On 26 August 2006, a bunch of self-declared radicals gathered in Yorkshire, close to the biggest point source of carbon dioxide emissions in Europe – Drax coal-fired power station. In this too brief (too long?) post I reflect on how it came to be, my role (not zero, not huge), what happened next, and what we could learn, if we had any learning capacity.)
How it came to be
From the 1950s the British public were informed about the possibility of carbon dioxide build-up leading to, well, trouble. This was only occasional, and usually came with “well, there might be an Ice Age, who knows?” caveats. By the mid-1970s though, the warnings started to come thicker. However, for good reasons climate change was not a campaigning issue for the various Green groups (the Conservation Society, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace). The 1980s was mostly about trying to keep the maniacs in the White House (not that the Kremlin was exactly sane) from starting a third (and final) world war. CND, marches, Greenham Common (we will come back to that). Finally, in 1988, for various reasons, the ‘greenhouse effect’ burst onto the scene and various campaigns got going. Non-violent direct action on environmental issues got going in the early 1990s, mostly around road bypasses (Twyford, then Newbury). Meanwhile, there was a ‘Wake Up’ time is running out protest in London.
In March-April 1995 there were protests at the very first Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Climate Treaty, in Berlin.
The roads protests movements of the 1990s broadened to a wider critique of “development” and “capital”, reaching a kind of apotheosis with the J18 protests (or, if you prefer ‘riot’) in the Square Mile. From that emerged a process – criticised at the time – of ‘summit-hopping’ – of using international meetings of the G7, IMF, World Bank as a hook for ‘action’. Who got to participate and who didn’t was somewhat elided.
Climate Change was definitely “in the mix” though – one of the summits “hopped” was the COP-6 meeting in The Hague, where climate activists did all sorts of cool stuff. The “Rising Tide” group was trying – with limited success (not their fault) – to get fellow activists more focussed on the carbon dioxide problem.
August 16, 2001 – Rising Tide has plenty of ideas
It’s unclear to me how this summit would have turned out – significant and in some cases life-changing violence was dished out to peaceful protestors at Genoa in 2001.
July 21, 2001 – Sleeping protestors beaten by Italian Police
Would that have had the desired effect of scaring people into silence, raising the costs of ‘recruitment’? We’ll never know, because 911 happened (for the avoidance of doubt – the claims it was an ‘inside job’ have always struck me as ludicrous).
Environmental NVDA types were a bit perplexed for 2002, is my sense. As the attack on Iraq became obvious (really by September 2002), people started talking about direct action against war preparations. And Keir Starmer, then a young-ish human rights lawyer, successfully defended some people who took action (but I digress).
Finally (!). In 2005, the UK was hosting a G-7 meeting, and Prime Minister Tony Blair was desperate to change the conversation from the seeming-Forever War in Iraq. He chose climate change as the issue to do that (in the same way that David Cameron, as opposition leader, would use environment- and climate – as a way of de-toxifying the Tory brand). But I am digressing again.
So, there were protests, from the ‘fluffy’ stuff through to attempts at spikier stuff at the Gleneagles G-7 summit (there’s an Ian Rankin Rebus novel set at this time, which is quite fun. Right, that’s my last digression (who am I kidding?)
Crucially, though a bunch of people, veterans of the roads protests, were thinking. They sent out an email (which I can’t find) which said, in essence
“Why are we reactive, letting the capitalists decide what we talk about? Why aren’t we (the activists) more active on climate, the number one issue? We think there should be a Camp for Climate Action in mid-2006, and if you think you want to be involved, come to a one-day meeting in Manchester.”
My role (because, you know, I am so important)
I’d been involved in various things in the late 1990s and for various reasons too boring to write about, had retreated from the ‘spiky’/arrestable stuff in 2001 or so.
I knew nothing of the G-7 discussions until the email hit my inbox. I had a fairly thick folder of newspaper clippings about climate change from the FT, the Grauniad etc. I’d had a vasectomy in 2004 because I knew that the societal response to climate change would be grotesquely inadequate (I’d thought that since the early 1990s) and that there was serious trouble ahead.
If the meeting had been called for anywhere else except Manchester, I probably wouldn’t have gone and my life would have been very very different, for reasons too boring to write about.
Anywho, I went to the meeting, was impressed by some of the people and decided to get involved, even though I knew it would – within a few years – end in tears (I had a conversation with an acquaintance at the end of the day and she asked why I was going to get involved if I had no hope of ‘success’? I said, probably even more pompously than I remember ‘well, you have to, don’t you?’
Some bits of the next few months are very clear, others I have expunged. The planning weekends were monthly, in different cities. Attendance hovered around 50 or 60. I thought London (May, I think) would be bigger but it wasn’t. A wise friend said “no smell of victory.” This was profound. People could get involved in, say, stopping a bypass, or keeping GMOs off supermarket shelves with a plausible path to victory. But climate? Come on – five minutes thinking about it and you realise that this is a lost cause, only to be fought by masochists with simple martyrdom complexes and the malcontents.
