When private meets public: young people and political consumerism in the name of environmental activism

ABSTRACT

This paper explores how Australian youth climate activists experiencing ecoanxiety overcome obstacles and frustrations in their climate action initiatives by exercising meaningful political agency in the marketplace. It briefly outlines how their concerns about climate change inaction galvanised and continue to drive their engagement in climate politics, reflecting fears and anxieties about their own and the planet’s future. Despite this growing interest and engagement in climate politics, however, the efficacy of political consumerism as a strategy, particularly among young people, remains largely unexplored [Micheletti, M. 2010. Political Virtue and Shopping Individuals, Consumerism, and Collective Action. New York: Palgrave Macmillan], with limited research on their consumption habits and behaviours [Kyroglou, G., and M. Henn. 2022. “Young Political Consumers between the Individual and the Collective: Evidence from the UK and Greece.” Journal of Youth Studies 25 (6): 833–853. https://doi.org/10.1080/13676261.2021.2012139]. Thus, this paper investigates how young activists in the study, despite their vulnerabilities and experiences of ecoanxiety, endeavour to address structural imbalances linked to climate change through political consumerist initiatives. Utilising in-depth interviews and a photo-elicitation exercise with ten participants aged 18–35, the 2022 Australian study examines youth activism and the interplay between political consumption, views on hope and sustainable lifestyle choices. It reveals that environmentally conscious consumption patterns such as buycotting, boycotting, engaging in discursive actions, and embracing lifestyle politics that young activists engage in serve as a source of hope for them.

KEYWORDS:

• Young people
• political consumerism
• environmental activism
• climate change
• ecoanxiety

Introduction

There has been growing academic interest in young people’s increased engagement in environmental politics and innovative change efforts, including unconventional political activism (Pickard 2019). This includes political consumerism, where the marketplace becomes an arena for politics (Micheletti 2017), such as buycotting and product boycotting as a response to ecoanxiety (Albrecht 2011). Despite heightened involvement, little is known about why political consumerism appeals to this age group (Micheletti 2010), and the activism initiatives inherent in their political consumerism remain understudied (Kyroglou and Henn 2022). This paper explores political consumerism through consumption behaviours, specifically the relationship between ecoanxiety and the political agency exercised by young climate activists aged 18–35 in Australia.

Several studies provide context for youth activism and climate change in Australia. Colvin and Jotzo (2021) examine climate policy dynamics, noting stronger pro-climate attitudes among younger generations, predicting increased support for climate action over time. Hohenhaus (2023) highlight youth-led climate activism amid escalating natural disasters, emphasising legal avenues for advocacy while identifying conservative media as obstacles. They also advocate for reviewing laws restricting protest to enhance youth engagement. Hilder and Collin (2022) emphasise the Australian Youth Climate Coalition's (AYCC) prominence in fostering youth engagement over fifteen years, and recent surveys reaffirm young Australians’ significant concern about climate change and their active involvement in addressing it (Arnot 2023; Salguero, Bogueva, and Marinova 2024).

Globally, there is considerable transdisciplinary scholarship about the determinants of increasing ecoanxiety driving unprecedented numbers of young people to gather, share their feelings and anxieties and fight for the planet (Boulianne, Lalancette, and Ilkiw 2020; Ojala 2018). However, these and other scholars also argue that prioritising ecoanxiety individualises the burden of climate change (Hickman 2021) and fails to investigate what young people experience as citizen-consumers. Young activists practising citizen-consumerism employ strategies like buycotting, boycotting, discursive actions, and lifestyle politics (Stolle et al. 2010), which orient purchasing power to support products that meet ethical standards, such as Fair Trade, sustainability or cruelty-free principles, rewarding the brands and corporations behind products that meet these specifications. Conversely, they boycott products, brands or companies that misrepresent or don’t meet socially conscious standards.

While the efficacy of these strategies is contested, being a critical citizen-consumer is one dimension by which individuals embrace a more political identity through their discursive actions and lifestyle politics (Ward 2008). The paper, therefore, explores the relationship between the ecoanxiety young activists experience and political consumerism and finds that despite feeling overwhelmed by climate change and their energy for activism being fragile, young activists in this study seek to change existing systems by adopting environmentally conscious consumption patterns, and these strategies provide a source of hope for them.

Climate grievances, ecoanxiety and youth-led activism beyond the scope of conventional politics

The global engagement of young people participating in climate change movements (like Fridays For Future) highlights their climate change concerns and dissatisfaction with climate action (O’Brien, Selboe, and Hayward 2018; Pickard 2019). Young people's grievances about climate change inaction have mobilised and continue to drive their participation in climate politics, reflecting their fears and anxieties about their and the planet's future. Termed ecoanxiety (Albrecht 2011), their fear and anxiety are often expressed as a lack of hope, evident when young people describe feeling overwhelmed by the magnitude of climate change and disempowered as citizens and consumers (Marlon 2019; Ojala 2018), which impede their ability to fulfil hopes and aspirations for the future (Ojala 2012a; Sanson and Bellemo 2021).

