Spotlight on Michelle Catanzaro - on youth climate activism and visual communication

Mon, Mar 30, 2026

SPEAKERS

Michelle Catanzaro, James

James

Could you tell me a bit about your academic background? What led you to focus on the area of young people and Youth Activism?

Michelle

So I've been in academia now for about 15 years, and I guess what's always been key to my research and what I want to do is the role that creativity plays in helping us think through complex issues, so that could be social, political, environmental issues, cultural issues. And I think that I first started working on a project in 2015 with Amanda Third and other colleagues from the Young & Resilient Research Center. And that was called The Invisible City, and it was a project that used a digital platform and creative methodologies to work with young people to help understand their relationship to place how it could be improved. So we specifically looked at Parramatta, and we asked young people, how does this place make you feel? Why do you feel this way, and what would you change? And part of that was that we utilize photography and emotions to understand those relationships. So that was probably my first big project that really influenced me in working more with young people and seeing the power of young people to change and impact futures that they're obviously going to impact, and spaces that they're going to go on and live in, and places they're going to they're going to lead. That was when I saw that it's really, really important that we're thinking about working with young people. I think it's something like 89% of young people say that they're creative. And it drops to really low [for adults]. Something slips away where, when you're doing research with older people, that kind of creativity is lost, and when you're working with young people, it's a chance, for me, as a visual communicator and a creative researcher, to harness that creativity to think about solutions for a better world.

James

Like how people grow to be a bit more cynical as they get older?

Michelle

Yes, definitely. The workshop that I did [last week], when I've ran that kind of workshop with adults, it's so hard. I'd run them with young people and you can see all the amazing things they do in like an hour. You do it with adults, and they just sit there going "You want me to what?". Like, they just can't freestyle, it's really interesting.

James

Would you say that the this area of study the perspectives of young people tend to be ignored?

Michelle

Yeah, definitely, I think so. And I think that why I work in the way that I do, is that using visual communication or visual methods to amplify the concerns of young people is quite powerful. So an example of that is the event that we ran in 2023 which was with the Powerhouse, the 100 Climate Conversations. And what I did was work with young people to create design outcomes that really cut into their concerns about climate change and solutions-based thinking for that. And then they created visual outcomes, and we displayed them in the Powerhouse, and they were projected up. Some of them were huge along the turbine walls. Other ones were in a gallery space. Over 500 people attended, and it was a really great event because it took these really complex messages that were distilled into visual communication that were really impactful, but made by young people for a really diverse audience, and it allowed people to engage with young people's thoughts in a way that they might not on the streets of climate action or activism that they might dismiss. So it's thinking about the role of public institutions to amplify young people's creative outputs for kind of educating other generations.

James

Could you tell me a little bit more about the book that you're releasing later this year?

Michelle

So the aim of the book is that, as part of our New Possibilities project we've done, we've published a lot. We've written quite extensively across our team. We've got a really skilled trans-disciplinary team, and we've had a fair bit of journal articles and book chapters and books and an edited special issue that should be out also in June. We've had success with a podcast. We've done a few of those events as as I've discussed. And I suppose what the book aims to do is harness that energy where we're not necessarily creating academic research for academics. We're working with young people, and we're trying to create something that actually speaks to them and is co-written by them. So it will feature the thematics and the high level theoretical outcomes of our research, but translated by young people for young people. And as part of that, it will also have visual outcomes that digest and re-communicate those ideas. So things that young people will pick up, because we're aware as academics that academic articles aren't necessarily accessible or enjoyable for young people to read Some are super into it, but what we want to do is create something that is more of a general public publication, something that young people can read and connect with, but we can also share with policymakers and people in power to say, "this is the views of young people". It's been created by and with young people, and features the work of young people, and we hope that then has some traction for change.

James

The book's kind of a culmination of the New Possibilities Program, which has been run since 2019, isn't it? Do you think your perspective has changed on Youth Activism, either as you learn more, or as the world around it has changed?

