On Saturday afternoon, as most world leaders had left Copenhagen, the AYCC International team gathered in a circle on the dusty floor of a large warehouse called Oskenhallen that most of the NGOs, including us, had been using as a workspace since we’d been locked out of the Bella Centre a few days into the second week of negotiations.
The mood in Oskenhallen was sombre. Small groups of climate advocates were conferring around tables, talking quietly and seriously about next steps post-UN Climate negotiations, and working hard to frame the debate back in their home countries. The sense of activity and purpose and expectations of the past few days had drifted away in a blur of confusion, disappointment, anger, outrage, disbelief, sadness and sleep deprivation. Most of our team had been up all night – either at the snap action held outside the conference centre as soon as news of Obama’s “accord” was released, or doing domestic media interviews and writing opinion editorials for Australia.
At 4pm the 21 members of our core team came together. Slowly, each person reflected on what the past 2 weeks had meant, and expressed their reactions to the outcome.
I looked at our team and smiled. What an amazing group – comprising an up-and-coming comedian from Adelaide, a scientist-turned-activist from Mildura, a young Labor party member (“I might have to re-think my membership of the ALP after this,” she said), two inspiring young Aboriginal leaders who played an influential role in getting Indigenous rights recognised in the draft negotiating text, a PhD student studying emissions trading, two film-makers, a high school student from rural Victoria who fought the Black Saturday bushfires, an economist, a musician and many more. Despite the fact that everyone in our team is under 27, together we have a wealth of experience in policy, advocacy, media, public speaking, online campaigning, logistics and project management.
It’s truly an amazing team – complemented by our “base team” back on the ground in Australia, who are just as wonderful and did an incredible job organising actions, vigils, and the domestic pressure we needed for us to be a credible and effective voice over here. To give you an example – over 2,000 of our members back home wrote letters of support to Pacific Island negotiators in under 12 hours. These were delivered along with home-baked brownies by our Project Survival Pacific team in the Conference Centre to exhausted AOSIS negotiators who’d been under immense pressure from Australia and other nations to back down from their strong stance supporting a deal based on 350 parts per million.
As we went around the circle in our team meeting, people cried, laughed, and shared stories that were truly special and moving. After spending just 2 weeks together, our group felt as close as family. I felt a sense of determination sweeping through us. Although Copenhagen did not achieve what we needed it to, we knew we wouldn’t give up. Our leaders aren’t done yet – so neither are we. We are all aware that the type of deep change we seek has always required great struggle and great sacrifice. Our movement has grown, in size and depth, and determination.
Sitting in on our meeting was Hannah Mia, a young Swedish climate activist with one of the most heart-warming smiles I’ve ever seen. After listening to us talk, she said that the Swedish youth delegation was back at her hostel, sad and depressed – but that our determination and energy had given her hope to keep going. In this movement, we inspire each other, we support each other, and we keep each other strong. I didn’t go into our meeting with a false sense of positivity, some kind of idea that I had to “stay positive for the team” like I have seen leaders do at times. I went in with an open heart and honesty.
Beyond exhaustion, beyond anger, beyond sadness and disbelief, beyond sleep deprivation and exhaustion and working so hard for so long, what is left? Hope – still hope, always hope, and the knowledge that in many respects, our movement has only just begun.
What’s left is the understanding that this was never going to be easy and that we will have to work harder to get the outcomes the planet needs, even though the urgency of the problem presses down on us every day. What’s left is a resolve that we can accept small steps, but not steps backwards.
This is why the fact that Obama’s weak “accord” was only “noted”, not “adopted” by the UNFCCC plenary, is important. It means the UN Climate negotiations will continue. What’s left is the fact that despite huge pressure, many countries stood up for their survival and refused to endorse through the UN process a non-legally binding document that “recognises” that science saying we should limit global warming to 2 degrees but which would probably ensure a 3 degree or even higher temperature rise.
It’s Monday morning, and Copenhagen’s over. Monday morning, to many people in the world, means we wake up and get back to work.
