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What is the role of psychology in fighting environmental crime? Criminal psychologist Dr. Julia Shaw joins Climate Curious co-hosts Ben Hurst and Maryam Pasha to explain what a green crime is, and why she spent three years writing a book on the topic. This conversation kicks off our new four-part mini-series ‘Climate Curious on Crime’ launching October 6th 2025, exclusively on the ‘Climate Curious’ podcast.
Learn more in Julia’s new book, ‘Green Crime’, https://linktr.ee/drjuliashaw
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Created by TEDxLondon
Executive produced by Josie Colter
Produced by Ben Beheshty
Curated by Deesha Chandra
Hosted by Maryam Pasha and Ben Hurst
Communications by Tara Cooper and Issey Gladston
00:00 Introduction
00:34 What is Green Crime?
01:49 Julia Shaw’s background
03:12 The psychology behind climate crimes
04:41 Mini-series announcement
[00:00:00] Introduction
[00:00:00] Maryam Pasha: Hello, Ben. Hey girl. Hey girl. We haven’t been in the studio together for like, for a long time. For a long time.
[00:00:11] Maryam Pasha: We’re very excited because we are gonna be doing something we haven’t done really before. I know it’s a little four part miniseries. It’s excited. It ex
[00:00:19] Ben Hurst: excite. It is exciting, isn’t it? I feel like it’s exciting.
[00:00:22] Ben Hurst: I feel like it’s exciting. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:00:23] Maryam Pasha: Yeah. Um, and it’s also exciting because we’re doing it with one of our recurring [00:00:30] fave. Oh, telex London. Speakers. Julia Shaw, Dr. Julia Shaw.
[00:00:34] What is Green Crime?
[00:00:34] Maryam Pasha: The doctor’s important because we are gonna be talking about green crime.
[00:00:39] Ben Hurst: Oh, very interesting. Very interesting. Very interesting.
[00:00:42] Ben Hurst: It’s based
[00:00:42] Maryam Pasha: on her new book, green Crime. [00:00:45] Mm-hmm. And we’re gonna talk about more about that in a bit. Um, but before we get into that, first of all, welcome Julia. For those of you who don’t know who Julia is, first of all, just go watch all her TED talks ’cause they’re really, really good. But also, she’s a criminal psychologist at University College [00:01:00] London.
[00:01:00] Maryam Pasha: She’s a regular podcast and TV host, as I’ve said. She’s been a Ted Andex London speaker. Mm-hmm. And she’s author of this new book, green Crime, inside the Minds of the People Destroying the Planet and How to Stop them. And before we get into the real stuff. [00:01:15] Can you just tell us what is a green crime?
[00:01:17] Julia Shaw: Green crime is another term for environmental crime and it is when you extract or take something out of nature or pollute. So put something into nature that you’re not supposed to, and it’s breaking a law. So it’s not just [00:01:30] the earth but bad. It’s not just sort of general. Mm-hmm. Bad behavior. Mm-hmm.
[00:01:33] Julia Shaw: Mm-hmm. It’s also not,
[00:01:34] Ben Hurst: not crime on the planet. Yeah. Right. It’s also not all things. People do
[00:01:37] Julia Shaw: it like bad things people do, which I think people. Sometimes assume this book is gonna be about just like everything bad in general. Yeah. And it’s like, no, I am in fact focusing on things that are [00:01:45] crimes. Yeah.
[00:01:45] Julia Shaw: Yeah. Not just. Things that we wish we saw about vibes. Yeah. And I read
[00:01:49] Julia Shaw’s background
[00:01:49] Maryam Pasha: like a little bit about your bio, but will you tell our listeners a little bit about your background that brought you to this topic and like kind of what you’ve wrote on before?
[00:01:58] Julia Shaw: So, I’m a criminal [00:02:00] psychologist and I study why people do bad things, and I’m actually an expert in terms of being an expert witness for courtrooms as well.
