Apocalyptic Authoritarianism

In Apocalyptic Authoritarianism, media scholar Hanna E. Morris reveals how national anxieties following the 2016 presidential election have shaped American news coverage of climate change in ways that severely limit how it has come to be known, imagined, and contended with. Looking at climate change reporting across ideologically diverse U.S. news media outlets over the past decade, the book traces how media creates an illusion of control in the present through nostalgic and heroic stories of the past. Morris identifies a new mode of reactionary politics called "apocalyptic authoritarianism" to describe the post-2016 alignment of historically privileged figures united by a common enemy of the "new" New Left and a shared appeal to fears of "total crisis." Ultimately, Morris calls for a robust and inclusive form of climate journalism and politics to set the nation on a path toward democratic and equitable responses to the climate crisis.