The effect of these anxieties has been debated within the field. Some scholars have found that one consequence of this ecological anxiety is that the overwhelming burden of climate change causes young people to disengage from living sustainably (Ojala 2018, 2022; Sanson and Bellemo 2021). Others suggest that ecoanxiety drives protest. Critical to both positions, however, is that climate change anxieties, frequently reinforced through social and economic precarity and the disproportionate effect these represent for their futures, personalise climate grievances specifically for young people. Ontological security is disrupted by climate change, accounting for the existential anxieties many young people experience associated with this phenomenon (Ojala 2021; Pihkala 2020). Furthermore, young people’s climate anxiety is rooted in perceptions of betrayal by governments that are too slow to act and adults by whom they feel abandoned (Hickman 2021). For example, Antadze (2018) notes a ‘politics of apathy’ (ibid: p. 45) -‘ignorance, non-response, and non-action toward climate change’ (ibid: p. 45) – that dominates politics (expressed through choices and priorities implemented by institutions) which have ‘dire long-term consequences’ (ibid: p. 45).

Pickard (2019) identifies that young people instead engage in a range of protest repertoires beyond the scope of conventional politics, given their lack of trust in traditional political institutions (Allerbeck, Jennings, and Rosenmayr 1979; Monticelli 2021). Pickard (2019) has labelled these initiatives ‘Do it Ourselves’ DIO politics, which include everyday sustainability practices in the private sphere (Boulianne, Lalancette, and Ilkiw 2020; Pickard 2019) and young people’s engagement in climate campaigns and movements. Additionally, there are forms of privatised-public dissent, initiatives where young people’s private consumption behaviours interface with the public realm of the marketplace (Marshall 2016) as political consumerism (Micheletti 2017). Buycotting, boycotting, and lifestyle politics (Stolle, Berlin, and Micheletti 2010) channel individual consumer power toward collective public concerns, giving those engaging in these behaviours a sense of meaning, agency and empowerment (generating hope).

Political consumerism blurs the boundaries between citizenship and consumerism, as individuals enact their political agency through consumption behaviours and patterns, directing it toward collective public issues (Kyroglou and Henn 2017). In their everyday consumption practices and longer-term financial choices, the marketplace becomes a platform where young people exercise political agency and reconcile the obstacles and frustrations they encounter in their activist initiatives. Exploring the study participants’ political engagement revealed how these young activists exploit the overlapping relationship between their consumption behaviour and the public realm of the marketplace to create an access point for political dissent (Marshall 2016).

In their paper examining the capacity of young people as change agents for sustainable living, Fien and colleagues (2008) argue that political consumerism is a robust strategy for climate activism, noting that consumption is a defining characteristic of contemporary societies that significantly impact the environment and society; that the emergence of postmaterial values and the possibility for sustainable consumption offer choices beyond conventional lifestyles; and that there is the opportunity for young people to develop skills in challenging the influences that promote mindless consumption. Micheletti (2010) expands on the potential of political consumerism by discussing ‘politics behind products’ (Micheletti 2010). Activism of this kind involves privatised-public dissent because it ‘embodies the public world of things and the private individual’s decisions as a consumer, as that person makes meaning through her or his actions around those goods’ (Marshall 2016, 232). Participants’ philosophies about sustainable living are especially apparent in their expressions of anti-consumerism. They echo other research on young people engaged in climate activism who ‘question the prevailing logic of forever-higher-faster-further-more and derive great pleasure from energy saving, climate control, sharing, gifting, and rejecting packaging’ (Aljets and Ebinger 2016, 6).

More recently, Kyroglou and Henn (2022) report that although the rise in young people’s political interest and engagement resulting from their environmental concerns and cosmopolitan values is well-noted, their political consumerism initiatives remain understudied. Despite the insufficiency of research into young people and political consumerism as a strategic political response to ecoanxiety, a study involving 634 young people aged 18–29 from Greece and the UK in 2018 revealed that an environmentally responsible lifestyle is one of the critical motivations for political consumption measures like buycotting and boycotting (Kyroglou and Henn 2022).

However, several scholars have also drawn attention to the limitations or weaknesses of political consumerism. Stolle and Huissoud (2018) warn about the undemocratic nature of political consumerism, noting that it can also be used to‘spread hatred, pit groups against each other, and practice exclusion’ (ibid: p. 625). Boström, Micheletti, and Oosterveer (2018) also points out how political consumerism can promote and institutionalise practices that discriminate and marginalise socially and economically disadvantaged groups. For example, the White Sugar and Buy Australian-Made campaigns in early-20th- century Australia (Affeldt 2018), the Nazi-led campaigns boycotting Jewish businesses in the 1930s and 1940s (Stolle and Huissoud 2018), the Klu Klux Klan’s twentieth-century comprehensive boycott programme as a form of racial terrorism (Stolle and Huissoud 2018), and the 2015 boycott halal campaign in England (Lekakis 2018) are all examples.

