Poll: 65% of the French think we need to slow down innovation in the face of climate change

This arti­cle is the sec­ond episode of a two-part sur­vey con­duct­ed with Ifop in August 2022. Click here to down­load the results.

When asked about the place cur­rent­ly occu­pied by sci­ence in the major debates in soci­ety¹, most French peo­ple (56%) con­sid­er that it is “not giv­en enough space”; while 38% con­sid­er that it has nei­ther too much nor too lit­tle space. Only 6% of the French con­sid­er that sci­ence takes up too much space in these debates. In this respect, pub­lic opin­ion on this issue remains absolute­ly unchanged com­pared to 2018, i.e. before the pandemic.

How­ev­er, 82% of French peo­ple believe that pol­i­cy­mak­ers should rely more on sci­en­tists and inde­pen­dent health agen­cies to inform their deci­sions, includ­ing 20% who strong­ly agree with this state­ment. This score, although high, shows a notable drop of ‑5 points com­pared to 2018, which per­haps reflects the effects of Covid, where we have seen pub­lic author­i­ties adapt their, some­times-unpop­u­lar, deci­sions accord­ing to the opin­ion of the sci­en­tif­ic council.

While more than 7 out of 10 French peo­ple con­sid­er that polit­i­cal pro­grammes should be based more on sci­en­tif­ic stud­ies (75%, with 15% strong­ly agree­ing with this state­ment), only 33% con­sid­er that cur­rent polit­i­cal pro­grammes are based on sci­en­tif­ic stud­ies and 39% con­sid­er that sci­ence is suf­fi­cient­ly present in pub­lic debate. 

This dis­par­i­ty between the atti­tude of the French pub­lic and the real­i­ty of cur­rent polit­i­cal action in rela­tion to sci­ence is coun­tered by a strong con­cern about the instru­men­tal­i­sa­tion of sci­ence in the pub­lic debate. 73% of the French pub­lic agree with the idea that “sci­ence is being instru­men­talised in the pub­lic debate”, includ­ing 14% who are com­plete­ly con­vinced of this.

More specif­i­cal­ly, 25–34-year-olds and employ­ees below man­age­ment lev­el are once again dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly rep­re­sent­ed (78% and 81% respec­tive­ly), as are 50–64-year-olds (84%). Here again, the health cri­sis and the polit­i­cal deci­sions, which are some­times con­sid­ered author­i­tar­i­an regard­ing trav­el restric­tions, the oblig­a­tion to wear a mask, com­pul­so­ry vac­ci­na­tion, etc., in an attempt to curb the epi­dem­ic, may have con­tributed to this statement.

For the French, the con­tri­bu­tions of sci­ence are unde­ni­able, although there is a sig­nif­i­cant mis­trust of the relat­ed issue of tech­ni­cal progress.

Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, 40% of the French feel that sci­ence brings more good than harm to human­i­ty, and 45% con­sid­er that it brings as much good as harm. On the oth­er hand, 15% feel that sci­ence brings more harm than good, and this pro­por­tion has increased sig­nif­i­cant­ly since the 1980s (4% in 1989 and 6% in 1982). While there are few dif­fer­ences between cer­tain cat­e­gories of the pop­u­la­tion in terms of the per­cep­tion that sci­ence brings “more harm than good”, there are sev­er­al cleav­ages among those who feel that it brings “more good”: men (46%), res­i­dents of Île-de-France (47%), high­er edu­ca­tion grad­u­ates (63%), sup­port­ers of the left (49%), LREM (La République en Marche!)(54%) or LR (Les Républicains)(65%) are more like­ly to recog­nise the ben­e­fi­cial con­tri­bu­tion of sci­ence to human­i­ty, While women (35%), peo­ple liv­ing in the provinces (39%), non-grad­u­ates (29%), RN sup­port­ers (35%) and those with no par­ty affil­i­a­tion (28%) are under-represented.

In addi­tion to the fear of the instru­men­tal­i­sa­tion of sci­ence referred to above, the French show a cer­tain mis­trust of tech­ni­cal progress, which they strong­ly asso­ciate with sci­ence: 86% state that the pur­pose of sci­ence is to enable tech­ni­cal progress.

This dis­trust is in line with the dis­trust of pub­lic author­i­ties – and there­fore with the idea of the instru­men­tal­i­sa­tion of sci­ence – inso­far as 6 out of 10 French peo­ple say that tech­ni­cal progress serves above all to increase the pow­er of those who gov­ern. This score is up by 17 points in com­par­i­son with 1989.

The asso­ci­a­tion between tech­ni­cal progress and unem­ploy­ment also remains high among the French even though it is low­er com­pared to 1989 and the start of dein­dus­tri­al­i­sa­tion: 55% con­sid­er that tech­ni­cal progress increas­es unem­ploy­ment, com­pared to 77% in 1989, i.e. 22 points less. Here again, women, who are more affect­ed by unem­ploy­ment and have greater job inse­cu­ri­ty, are dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly rep­re­sent­ed (59% com­pared to 49% of men). Con­verse­ly, anoth­er major­i­ty of French peo­ple (53%) con­sid­er that in the long-term tech­ni­cal progress cre­ates more jobs than it elim­i­nates (+8 points com­pared to 1989), and this idea is more strong­ly defend­ed by men (61% com­pared to 45% of women) and by peo­ple liv­ing in the Île-de-France region (63% com­pared to 50% of peo­ple liv­ing in the provinces).

The French trust sci­ence when it comes to prov­ing the harm­ful effects of a prod­uct or tech­nol­o­gy, but the oppo­site is not always true.

