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In early September 2006, Johann Hari, a columnist for the British newspaper The Independent, visited what was then an unusual gathering: a climate action camp. A village of tents had appeared in the shadow of Selby, England鈥檚, towering Drax coal-fired power plant鈥攐ne of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases in Europe. Hari found some elements of a counter-culture festival, but he also witnessed what amounted to an 鈥渙pen-air science seminar, where 600 protesters discussed climate chaos with a level of knowledge that would shame our news broadcasters.鈥�

The camp was also a launching pad for direct action, culminating in an effort to temporarily occupy the power station. 鈥淭hese protesters,鈥� Hari observed, 鈥渨ere tired of praying the world鈥檚 scientists have made some unprecedented collective error, or waiting for a political Messiah to solve the problem.鈥�

Like earlier mass movements in their infancy, the campers had plenty of knee-jerk detractors. The right-wing Sun newspaper dubbed them 鈥渘a茂ve beyond belief.鈥� Hari saw it differently. He pointedly asked in his column, 鈥渋sn鈥檛 the real na茂vete coming from people like them who say we should just sit back 鈥� and continue to drastically change the chemical composition of the atmosphere?鈥�

Leaving the camp, he declared 鈥渢he birth of a new protest movement to force action on global warming.鈥�

Climate-change activism has been taking place in some form for decades, but in recent years the ripples created by events like the Selby camp have been swelling into something larger鈥攕omething that is attracting ever-greater numbers of mainstream environmentalists, gathering support from top climate scientists and prominent public figures, and starting to look a lot like a mass movement.

This movement is set to produce a broad wave of dissent this fall in the United States and internationally, and it is not afraid to think big. 鈥淭he Civil Rights Movement, the suffragettes, India鈥檚 movement for independence. That鈥檚 the sort of scale we need to be thinking on when we鈥檙e thinking about climate change,鈥� says Abigail Singer, an organizer with the environmental group Rising Tide and co-coordinator of the Mobilization for Climate Justice coalition.

A Global Uprising

While nothing of historic proportions has yet materialized in the United States, environmentalists elsewhere are providing impressive models for climate disobedience. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got activists in Italy doing multiple day-long sit-ins at coal-fired power plants that actually shut them down,鈥� says Jennifer Krill, a forest and climate campaigner at Rainforest Action Network. 鈥淎nd in Australia you鈥檝e got massive blockades of coal trains, as well as the coal plants themselves.鈥�

CLIMATE HERO

Kumi Naidoo chairs the Global Campaign for Climate Action, the group behind TckTckTck, a diffuse and colorful campaign for worldwide mobilization whose name evokes a countdown for climate action.
Meet all 大象传媒 Magazine Climate Heroes

Since Selby, climate camps have become recurrent events in the United Kingdom and have also popped up in Germany, Holland, Ireland, and Australia. They have made the names of major coal-fired plants, such as Drax and Kingsnorth, synonymous with militant protest.

And they鈥檝e had an impact on policy. Public pressure compelled Britain鈥檚 energy and climate minister, Ed Miliband, to rethink previous plans to allow plant expansion and declare in April that 鈥淭he era of new unabated coal has come to an end.鈥� Facing concerted opposition, the E.ON power company announced in October that it was shelving its plans to build a major new coal-burning facility at the infamous Kingsnorth site.

For activists from the Global South, the December 2007 U.N. climate summit in Bali was a landmark of coalescing resistance. There, a broad network of grassroots NGOs such as the Third World Network, the farmers鈥� coalition Via Campesina, and representatives of communities directly affected by the early impacts of global warming came together under the banner of 鈥淐limate Justice Now!鈥� The network has maintained a visible presence at international negotiations, pressuring advanced industrialized countries that, in the words of one network statement, 鈥渉ave refused to live up to their own legal and moral obligations to radically cut emissions and support developing countries鈥� efforts to reduce emissions and adapt to climate impacts.鈥�

The lesson Krill draws: 鈥淲e need to turn up the heat in the United States.鈥�

Bringing Home the Heat

鈥淚n the U.S., historically, [large-scale mobilization] has tended to work best when there鈥檚 a progressive leader in power and some kind of mass awareness of the problem,鈥� argues Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men. 鈥淲e have both of those things now,鈥� he says of the climate crisis, 鈥渨e just don鈥檛 have people taking to the streets.鈥�

The Yes Men, pranksters famous for impersonating corporate spokespeople at high-profile events, are part of one coalition working to change that. They helped create BeyondTalk.net, where visitors can sign a pledge of resistance, vowing to be one of 10,000 willing to risk arrest at protests that will take place simultaneously in major cities before the December U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.

While the United States lags behind some other parts of the world, activity has proliferated here in the past two years. This is particularly true in Appalachia, dubbed 鈥淐limate Ground Zero鈥� by organizers who are challenging the ghastly practice of mountaintop-removal mining. The CoalSwarm website keeps a running tally of protests, and its swiftly growing list of events in West Virginia and North Carolina includes civil disobedience marches onto mining sites, tree sits to halt mountaintop blasting, and an action in which climbers scaled a dragline excavator to stop its use.

On the other side of the country, in the Navajo Nation, ongoing resistance at the Desert Rock coal-fired power plant contributed to the EPA withdrawal of its air quality permit this summer. Indeed, CoalSwarm cites more than 75 coal plants canceled, abandoned, or put on hold countrywide in 2007 and 2008, owing in large part to organized community opposition.

