{"title":"The ClimateHack: How tech entrepreneurship shapes climate action","authors":"Paula Bialski , Daniela Weinmann , Julien McHardy","doi":"10.1016/j.envsci.2025.104184","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The intersection of technological entrepreneurship and environmental activism has given rise to various approaches aimed at mitigating climate change. This paper explores how tech-driven initiatives, exemplified by the Swiss-based ClimateHack, reshape climate action through entrepreneurial practices and technological solutionism. Drawing on a collaborative ethnographic study conducted between 2022 and 2024, we examine ClimateHack’s role as both an online incubator and a cooperative that leverages agile, data-driven methods to address climate challenges, particularly focusing on Switzerland, where, despite a highly subsidized and reliable public transport system, the percentage of train usage passengers stagnates at a low rate. The study highlights the tensions between rapid, scalable technological solutions and the foundational principles of sustainable and inclusive environmental activism. While ClimateHack’s approach offers efficiency and immediate impact, it often overlooks deeper systemic changes required for long-term sustainability.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":313,"journal":{"name":"Environmental Science & Policy","volume":"171 ","pages":"Article 104184"},"PeriodicalIF":5.2000,"publicationDate":"2025-08-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Environmental Science & Policy","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S146290112500200X","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The intersection of technological entrepreneurship and environmental activism has given rise to various approaches aimed at mitigating climate change. This paper explores how tech-driven initiatives, exemplified by the Swiss-based ClimateHack, reshape climate action through entrepreneurial practices and technological solutionism. Drawing on a collaborative ethnographic study conducted between 2022 and 2024, we examine ClimateHack’s role as both an online incubator and a cooperative that leverages agile, data-driven methods to address climate challenges, particularly focusing on Switzerland, where, despite a highly subsidized and reliable public transport system, the percentage of train usage passengers stagnates at a low rate. The study highlights the tensions between rapid, scalable technological solutions and the foundational principles of sustainable and inclusive environmental activism. While ClimateHack’s approach offers efficiency and immediate impact, it often overlooks deeper systemic changes required for long-term sustainability.
期刊介绍:
Environmental Science & Policy promotes communication among government, business and industry, academia, and non-governmental organisations who are instrumental in the solution of environmental problems. It also seeks to advance interdisciplinary research of policy relevance on environmental issues such as climate change, biodiversity, environmental pollution and wastes, renewable and non-renewable natural resources, sustainability, and the interactions among these issues. The journal emphasises the linkages between these environmental issues and social and economic issues such as production, transport, consumption, growth, demographic changes, well-being, and health. However, the subject coverage will not be restricted to these issues and the introduction of new dimensions will be encouraged.