This article takes its lead from these debates, focusing on political consumerism to explore its role in meeting activist objectives for climate protection, considering its response to ecoanxiety and its effect on pro-environmental behaviour, hope and well-being. While hope is recognised as a positive motivational force for pro-environmental behaviour (Ojala 2012a), its connection to political consumerism is underexplored in the literature. This is despite the acknowledgement of the potential of hope inherent in consumer politics by the former Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP):

Consumers are increasingly interested in the world that lies behind the product they buy. Apart from price and quality, they want to know how, where and who has produced the product. This increasing awareness about environmental and social issues is a sign of hope (Fien, Neil, and Bentley 2008, 52).

Methodology

The research¹ employed a multi-stage qualitative design to investigate young people's views on climate action, eco-anxiety, and hope as drivers for political engagement and future goals. Ten participants were purposefully recruited for the study² from university groups and Australian youth-led climate organisations, including the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC) and Extinction Rebellion (XR) (2024) Australia, through repeat advertising circulated among their memberships.

Despite an initial focus on ages 18–29, two participants aged 30 and 32 convincingly argued that the upper age limit should be raised due to their relevance as youth climate activists and recent post-doctoral students, reflecting the prolonged transition to adulthood. The revised age group 18–35 was chosen to capture the complexities of emerging adulthood, characterised by delayed transitions in education, work, and independence, as noted in literature by EGRIS (2001), Furlong (2019), Farrugia (2023), Pickard (2019), and Blatterer (2009). These young people also comprise an age group who, as well as their experience of a more protracted and non-linear phase in the life course, are vulnerable to the social and economic precarity experienced by their generation (Bessant, Farthing, and Watts 2017; Standing 2011). The ten young activists recruited participated in fieldwork that occurred between April and July 2022. Table 1 outlines the participants’ activism experience, age, gender, and location. The participants actively engaged in climate politics provided insights into their experiences of empowerment, hope, and concerns about their future amidst social and economic precarity. Furthermore, they represent stakeholders who will inherit the consequences of climate inaction.

Table 1. Study participants.

Pseudonymn	Pronouns	Age	Activism Experience
Luke	He/His	30	University-based climate action; Extinction Rebellion; climate change rallies; environmental conservation, wildlife rescue; bush regeneration, beach cleans; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.^4
Charlie	He/His	23	University-based climate action; climate change rallies; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Kelly	She/Her	32	University-based climate action; Extinction Rebellion; climate change rallies; environmental conservation, wildlife rescue; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Isabelle	She/Her	28	University-based climate action; Extinction Rebellion; climate change rallies; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Aaron	He/His	25	Vegan Activism; climate change rallies; climate change informal community information and education; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Gary	He/His	27	Vegan activism; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Robyn	She/Her	27	Sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Violet	They/Them	22	Extinction Rebellion; civil disobedience actions; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Cathy	She/Her	18	Extinction Rebellion; climate change rallies; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.
Ollie	He/She/They	23	Extinction Rebellion; climate change rallies; bush regeneration; sustainable living practices; financialised decisions.

Participants were recruited from four provinces across Australia: New South Wales (5), Queensland (1), Victoria (1) and Western Australia (3). All but one of the participants have or are working toward a higher degree qualification, several of which are related to climate science, including PhDs in Biological Science and Research Masters Degrees in Natural Science. Several are involved in citizen science movements, and many participants lead a committed vegan lifestyle.

The fieldwork involved two stages. The Stage 1 In-depth interviews explored the dimensions of young activists’ ecoanxiety, the nature of their climate activism, obstacles encountered, and the role of hope in motivating or sustaining climate activism engagement.

At the initial interview, the participants were asked about their interest in keeping a photo diary of their sustainability practices, which comprised Stage 2 of the study. This stage provided information about the everyday sustainability practices participants chose to share (like recycling, using keep cups and alternatives to plastic, composting, op-shopping and veganism) and insight into their feelings of frustration, disempowerment, inefficacy and an indication of whether hope was evident in the climate activism strategy or outcomes. Participants were asked to focus their photo diaries on what they felt the most and least empowered by and hopeful about in their sustainable living practices. They kept the photo diary for approximately two weeks, after which time was spent with the participants in a follow-up interview, where they discussed the photographs, why they were taken, and how each related to themes of empowerment and hope in their daily lives.

This method offered a discreet means of witnessing young participants’ sustainability practices in daily life. They directly shared sustainable living experiences, detailing obstacles to engagement, (dis)empowerment, and the influence of hope (or lack thereof) in their daily routines. Particularly within these discussions, the significance of political consumerism as a political strategy and source of hope emerged.

Findings

The findings address two key themes: an illustration of the ecoanxiety participants’ experience that drives and sustains their involvement in climate politics and an outline of their engagement in three modes of activism (public, private, and political consumerism). The first two modes, public and private activism, are discussed briefly to develop an understanding of their scope and to set a context for the key focus of this paper, political consumerism.

