Outrage + Optimism / Special Series

Lifelines VS Deadlines

In a special two-part series of Outrage + Optimism, Paul Dickinson brings you Lifelines vs Deadlines: The Need for Science-Based Policy, an urgent exploration of what’s really blocking governments from delivering the rules, incentives, and protections that would make net zero achievable at scale.

About this series

Joining Paul for Part One is guest co-host Dylan Tanner, Executive Director of InfluenceMap, bringing deep expertise on the forces shaping, and distorting, climate policy around the world.

This series isn’t just about what should happen. It’s about what’s actually happening and why.

What this series is all about:

The net zero gap: Businesses have set targets aligned with climate science but can they meet them without governments stepping in to de-risk, regulate, level the playing field, and penalise persistent offenders?
Lifelines, not slogans: What “science-based policy” really looks like and why it’s the missing infrastructure beneath so many climate commitments.
The blockers: Why are we seeing antipathy,and in some cases organised disinformation, aimed at stopping the very regulation that would enable a faster, fairer transition?
Who benefits from delay: What forces are at play, and why governments aren’t stepping up to the challenge at the speed science demands.

Across Part One, Paul and Dylan are joined by an expert line-up including Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (United States Senator for Rhode Island), Naomi Oreskes (Henry Charles Lea Professor of the History of Science, Harvard University and Affiliated Professor of Earth & Planetary Sciences), Amita Chaudhury (Group Head of Sustainability, AIA and PSI Board Chair, UNEP FI Principles for Sustainable Insurance), Steve Waygood (Chief Responsible Investment Officer, Aviva Investors) and Chris Skidmore (Former UK Member of Parliament; Chair/author of the UK Government’s Independent Review of Net Zero)

In Part Two Paul returns with co-host Fiona Macklin to move beyond the politics and into the practical: what industry, cities, lawyers, and youth leaders are doing, and what collective pressure is needed, to build the regulatory lifelines that make meeting our deadlines possible.

Part Two features guests including Mark Watts (C40 Cities), Lord Adair Turner (Energy Transitions Commission), Paul Polman, Georgina Beasley (Net Zero Lawyers Alliance), Joshua Amponsem (Green Africa Youth Organization / Youth Climate Justice Fund), Shyla Raghav (TIME CO2), and Dr Ellen Quigley (University of Cambridge).