Indeed, GM crops receive the low­est approval rat­ing (19%, of which only 3% are com­plete­ly in favour) and are also per­ceived as prod­ucts whose harm­ful­ness has been sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven by a rel­a­tive major­i­ty of French peo­ple (44%), with only 8% men­tion­ing sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven ben­e­fits, 4% who believe that there is no sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven risk, 21% who believe that nei­ther the harm­ful­ness nor the ben­e­fits have been sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven, and the remain­ing 23% who have no opinion.

Next comes 5G, for which opin­ions are divid­ed in terms of use: a slight major­i­ty (58%) are in favour, while 42% are against, includ­ing 13% who are total­ly against. Opin­ions on its harm­ful­ness are also divid­ed: 19% con­sid­er it sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven, com­pared with 16% who con­sid­er that its ben­e­fits or lack of harm­ful­ness are sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven, while the major­i­ty of respon­dents either con­sid­er that nei­ther is proven (34%) or do not know (31%).

Nuclear ener­gy has a rel­a­tive­ly high accep­tance rate (64%), even though 31% con­sid­er that it is sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven to be harm­ful. How­ev­er, here the prin­ci­ple of neces­si­ty seems to be at work. Thus, while only 8% defend the idea that the absence of risk is sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven, 19% men­tion sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven ben­e­fits (prob­a­bly the use of a decar­bonised ener­gy). How­ev­er, 19% con­sid­er that nei­ther is proven and 23% do not know.

Final­ly, the Covid-19 vac­cine and home­opa­thy have very high accep­tance rates (63% and 83% respec­tive­ly, of which 28% and 34% are very favourable) and this should be seen in the light of a benefit/risk bal­ance in favour of sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven benefits.

Nuclear ener­gy has a rel­a­tive­ly high accep­tance rate (64%), even though 31% con­sid­er that it is sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven to be harm­ful. How­ev­er, here the prin­ci­ple of neces­si­ty seems to be at work. Thus, while only 8% defend the idea that the absence of risk is sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven, 19% men­tion sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven ben­e­fits (prob­a­bly the use of a decar­bonised ener­gy). How­ev­er, 19% con­sid­er that nei­ther is proven and 23% do not know.

Final­ly, the Covid-19 vac­cine and home­opa­thy have very high accep­tance rates (63% and 83% respec­tive­ly, of which 28% and 34% are very favourable) and this should be seen in the light of a benefit/risk bal­ance in favour of sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven benefits.

These fac­tors tend to prove that the French have con­fi­dence in sci­ence when it comes to prov­ing the harm­ful­ness of a prod­uct or tech­nol­o­gy. But in the absence of a strong con­sen­sus, their atti­tude dif­fers, depend­ing on their socioe­co­nom­ic sta­tus and lev­el of knowl­edge, but also, and pri­mar­i­ly, accord­ing to gen­der. Indeed, women are large­ly dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly rep­re­sent­ed among those who are in favour of using home­opa­thy (+6 points com­pared to men and +12 points among those who are very much in favour of its use), while they are less numer­ous to declare them­selves in favour of the use of nuclear pow­er (-17 points com­pared to men), vac­cines (-18 points) or 5G (-16 points).

As both the source of the prob­lem and the vec­tor of the solu­tion, sci­ence in the 21st cen­tu­ry must address the major chal­lenge of the climate.

As we have seen, the French have great con­fi­dence in sci­ence, and this is reflect­ed in the envi­ron­men­tal field by the wide­ly shared belief that sci­en­tif­ic stud­ies make it pos­si­ble to cor­rect­ly assess the impact of human activ­i­ty on cli­mate change (81% agree with this propo­si­tion, includ­ing 18% who strong­ly agree). They there­fore believe that sci­ence can accu­rate­ly mea­sure the extent of the problem.

How­ev­er, 84% also share the view that “sci­ence has no right to do cer­tain things because it would alter nature too much”, thus shar­ing the Rabelaisian adage “sci­ence with­out con­science is but the ruin of the soul”. This opin­ion – with which 28% com­plete­ly agree –  is up by 2 points com­pared to 1989, and is main­ly held by left-wing sym­pa­this­ers (90%), who are more sen­si­tive to cli­mate issues, and by the most high­ly edu­cat­ed (86%). In this way, the French place a lim­it on sci­ence, very prob­a­bly in con­nec­tion with their envi­ron­men­tal con­cerns. It is there­fore not sur­pris­ing that after the scorch­ing sum­mer of 2022, marked by heat waves, fires, and vio­lent storms, and marked by the afore­men­tioned mis­trust of tech­ni­cal progress, two out of three French peo­ple (65%) say that human­i­ty will only over­come glob­al warm­ing if it slows down the pace of inno­va­tion and moves towards sobri­ety and “soft” or “low tech” technologies.

In con­trast, only one third of French peo­ple (35%) are con­vinced that tech­ni­cal progress will make it pos­si­ble to over­come glob­al warm­ing while pre­serv­ing the cur­rent eco­nom­ic sys­tem and the quest for growth.

Gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, the sup­port­ers of sobri­ety include sev­er­al types of pro­file: on the one hand, women (73% vs. 57% of men) who, as we have seen, are more crit­i­cal of sci­ence and tech­ni­cal progress, and over­all, French peo­ple with a poor image of sci­ence (71%), but also left-wing sym­pa­this­ers (70%) and in par­tic­u­lar EELV (“Europe Ecolo­gie Les Verts” – The Green Par­ty) (75%).