I look back on the things I do remember and for the most part I wince and cringe at my actions and general deportment. I look back on some things with a sliver of pride – the
the “Time Up” book, the burnout booklet, and a few others. I loved working with my cartoonist friend Marc..
Anyway, the Camp happened (we will come back to that) though I had thought the odds of the site being occupied were at best 50-50. There were some friendships made, and some near-networks.
August 31, 2006 – activists try to “Reclaim Power”
There were also many many problems that didn’t get noticed, or were thrown in the too-hard basket – such is the nature of social movement organising.
The interest from the media was unexpected by most, I think. It was, however, “silly-season” (parliament not sitting, politicians on holiday, still acres of newspaper to be filled), and “hippies whining about climate change” was novel.
The Environmental NGOs sat up and took notice, which was a two edged sword.
And the police and security services… well, we will come back to that.
So, after the Camp everyone was exhausted. The decisions about ‘what next’, which I had tried to kick off, with very limited impact, were deferred to the next meeting, at the same venue in Manchester.
That was when I really began to have serious doubts about the strategic nous, and trust in process, of key people. Without re-hashing events that happened literally 20 years ago, there is such a thing as “facipulation” – priming an audience in a certain way and then asking them to make a “free” decision. And that’s what happened. The needed discussion about whether another Camp was the best way forward for 2007, what the dangers and other possibilities were, was simply not held. It COULD have been, thanks to the choices of some people, in positions of power (anyone who tells you there is no power/authority in so-called ‘non-hierarchical organisations’ is either an idiot or a bald-faced liar. Or perhaps both).
I stayed involved, with more and more misgivings. There were moments I appreciated (thanks to whoever got the Greenham veteran to lead a session in Leeds in early 2007 – that was mint, she was great). My final straw was seeing how the activists at Glastonbury 2007. Too boring to write about. I bailed, and started focussing more on local action (Manchester Climate Forum, Manchester Climate Fortnightly, Manchester Climate Monthly. Climate Emergency Manchester what a Gaiadam waste of time).
What happened next
Climate Camp went to Heathrow in 2007. Climate was a hot topic, and the camp was there in London, so of course attendance was much higher (despite bullshit claims, there’d never been more than about 600 people at any one time at Drax. ‘thousands’ my very fat arse).
The following year, 2008, saw the Camp, by now the typical honeypot for various Trot groupuscules, NGOs etc etc parked next to a coal-fired power station again, because this was the age of new coal-fired power stations that were going to be “carbon-capture ready.” Not Ed Miliband’s finest moment – the man does, of course, like his ludicrous technofixes.
That 2008 Camp for Climate Action was pivotal. The police had decided to take the velvet gloves off, mostly. They intimidated, via searches and photos of all who wanted to attend. They blasted “I fought the law and the law won” on loud speakers in the middle of the night. They briefed journalists that police had been injured (implying it was those dirty violent hippy protestors, knowing a mostly supine media would not ask any questions).
This worked – I remember a Manchester activist full of guilt and shame because she couldn’t face the intimidation and threatening behaviour that went with participating in the Camp.
Meanwhile, a couple of months later – The Climate Change Act was passed (props to Friends of the Earth – they threw everything they had at it, lobbyingwise. They got a little lucky (Cameron needing a re-branding issue), but without FoE’s expertise and heft, I don’t think the CCA would have been anywhere near as ‘strong’ as it was [To be clear, we’re utterly toast, my 2004 vasectomy was the right choice. But within the context of the ‘possible’, the CCA was an achievement.]
As far as I could tell, from distance, a lot of the 2006 crew had gotten fed up/burnt out and by 2009 the “Climate Camp” brand was in new, and slightly weird hands. It was held on Blackheath, in London (so, the South dominates again, and again).
2009 was dominated by the upcoming “last chance to save the world” COP to be held in Copenhagen. Despite the fact that “Camp for Climate Action” had started with an explicit critique of ‘summit-hopping’, off people went. Meanwhile, a march in London that all the NGOs had spent the year begging people to attend attracted a relatively paltry 50 thousand (“the Wave” – got help us).
2010 was nail in coffin time, as you’d expect for a social movement wave (people can only put the rest of their lives on hold for so long, sustain the myth of progress for so long, before they say ‘so long’ to forever comrades).
The Copenhagen debacle meant that a lot of people Lost Hope (srsly, fuck ‘hope’). The media stopped paying attention to the whole issue, not just “hippies in a field want social change”. The first climate camp north of the Watford Gap since 2006 was a bust. And then came the revelation that key players in the social movement organisations that had given us roads protests, ‘anti-globalisation’ and, yes, climate camp, were, in fact, deep cover police.
“Awks,” as the kids used to say, briefly.
It’s in that context that the cringe “Metamorphosis” statement emerged from a meeting in early 2011. Climate Camp was dead. Long live… er… er.. Reclaim the Power?
Reclaim the Power tried to stop a new wave of gas-fired power stations, using many of the techniques refined during the Climate Camp era. Brave people, putting their bodies and liberty on the line. Meanwhile, other people threw themselves into stopping fracking, with more success.
