Extinction Rebellion (ER) has emerged in the UK as the latest expression of the deep discontent and grief felt by many who can see that the planetary exploitation of nature is having irreversible effects on the Earth’s climate.
“We are facing an unprecedented global emergency. The government has failed to protect us. To survive, it’s going to take everything we’ve got.” – ER website.
Extinction Rebellion has three demands:
1. The Government must tell the truth about the climate and wider ecological emergency, reverse inconsistent policies and work alongside the media to communicate with citizens.
2. The Government must enact legally binding policy measures to reduce carbon emissions to net zero by 2025 and to reduce consumption levels.
3. A national Citizen’s Assembly to oversee the changes, as part of creating a democracy fit for purpose.
Advocating civil disobedience as a way to draw attention to a planet in crisis, XR has been quick to rollout a series of events from ‘swarming’ roadblocks, office occupations (including Greenpeace), to a series of Rebellion Days of mass protests in central London, the first two of which are depicted here.
The first Rebellion Day on 17 November 2018, occupied five road bridges (Waterloo, Southwark, Westminster, Blackfriars and Lambeth) in central London resulting in over 80 arrests. The second a week later was a memorial funeral for extinct species. Initial attempts to dig a burial grave in the centre of Parliament Square were stopped by police. Instead the coffin headed a procession past Downing Street and the Cenotaph and eventually came to rest at the gates of Buckingham palace where a letter was read out to the Queen.
By picking up the civil disobedience baton, ER has become the latest in a long line of protest resistance from the Diggers to the Suffragettes. More recent movements to confront the same issues as ER using civil disobedience have had varying degrees of success. Perhaps the one with most parallels and most similar acronym is Earth First! or EF! as it is commonly known.
Beginning in the early 1990’s EF! forged alliances, challenged entrenched environmentalism and galvanized civil disobedience towards the issues of the day, from rainforest destruction to road-building and climate change. It spawned a series of spin-off movements: Reclaim the streets and Climate Camp, to name a few.
Do or Die – the activist journal that reported on the events of the 90’s and provided political analysis of the day came to an end in 2003, but still provides an excellent archive of this period of resistance.
As with all movements that attempt to bring about societal change, ER has already courted controversy and stimulated debate within the resistance movement on the relative merits of the current direction of travel – central among them civil disobedience leading to arrest, often on a large scale.
Many in the EF! movement gave up their liberty and did their time imprisoned for their beliefs. Many more faced court trials, fines and criminal records for ‘digger-diving’ or similar. More often arrests were incidental to the actions of protest rather than the aim in itself, and this is perhaps a key distinction to be explored. Given the enormous amounts of energy and costs associated with prosecution, it is worth having clarity on the approach from the outset.
“We are willing to make personal sacrifices. We are prepared to be arrested and to go to prison.” – ER website.
The ER approach of apparently getting arrested as end in itself as a political statement, has been criticized by some as politically naive for risking turning away potential recruits at an early stage in the development of the movement and risking its long-term sustainability.
Whatever the outcome of this particular debate, there is no denying that ER has entered the resistance stage with aplomb. Revitalising resistance after barren years dampened by the war on terror and austerity, ER’s injection of energy provides a welcome boost.
The question now is whether it is politically savvy enough to expand its position, and appealing enough to cause a snowball effect to attract a mass following from beyond the seasoned activist scene.
Here is the full Extinction Rebellion Declaration of Rebellion.
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Extinction Rebellion protesters camped out at London’s Marble Arch, finally declared a pause after days of protests in the UK capital over the Easter holidays. At one point four major intersections were closed to protest. Before an evening closing ceremony in Hyde Park on Thursday, hundreds carried out ‘swarming’ protests,...
