A new paper by more than 20 scientists from 13 different countries has analysed existing research on climate change, global warming and environmental collapse and how they connect with what men do. Published in Norma: International Journal for Masculinity Studies, the paper points to a familiar hierarchy of damage: the people with the most power, the most consumption, and the most control over extractive systems are also the ones shaping the crisis while the rest are left to live with it.
Who Benefits From the Damage
The paper is titled 'Men, masculinities and the planet at the end of (M)Anthropocene'. It covers questions as diverse as climate denial in Canadian pipeline politics, environmental impacts of Chinese policies in the Pacific Ocean, pro-meat online influencers in Finland, and positive action by men activists in Africa, Latin America, the UK and globally. That range matters because the problem is not just personal habits; it runs through politics, industry, media, and the social scripts that keep destructive systems looking normal.
Researchers found that men tend to have a greater carbon footprint and greater environmental impact through consumption, especially in travel, transportation, tourism and meat eating. The article cited a 2025 study involving 15,000 people in France that found men emit 26 per cent more pollution than women from transport and food. The numbers are blunt, and they land on the everyday routines that are treated as private choices even when they are tied to larger systems of consumption and status.
The team also warned that men tend to have "less concern with climate change," are "less ambitious and less active in environmental politics," and are less willing to change everyday practices to tackle the growing issue. The paper does not dress this up as a mystery. It describes a pattern of refusal, a social order that rewards inaction while the atmosphere keeps absorbing the cost.
Who Holds the Levers
Men also tend to be more involved in owning, managing and controlling heavy, chemical, carbon-based, industrialised industries such as agriculture, along with other high environmental impact and extractive industries, and militarism, the paper said. That is where the hierarchy becomes hard to miss: the same gendered power structures that shape consumption also sit inside the industries and institutions that produce the damage.
A study from last year published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology found that men with higher levels of "masculinity stress" express less worry about climate change and are more likely to exhibit pro-environmental behavioural avoidance, such as avoiding eco-friendly products to maintain a traditional masculine image. The article shows how identity policing can work as a small but effective piece of social control, nudging people away from even modest changes that might reduce harm.
The researchers said these "damaging patterns" apply especially to elite, white Eurowestern men opposed to low-income men in the global south, while also acknowledging that some men are working "urgently and energetically" to change these tendencies. The article keeps both facts in view: the burden is not evenly spread, and neither is the response.
Professor Jeff Hearn, the paper's editor and a professor of Sociology at the University of Huddersfield, said, "There is now plenty of research that shows clear negative impacts of some men’s behaviour on the environment and climate," and added, "What is astonishing is how this aspect does not figure in most debates and policy in a more sustainable world." The omission is the point. The damage is documented, but the public conversation and policy machinery still manage to sidestep it.
What the Debate Leaves Out
The article also notes positive action by men activists in Africa, Latin America, the UK and globally. That detail matters because it shows there are people trying to push against the grain of the dominant pattern, even as the broader system keeps rewarding the same destructive habits.
Euronews said the article was by Liam Gilliver and published on 06/05/2026 at 9:40 GMT+2. The paper's findings, taken together, describe a crisis shaped not just by emissions but by power: who consumes, who controls, who profits, and who gets to keep pretending the problem is somewhere else.