Tackling The Climate Catastrophe Strategically
By Robert J. Burrowes
24 September, 2014
Countercurrents.org
If you like to ask or beg your oppressor to go easy on you, then you do
not need to read this article. And if you like to do what makes you feel
good at the time, irrespective of its strategic impact, then this
article is not for you either. My interest in tackling violence, in
whatever form it takes, has always been to take action myself that
leaves the perpetrator powerless (but, hopefully, a convert too). I also
like to be strategic so that the impact of my action is long-lasting (in
fact, preferably permanent) and structurally reduces the violence in our
world. Here's how I work.
I never vote or lobby elites, nor do I participate in actions designed
to do this, such as the recent People's Climate March in New York (and
elsewhere). For critiques, with which I largely agree, of this type of
action, see the recent articles by Chris Hedges 'The Last Gasp of
Climate Change Liberals'
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_last_gasp_of_climate_change_liberals_20140831
and kat yang-stevens 'Quelling Dissent: How The Big Greens Contain &
Dissolve Resistance'
http://groundworkforpraxis.com/2014/08/29/quelling_dissent/ Fortunately,
some of the groups that organised other events around the People's
Climate March are politically savvy.
One of the other problems with mass mobilizations of this nature is that
they put too much emphasis on numbers. Estimates suggest that up to 30
million people worldwide mobilized on 15 February 2003 to protest the
impending war on Iraq. What did it achieve? Numbers are politically
irrelevant unless strategically deployed.
In brief, my analysis, reinforced by decades of casual observation, is
that lobbying elites is a complete waste of time and that a strategy
that focuses on engaging 'ordinary' individuals and a diverse range of
grassroots groups to take action in the desired direction is far more
effective. Why?
Mainstream political processes are usually described as 'democratic'
which means that they are supposed to be responsive to and
representative of the popular will. When they were originally created
this was usually the explicitly stated or implicitly presumed aim.
However, with the passage of time and the steady rise of corporate
power, corporate money has corrupted the 'democratic ideal' so that the
'people's representatives' are no longer responsive to the people.
Corporations (using their elite fora, industry organisations, front
groups, think tanks, political and judicial lackeys, lobbyists,
'philanthropic' organisations, corporate media and co-opted NGOs) long
ago seized control of governments and key international organisations,
such as the United Nations. And other powerful non-state actors,
including particular religious elites such as Zionism, the Vatican and
Wahhabi Islam, exercise disproportionate power in certain contexts too.
In essence, this means that elites will continue to encourage us to
'exercise your democratic right' to vote and to lobby them because once
our political effort has been so channelled, our dissent is easily
dissipated and ignored. Conservative political 'action' groups of
various kinds often play a part in drawing us into using ineffective
strategies and we need to be aware of the part they are playing on
behalf of elite interests even if, sometimes, this is simply the result
of an inadequate political analysis rather than something more sinister.
So what can you do to take strategic action yourself in relation to the
climate catastrophe? Any reputable analysis of this ongoing disaster
always identifies carbon dioxide and methane emissions as primary
drivers of the problem. So one vital part of what you can do is to
boycott products that produce carbon dioxide and/or methane in excessive
quantities: for example, don't travel by car or aeroplane and don't eat
meat. Or, if this sounds beyond you in the short term, tackle these and
all other environmental problems in a systematic and strategic manner by
joining those participating in 'The Flame Tree Project to Save Life on
Earth' http://tinyurl.com/flametree which outlines a strategy to reduce
consumption in seven key resource areas by 10% each year for 15 years
while increasing your self-reliance, in 16 key ways, also by 10% each
year for 15 years.
The Flame Tree Project was inspired by Mohandas K. Gandhi who identified
the environmental crisis decades before it became an issue in the West,
and who lived his own life in extraordinary simplicity and
self-reliance, symbolised by his daily spinning of khadi. 'Earth
provides enough for every person's need but not for every person's
greed.' He also invited us to powerfully follow our conscience,
reminding us that 'Hesitating to act because others do not yet see the
way only hinders progress.'
But, critically important though he believed personal action to be,
Gandhi was also an extraordinary political strategist and he knew that
we needed to do more than transform our own personal lives. We need to
provide opportunities that compel others to consider doing the same.
Rather than spell out how climate activists might do this here, I would
like to illustrate this with a simple example.
