Al Gore, James Hansen, and Civil Disobedience

Gordon Clark, September 1, 2007, ZNET

In his recent global warming op-ed in the New York Times ("The Big Melt," August 16, 2007) , Nicholas Kristof reported on a conversation with Al Gore in which the former Vice-President said: "I can't understand why there aren't rings of young people blocking bulldozers, and preventing them from constructing coal-fired power plants." His comment was a reaction to the ever- quickening pace of polar ice meltoff, with all its catastrophic implications, and the huge role played by coal-fired power plants in advancing our demise through global warming.

Gore's comment was also strikingly similar to a recent quote from Dr. James Hansen, the top climate scientist at NASA: "It seems to me that young people, especially, should be doing whatever is necessary to block construction of dirty (no CCS) coal-fired power plants."

What does it mean when one of the top scientific leaders ringing the alarm on global warming, along with a top political leader, both suggest, in so many words, nonviolent direct action (or civil disobedience) to confront the challenge of climate change?

Clearly both men must realize the importance of nonviolent resistance in social change efforts of this magnitude and agree, if only subconsciously, with historian Howard Zinn's observation that "Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy. It is absolutely essential to it." (Dr. Hansen, for his part, goes on to quote the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution at some length.)

Gore and Hansen must both know that nonviolent direct action has been a significant catalyst in nearly every major social change movement in U.S. (and world) history, starting in this country with the Boston Tea Party and extending through the anti-slavery, woman's suffrage, labor rights, civil rights, environmental and anti-war movements. Nonviolent direct action can dramatize an injustice or danger to the general public as few other actions can. It both provokes other people to act and speak - often people who had previously been silent - and it opens up political space for them to do so. Nonviolent actions are acts of courage that inspire others to follow. They are acts of leadership.

The twin quotes also reflect the extraordinary urgency of our predicament. As Jay Gulledge, senior scientist at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, notes in Kristof's column, "Over and over again, we're finding that models correctly predict the patterns of change but understate their magnitude."

Or their speed. According to the May 2007 report from the National Snow and Ice Data Center, polar ice is melting significantly faster than computer models of climate calculate, and the Arctic Sea could be free of summer ice by 2020 - 30 years earlier than the recent prediction by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Clearly, we are running out of time.

What is strikingly curious about the quotes, however, is the suggestion by both men that "young people" need to be doing this. Clearly young people will have to suffer the disastrous effects of global warming longer than older people. But that does not make the responsibility any less on the older heads among us to take any and all actions necessary to stop the planet-destroying calculus of carbon emissions. Indeed, one would think that those who are older are more culpable for the current condition of our planet than those who are younger, and therefore more responsible for taking dramatic action to confront the crisis.

I would also imagine that young people (and I can only imagine, being middle-aged myself) are, while grateful for recognition of their vital role in the movement, probably less than enthusiastic to have this particular imperative dumped on them and them alone.

Personally, I pray for and will gladly follow leadership from any quarter and age group. But I expect it from those in the climate change movement who are older, more experienced, and more influential. Especially when it comes to nonviolent resistance. I know, for instance, that when I or younger activists organize nonviolent direct actions, a relative few people will hear and join us, and we are lucky to get more than a few stories outside the independent media. If Al Gore were to actually call for and lead such an action it is likely that thousands would join him, and the story would be splashed across the mainstream media for all of America to see.

None of this should be read as criticism of Mr. Gore's incredible efforts on global warming. He has arguably been the single most effective (and active) person on the planet in raising the clarion call. But perhaps now his leadership is requiring even more of him. After all, if you truly recognize the extreme emergency and catastrophic danger inherent in global warming, how long can one wait before taking the most dramatic, effective and necessary actions in response - as opposed to wondering out loud why those younger and less influential than yourself aren't doing so?

Of course, this is a question that everyone who understands the reality of global warming needs to be asking themselves right now. How long can any of us wait? As with all revolutionary changes, forging a new, sustainable society will require us to take risks, make sacrifices, and endure suffering - all hallmarks of nonviolence. And nonviolent blockades of coal-fired power plants, Mr. Gore and Dr. Hansen are correct in noting, would be an excellent place to start.

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Gordon Clark is the convener of the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, www.iraqpledge.org

After Walk Against Warming: where next for the movement?

Kamala Emanuel, November 16, GLW

November 11’s national Walk Against Warming was an important initiative for the climate change movement. It was smaller than the 100,000 people organisers had hoped for, but the fact that tens of thousands joined the biggest political demonstration of the election period confirms the opinion poll findings that climate change is a grave concern for large numbers of people.

