{"id":2588,"date":"2019-04-29T11:21:14","date_gmt":"2019-04-29T11:21:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/?p=2588"},"modified":"2019-04-29T11:21:47","modified_gmt":"2019-04-29T11:21:47","slug":"what-now-for-extinction-rebellion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/?p=2588","title":{"rendered":"What Now for Extinction Rebellion?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What to make of\nExtinction Rebellion (XR) after its spectacular week occupying four very\nvisible sites in central London? We were there on the first day of the action,\non Monday 15 April, talking to protesters. Between us, we spoke to over 600 protesters\nand handed out surveys to a great many of them. from as far afield as Norfolk,\nCornwall and Preston. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The vast majority were\nnot new to protest. Only a handful, at most, told us that this was their first\ndemonstration. Some talked of peace movement protests they had been on in the\n1980s. Some we recognised, from previous climate protests, including the\nclimate strike rallies in March.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what\u2019s different\nthis time around? \u201cI hope you are not going to write that we are white and\nmiddle class\u201d, said one woman. Well\u2026 we could also add that our research shows\nthat not only are they white and middle class, they are also very highly\neducated, very well informed and are from across the generations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many protestors also have\nquite spectacularly low levels of trust in our democratic institutions. A\nnumber of people would have given minus answers on our scale of 0-10 for trust\nin democratic institutions, if only our survey had allowed them to do so. Two\nwomen from Colchester were wearing identical signs, saying \u2018Planet, not\nPolitics\u2019. We asked them what they meant by this: they told us they had little\nfaith in parliament to address climate change in the way required, or for party\npolitics to provide a solution to the crisis. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s fair to say that\nXR\u2019s action this Easter, with 1065 arrests reported so far from the London\nApril protests, have now squarely put the issue on the political agenda, and\nmade the complaints about disruption and \u2018misery\u2019 from government ministers, Commissioner\nof the Metropolitan Police Cressida Dick, and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan look\nridiculous in the context of climate disruption. The combined contributions of\ntwo secular saints at the start and end of the protest \u2013 Greta Thunberg\u2019s\narrival in London in time to join the demonstrators, and David Attenborough\u2019s\nBBC programme on climate change were perfectly timed for XR. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Protest and\npolicing<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

As we write, XR is\nvoluntarily bringing to an end its presence in London, and is grappling with\nthe question of what next. XR\u2019s arrest strategy has certainly caused\ndisruption, given activists agency, and attracted the world\u2019s attention; its\nco-founder, Roger Hallam, based this strategy on the non-violent action theory\nof Gene Sharp, who wrote about how to resist authoritarian regimes. The key to\nthis is winning over the forces of repression (the police, the army). But this\nstrategy seems more relevant to the current events in Sudan than to the UK\ntoday, where the question is (usually) not whether the police or army will\nshoot, but how can public democratic space best be protected?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

True, the Met struggled\nto justify using significant force against XR initially, especially given XR\u2019s\ncommitted worthiness, unity, commitment and good humour. But the lack of a\ncredible threat to public order, combined with the numbers of protesters, was\nprobably more important than their niceness to the police, however tactically\nastute this was. This is also atypical: we know from recent studies of the\npolicing of protest by Joanna Gilmore at the University of York and Will\nJackson at Liverpool John Moores that where protesters are fewer, commercial\ninterests are more obviously in play, and the locations are less visible (such\nas in the anti-fracking protests at Barton Moss and Preston New Road) that\npolice have used increasingly tough measures against non-violent protests. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the end of the Easter\nweekend, the policing of XR had noticeably become more robust. XR can likewise expect\nthe police to adapt and attempt to undermine future protests. Undercover\nofficers will be gathering intelligence, which police training manuals justify\non the basis that disruptive protests are serious criminality, even \u2018domestic\nextremism\u2019. For the police, \u2018peaceful protest\u2019 is limited to the narrow definition\nof demonstrations, marches and non-disruptive actions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