1. ) Ecoanxiety as motivation

Before exploring how young activists engage in environmental activism, it is crucial to understand why they become involved in climate politics and what continues to drive this participation. This motivation also offers insight into whether the participants evaluated their activism's effectiveness in bringing change or instilling hope to sustain their commitment. The participants’ grievances about climate change and their involvement in climate politics reflected their fears and anxieties about their and the planet’s future. Luke shared his distress about climate change when he said,

The whole system is collapsing, and it’s pretty hopeless. It’s a planetary issue. There is no point in wasting time fighting these local issues because climate change is global. So, I don’t know how not to have ecoanxiety.

Luke’s comment illustrates the emotions intrinsic to ecoanxiety, including hopelessness, frustration and despair, reflecting a belief that the planet has no future (Burke, Sanson, and Van Hoorn 2018; Ojala 2012b; Sanson and Bellemo 2021; Sanson and Burke 2020). When asked about remaining hopeful in the face of a forecasted twenty-year expiration of the planet, Cathy responded, ‘I’ve been given many different time frames from many different sources, but I would probably give it less time.’

Feelings of hopelessness were frequently described as a diminished sense of agency and meaning in life, manifesting as fatigue borne of disempowerment. Kelly expressed this experience as a citizen-consumer trying to live sustainably,

But then you look around, and when you start feeling like the balance of your mental health tapers into depression, it's like, is there any point even trying to get the majority of people to behave sustainably?

Ecological grief was another emotional aspect of ecoanxiety, with some participants speaking about prioritising seeing species they expect to become extinct in their lifetime. At the same time, Charlie revealed, ‘It's just quite depressing to know that the nature I was privileged to be a part of in my youth won't be a thing as time continues’. This remark typifies expressions of grief that study participants shared in response to climate-related disruption. Albrecht (2011) uses solastalgia to describe this anguish or desolation that individuals experience through the awareness that where they live is incurring incessant physical ruin.

During the interviews, the feelings of hopelessness, frustration, and grief sometimes gave way to moral outrage and anger at injustices participants attributed to social inaction in response to environmental degradation, exemplified in the words of Aaron,

What's the purpose of this [farming] land? It's here to facilitate the killing of animals. Not only that, but this land was also taken from the original owners and doesn't look anything like it used to look; all the trees have been cut down to facilitate grazing land for animals that were involuntarily shipped from across the world to Australia. This is pretty messed up on several axes, like animal rights, obviously, and the invasion of Australia, but also, the environment was utterly ravaged to make room for a monocrop of grass that sheep ate. That's not sustainable at all.

Beyond expressing justifiable anger for violating the rights of the traditional owners of Australia, Aaron shared feeling morally affronted by the subsequent inhumane treatment of human and non-human inhabitants and the poor stewardship of natural resources. Although ecoanxiety literature acknowledges outrage (and anger), the specific function of this outrage is often under-examined (Pihkala 2020). In this context, the observation is that moral outrage (as Aaron’s comment demonstrates) triggers a valid emotional reaction to climate injustice that may contribute to climate action (Antadze 2020).

Moral outrage is also a sufficiently robust emotional response to motivate collective action (Pickard and Bessant 2018), being an action-orienting response that displaces anxiety (Antadze 2020). This is exemplified by Ollie, a Western Australian activist, who articulates, ‘I would say that I have been radicalised by Woodside³ building the Burrup Hub. That’s just gone a step too far for me. And now I’m furious. The rage was overcome by despair before, but the rage is pretty strong now’. Participants from Western Australia, including Ollie, directed their outrage at large ‘mining’ companies (notably Woodside Energy), which have their headquarters locally. Social movement research acknowledges that mobilisation intensifies when activists direct moral outrage they cultivate toward a specific target held responsible for injustice (Antadze 2020), for instance, Woodside Energy Group Ltd.

These expressions of ecoanxiety reiterate that climate change is a direct threat to humanity's survival. However, in addition to despair and hopelessness, the participants in this study also expressed this anxiety as anger and moral outrage. For the participants, the current situation raises ethical questions about lifestyle choices and their relationship to other humans, non-humans, and the natural world. Given the dire scientific forecasts for the planet's future, it also challenges individuals to evaluate the weight of pro-environmental behaviour and activism.

b)	Responding to ecoanxiety: Public and private activism

The range of ecoanxiety emotions shared by participants represented critical emotional resources to energise and advance their climate activism. Their participation in diverse forms of political dissent and their commitment to day-to-day private sustainability practices implied a presumption of agency, that change is possible and, thus, of hope – the ability to ‘imagine a different future’ (O’Brien, Selboe, and Hayward 2018).

Young people’s public activism refers to their involvement with climate politics in the public domain. Besides functioning as a political strategy, participants in this study described how their public activism engages them in collectives that provide ontological security by immersing them in something bigger than themselves. They derived meaning from personal feelings of efficacy and empowerment and the hope these emotions generate. For example, Aaron stated,

most of the public activism I engage in now is talking with people about veganism … I find my everyday discussions with people are the most helpful for informing and encouraging others, more so than anything else I do.

