Who we are?
We are an international network racing to save humanity. We have a recipe for effective civil resistance. Support us. Join us. You are needed.
Our Declaration
We are the Last Generation of the old world. We are here today to say we will create a new world – where humanity embraces itself, forgives itself, loves itself and commits to continue our great adventure.
As the Last Generation, we will do whatever it takes to protect our generation and all future generations. As is our inalienable right.
The old world is dying. We are in the last hour, the darkest hour. This world is being decimated before our eyes. We are in between moments. What we do now decides the fate of both this world and the next.
So we decide. We decide, we are no longer indulging in our fears, our despair, our resentments. We are putting ourselves behind us.
Together, in community, we are taking hold of a higher purpose. The source of what it is to be truly human. It calls to us across the ages, and with its power we will bring down those who kill to maintain their regimes of extraction. This is the old world. It cannot continue.
We are here to make clear: humanity is better than to give in to extinction. We are here to say society has not turned away from love and truth; it has not embraced evil and death. The world we desire, the one we can have, is already in reach. But we have to reach for it.
But we are not here to highlight, plead or to entertain.
We are here to reach for the change that is required for this to happen. We are here to force governments to slash carbon emissions, nothing less. We are here for action, not words. We have a plan.
We are mobilising in our many nations and many cultures. Teams will run projects. Projects will make demands on governments. We are reaching out to anyone who will reach back and join hands to create this new world. If we are refused we will disrupt, week after week, as those who came before us did many times in the struggle for human rights.
We speak directly to the public, and recruit in hundreds of open meetings.
We commit to mass civil disobedience.
This is our solemn responsibility. Sacred rights require a sacred duty to defend them. And until everyone is free, none of us are free. Only then will justice be done. We will not fall into the trap of hating the other – the other is part of all of us. Our hands do not hold weapons and our hearts are open.
We are humanity, believing in humanity. We are Democracy.
We are open and nonviolent. We are Care and we are Freedom. We will accept the consequences of our actions and look our destiny directly in the eye.
Bring it on. While there remains breath in our bodies we will not stop. This is our life now.
We are the Last Generation. But we are also the First. We are everywhere. We are coming.
Everything will change. The old becomes the new. And everyone can change.
OUR NETWORK, AT A GLANCE
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TAKE A TOUR OF THE NETWORK
Here’s a brief introduction to each of the projects
Liberate Switzerland
Liberate Switzerland
We are Switzerland's civil resistance for a nonviolent revolution to preserve life on Earth in the face of the climate emergency.
Liberate Switzerland is the second campaign of act now!, a Swiss civil resistance movement created in early 2023 in response to the success of its first campaign, Renovate Switzerland.
Liberate Switzerland is a campaign to free Switzerland from cars. To protect the climate and the living world, we demand that the Swiss Confederation ban the sale of new cars powered by fossil fuels from 2025 and invest massively in soft mobility and public transport.
We appear in the public sphere through non-violent actions, discussions, debates, training and other awareness-raising events. We create spaces in which we encourage cooperation between accountable and responsible people. We want to create a multi-faceted movement in which everyone can find their place, whatever their age or social background. Transparency and participation are at the heart of our concerns.
Last Generation, Canada
Last Generation, Canada
Last Generation Canada is demanding through civil resistance that the Canadian government implement a National Firefighting Agency that trains and employs 50,000 professional full-time wildland firefighters by summer 2024.
Canada made international headlines last summer when wildfires across the country engulfed an area larger than the size of Greece, forcing more than 200,000 people to flee their homes, releasing 2 billion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere, and causing millions of dollars’ worth in damage. What was once unprecedented is becoming more common as climate change causes summers to become hotter, drier, and last for longer which, when combined with irresponsible forestry practices, results in longer and more severe wildfire seasons. Fire chiefs and federal party leaders agree that firefighters need more resources to face the front lines of the climate crisis.
Our second action phase starts Feb 6 in Ottawa. Join us.
Ostatnie Pokolenie, Poland
Ostatnie Pokolenie, Poland
Ostatnie Pokolenie (Last Generation) was founded in January 2024 and started a campaign of civil disobedience in March 2024. The demands are to shift all the money planned for expansion of new highways and expressways (68 bln EUR up to 2033) to regional public transport to fight transport exclusion and to introduce a monthly ticket for all public transport for 50 zł (12 EUR).
