“Much too often we speak to those who already know,” says the President of Austria, Alexander Van der Bellen. “It is so much more difficult to arouse someone’s interest, when they have never dealt with the subject of the climate crisis before.”

This is exactly the problem that Arnold Schwarzenegger’s climate initiative (and its conference, the Austrian World Summit (AWS)) aims to counteract. With the goal of being solutions based, the initiatives’s motto is “less talk, more action”. 

How did the AWS come about? After his second term as Governor of California in 2011, United Nations Secretary General Ban-ki Moon asked Schwarzenegger if he would create an environmental NGO with support from the UN. Schwarzenegger needed a partner to help him. 

“No one in my field wouldn’t want to work with Arnold Schwarzenegger – plus, I’m Austrian,” says Monika Langthaler, who is now director of the actor’s climate initiative, which runs the AWS. I spoke to her in March, via Zoom, at her office in Vienna. She is a committed climate activist, bubbly yet sharp, and clearly enthralled by Schwarzenegger’s personality and vision.

”When we first met, we immediately understood each other, because we Austrians have the same jokes. I think that’s what he liked and I liked. He has a great sense of humour.” 

Not just any sense of humour though – specifically an Austrian sense of humour. And how would she …