The interviews also revealed the diversity in young people’s climate activism. Participants, for instance, engaged in activism on a smaller, less formal community scale that educates and raises awareness, such as those aimed at resisting dominant norms and practices related to the climate and sustainable living, to participation in large-scale climate protests, for example, rallies organised by the FridaysForFuture (FFF Fridays For Future 2024) and ClimateStrike (SS4C School strike 2024 climate Australia 2024) movements. Many also spoke about affiliations with other direct-action groups like XR Australia (2024). As well as being a forum for action, involvement in these groups was discussed as fostering a sense of collective effervescence that unites like-minded individuals when they gather (Durkheim [1912] 1915, in Pickard 2019). Luke summarised these experiences, saying,

That's when I feel like what I'm doing matters. I think it's just being around other people with the same belief system. In our everyday lives, we are disconnected. But those moments together, you feel like, actually, maybe it does matter because other people seem to think so, too.

The young activists spoke of peaceful protest participation, including civil disobedience initiatives. These included engaging in protest art like dance performances and peaceful flash mobs and direct action and civil disobedience initiatives, including disruptions and disturbances involving participants chaining or padlocking themselves to objects or each other or supergluing themselves to surfaces. While several participants said that their public activism offered a sense of camaraderie and hope, participants also articulated the doubt and insecurity that persists beyond group activism initiatives, like Charlie, who said, ‘and for a day, you feel great, and the next day is pretty good. But the next week … nothing’s changed, and everyone’s stopped talking about it.’

Many climate change scholars recognise that system change is dependent on individuals transcending dominant norms and lifestyles that perpetuate the consequences of ‘business as usual’ (Bohman 2007; Barry 2012; O’Loughlin and Gillespie 2012; Song 2012; Crayton 2014; O’Brien, Selboe, and Hayward 2018). For example, dissension from fossil fuel use and consumption practices that pollute and increase biodiversity loss affects how individuals live their daily lives. This private activism was captured in the photo diaries provided by the participants, which recorded their endeavours to live sustainably and authentically according to their climate values, beliefs, and personal goals (Pickard 2019). Although the perception that not all lifestyle practices (particularly simple sustainability measures) are equally effective (and some participants, therefore, are almost wholly focused on their public activism) emerged as a prominent theme, most participants engage in some degree of everyday climate politics through lifestyle measures. Aaron, for example, in describing his everyday reuse, renew and recycle activities, commented, ‘These habits are just so ingrained in how I live my life now that when I do them, I’m not doing a sustainability practice, it’s just what I do.’ A diversity of private sustainability practices were described, including reusing environmentally friendly products such as using keep cups and alternatives to plastic, composting, cycling, beach cleaning, community vegetable gardening, op-shopping and veganism. For example, Kelly stated, ‘I can't remember when we last used a plastic bag at the supermarket; it's just not a thing. While these practices seem trivial, the consequences of simple choices cumulatively challenge dominant practices around fossil fuel use and unsustainable consumption practices, which several participants blame for climate change’s widespread and enduring global consequences.

Participants in the study committed to varying degrees of engagement dependent on factors like availability of information, services, support and space for recycling; the degree of moral responsibility (and guilt) they experience when they do not recycle; and feelings of hopelessness and inefficacy about the value of their efforts to make a difference. Several participants shared their frustrations and obstacles or the pessimism they experienced in response to generalised social apathy about sustainability. Aaron demonstrates this in his comment:

Sometimes it's too hard. What's the point? It's abundantly clear that so many people are not thinking about these things. I'm just going to put these batteries in the bin; I can't go to Officeworks and recycle them. But it also makes me want to try harder because I want to be someone trying to make the world a better place. And even if that seems impossible, in the current political climate, you've got to do it. For me, there's no other option.

Despite the feelings of ecoanxiety experienced by participants, suggesting the frailty of emotional energy for activism, the participants nonetheless remained engaged in both public and private activism. However, the participants also described that political consumerism complements their public and private activism by filling in gaps and responding to limitations they experience in these spheres. In the next section, these measures are explored, outlining how participants acknowledge the limitations of different forms of political consumerism and how they also provide a sense of efficacy and empowerment.

c)	Political consumerism

Political consumerism characterises how citizen-consumers and political activists use their agency to shift the economic value of goods and services by appealing to the broader consuming public (Marshall 2016). The marketplace becomes a platform where they exercise political agency and reconcile the obstacles and frustrations they encounter in their public and private initiatives. Stolle and Micheletti (2013) argue that the declining trust in government bodies and increased demand for solutions to complex issues results in a reconfigured framework for political responsibility to individualised responsibility-taking, political consumerism being one key mode of this individualised responsibility-taking (Stolle and Micheletti 2013). Gary notes, ‘As a consumer, the one power we have within this capitalist system is that we can vote with our dollar’.

The participants discussed four forms of political consumerism: buycotts, boycotts, discursive actions and lifestyle politics. Each is discussed in turn.

i)	Buycotting (positive political consumerism)

Buycotting involves the preferential use of products and services for sustainable purposes (Kyroglou and Henn 2017). This is a form of positive political consumerism, where individuals deliberately strive to promote purchasing particular brands (Micheletti 2010). Although buycotting doesn’t have the mobilising impact of more protest-oriented styles of political consumerism, most participants shared how they changed to environmental products integral to more sustainable lifestyles, exemplified by Kelly’s description of personal hygiene products:

We use biodegradable and refillable deodorant. The same goes for toothbrushes. They’re bamboo, and you can replace the heads. It all comes in recyclable and compostable packaging. We also stopped using bottled shampoo three or four years ago; we use shampoo bars … we’ve never looked back.