In March, Ostatnie Pokolenie made headlines by disrupting a concert and throwing paint on the statue of Warsaw Mermaid. During that time a letter with the demands was given to the Prime Minister Donald Tusk with a 5 weeks deadline to accept it. After lack of response from the government, people began to block bridges in the capital for 2 weeks.
The transportation sector in Poland is one of the very few sectors in the economy where emissions keep rising (from 2005 to 2017 up by 77%). At the same time, there is a very substantial social problem with the lack, or very poor access, to public transport services in Poland. Over 10 million Poles (out of 38 mln) are affected. The current government is withdrawing from climate policies promised during the election’s campaign.
Ostatnie Pokolenie is there to make them stop. Until a livable future is in reach.
Nødbremsen, Denmark
Nødbremsen, Denmark
Nødbremsen ("The Emergency Break") is a Denmark-based climate campaign, launched in September 2023, using civil resistance against the government's active and deliberate escalation of the ongoing climate collapse.
The Danish Government pretends to be spearheading climate action but is doing the opposite. One of the many examples of this is the decision to spend DKK 26 billion (3.5 billion Euros) on building 15 new highways before 2035. Denmark - a relatively small country - already ranks #7 in the EU when it comes to km highway per capita. Meanwhile, the prices for public transport are increasing and bus routes are closed down - especially in areas where people already are quite dependent on having a car. The 3.5 billion Euros that will be spent on building new highways could be spent on expanding public transport - and for the green transition in general.
The 15 new highways will not only emit more than 1.3 million tonnes of CO2 in their construction phase, but they will also create a lock-in effect for decades where the number of cars will increase. In addition to the climate effects of the highways, they are causing irreparable destruction of the sparse and vulnerable nature and biodiversity across the country.
The local campaigns against the highways and the NGOs are systematically ignored by the government - and the government has publicly said that they "have listened to the interest of private companies" when deciding on building the new highways.
In Nødbremsen, we are peacefully blocking roads & highway exits and disturbing cultural events with the simple demand to the government that they cancel the 15 new highways.
Letzte Generation, Germany
Letzte Generation, Germany
The movement Letzte Generation was initiated in 2021 by a small group of activists who organized a hunger strike in front of the Reichstag building in Berlin. They made Olaf Scholz, then chancellor candidate, to meet up with them for a public discussion about the climate catastrophe and the political failure of an adequate response.
Now the movement is organized by several hundred people of all ages who stand up for their rights following the guide-lines of nonviolent civil disobedience.
They emphasize the necessity of an economy without fossil fuels, that should be accomplished by 2030 at the latest and demand honesty about the current dramatic situation and the necessary steps to avoid the total collapse of the biosphere and civilization as we know it.
They have been blocking city streets, highways and airports all across Germany, regularly backed by scientists, artists, legal practitioners and other groups. In summer 2023 they started spraying orange paint on symbols of excessive wealth and more recently on famous monuments and, joining in an international campaign to mobilize students, on university buildings.
Despite recurring police violence, penalties reaching from fees to yearslong prison sentences, and criminalization attempts in general the supporters of Letzte Generation plan to continue with their protest till the urgently required change – away from fossil fuels, towards an honest and socially balanced climate policy- is made.
Folk Mot Fossilmakta, Norway
Folk Mot Fossilmakta, Norway
Folk Mot Fossilmakta was started in the summer of 2024 and came out of the previous A22 project in Norway: Stopp oljeletinga. We use non-violent civil disobedience to expose the entrenched power of the oil industry in Norway. We have 3 concrete demands to the government;
- Divest the Government Pension Fund Global out of fossil fuels
- Ban fossil fuel advertising
- Regulate the oil industry by working with other countries to develop a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty.
We work to wake the Norwegian public up to the realities of climate collapse and to expose Norway's role as a major oil producing nation. Entrenched power like the oil industry does not listen to petitions and letters - it listens when people are prepared to put themselves in the way of it. Norway likes to present itself as a climate leader while it is not even doing the most basic things when faced with climate collapse. The Government Pension Fund Global is still the biggest investor in fossil fuels in Europe, even though the government has claimed they want to make it the leading fund in the world in terms of responsible investment and climate risk. At home, Equinor (our state owned oil company) advertises at many of the major sporting and cultural events as well as in all of Norway's biggest newspapers. We believe this is a threat to democracy because it means that they have free reign to own the narrative amongst the public and to shape policy around further development of Norway's oil reserves.
