Why Climate Justice activists are preparing to hack the Paris climate summit
A new report by the global EJOLT project includes essays from climate justice activists and academics on how they aim to hack, resist and confront inaction and false solutions at the upcoming COP21 in Paris in December. It aims to provide background and guidelines for those who care about climate change on how they can take action in the run-up to the event, regardless if they will be in the streets of Paris.
Climate change is happening faster than previously thought. Yet as ice-caps melt, sea-tides rise and desertification grows, global leaders continue to ignore the popular mandate to confront the fossil fuel industry and the root causes of climate change. Tamra Gilbertson, co-editor of the publication, states, “Government and corporate-led strategies on climate change focused on the benefits to big business over the last 21 years resulting in devastating market-led mechanisms that do nothing to address root socio-economic and environmental problems. These ineffective and dangerous policies have to stop now!”
The report demonstrates how global decentralized climate justice movements are opposing fracking, pipelines, off-shore oil, and dirty coal, racking up victories and gaining strength. According to report co-editor Leah Temper, “The ongoing resistance of those living alongside exploitative projects – from forest-grabbers to pipelines – are the most powerful force for keeping fossil fuels under the ground and the main hope in the struggle against climate change. This report shares their stories.”
This compilation of articles aims to open space for debate on climate politics ahead of and beyond the COP21 in Paris, to give a voice to these resistances, share vital research from destructive projects and demonstrate how the UN’s lack of leadership threatens the planet and exacerbates the climate crises. In the face of paralysis from the UN, resistance to global climate injustice and inequality is alive and building from the ground up. The report is a product of EJOLT (Environmental Justice Organizations, Liabilities and Trade), an EU-funded project coordinated at ICTA-UAB, that brings together 23 research and activist organizations around the world to support Environmental Justice research and action.
The report is accompanied by an EJOLT produced video shot at the Unis´tot´en camp in North-Western British Colombia showing how the camp is succeeding in stopping up to seven oil and gas pipelines, holding up billions in investment and keeping millions of barrels (and cubic metres) of fossil fuels under the ground.
Watch the video at: https://youtu.be/ZDR1l_Xw7ts
Read the accompanying report: Refocusing resistance to climate justice: COPing in, COPing out and beyond Paris, EJOLT report no. 23, 2015 here: www.ejolt.org/2015/09/refocusing-resistance-climate-justice-coping-copin...