The commitment to purchase sustainable products expressed in Kelly’s comment demonstrates how consumer behaviour moves activism from intimate practices in the private sphere to acts of dissent as they increase demand for these products in the public marketplace through, for example, the call for product labelling that accurately reflects production processes (Stolle and Micheletti 2013). Labelling scheme demands can be problematic because corporate actors may be reluctant to cooperate; labelling is often not required for products (shoes, clothing), and it is only more expensive items that are labelled (Stolle and Micheletti 2013). Furthermore, several participants were sceptical about how products are deceptively marketed as environmentally friendly (greenwashing) by many companies to capitalise on the increased profitability of green consumerism, exemplified in the remark by Luke,

Companies have picked up on climate change and environmentalism, but they have not addressed anything; they've done the bare minimum with a bit of greenwashing. On their packaging, it says ‘recyclable – this cardboard was made with a recycled product’ or something like that, and they continue doing whatever they want and then make a token effort or write something that sounds positive on a box. And that's how they appease the customers who want environmental change.

Luke’s comment about the subsequent diminishing effect of greenwashing on young people’s political consumerism initiatives, which they anticipate will compel companies toward more sustainable manufacturing processes and practices, reveals exasperation and anger.

• ii) Boycotting (negative political consumerism)

Boycotting involves individuals choosing not to purchase specific products and brands (Kyroglou and Henn 2017; Micheletti 2010). The basis for many of the choices participants made was their awareness of environmentally unfriendly production processes, transport and investments associated with specific companies, products, and unsustainably sourced components. Gary said, ‘I do my best not to support companies like Nestlé. I guess the point is I take my power, the little power I have as a consumer, very seriously.’ Luke and Kelly also take their consumer power seriously by boycotting all bottled water products and products that are not Rainforest Alliance certified (Rainforest Alliance 2024).

Like buycotting, boycotting also impacts outcomes in the marketplace; however, participants’ decisions to boycott unsustainable products or services negatively affect marketplace demand. Boycotts can also be harmful in ways that disadvantage unintended others; for example, they may threaten worker’s livelihoods in targeted companies, send discordant messages to corporate elites such as the longstanding Disney boycott (Micheletti 2010), struggle to demobilise supporters following action cessation, and cross-corporate ownership makes targeting specific organisations difficult (Stolle and Micheletti 2013).

• iii) Discursive political consumerism

Stolle and Micheletti (2013) define discursive political consumerism as ‘the expression of opinions about corporate policy and practice in communicative efforts directed at business, the public at large, family and friends, and various political institutions’ (ibid: p. 1359). As a strategy, discursive political consumerism is concerned with impacting the reputation of a business rather than endorsing or penalising financial transactions (Park 2018). For example, during the interviews, participants expressed strong concerns about a perceived lack of government regulation that allows big corporations (like energy and mining conglomerates) to exhaust non-renewable resources and perpetuate environmental degradation. Like, Gary who said,

If we allow the free market to continue, these oil billionaires will continue to pay off their politicians in the US; they will continue to ruin the earth simply so that the number goes up. And they're not motivated by anything other than profit and greed.

Gary expressed the sentiment of several others that, apart from voting, financialised decisions have the most significant impact on government and large corporations. All participants spoke about choosing banks and superannuation funds aligned with their values, beliefs, and personal goals regarding environmental sustainability. This also included discussing their choices with friends and acquaintances as a political strategy. For example, while most participants discussed selecting institutions that did not invest in fossil fuels but in renewable energy options, several participants also said they actively inform and encourage others to boycott institutions (like banks and superannuation funds) with environmentally unfriendly profit-driven goals while supporting those whose profit motives are sustainability-oriented.

Reference to scientific rationality and evidence in investment decisions provide a basis for the participant’s decisions, creating a sense of efficacy, empowerment, and, thus, hope. Aaron stated,

We need to radically shift the system we construct around ourselves if we want to inhabit a rich and satisfying world that will not be rapidly destroyed. At the same time, we exist within these systems. So, switching to a bank or super is something that you can do. Ideally, these decisions wouldn't be at the behest of the individuals making them, but you can make them as a consumer. It comes down to neoliberalism putting pressure on individuals to make these changes because the big corporations and the governments of the world aren't doing it as they should be. It's worth acknowledging, too, that these things evoke an emotional response, often frustration, anger, or exhaustion.

The shift from a framework for political responsibility to individualised responsibility-taking is implicit in Aaron’s expression of the burden individuals assume on behalf of governments to ensure the companies they invest with abide by environmental, social, moral and ethical standards of conduct. The burden imposed on individuals because of reduced or ineffective government intervention was expressed further by Gary, who said,

While our actions can make a difference, there's a danger of putting too much individual responsibility on consumers and not on the political action needed to ensure our governments and large multinational corporations are shifting towards renewables. You know, I can't stand these neo-libs who say, ‘The consumer will do everything; the free market will dictate.’ Well, no, the free market will not!