We aim to mobilise many ordinary people to engage in peaceful civil resistance against the entrenched power that is making Norway complicit in climate collapse.
Climate Liberation Aotearoa, New Zealand
Climate Liberation Aotearoa, New Zealand
The climate crisis is here and now, and it’s shaping the rest of our lives. Our political and economic systems have failed us and now we face the collapse of our economy, ecology, and society, but together we can find ways to look after each other and the natural world on which we depend.
Our plan is to transform society by building people power. To do this, we demonstrate the effectiveness of working alongside each other in a systematic, well organised way that achieves results. It’s up to every one of us to decide. We can liberate ourselves and each other. Or we can live in distraction and powerlessness.
Our opponents have big money, sophisticated marketing, and technology which they are unleashing relentlessly to pursue their goals. In response, Climate Liberation Aotearoa is here to organise resistance to the destruction of our home, and to take back our power.
This year we are focusing on transport emissions and pollution. This means 1. Travel Less, 2. Travel Active, 3. Travel Public, 4. Travel Electric. Our first win will be to move the dial on cruise ships – a type of luxury emission worse than flying which we can all do without. Join us to find out more about how we plan to win. In action there is friendship, hope, and love. The first step is to show up.
Our Demands
- Count international shipping and aviation emissions in our climate targets and emissions reduction plans. We need to include cruise ship emissions at a local level and in our national emissions reduction strategy.
- No subsidies for the cruise ship industry. Ratepayers contribute to the profit of cruise ship corporations through subsidised on-shore transport including buses and rail, as well as sponsoring NZ Cruise Assn conference, promotion, and training and admin costs for cruise ship volunteers.
- No cruise ships in ecologically sensitive areas such as Milford Sounds, Marlborough Sounds and Hauraki Gulf Islands. Cruise ships run on heavy fuel oil which produces both greenhouse gases and high amounts of very small air pollution which contributes to smog, acid rain and health impacts of cancer, asthma/lung damage.
Ultima Generazione, Italy
Ultima Generazione, Italy
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
Ultima Generazione has been active in Italy since December 2021. Our main goal is to pressure the Italian government to take action for the ongoing social and economic crisis due to climate collapse, by first establishing a Restoration Fund to help the population cope with the loss caused by floods, drought and landslides, just to name a few. In the past 6 months we witnessed major extreme climate events that destroyed villages, crops, and farms.
We do so by all nonviolent means possible. Despite that, we face huge repression: the government is passing bills directed at silencing our actions, while the media dismiss our demands. Yet, we know the only thing we can do is to keep raising our voice, mobilise people and gather in the streets to withdraw our consensus from an irresponsible government and ruling elite.
We demand the government to take its responsibility to provide and care for its population, as we do when we undergo trials for our actions. We will not stop until our demands are met.
Just Stop Oil, UK
Just Stop Oil, UK
Just Stop Oil is a nonviolent civil resistance group demanding the UK Government stop licensing all new oil, gas and coal projects.
Allowing the extraction of new oil and gas resources in the UK is an obscene and genocidal policy that will kill our children and condemn humanity to oblivion. It just has to stop.
Hundreds of independent scientists, MPs, NGOs and even the government’s own climate advisors agree — it’s time to take the basic first step and end the licensing of new dirty fossil fuels. Our job now? To make sure the corrupt politicans in power have no option but to do the right thing.
Återställ Våtmarker, Sweden
Återställ Våtmarker, Sweden
Återställ Våtmarker (Restore Wetlands) started with highway blocks on March 28, 2022. Since then we have managed to vastly raise public awareness on the urgency of restoring wetlands. From being a question discussed in niche contexts, and a marginalised and underfunded point on the political agenda, our peaceful protests have brought restoration of wetlands to the fore.
Besides it now being part of the national climate tactic debate, and a question constantly featured in the media, Swedish politicians have been forced to respond. Although their responses so far have been nothing more than greenwashing budget proposals, and calls for more repression, their need to respond shows the efficacy of disruptive peaceful protests. Their failure to act shows the inadequacy of our current political system. And that’s why repression, ridicule and raging politicians can’t make us back down. The people want to live!
News
Latest developments, from across the network
- Opens in a new pageNewsletter September 2024
Dear supporter!