In early March, a coalition effort to channel local actions into a national mobilization produced crowds demanding closure of the Capitol Power Plant. The plant, one of the dirtiest coal-burning facilities in the country, sits in downtown Washington, D.C., and helps heat the chambers of Congress. The protest took place immediately after the massive Power Shift conference, which drew over 12,000 young people to the nation鈥檚 capital to attend workshops on climate activism and lobbying techniques. Thousands of people鈥攊ncluding many Power Shift participants, as well as movement luminaries such as writer Bill McKibben and world-renowned climate scientist James Hansen鈥攔isked police reprisal when they blockaded the Capitol Power Plant鈥檚 entrances.

It worked: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid preemptively announced that they would instruct Capitol officials to shift the plant to natural gas. Activists regard this as only a partial victory, citing natural gas, along with nuclear power and 鈥渃lean coal,鈥� as among the 鈥渇alse solutions鈥� currently being promoted for climate change. Nevertheless, the mobilization served as a promising sign for future resistance.

鈥淭here were massive numbers of people willing to commit civil disobedience on climate change,鈥� says Singer. 鈥淭hat just hasn鈥檛 happened before.鈥�

The Road to Copenhagen

Environmentalists almost universally agree that the upcoming Copenhagen conference represents a critical moment for the planet, and thus a key time for the public to exert pressure. Groups in NGO offices, church basements, and action camps are contributing to major climate organizing campaigns鈥攊ncluding citizen lobbying, public awareness, and direct action鈥攅ach of which could be the largest of its kind in history.

On October 24, environmentalists throughout the world joined creative demonstrations that drew attention to 350鈥攚hat McKibben calls 鈥渢he most important number on Earth.鈥� He writes, 鈥淎 NASA team headed by James Hansen reported that the maximum amount of carbon the atmosphere can safely hold is 350 parts per million, at least if we want a planet 鈥榮imilar to the one on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted.鈥� Since we鈥檙e already at 390 ppm, the message was clear: we don鈥檛 need to buy an insurance policy to reduce the threat of future warming. We need a fire extinguisher, and we need it now.鈥�

350.org was coordinated by the same organizers who created the Step It Up campaign in 2007, which produced 2,000 demonstrations spread across all 50 states to demand that Congress cut domestic carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050. This time, they worked internationally, and they were awed by the growing momentum.

HOW WILL YOU GET INVOLVED?
We don鈥檛 have to tell you to switch your light bulbs and carry a cloth bag to the grocery store: You already do. But saving the planet is going to take more than a reusable mug. So how do you take your beliefs from private home to public square?

Tell your friends. Your neighbors. The guy next to you on the bus. Talking to others about climate change may feel awkward (鈥淪o, how do you feel about greenhouse gases?鈥�), but it helps spread the word that climate change is real, and that we can still do something about it. Talk about how you鈥檙e giving up your car, or how you鈥檝e been writing your congressperson.

DIY. Join the or organize your neighbors around the movement. When you change the way you live, and help others change the way they live, momentum builds for legislative change.

Become a local advocate.
Send letters to the editor, work for climate-friendly policies (bike lanes, public transit), and join up with others to amplify your voice. Plug in to action-oriented organizations. Then donate, and demonstrate.

See our Climate Action Resource Guide for a list of activist groups to join.

鈥淚 can鈥檛 really believe it,鈥� says organizer May Boeve of the events in more than 180 countries. 鈥淲e have scuba divers off the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, and we have monks in the Himalayas, and we have musicians in all different corners of the world.鈥� Photos or video from each site were sent to world leaders, she says, 鈥渢o communicate this sense that the public is not only paying attention to Copenhagen, they know what the outcome needs to be. They know we need to get to 350.鈥�

Another day of action, taking place on November 30, a week before the start of the Copenhagen summit, will be more likely to result in jailed activists. The Mobilization for Climate Justice, Rising Tide, and other allies will be coordinating events that target major polluters, interfere with carbon-emission-as-usual, and demand strong regulation. 鈥淔or people who feel they can鈥檛 get arrested because they have too much at stake right now, the BeyondTalk.net site has an 鈥榓ction offsets鈥� program,鈥� Bichlbaum explains. 鈥淛ust like you can buy carbon offsets, you can buy action offsets鈥� that will pay for training or bail for someone who can risk arrest.

鈥淪eattle鈥� the Summit?

A significant precedent for this fall鈥檚 protests is the 1999 mobilization against the World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle. Not accidentally, the November 30 events fall on the 10th anniversary of Seattle鈥檚 pivotal day of action. With tens of thousands of people rallying outside the WTO sessions, Seattle brought together an unlikely coalition of trade unionists, environmentalists, indigenous rights advocates, anti-sweatshop campaigners, and small farmers who recognized that the exploitative model of corporate globalization championed by the WTO cut across diverse causes and communities. The success of those groups in working together to derail the WTO talks is routinely forgotten by those who depict Seattle as a mindless riot.

Drawing inspiration for the present, a Rising Tide statement argues, 鈥淭his year we have the opportunity to construct a movement of movements around climate, and find common ground in struggling for our collective survival.鈥�

Regardless of the final shape that Copenhagen protests take, the crucial role that citizens must play in forcing better solutions is clear. 鈥淚n order to get any sort of climate policy that even resembles something good,鈥� says Singer, 鈥渨e鈥檙e going to need massive amounts of people to get involved in these sorts of mobilizations.鈥�

Bichlbaum adds, 鈥淲e have the technology that we need right now to stop climate change. The technology we need is a pen and a piece of paper. All we need is to sign the right laws. And the demand for that goes through the streets.鈥