101056891) and the National Research Agency (WIASSS project, ANR-25-CE26-4698).

Uyanga Turmunkh received funding from the European Union under the Horizon program (project CAPABLE, no. 101056891) and the National Research Agency (project ENDURA, ANR-21-CE03-0018).

–ref. Climate policies: how to convince centrist voters and obtain majorities?https://theconversation.com/politiques-climatiques-comment-convaincre-les-electeurs-centristes-et-obtenir-des-majorites-277799