Many will need – and all deserve – a break to recover from the emotional and physical burnout that Copenhagen induced in our movement. I am in London, a city I’ve never been to before, but I won’t be doing any sight-seeing until I process what has happened the past 2 weeks, regroup, and clear some space in my head to prepare for the strategising that needs to be done as we plan for 2010.
In some respect, knowing what our next steps are domestically is easy. It’s an election year in Australia, and we need to make climate change the number one issue for Australians as they case their votes. We need to challenge all our politicians – local, state and federal – to commit to stronger climate change action. We need to counter the destructive force of Tony Abbott, Barnaby Joyce, Martin Ferguson and Co. in confusing the debate on climate change in Australia. We need to make these kinds of politicians political liabilities for their parties. We need to enrol more young people to vote! And we need to involve more people in our movement, be more strategic, more inclusive and continue to build alliances with non-traditional allies.
But first, we need to allow ourselves to feel. Without feeling, our movement can never win. Because we are up against forces bigger than ourselves – big coal, big oil, and their lobby groups with money to burn – but we are fighting from our hearts as well as our heads. This means we have to be able to mourn about what happened in Copenhagen. It was the world’s best chance to solve climate change, if countries had looked to their long-term interests and agreed on a fair, ambitious and legally binding deal to reduce emissions. They didn’t do it, and it’s ok to be full of sadness about it. As long as we don’t give up.
I have two mottos, as all my friends know. The first one is, “Those who say it can’t be done should get out of the way of those already doing it” and the second is, “We have to do the impossible to avoid the unimaginable.” I say them over and over, in almost every speech I do and to all the young people I meet who are new to the movement. Both of these mottos are timely and today I think perhaps I should get one tattooed on my body, like my friend Anna Keenan who tattooed ‘Climate Justice’ on the back of her neck.
I’ve received a few passionate emails over the past week, full of emotion, from young climate advocates around the world. From my friends. This is what keeps me going when I feel it gets too hard. These people and their passion move me to tears, and allow me to re-connect with the core thing inside myself that makes me do the work I do – my sense of justice, and my determination that is motivated by love for this beautiful planet and the people who live here.
If you’re reading this – thank you! And I look forward to working with you this year for a safe climate future. What’s left after Copenhagen is us – a stronger movement, a new year about to begin, another chance for us to make the world a better place.
Thank you! I think you are absolutely right about the feeling. In so many ways, feeling must be at the heart of this movement, for our lack of feeling, our denial of our inherent interconnection with the earth, is why we have gotten so far from where we need to be in caring for the world – and ourselves. We are the earth. Therefore on order to heal the earth we must not only work to heal the literal soil and trees and oceans, but ourselves. My heart goes out to you. Many blessings!
Thank you! You are absolutely right about feeling. In so many ways it is our emotional problems, our denial and lack of feeling which have drawn us so far from where we need to be in terms of our relationship to the earth, as part of the earth. We are the earth, and so in order to heal the earth we must also heal ourselves. If we can come to honesty and clarity with ourselves we can be honest and clear and respectful of everyone and everything which makes up the enormous ecosystem we are inherently a part of. My heart is with you. Many blessings!
“we can accept small steps, but not steps backwards”
What do you mean by “accept,” in that statement?
We’ve got to avoid climate tipping points, so I don’t see how small steps are, in any way, acceptable. Small steps may be the best that we’ll ever get from the UNFCCC COP talks, but that doesn’t make those small steps acceptable.
Thanks for the perspective offered in this post. I know the Australian climate movement has been a source of great inspiration to us US activists these past few years. 2010 is our chance to keep the momentum builing in Australia, the United States, and all over the world!
Thanks for being awesome.
Here in DC, we’ve had an interesting few weeks. We’ve done a lot of work to amplify the great activism in Copenhagen, but its also hard knowing the US Senate is the biggest (although not the only) force stopping real global climate action. Youth here have a lot of work to do in upcoming elections, and we’ll do it, as long as we can feel, like you said, and share these stories with our entire generation.