The power imbalance between governments, large corporations and citizen-consumers within a free-market system that necessitates greater individualised responsibility-taking is evident in these remarks. These factors, which impede young people's pathways and goals, account for the frustration experienced by the participants and frequently lead to feelings of inefficacy and disempowerment, characteristic of ecoanxiety. However, despite feeling frustrated, isolated, and overwhelmed by this burden of responsibility, these strategies of political consumerism provided them with viable options through which they could experience a sense of efficacy and hope. Their lifestyle politics also exemplify this commitment to climate change that bears witness to hope.

• iv) Lifestyle Politics

Lifestyle politics describes the consistent and conscious alignment of private sphere consumption choices with political values (Stolle, Berlin, and Micheletti 2010). Stolle and Micheletti (2013) describe lifestyle politics as a dedicated commitment to principles across diverse societal roles that demand the simultaneous practice of the other three forms of political consumerism. For example, vegetarians and vegans demonstrate different forms of political consumerism by rejecting meat products (boycotting), buying vegetarian/vegan labelled products (buycotting), discussing their choices and reasons with others (discursive political consumerism), and adapting their whole lifestyle to reflect their beliefs (lifestyle politics) (Stolle and Micheletti 2013). The decision to transition to a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle for environmental, ethical and animal welfare reasons was prominent for many participants, like Gary, who declared,

My climate activism is inextricably linked with my veganism. I went vegan about six years ago. As a non-vegan, I watched debates online, just interested in the actual philosophical arguments for the lifestyle, and I was compelled. I went vegan pretty much overnight because the arguments all made sense. Just the amount of land clearing, the crops that are explicitly grown to feed animals, you know, when we could easily feed the entire planet and reduce our carbon footprint significantly if we all went vegan. That's unfortunately likely not to occur.

Gary’s comment demonstrates how personal sustainable choices like vegetarianism and veganism have broader resonance, potentially impacting wider public consumption practices. As individuals and within wider communities that make climate-friendly food choices, young activists can exercise their political agency to bear on companies that use animal products. For example, beef-free mince and the multitude of plant-based milk alternatives available exemplify the increased demands of emerging vegan (and vegetarian) lifestyles, discussed by young activists in the study.

As noted, Stolle and Micheletti’s (2013) explanation of lifestyle politics reflects discursive pollical consumerism, buycotting and boycotting. They discuss lifestyle and political consumerism developments, like simplicity, slow food, and Buy Nothing Day (Stolle and Micheletti 2013). However, study participants only spoke about simplicity, consuming less, and engaging with other forms of political consumerism. Several participants spoke in a disgruntled manner about endless consumerism and free-market capitalism; for example, Luke argued,

That’s the biggest failing of societal structure. Capitalism and consumerism have always talked about this endless, infinite growth; how did anyone ever think that was plausible when we live on a planet that is, by nature, finite? But that’s how the economy is built; we must constantly grow and increase profit … but we base everything on money. And that’s what’s cost us the planet.

Many participants echoed Luke’s grievance about consumerism, as planetary resources are finite. These feelings motivated them to make lifestyle choices that reduce their consumer footprint by only purchasing upcycled, recycled, or second-hand items. Aaron’s comment encapsulates these anti-consumerist beliefs and behaviours,

I think capitalism as a mode of consumption is antithetical to sustainability. Indicating to someone that you want them to create something new by spending your money is a poor decision when you can get so much free or second-hand through various other avenues. So that’s a pretty big one for me. I haven’t bought new clothes in five years; I get everything from op-shops.

Most participants’ views are reflected in this comment, nominating consumerist behaviour as a significant causative factor in environmental issues, challenging the prevailing logic of forever-higher-faster-further-more. Goals drive them, and they perceive their personal lives as a political statement, a project, and a mode of action (Micheletti and Stolle 2010). These everyday politicised lifestyle choices that have global implications play a crucial role in DIO politics among young people (Pickard 2019). It was apparent in participant comments that they experience a sense of efficacy and empowerment in undermining dominant norms that are complicit in maintaining unsustainable development. Furthermore, political consumerism is conceptualised as an individualised form of collective action that fosters collaborative environments, actions, and confidence (Micheletti 2010) among young people who share similar values. They are thus linked to an increased sense of efficacy, empowerment and well-being (which generate hope).

Discussion

To explore how young climate activists who experience ecoanxiety overcome obstacles and frustrations in their climate action initiatives, this paper examines how they exercise meaningful political agency in the marketplace. As mentioned previously, some researchers express concern that young people disengage from living sustainably because of the overwhelming burden of climate change (Ojala 2018, 2022; Sanson and Bellemo 2021). However, Beck (1997) regards this as the opposite of a participation decline, but rather that the everyday acts of individuals have the potential to reshape society. Stolle and Micheletti (2013) explain this as the role of active subpoliticians – citizens taking on the responsibility for risks themselves (Holzer and Sørensen 2003) – fill the void left by a lack of governmental capacity when governments struggle to manage risks in certain aspects of globalisation.

