This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: A Dutch family doctor named Tibor Poelmann posted a petition on an online forum for general practitioners (GPs) in 2021. He wanted their pension fund to stop investing in oil and gas.
It quickly gathered 1,200 signatures. Three years later, the fund, which looks after €10 billion (£8.4 billion) for 25,000 doctors, decided to sell all its fossil fuel investments. The push came from the doctors themselves, through a council of GPs elected by the fund's members.
Our new paper in the journal Frontiers in Education was inspired by cases like this. Research on who can act on climate change tends to sort the world into governments, markets and campaigners. Professionals fall between those groups.
We treat them as a class of climate changemakers with their own means of influence. Nearly everyone agrees something has to be done, yet under current policies, the world is still heading for nearly 3°C of warming. Responsibility is scattered across governments, businesses and individuals, each able to point to someone else who should act first.
Psychologists call this diffusion of responsibility. In everyday life, that sounds like "that's not my job." A doctor's focus is health, a lawyer's is the rule of law, an engineer's is structures that stand up and a teacher's is the children in front of them. Climate change now threatens each of those.
Doctors owe duties to patients, and lawyers to clients. Climate change has begun to harm those people, so acting on climate change is part of doing the job well. Professionals also influence the institutions and decisions that shape how society responds.
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