Citizens Climate Campaign - Campaign Diary - Democracy and Global Warming

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Citizens Climate Campaign

Campaign Diary

Your responses
to
Democracy and
Global Warming

In our Campaign Update, Democracy and Global Warming, we asked you to nominate which stage you think the climate change movement in Australia has reached in the Social Movement Success model.

1. Normal Times.
2. Failure of Official Policies.
3. Ripening Conditions.
4. Take Off.

5. Perception of Failure.
6. Majority Public Opinion.
7. Success.
8. Continuing the Struggle.

Here are some of your responses:

Stage 5 at best. David

IMHO I feel that we are between stages 5 and 6. Keep up the good work ! John & Guia

This is very valuable material folks, I feel.
My guesstimate is we are at 6 or 7 and building to 8 soon.
We have 4 & 5 to go through again if we are at 6 and that is possible, though 7 is more likely the level for us now.
Burn out happens continuously more at an individual level, yet this movement will not cease as a whole.
We have too many too widely spread across the planet for that to happen.
More power to you and us! Kind regards, Paul

Hello fellow travellers,
Thank you for sharing this with us - as you say, it helps to keep a sense of perspective.
From my reading of the situation re climate change, I think we might be at about stage 6 - 7 [my reasons: Labour's recent Climate summit and Rudd's statement that it's the most important issue - on which all other things depend; good Green's climate policies - including a mixture of both carbon trading and carbon taxing; Liberal party is showing appearance of presenting appropriate policies but still 'dragging the chain' in reality - eg: no carbon trading until 2012, advisors include too many industry representatives, etc; there's a growing acceptance by the Govt that a large proportion of the electorate see climate change as the real issue for the 21st century.
The timing of the approaching election may help to increase the pressure on the Govt - fear of losing could galvanise more effort towards effective climate change policies.
The Citizens Climate group and other like-minded organisations need to capitalize on this [perhaps we ought to suggest that our supporters actively engage with other like-minded groups as well (don't be satisfied with being a part of only one group eh? - I've personally also joined ACF and am supporting their activities).
The results of a poll of which of the stages 1 - 8 people think we're at might be interesting feedback for us all? What do you think? (might help to galvanize us all a bit more/stop us from giving up/being complacent)
Regards Hugh

Reinforcement to KEEP UP THE PRESSURE................ we have to win on this issue........
Margaret

I think we are at a stage halfway between stage 4 and 5. there are still powerful intransigents who are not convinced of the urgency of the situation ( eg. Sartor). and there are still media people who have a great effect on the "little people" such as michael duffy ( who wrote in SMH on saturday that the hottest years on earth were back in the 1930s ) and we are all still being distracted by dirty tricks campaigns (such as the smear campaign re Rudd and his visit to a nite club) which have no importance for the survival of the planet.
we need to have the determination shown by Wilberforce in the movie" amazing grace" to keep fighting for what we know is for the good of all.
judy

I believe we are at stage 7 with global warming. The government have decreed (just before a federal election) there is a problem, but are doing little towards changes as they are more interested in the booming economy than saving our planet. Whilst we have the Liberal government running the country we will not see significant changes.
We need more rallies, people power, more lobbying etc etc. I must say I am a little disillusioned as I lobby the Howard government and Rudd party and get replies which appear to be carbon copies with a different signature.
The two party preferred will not see the dramatic changes Australia needs, so it will take years for the necessary changes.
Regards Kerrie

I went to an art competition opening night at which they had chosen a speaker "David Bradbury". (Quite an unusual choice I thought as it was a Lions Club fundraiser). David spoke at length about the governments inaction on climate change as well as the government's readiness to "jump in" to the events unfolding in Aboriginal communities in the Nthn Territory. Approx. 50% of the audience seemed to gradually move to the back of the hall and carried on talking to each other while David Bradbury was speaking becoming louder and louder, until I walked to the back of the hall and in an even louder voice, told them to "shut up"!
So in this so called "greenies" area of Byron Bay but more specifically Ocean Shores, it is obvious they do not want to hear this message.
I think that the Howard government may sneak back in, simply because that sly old bastard knows which buttons to press, and they are: 1. small children and 2. Labor are not laying claim to the success of the programs Keating put in place which created the boom conditions, and so they are thought to be (wrongly I conclude) bad for the economy. People are actually buying Howards claims about clean coal and horrifyingly " nuclear! Simply because they think these solutions are not going to cost them as much when those energy bills come in.
So I think we need to push the "children" angle e.g. "what kind of a future will children have in a globally warmed world".
AND
"If we don't embrace solar energy for homes as "single investment/no cost to run energy"
AND
"solar charged/no fuel costs to run electric vehicles", then there won't be any oil left and we won't be able to afford to get to work, so where will the economy be then! We simply have to get across to voters and the opposition party that these are the MOST IMPORTANT THINGS THAT WE CAN DO THIS DECADE, NOT NEXT DECADE!
Sandy

