CAST’s partnership with Pledgeball, a charity rallying the sports community to accelerate systemic change, will enable CAST to drive meaningful climate action by harnessing the power of sports fans across the UK.
We are thrilled to announce CAST’s partnership with Pledgeball – one of our key partners for Phase 2 of our research over the next five years – a charity rallying the sports community to accelerate systemic change. This collaboration will combine Pledgeball’s unique ability to mobilise sports communities with CAST’s expertise on how to transform lifestyles, organisations and social structures to create a sustainable, low-carbon future.
Since the award-winning charity Pledgeball began its work in 2021, they have rallied fans from hundreds of clubs to make personal pro-environmental pledges in support of their clubs that contribute to reducing carbon emissions. These pledges enable fans to re-evaluate their role in tackling climate change, resulting in further engagement with the topic, which not only increases their likelihood of adjusting their daily consumption habits, but also having more frequent conversations about climate change.
Together, we aim to assess, evolve and scale the impact of fan-driven pledges and other engagement approaches and continue to drive this momentum forward, inspiring fans and sports organisations to take responsibility for their environmental impact.
As a global leader in research focused on sustainable behaviour change, we also aim to empower Pledgeball to deepen its impact further by understanding the social science behind effective behaviour change and translating this into real-world outcomes. By integrating our expertise into Pledgeball’s existing framework, we aim to drive a lasting and measurable reduction in carbon emissions within sports communities.
Overall, our collaboration will focus on evaluating the effectiveness of Pledgeball’s current initiatives, exploring new strategies to engage fans, and providing evidence-based insights that help sports organisations implement sustainability into their operations. We’ll develop innovative strategies that resonate with the fan community, leading to a collective reduction in emissions both directly and through consumer-led demand. We look forward to seeing how sports communities unite to drive meaningful and lasting change.
Our CAST Director, Professor Lorraine Whitmarsh, emphasised the potential of the collaboration:
“I’m delighted to be formalising CAST’s relationship with Pledgeball, who we have already started to work with, providing evidence of their campaigns’ effectiveness. There is huge potential to harness the power of sports fans to help transform the sports sector towards sustainability, and we’re excited to help deliver this by bringing together Pledgeball’s award-winning work on fan engagement with CAST’s expertise on transformational climate action.”
Katie Cross, CEO of Pledgeball, remarked:
“As a charity striving to create the transformational shift necessary to address climate change, this partnership with CAST is crucial for our future. We are committed to further increasing our impact, and through collaboration with the world-leading researchers at CAST, we can continue to refine our approach, expand our reach, and ensure that our efforts are grounded in science. Together, we’re building on the progress we’ve made and the work we’ve already done with CAST, and we’re excited to see the outcomes of this partnership.”
For more information on how to get involved with Pledgeball and make a pledge, visit their website. To learn more about CAST’s plans for Phase 2, read our Phase 2 blog post announcement. For further information about CAST’s research from the past five years, read our key messages report.
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