In 1988-1990 I was involved in the campaign of the Melbourne Rainforest
Action Group (MRAG) which had about 70 members attending weekly meetings
using consensus decision-making and processes to ensure balanced gender
participation. We decided not to waste one moment lobbying politicians
to end the import of rainforest timber from South East Asia. We wanted
to be effective.
Instead, we developed a nonviolent strategy that involved doing many
highly disciplined and completely transparent nonviolent actions. This
eventually even won the support of the police who reached the point of
refusing to arrest us in most circumstances, thus giving us the
opportunity to review our strategy and adopt new tactics when we judged
arrest to be strategically useful. Our fundamental message was always:
'Don't Buy Rainforest Timber'. If we blockaded a rainforest timber ship
in the Yarra River – see, for example, 'Nonviolent Struggle for the
Rainforests' http://dkeenan.com/NvT/15/15.2.txt and 'Rainforest Ship
Blockaded and Picketed' http://dkeenan.com/NvT/18/18.7.txt – which
provided great visuals that even the corporate media couldn't always
ignore, our largest sign always said 'Don't Buy Rainforest Timber'.
We also liaised extensively with other interested parties, particularly
the local Wurrundjeri (indigenous) people (to whom we 'paid the rent'
for our use of their land), the police (to whom we always told the truth
about our planned actions), port authorities and fellow activists of
various persuasions. We spent time liaising with fourteen key trade
unions which got tug boat crews refusing (for 24 hours for each ship) to
staff the tugs that ships needed in order to dock, waterside workers
(longshoremen) refusing to unload the ships for at least 24 hours, truck
drivers delaying driving the timber away from the dock, builders
labourers refusing to use any imported rainforest timber on building
sites….
And we convinced groups like timber merchants and local hardware store
owners to refuse to stock the timber, mainly by asking teachers to ask
school students to write letters to them. Obviously, too, droves of
consumers and builders chose our recommended sustainable timber
alternatives, about which we prepared a short booklet, as well. If you
are interested, the 15 minute video of the MRAG campaign, which includes
some dramatic footage of nonviolent actions, is included on my website:
http://robertjburrowes.wordpress.com
In 2014, there is no government ban on rainforest timber imports into
Australia. Since 1991 (after the campaign ended), rainforest timber
imports into Australia have been at 10% of their pre-1989 level
(although there has since been a progressive substitution of paper
imports which a new campaign needs to address).
If you were designing a strategic nonviolent action campaign to
encourage people to reduce their consumption and increase their
self-reliance to help save our climate, with whom would you work and
what would be your strategy? If you want suggestions for this, the 12
point strategic framework in the book 'The Strategy of Nonviolent
Defense: A Gandhian Approach'
http://www.sunypress.edu/p-2176-the-strategy-of-nonviolent-defe.aspx
will be useful; cheap, second hand copies are readily available.
If you were planning a nonviolent action, do you know how to maximise
its strategic impact? For help with this, see 'The Political Objective
and Strategic Goal of Nonviolent Actions'.
http://warisacrime.org/content/political-objective-and-strategic-goal-nonviolent-actions
Do you know why and how to liaise with the police? If not, see 'How To
Do Police Liaison'
http://anitamckone.wordpress.com/articles-2/how-to-do-police-liaison/
And here's a 17 point checklist to make it extraordinarily difficult for
the police to use violence at your nonviolent action and to ensure that
it is strategically counterproductive for our opponents if they do so:
'Minimising the Risk of Police Violence' http://dkeenan.com/NvT/40/9.txt
Finally, if you would like to see your efforts within the context of a
worldwide movement to end all violence, you are welcome to consider
signing the online pledge of 'The People's Charter to Create a
Nonviolent World' http://thepeoplesnonviolencecharter.wordpress.com
In summary, saving the climate is like saving the rainforests:
fundamentally, we must reduce our consumption, particularly those of us
who live in industrialised economies. If you are not willing to do this,
as Gandhi did, do you feel that you can credibly ask others to do so?
Gandhi led by example. How do you lead?
And as for lobbying elites? To me, it is an act of disempowerment. What
do you reckon?
Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding
and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in
an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a
nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of 'Why Violence?'
http://tinyurl.com/whyviolence His email address is [email protected]
and his website is at http://robertjburrowes.wordpress.com
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