[00:02:07] Julia Shaw: Mm-hmm. Where I talk about memory. So that’s a very, that’s my niche, my particular niche. And I’m always interested in how people construct realities. And [00:02:15] that’s something that you’ll see throughout this book as well, is that the different ways in which the narratives are controlled around who is at fault for the climate crisis and how we tell these stories about these crimes, both in terms of the perpetrators, but also in terms of what we should do about them.
[00:02:29] Julia Shaw: Mm-hmm. [00:02:30] And so narratives is something that I’m always interested in, in memory. Storytelling. And on the other hand, I’m interested in why are people engaging in these things that we all know at this point? No one’s like what the things might be changing and we should be careful with [00:02:45] pollution. Everybody knows.
[00:02:45] Julia Shaw: Everyone knows. Even if you’re like, no matter where you’re on the political spectrum, there’s some version of that. Even if it’s just like saving your local park, um, you have some interest probably in a clean environment, at least where you live. Mm-hmm.
[00:02:56] Maryam Pasha: What. But for you personally, I guess [00:03:00] why climate or why green environment?
[00:03:02] Maryam Pasha: What brought you to this point? Why do you care? Why do I care? Why do question, I guess we have was, you could talk about, you could have written about a lot of different things. Yes. There’s a lot of bad things people are doing in the world right now. A lot.
[00:03:12] The psychology behind climate crimes
[00:03:12] Maryam Pasha: Um, and there’s a lot of psychology behind, like, why do AI people wanna take, like, destroy our pla?
[00:03:18] Maryam Pasha: You know, you could have read about a lot of stuff. Why climate? Wine environment?
[00:03:22] Julia Shaw: Because I, uh. I’ve always been interested in environmentalism. Mm-hmm. And I was [00:03:30] faced with this black hole of, I don’t know, my feed was just, uh, back to back stories of devastation and everyone doing it wrong. And this, the, the overwhelming message I think you get, or at least that I was getting, is no one’s doing anything
[00:03:43] Maryam Pasha: Right.
[00:03:44] Julia Shaw: And [00:03:45] I was like, well, if no one’s doing anything, first of all, why are people still committing these crimes? Yes. Again, most people now think about, I mean, research has shown that most people think about the climate, uh, emergency at least, at least every week. Mm. Most people think about it, and lots of people [00:04:00] think about it every day.
[00:04:01] Julia Shaw: And so this isn’t like this niche topic anymore. And yet you still have people who are like, I’m just gonna burn down the rainforest, right. And put some, put some cattle here. And so for me it’s like, that is such a mind flip where you’re going. This [00:04:15] is also like the criminals who are strained planet, but how can you know?
[00:04:17] Julia Shaw: And still Well, it’s burning down your own home. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like they live here too. This
[00:04:21] Ben Hurst: is not, it’s not good for you and bad for us. It’s bad for everyone. It’s bad for everybody. Yeah.
[00:04:24] Julia Shaw: And so I, that there’s that, that was drawing me to it. And frankly, I felt surely [00:04:30] they. There’s some social science here, right?
[00:04:31] Julia Shaw: That can help us to understand what’s going on, but I didn’t know it, and so I wanted to figure out what it is and whether we can use criminal psychology to help us to fight this.
[00:04:41] Mini-series announcement
[00:04:41] Ben Hurst: If the idea of green crime has caught your attention, [00:04:45] join us every Monday this month for a brand new mini series. Climate Curious on crime.
[00:04:51] Ben Hurst: It’s where true crime meets climate meets psychology exclusively here on Climate Curious will be dropping a four part weekly series [00:05:00] with criminal psychologists, Dr. Julia Shaw. Together we’ll share the stories of the psychology behind three famous climate crimes, unpacking them along. Side Julia’s six pillars of green crime Framework.
[00:05:12] Ben Hurst: Whilst asking the question, [00:05:15] what role does psychology play in the fight against climate crime? And in our true climate curious style, we are looking at these climate crimes from the viewpoint of positivity and progress through the eyes of capable guardians, [00:05:30] the people who catch the con men murderers and traffickers of climate crimes.
[00:05:34] Ben Hurst: See you next week for episode one. Dieselgate and the psychology of corporate green common. Just follow climate curious wherever you get your [00:05:45] podcast.
