Between 2018-2020, there was a significant surge in climate activism across the globe, particularly in Europe, Australia, and North America, characterised by groups like Extinction Rebellion (XR) and Fridays for Future (FFF). While the structure of this mobilisation has been well covered within the literature, the full extent of the movement’s impact remains an area of interest for scholars of climate communication, and climate politics. Existing climate communication literature has explored the contemporary climate movement’s use of apocalyptic discourses and crisis temporalities, yet there has been little examination of how this rhetoric of urgency intersects with frameworks of security, despite its similarity to the securitised climate discourse of the late 2000s. This is an important gap, as securitised climate discourses have been theorised as both a motivating force for climate action, and a barrier to experimentation and equitable climate adaptation, for example due to the risk of depoliticisation. This thesis addresses that gap, exploring the campaign discourse of UK climate activism between 2018-2020 using a multimodal critical discourse analysis of the climate campaigning websites of XR, The UK School Climate Network (UKSCN), and Friends of the Earth (FoE), and assessing the extent to which these groups utilise securitising discourses in their public-facing material. The results indicate that the climate communication of the 2018-2020 wave significantly utilised discourses of security, by establishing activists as securitising actors, by emphasising threats and vulnerabilities associated with climate change, and by constructing a securitised, emergency scenario which foreclosed uncertainty and hesitation. This results in a justification and legitimisation of exceptional behaviour both by themselves as campaigners – in the form of disruptive protests - and by the institutional powers they called to act – in swift, radical and authoritative policymaking. While the literature suggests that securitisation can depoliticise a conversation and remove politics and justice from the policy debate (Fischendler, 2015), there is evidence that some climate protest groups used the window of opportunity provided by the COVID-19 pandemic to begin constructing new future imaginaries. This suggests that policymakers may be able to actively collaborate with climate activists and local communities to ensure climate policies are responsive to the crisis, but grounded in the needs and perspectives of those most affected by it, leading to wider public acceptance.
“Humanity is waging war on nature”: Security narratives and securitisation in UK climate campaigning discourse between 2018-2020
Kilpatrick, F. (Author). Mar 2026
Student thesis: Doctoral Thesis