XR would do well to\nstudy the history of the Committee\nof 100<\/a>, whose sit-down demonstration in Trafalgar Square in 1961 led to\n1314 arrests, using a very similar strategy. The authorities reduced the\nnumbers arrested and charged, concentrating on strategic incapacitation of\nleaders, causing divisions in the movement and a rapid decline. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The serious work begins now<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, the\npolitics of protest have changed since the 1960s. Civil disobedience is now more\nfamiliar, and even widely accepted. Given the momentum created by XR and the\nschoolchildren\u2019s strike, there is an interesting argument coming up about the\nscope for using civil disobedience and non-violent direct action to create a\nnew democratic focus that parties and elections no longer seem able to produce.\nThis is not to replace representative democracy but to complement it: even if\nXR\u2019s demand for a Citizens\u2019 Assembly on climate change fails, this matters less\nthan the sense that politicians and the major parties are playing catch-up, and\nlooking to engage with climate mobilisations which clearly have a strong public\necho. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The challenge XR faces\nnow is one of movement building. Its success in mobilising its supporters was\nbased on traditional methods of public meetings and training to remove the\nbarriers to civil disobedience. This led to a broader mobilisation than\nprevious direct action networks such as Climate Camp and Reclaim the Power\nachieved; but to build a movement equal to its ambitions, it needs to be broader\nstill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words, the\nserious work begins now: XR faces the challenge of growing the movement and sustaining\nthe agency of the activists it has energised, or of falling into the trap of\ndemobilisation (and the victory of the politics of \u2018business as usual\u2019). This\nmeans making the urgency of the response to climate change a new normal,\nthrough multiple local actions, away from London and media spectacle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But this also means\nmaking choices which will alienate some. It\u2019s fine to \u2018tell the truth\u2019 about\nclimate change: but politics is about trade-offs, and climate politics is about\nfundamental systemic change. Some of XR\u2019s initiators have spoken of wanting to\nappeal across the left-right divide; but the response to XR has mainly been critical\non the right, and broadly supportive, although not without some criticisms, on\nthe left. One issue is that XR\u2019s strategy of courting arrest assumes a white\nand middle class privilege<\/a>. Otherwise supportive\ncritics<\/a> have pointed out that people of colour may have good reason to be\nwary of inviting arrest and also that prosecutions and trials are likely to sap\nthe energy of the movement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

XR\u2019s initial framing\nof climate change seemed to be more moral than political, glossing over the explanation\nof why the harmful impacts of climate change are already being experienced in\nthe Global South. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even in the space\nof a few months XR has evolved. Naming the pink boat that was locked to the\nroad at Oxford Circus after the murdered Honduran environmental and human\nrights defender Berta\nC\u00e1ceres<\/a> was an important statement of solidarity. It was also good\nsign that the focus of the XR People\u2019s Assembly at the end of the first week of\nthe April London actions was on how XR can address decolonisation and\ninclusivity. Those debates can probably never be settled, but making space for\nthem to take place is an important first step.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

XR cannot appeal to\neveryone and will have enemies as well as friends: making ideological choices\nis an inevitable process in developing a social movement. How it responds to these\ntwo challenges, of ideas and agency, will determine its success \u2013 and maybe,\nthe future of climate change. <\/p>\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What to make of Extinction Rebellion (XR) after its spectacular week occupying four very visible sites in central London? We were there on the first day of the action, on Monday 15 April, talking to protesters. Between us, we spoke to over 600 protesters and handed out surveys to a great many of them. from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":116,"featured_media":2589,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1395,1407,1396],"tags":[1611,1612],"coauthors":[1576,1577],"class_list":["post-2588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-comment","category-environment","category-uk","tag-climate-change","tag-protest"],"amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/What-Now-for-Extinction-Rebellion-32768299737_38ad640e9a_k.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/116"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2588"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/politicalquarterlyblog.preliveweb.site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=2588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}