It has been quiet around our newsletter for a few weeks, but we’ve been busy with unignorable protests. Today we’ll give you an update on what was going on during this resistance-summer. Can you imagine, we did what governments failed to accomplish for decades: An international coordinated, determined and serious action across several countries. But we’ll get to that later!
Support us. Join us. You are needed.
återställvåtmarker.se
elokapina.fiWe’re starting off with the news in Sweden and Finland: On Wednesday, 25.09., we joined forces with Elokapina (XR Finland) and sprayed the Finnish Parliament with blood red paint. With this protest, we demand an end to peat mining and fossil subsidies.
We created many heated discussions in Finland and the whole of Europe on whether this action is appropriate to shed light on the fact that the Finnish government owned company Neova mines peat in Sweden like never before, causing more emissions than all of Sweden’s domestic flights.
The action garnered support from Terike Haapoja, the grandchild of the designer of the House of Parliament, J.S. Siren. She defended us on her private social media account: She says we have "a great sense of aesthetics and the ability to draw an artistic parallel between the bourgeois power represented by the building and the life-destroying politics practiced by the Finnish state."
Bold, unignorable international action on climate collapse - that is the #oilkills campaign with Stay Grounded and we started on July 24th: We took action with 500 people of 19 groups in over 13 countries. With this campaign, we demand from governments to sign a fossil fuel nonproliferation treaty.
In Germany, people glued themselves to runways of several airports such as Munich, Leipzig or Cologne. In Austria, we spilled orange paint in one of the terminal halls at the Vienna Airport. 50 supporters of Students Against EACOP in Uganda were arrested and faced violent repression and horrific conditions in custody.
In the UK, the sole news of future action was enough for police intervention. Just Stop Oil experienced some of the most extreme repression with 15 supporters remanded to prison over the course of the campaign and 14 remaining inside to this day.
We’ve also sparked the public debate in Denmark and increased pressure on the government due to their inadequate reaction to the climate crisis.
With nine highway blockages, we protested the construction of new highways - which is a completely insane idea in the midst of an escalating climate catastrophe. Clotide attempted to extinguish the bonfire to commemorate Saint John's Eve, the national Midsummer festival in Denmark. Here’s what she says:“I find it astounding that the Danish government continues to approve extremely climate destructive projects such as our 15 new highways, when we already see mass hunger, conflict and migration driven by heatwaves, forest fires, floods and droughts all across the world. When our elected officials with open eyes continue to pour gasoline on the bonfire that is the climate collapse, we all have a duty to stand up and resist.”
In July, we started a new campaign in Norway! Our name translates to “the people against fossil power” and three of our brave supporters have participated in our first protest on the runway of Oslo’s airport, bringing air traffic to a halt with the international #oilkills campaign. We are now working on our second demand and are preparing our next protest phase that is coming up in october. We want to spotlight Norway's oil-fund, where the money from the oil and gas industry is collected, and which has a market value of more than 18000 billion NOK (thats more than 1,7 trillion USD). The people are the owners of the fund, and we will not have our pensions invested in the weapons of mass destruction that are wielded against our future.
The Norwegian oil and gas industry has so much power in our society that they control the entire narrative in the debate around climate- and oil policies and sponsor everything. They are able to sell the story of Norwegian oil and gas as “green and democratic” to such an extent that the majority of people believe it, and being in opposition to this story can feel incredibly alienating. We are here to turn the narrative and speak the truth!
In the UK, we’ve won! Five years ago, this was unimaginable, in July this year it became reality: The new government declared that they will stop licensing all new oil and gas projects. We know it's not the time to stop. We need an end to ALL fossil fuels by 2030 - and that's why we are calling with #oilkills for the UK government to sign a Fossil Fuel Nonproliferation Treaty.
At the moment, 25 Just Stop Oil supporters are imprisoned for taking nonviolent action in the face of climate collapse. The irony? UK prisons face an overcrowding crisis. People taking nonviolent direct action in defense of life are increasingly being smeared and treated as organized criminals. While perpetrators of violence are being released early from prisons, nonviolent supporters of our campaign remain in cells: Phoebe and Anna have been sentenced to 2 years and 20 months respectively for throwing soup over the glass frame of Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’.