In 2015 there was a (failed) attempt at using yet another COP to “kickstart” the UK climate movement.
In 2016 there was an activist zine on “Drax ten years on.” Full disclosure – I was invited to write a piece, and I did. If I can dig it out I will. But the zine was not, in my opinion, a success – many of the key questions that needed asking were not even asked.
See also – Hope, false hope, stupid hope and #climatechange: From Paris to Extinction (Rebellion)
In the second half of 2018 “Extinction Rebellion” came along. Combined with the school strikes, the IPCC’s “1.5 degrees” report and Greta Thunberg’s school strike (a highly emotive and easily replicated new repertoire), this gave us the latest ‘Big Wave’.
One observation – during that period you could talk to ‘heavily involved’ XR types who would look at you blankly when you said “Climate Camp.” For the young ones, that was understandable – they had been 8 or 9 or whatever. For those fire-breathers in their 50s and 60s it was, I think, an uncomfortable topic, because it put the lie to the notion that nobody had ever tried to act on climate. These people had, for whatever reason, chosen not to get involved over a decade earlier. Some were quite desperate to ‘make up for lost time’, which, er, you can’t do…
Even before COVID, though, there were real signs that all was not well. I have written about that to death, and if I can be bothered will post some links below.
Extinction Rebellion says ‘we quit’ – why radical eco‑activism has a short shelf life
Attempts to keep the flame alive with Insulate Britain and Just Stop Oil [see Just Stop Oil – anthropologically fascinating but politically terrifying] have not worked. The State has responded, predictably, with ever more draconian laws and judicial smack-downs.
Now and tomorrow?
I think the shituation is truly desperate (duh). We seem to have wasted the last good chances to get our shit together. The future looks unutterably bleak, and I mean the near future, not “2050”. What irritates me the most is that we seem incapable of learning any lessons about anything much. I keep trotting it out, but only because it’s true; if Groundhog Day involved Phil Connors reliving the same day over and over and never learning anything, it would not only be not a comedy, it would be an unwatchable tragedy.
What we could learn
Actual Movement Building is really really hard.
It’s easy to proclaim, much much harder to do.
See here – Mobilisation versus Actual Movement Building – All Our Yesterdays
It starts (but does not end) with holding meetings, film showings etc that are actually engaging rather than disempowering for all but the organisers and their acolytes.
Meetings, Gatherings or… “Fodderings”?
How I’d design a film showing and discussion | manchester climate monthly
It continues with figuring out how to share skills, knowledge, to thicken relationships among individuals and groups, especially facing bits of “civil society” that are not explicitly ‘campaign-y/NGO’.
It continues with having functional groups that can sustain themselves, and make common cause on related issues, and identify leverage points where both policy but ALSO broader social/economic/cultural change might take place.
It needs organised labour, but the trouble is many of the existing organisations (trade unions) are horrifically complicit and sclerotic.
Transmission belts of ‘activist tradecraft’ are fragile.
There is a lot of wheel reinvention (this is not to say that Climate Camp was particularly great at designing and facilitating meetings, either internal or public facing. Some were okay, but for the most part nothing was innovated, learnt, retained, and it was all quite excruciating). But starting from scratch is disastrous.
The pendulum swings
If you aren’t building a group that can survive when the streets empty and the media circus moves on, then you aren’t building anything but your own mausoleum.
The State is far more interested in you than you realise.
Spycops. Not just a job creation scheme for perverts and sadists. Crucially – that first camp (and the others) was allowed to happen. The ‘take the site’ thing in 2006 was choreographed by the police, who knew more than enough to stop it, thanks to their undercovers. It was useful to them to allow the Camps in 2006 and 2007 to go ahead. In 2008 something changed – I don’t know what – maybe the politicians said “enough” or the cops themselves had no more use for the theatre, but they basically stopped it.
Er, …that’s it. It’s Cocker Protocol Time, people.
I’d be interested to hear other people’s takes on all this, especially folks who were there.
Further reading
I’ve read a few academic articles about climate camp, but none that struck me as either insightful or useful. So I ain’t linking to them. If you think you have one that’s particularly good, do chime in.
I’ve not been particularly looking for other “what next for the climate movement?” blogs, and if you think you have one that’s particularly good, do chime in.
Meanwhile, my GAIA I have wasted the best (sic) years of my life writing stuff that hardly anybody reads and even fewer try to act on. Cher, incentive structures and our inevitable doom
What a waste. I am genuinely embarrassed for myself.
Extinction Rebellion says ‘we quit’ – why radical eco-activism has a short shelf life
“If we don’t tend to our relationships with each other, this isn’t going to work” or DIGGERS!
Feeding the trolls – of XR, ad hominem abuse and the Kool Aid
2019: How we blew it, again | Peace News
Dear ‘new’ #climate activist. Unsolicited advice, #oldfartclimateadvice
“There’s a hole in my movement, dear Liza…” (aka “caught in a trap, can’t walk out…”)
A coda on AI
This is gibberish. For the love of Gaia, do not rot your brain (and poison the well of public discourse) by using thirsty plagiarism machines. I implore you.