Michelle

I guess my opinion is that Youth Activism has shifted, and I think that in 2019 when we first saw the School Strike for Climate movement in Australia, at the time, that was one of the biggest documented actions in Australia, especially for young people. But since then, we've seen equally big documented protests for more diverse issues such as the Free Palestine movement. And I think what we've seen happen is that Youth Climate activism has become more broad-reaching and more intersectional. We're seeing climate action as part of a broader kind of climate justice movement, and that looks at things like First Nations people and Invasion Day protests, the Free Palestine movement, the anti-protest laws. So I think what we're observing is that young activists are having a much more inclusive and expansive understanding of how all these issues intersect, and understanding it as a poly-crisis, where there's multiple conflicting crises happening all at once, and they're all as important as each other, and they're all, in fact, having an impact on climate. I mean, war in itself, is a huge contributor just to the environmental impact of climate, but that's sort of rooted in this sense of justice for people.. So I think it's evolved. And I do think that the as far as the street protests, if we're just talking about just climate activism, since 2019 to now, that has really declined. There's been other issues that have kind of taken the centre stage. But I also think that young people have become quite tactical in the way that they've moved towards what organising an action looks like. So there's things like community picnics, there's community education models that are emerging, people pursuing formal legislation and litigation cases. There's people that are moving more formally into politics. There's a push to lower the voting age to 16. I think that after quite a long period of time striking and seeing that those street protests aren't having the impact that they were hoping for, people have moved in other ways. The Rising Tide movement that happens in Newcastle is a really coordinated strike that also has a really political and public impact associated with it, where they're blocking the ships coming in. Something like that is co-organised with young people but it's being led by a broader movement that's not necessarily a youth movement. One of the placard signs that I always think about in this instance, says "four years of striking, what difference does it make?" It's a student who's obviously showing up every year for four years to every strike and thinking what's it going to take? I think that really exemplifies a lot of how young people are feeling. They're seeing this fatigue of showing up and not necessarily seeing the impacts or the action that they want happening in politics,

James

There's also been sort of that rise in digital activism, especially post-COVID.

Michelle

Yeah, definitely. I think that that's a really great place for young people to join together and to organize and to have a sense of community, and to be able to see the views of others and understand that other people feel the same way that they do, especially in regional areas of Australia. So obviously, the social media restrictions are impactful in that regard. And a discussion that we've had with young people is "where are we going to go? What does that mean for the future of youth action and the way that people come together?" So that is a that is a concern for sure.

James

Has there been any difficulty adapting to working around young people, or has it been easier than you expected? Possibly even easier than working around adults?

Michelle

Being really agile as a researcher is important when working with young people, because every individual young person I've worked with is very different. And I think if you want to be an ethical researcher, you need to understand the young person themselves, their background, how they're coming at research. I think that it's definitely not difficulties, but in the time that we've been working with them, we've really evolved. I've evolved how I think about and work with young people. And there's certain things like "What's the reasons that children and young people are interested in participating in a project?". So, making sure that you know their interests are actually being reflected in the research, finding out what their end purpose is. So for some of them, it might be that they're quite interested in maybe publishing and getting into research, but for others, it might be, getting them to think about the design of a project or the methods, or clarifying how they like to work, identifying barriers to authentic participatory work. So thinking about power differences and expertise without being adultist, striking that balance between not being overly protective, and also giving young participants a voice, but without excessive responsibilities or burdening them with the job of fixing the problem. And I think that's a tricky thing to work with when you're talking about climate because obviously some of the stats are not very hopeful. And I think it's hard when you're working with young people, because you don't want to minimise that. But also it's striking that kind of balance, making sure you go slow as well, and not work to the kind of crazy deadlines that academics always work to, finding out what's the best way you can work together, regularly checking in and debriefing, paying young people and making sure that they're actually validated and given credit for the jobs that they do. For me, personally, I think planning for non-academic outputs is a really important part of my practice. So asking them "how do you want to talk about what you've been involved in?" Is it media, posts, writing songs, drawings, photographs? How are we involving young people in research that's not just connecting with researchers and academics, but is actually co-circulating back to become part of conversations with other young people as well.

