Fifty Shades of Greenwashing: The Political Economy of Climate Change Advertising on Social Media
Fuente:
arXiv
Enregistré dans:
| Auteurs principaux: | , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Preprint |
| Publié: |
2025
|
| Sujets: | |
| Accès en ligne: | |
| Tags: |
Ajouter un tag
Pas de tags, Soyez le premier à ajouter un tag!
|
| _version_ | 1866912717276708864 |
|---|---|
| author | Kubinec, Robert Mahajan, Aseem |
| author_facet | Kubinec, Robert Mahajan, Aseem |
| contents | In this paper, we provide a novel measure for greenwashing -- i.e., climate-related misinformation -- that shows how polluting companies can use social media advertising related to climate change to redirect criticism. To do so, we identify greenwashing content in 11 million social-political ads in Meta's Ad Targeting Datset with a measurement technique that combines large language models, human coders, and advances in Bayesian item response theory. We show that what is called greenwashing has diverse actors and components, but we also identify a very pernicious form, which we call political greenwashing, that appears to be promoted by fossil fuel companies and related interest groups. Based on ad targeting data, we show that much of this advertising happens via organizations with undisclosed links to the fossil fuel industry. Furthermore, we show that greenwashing ad content is being micro-targeted at left-leaning communities with fossil fuel assets, though we also find comparatively little evidence of ad targeting aimed at influencing public opinion at the national level. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_14930 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Fifty Shades of Greenwashing: The Political Economy of Climate Change Advertising on Social Media Kubinec, Robert Mahajan, Aseem Applications Artificial Intelligence General Economics Economics In this paper, we provide a novel measure for greenwashing -- i.e., climate-related misinformation -- that shows how polluting companies can use social media advertising related to climate change to redirect criticism. To do so, we identify greenwashing content in 11 million social-political ads in Meta's Ad Targeting Datset with a measurement technique that combines large language models, human coders, and advances in Bayesian item response theory. We show that what is called greenwashing has diverse actors and components, but we also identify a very pernicious form, which we call political greenwashing, that appears to be promoted by fossil fuel companies and related interest groups. Based on ad targeting data, we show that much of this advertising happens via organizations with undisclosed links to the fossil fuel industry. Furthermore, we show that greenwashing ad content is being micro-targeted at left-leaning communities with fossil fuel assets, though we also find comparatively little evidence of ad targeting aimed at influencing public opinion at the national level. |
| title | Fifty Shades of Greenwashing: The Political Economy of Climate Change Advertising on Social Media |
| topic | Applications Artificial Intelligence General Economics Economics |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.14930 |