The Climate Change movement is only just getting going in Australia. Unfortunately it is now a bunch of fragmented, small groups, believing in different facets of problem and cure. There is even a splinter political party forming up. Until all groups can be linked to provide a united front which represents a poultice of votes the movement will have no clout. And while ever there are groups that dogmatically refuse to consider state of the art clean nuclear power generation, the movement is doomed to failure. One of the biggest renewable sources to date is hydro, and with no rain, no Hydro. This is already being experienced by the Snowy system.
I am a member and local correspondent of Environmentalists For Nuclear Energy (EFN). If anyone has doubts about the use of Nuclear energy for power generation, they should take a long look at www.ecolo.org
Cheers, Max

I think we might be up to stage 5, but I'm not sure that we have 40% of the public convinced.
Gregory

I believe we are at number 7. Ronan

Thanks for keeping us informed. I'm perhaps pessimistic but I think 2 at best... 3 possibly. There is a vast pool of apathy even about something as vitally important as the future of Earth and life upon it. This is demonstrated in lots of little, local, ways which, collectively......................
Bill.

Greetings CCC, I reckon we're somewhere between the fifth and sixth stage. I was in the fifth when the Anvil Hill coal mine was approved but I'm sensing a change to the sixth as we approach the election with the Walk Against warming plans being prompted as well as the general increasing awareness of the general public about global warming.
Gregory

Stage 4 or 5, we have a long way to go! Have we time to get there!
Jennie

Dear Campaign Committee Thankyou for your recent information on Democracy & Global Warming. It seems to me that we entering stage 5. The government continues to pay lip service to the challenge, which is very discouraging. Yet another example is the report in the Herald yesterday of a leaked agenda item for the APEC meeting, promoting a weaker "aspirational" goal for emissions reduction rather than hard targets, to be presented to the UN.
Sometimes campaigning against the government juggernaut seems hopeless and the opposition has been disappointingly low key of late.
I congratulate and thank you for your ongoing energy and commitment to this task. Your new interactive format makes it even easier to send letters of protest to the relevant people. Keep up the good work!
Yours sincerely, Anne

I see things as being at stage 5
Regards, Iain

I believe we are somewhere between 5 and 6. Not quite majority!
I'd like to take the opportunity to thank you for all the work you do!
Kind regards, Liz

Hi all
I think that we are at level 6. However I also believe that the general public have no real conception of the danger of the climate situation as they have next to no grasp of the many domino effects which are and will continue to spread through our multi layered global ecology (even ecologists cannot predict the full extent of the threat).
I know that self interest is always a winner and that an effective way to sell the dangers of global warming to society at large is to illustrate the threats to humans. However, I despair that very few people express dismay at the destruction to our planet's biota and the threats to the natural evolutionary process which climate change is bringing. When human problems are identified as the main source of concern we hear of so many solutions for "living with climate change" to make the problem go away. Never mind that the biosphere becomes a smouldering hole whilst we replace the Azaleas with cacti and stick a rainwater tank on the side of the mcmansion. The danger here too is that when people decide that global warming hasn't really brought any harsh lifestyle changes to them in the last week or two or interrupted their ability to buy the newest mobile phone and plasma screen that the whole issue will lose its "flavour of the month" status. In such a situation re the fossil fuel companies and their political cheerleaders can find many ways to raise public cynicism and wedge the population, thus permitting a return to business as usual.
Yours in all things feathered.
Ricki

Hello, I think currently the campaign movement has got to stages 6 & 7.
I think a lot of the public are aware, but powerless and cynical about gov. If I think about the conversations I hear around me. How to mobilize all these people into action is a challenge.
You are doing a great job. Meredith

Dear Climate Campaign Organisers,
Thanks for your e-mail - I am indeed very encouraged by the way the whole climate campaign has taken off in recent times - and do believe that for this particular problem of humanity there is good hope. Considering all the other historic campaigns is also inspiring. I reckon it's at stage 4 -> 5. 5 definitely when the oil crunch starts to burn.
Let me also share some thoughts - hopefully they can be of some value to you and this campaign. I don't e-mail once a month - but have written a letter on the poor renewable energy policy a few months ago. I sent it to my local member (Minister Nelson), The PM, and Kevin Rudd. Actually received responses from all - Nelson's/PM's office forwarded it to Turnbull, who's ministry has just replied lauding the government's massive 2% MRET target and supposed $3.5bln renewables investment (it is something but I'd like much more!) So, it has definitely increased the politician's tally - but it might be counter-productive for me to write too persistently or else they'll just put me in the "definitely-not-coalition-voter" category and ignore it all.
The other thing is about statements like - "Now it is our generation's turn to take on the ultimate struggle for the survival of life on Earth." I think this is taking a hugely significant problem much too far, because _life_ itself doesn't seem very threatened by climate change. Surely horrible destruction/suffering but not end of life. Maybe rhetoric if too extreme, can actually discourage sceptics from accepting the green position?
Best Wishes! Eugene