The findings presented here contribute to this scholarship and touch on two critical themes: firstly, the focus is on depicting the anxiety experienced by participants that mobilises and sustains their engagement in climate politics. Secondly, an overview of two modes of activism – public and private – is provided, and a more comprehensive exploration of the third, political consumerism, is provided.

The expressions of ecoanxiety conveyed by the study participants underscore the idea that climate change directly threatens the survival of humanity. This reality is a critical factor that prompts individuals to reflect on their lifestyle choices and their impact on other humans, non-humans, and the natural world. It also compels individuals to assess the significance of pro-environmental behaviour and activism, especially considering dire scientific forecasts for the planet's future. As explored earlier, the diverse emotions expressed by participants serve as essential emotional resources to drive and enhance their climate activism. These factors increase understanding of why young people engage in climate politics and what sustains their participation.

As demonstrated, the participants were pessimistic, overwhelmed and fatigued, suggesting that energy for activism is fragile. However, despite this frailty and their expressions of anxiety, participants demonstrated hope for change through their actions. Besides functioning as a political strategy, their public activism engaged them in collectives that provide ontological security by immersing them in something bigger than themselves. Equally, commitments to sustainable lifestyles allowed participants to live authentically according to their values. These initiatives are motivated by a range of emotions beyond anxiety and hopelessness, which include those discussed, such as anger, frustration, and grief.

However, it is noteworthy that several participants shared that the excitement and sense of community from being with like-minded others is fleeting when coupled with the persistence of unchanged systems. Moreover, most participants shared feelings of inefficacy and disempowerment when their day-to-day efforts to live sustainably were constrained by insufficient pro-environmental information and inefficient services (like recycling), companies and conglomerates that prioritise profit margins over social, moral and ethical sustainability, and governments that fail in their duty to hold these organisations and service providers accountable. These findings are significant because they help us understand why young activists choose political consumerism to complement their other initiatives.

Political consumerism not only complements young activists’ public and private activism, addressing gaps and overcoming limitations in these domains, but it also stands out as the mode of activism that provides them with a sense of efficacy and empowerment because it allows them to express their values and beliefs through their consumption decisions, influencing businesses and markets in the process. The tentative findings show that political consumerism represents a way to actively participate in developing a world that aligns with their ideals. It reflects a broader shift in young people away from a prevailing logic like forever-higher-faster-further-more toward more socially and environmentally conscious consumption behaviour.

The findings also indicate that the young activists in the study recognise the complex issues associated with environmental degradation, such as rampant forms of capitalism and the insufficiency of proper government intervention. Hence, there is a specific focus on political consumerism because, in the face of these monolithic changes, these young activists co-opt (at least from their perspectives) market-based opportunities and practices to meet their objectives for climate protection. This is also a declaration of hope.

Conclusion

This paper explores how young climate activists who experience feeling anxious and overwhelmed by climate change and who have a fragile energy for activism pursue opportunities for change within existing systems by exercising political agency in the marketplace. It offers an analysis of original data obtained through interviews and Autophotography from ten young climate activists aged 18–35 in Australia about their ecoanxiety, public and private activism initiatives and, centrally, the nexus between these, political consumerism. However, it should be noted that despite efforts in the recruitment process to ensure that young activists’ profile data was neither similar nor dissimilar, the demographic makeup of the young activists sampled showed remarkable similarity, indicating a broader study could complement these findings.

The philosophies about system change expressed by young activists in this study reflect a deep concern for the ever-increasing growth of consumerist behaviour inherent in capitalist societies and the lack of regulation by governments over organisations and conglomerates whose practices perpetuate natural resource overconsumption and biodiversity loss. Nevertheless, despite this distress, young activists demonstrate hope for a better future through politicised actions to transform existing systems by adopting environmentally conscious consumption patterns like buycotting, boycotting, discursive actions and lifestyle politics.

Despite the growing interest and participation of young people in climate politics, more research is needed on the appeal of political consumerism. Given the potential for young people to drive change by challenging thoughtless consumption and their capacity to create alternative ways of living in the world, research in this space is imperative. Exploring why young individuals embrace political consumerism as a mode of activism and examining their consumption patterns and behaviours becomes crucial in this regard.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the young activists who participated in the research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Ethics approval Macquarie University Human Research Ethics Committee 21/03/2022. Reference: 520221119737017.

2 Participants provided informed written consent prior to study commencing.

3 Perth-based independent oil and gas company, Woodside Energy, explores and produces hydrocarbons globally (Woodside, 2023). The Burrup Hub comprises projects extending Woodside's facilities on Western Australia’s Burrup Peninsula generating new energy sources (The Burrup Hub, 2022).

4 Financialised decisions prioritise marketplace investments that reflect young activists’ sustainability and social impact concerns, for example, institutions that do not invest in fossil fuels but in renewable energy options.