When liberal “conventional wisdom” promotes the view that it is enough to vote for parties with the right policies, it can be difficult to convince people to rally in an election period. It can be harder again to convince the social movement peak bodies — often the ones with the resources and weight to pull off big mobilisations — to call such demonstrations. So the timing of the rallies, two weeks before the election, was to the credit of the organisers and an important way for ordinary people concerned about global warming to demand government action.

Nevertheless, the three key limitations revealed by the rallies pose serious questions for the climate change movement.

The capital city rallies weren’t built around clear demands. Posters and fliers carried the slogan “One planet. One climate. Last chance”, or modifications of this. But in the absence of clear, concrete demands, the way is open for the manoeuvring of the ALP and Coalition, which can claim to be “against warming” too. If we’re not explicit about what needs to be done, we dilute the pressure on them to act.

Linked to this was the decision to invite Labor and Coalition speakers to address the rallies, despite their refusal to commit to the measures necessary to prevent climate disaster. In this, the rally-goers were far in advance of the organisers, heckling and turning their backs on Labor’s Peter Garrett in Sydney, and elsewhere giving them a cold reception (compared, for example, to the enthusiastic reception given to Greens speakers such as Bob Brown).

A third shortcoming was the lack of democracy in the organising of the rallies. Conservation councils in each state organised or, in some instances, co-organised the capital city rallies with other environment peak groups (e.g., Greenpeace in Melbourne). With some exceptions (for example Hobart and in regional centres like Wollongong), meetings were not open to all activists or groups, or were only opened up once all the decisions had been made and the conservation groups were looking for people to spread the word. This restricted discussion and collective decision-making about such issues as which demands and speakers would be best, and reduced the sense of ownership of the event that comes through such democratic participation.

The Sydney rally organisers initially invited Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union mining division secretary Tony Maher — who promotes “clean” coal — to speak at the rally. He was pulled after an email campaign initiated by CFMEU member and Anvil Hill Alliance activist Graham Brown — but this wouldn’t have been necessary had the organising taken place in an inclusive way.

Given the urgency of global action to avoid runaway climate change, this is not a campaign we can afford to lose. To be most effective, this movement will need democratic processes and structures, to give participants the benefit of a range of ideas for tactics, demands and priorities, and to ensure the greatest number of people feel empowered to take action together.

It’s clear the movement is diverse and needs to be so. There are numerous specific campaigns that must be waged through a combination of measures — in the streets, in direct actions, in the courts. These include the campaigns to stop the Anvil Hill coalmine in the Hunter Valley, halt the expansion of the Newcastle coal export facilities, stop the Gunns’ pulp mill and associated native forest logging in Tasmania and many others. They are campaigns on their own, but winning each of them will be essential to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and/or maintaining and increasing the carbon sink (the Earth’s ability to absorb the greenhouse gases released into the air).

But as well as supporting these discrete campaigns, we also need to strive for unity across the climate change movement around broader demands, such as for the immediate and deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions required to keep global warming below at most 1.5-2°C and in the longer term to bring the temperature down; for rejecting the non-solutions of nuclear power and “clean coal”; for vast expansion of renewable energy production, alongside efficiency measures; and for an expansion of public transport — which really needs to be free, if it’s to be taken up on the scale necessary to get cars off the roads.

To support such campaigns and demands, the movement will need to be independent of the vested interests of the fossil fuel and other greenhouse polluting industries, and their Coalition and Labor lackeys. It will also need to avoid false friends like the nuclear lobby with their cynical attempts to reinvent nuclear power as the solution to climate change. This is not to advocate refusing to work with members of the ALP, or anyone else, to halt climate change. But we do need to oppose attempts to subordinate the tactics and demands we adopt to the electoral interests of the corporate parties that have shown their inclination to put profits ahead of the planet.

In this light, the plans by Melbourne Friends of the Earth to hold a post-election “Where next?” forum for the movement is a welcome initiative. Within the movement, we sorely need such discussions on how to advance this struggle — the efforts of the “greenhouse mafia” of major greenhouse polluters to stymie action that could cut into their profits means that stopping global warming will take a colossal struggle. The left will need to find ways to construct broad alliances to ensure real measures are taken to halt the warming — and that such measures are not only environmentally, but also socially, sustainable.

[Kamala Emanuel is a NSW Senate candidate for the Socialist Alliance.]