James

With the recent restrictions on protests, do you think those adversely affect the ability of young people to mobilise politically, perhaps more than anyone?

Michelle

I don't know about more than anyone, but I think they definitely impact on young people. It does it in two ways, I suppose, because there's the young people themselves and what they're going to be faced with, and then there's also the impact on their parents, who may have previously been supportive of them going to protest. Like I'm an adult woman and my father, who's an immigrant, freaks out when I go to protest because of what he sees on the news. So I can only imagine what it must be like for a young person whose parents are fearful of that. And I think especially for young people who may be themselves, or their parents might be migrants. So Dinusha Soo, who's worked on the project as a research associate and a master's student, has done research around the different cultural impacts. So she's talking specifically about people of colour and the different pressures and impact that their parents have on them. So that was the first barrier, because often it's striking from school, and now the legal ramifications and the connection with law that people from marginalised communities might have that's different to people from privileged backgrounds. That's also a really big impact. So I think what the big answer to that is that, yes, it's silencing the voices that should be heard the most, and it's scary.

James

How would you hope that policymakers would work with young people in the future?

Michelle

I think meeting them where they are is really important. So if they're not going to provide or support spaces of activism, which it seems that they're shutting down, then they need to be actively engaged with young people in youth communities to understand the issues that are impacting them every day, the issues that they're terrified about for the future. It's not only good politics on their behalf, because that will make them better political leaders, but it also is the future of Australia. And I think that I have a lot of hope personally in the discourse that I see happening amongst young people about the politics that they want or the kind of policies that they want and will expect in the future. For anybody in a powerful position, they really should be working with and listening to young people as much as possible. The closing down of social media sites is bad for political leaders, because that was a way that a lot of young people were able to advocate and connect with external audiences, including politicians, so they're taking away the right for a young person to tag somebody in something and actually speak directly to that person, whether they get a response or hear from them. I do think that if things progress in that way, we need to see new forms of politics and new forms of political conversations and reasonings that are inclusive of young people, because we know that the kind of young people who are often politically engaged and get a platform to speak to people in power are not necessarily representative of all types of young people.

James

Would you say that working around young people makes you feel more hopeful?

Michelle

Yeah, definitely. Every single time I work with young people, I feel really inspired and really hopeful. And I think part of that is actually just meeting them where they are, speaking to them, asking them about what matters to them, and that really matters to young people as well. It matters to them that they're heard and seen. That is really why, circling back to that very first question of, why I work with young people? It's because I do really believe that is the most important thing when we're thinking about any kind of future modelling, and it's the right thing for any adult to be doing. Young people have incredible ideas, they have incredible ways of thinking, they have incredible innovations that they're waiting to share. When you do hear those things, it is really hopeful, and it does contrast with the media doom cycle that we're constantly being fed.

James

Closing us out here, with the book being the culmination of the New Possibilities program. What do you think lies ahead for you?

Michelle

I think what I would like to do is continue this type of form of publishing and dissemination of information where I see myself as a kind of conduit. It's a weird word to use, but kind of an intermediary between young people in that public facing world where I can help all of the ideas and thoughts and creativity for young people. It's there, and it's a new way of thinking, or a new way of bringing those ideas together, packaging them up, and then delivering them to people that will find it quite hard, hopefully, to dismiss those ideas. So I would like to continue that method of working, really embedding knowledge into visual outcomes, or creative outcomes made with young people to connect with in a really palatable way for people in power or public audiences, so not just to agitate, but also to educate. Because I think that young people should be centred as educative agents for change, and we should be really looking to them and understanding their lived experience, this generation has experienced what it's like to live with climate change since they were born in a way that no other generation can actually connect with. How do we understand that as lived experience of what a potential future would look like if we don't listen now? So really thinking about all of those embedded knowledges in communication outputs, I think would be what I would like to continue pushing from this project.