Wildfire in the age of climate change: A messaging guide for forest advocates
Fire has long been a vital force shaping North American forests, grasslands, and shrublands — sustaining ecosystem health and biodiversity for millennia, including through the intentional stewardship of Indigenous communities. But more than a century of fire suppression, industrial forestry, unchecked development, and climate change has disrupted that balance. As extreme, weather-driven fires become more frequent and destructive, fear has come to dominate public discourse and policy.
This fear-driven narrative, often reinforced by land management agencies and policymakers, frames wildfire primarily as a vegetation problem solvable through logging, obscuring the ecological role of fire and diverting attention from the urgent need to protect homes and communities.
This guide helps cut through that confusion. It demystifies the latest science on forests, wildfire, and climate, challenges misleading narratives, and offers clear tools for reframing how we talk about fire. By equipping advocates, community members, and decision-makers with accurate information and effective messaging, it supports more just, science-based solutions — and helps build a future where communities and fire can coexist more safely and resiliently in a changing climate.
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