That is why we are coming together with sister campaigns Assemble, Youth Demand, and Robin Hood for the Umbrella March on Saturday 2nd November. We will march on Parliament to tell Labour they can #BinTheBudget. Then we’ll decide what should be done with a properly democratic Assembly, and throw a party to seal the deal.
You might have heard the news from our Austrian campaign - we stopped our protests. Before that, we put up pools in front of the Austrian parliament in July - because the water is up to our necks - and it was incredible hot in Vienna, with several days up to 35°C, so a pool is all what you can wish for if the Austrian government is not taking action to tackle the climate catastrophe.
After us joining the #oilkills campaign and also protesting for two days at Vienna airport, we announced the end of Letzte Generation Austria in August. However, the resistance will continue. We will be back, in one form or another. We’ll keep you posted!
In Poland we started the August action phase with a bang. On the 28th, around 2pm, Ola and Andrzej used fire extinguishers to spray the glass facade at the main entrance of a very famous shopping center. A nearly record number of new people registered for our online open meeting, intrigued by the entire action. Read what Ola has to say about it:
“I was extremely scared about the action and worried about the legal consequences, but what terrifies me even more, and still does, is the vision of the world in a few decades: A world where wars over resources are constantly being fought, where people have to leave their homes in large numbers just to survive. The whole event was a really tough experience for me—I felt drained and exhausted. But I believe the action was valuable, and that I contributed, even in a small way, to reducing the worst impacts of the climate crisis.”
With the first days of school in September, we started the next protest phase and asked: "What will we tell our children?". We also published a letter from supporting parents of Ostatnie Pokolenie to other parents. Among the new supporters of our campaign was the well-known journalist Ewa Siedlecka, who joined us in the streets in an orange vest. "I am here because you are a generation that has been deceived by politicians. Your demands are the absolute minimum needed for this planet to survive."
In Germany, we’re in the midst of an action phase in Kassel. Here, the state subsidizes every flight ticket from the local Kassel-Calden airport with 130€ - money we need elsewhere: in childcare, our health system or renewable energy sources. We demand a social just transformation with no more state money for a bankrupt airport. On Saturday, several hundred people joined us on the street with 80 arrested and overstretched police.
We’ve also been involved in the international #oilkills campaign. Many of our supporters have taken action by going onto runways of airports, bringing air traffic to a halt for several hours. We shed light on the destruction of the airport industry by continuing our protests for several weeks. Our supporters are facing criminal charges as well as civil lawsuits worth millions, however, we believe taking action and joining the resistance is the only right thing to do at this exact moment.
- Opens in a new pageNewsletter February 2024
On February 19th, we launched our new demand for a constitutional right to climate protection in front of lots of journalists who communicated our words to the country. Then we got started with action…
First, we brought a band onto the highway during a roadblock and played a live concert there. People who got out of their cars started dancing instead of shouting, hitting or honking. It was great!
Then we started our current protest wave, beginning with massive disruption on the highway in the capital, Vienna. We needed to make sure we would not be arrested for actual crimes because we are under investigation for being a criminal organisation. So instead of gluing ourselves to the road with sand, we locked ourselves to cars with finger and arm locks. We held the spot for three and a half hours - a new record!
Then we dumped a pile of horse shit on a very pretty crossing right next to Schönbrunn and titled it as the Chancellor’s climate policies. The media loved it and copied the message we wanted to send very well.
The next day, we sat in front of the Parliament, which made conservative politicians act like we were storming the building. Even the police felt the need to clarify that we were nonviolent and did not storm anything.
Before ending with our biggest protest in central Vienna, we annoyed the Chancellor’s office with counless phone calls, mails, faxes, social media comments and letters. We asked him about the climate protection policies he is failing to implement, and we requested his opinion on our new demand. He should like it because it was actually a demand of his own political party in 2019!
In February, Nødbremsen (the Emergency Brake) organised its first simultaneous protests, with three road blockades happening at the same time on the E47 highway and in central Copenhagen, uniting 18 people - the biggest number we’ve had so far - to demand that the Emergency Brake is pulled to avoid climate catastrophe.
We also organised a cultural protest and interrupted the Danish Melodi Grand Prix, the annual Danish music competition that selects the country's artists for Eurovision. Two supporters jumped on stage with banners to ask a simple question: "Who Votes for a Future?"
The Melodi Grand Prix is a cultural event which joins over a million Danes together in song and dance, but the song contest has always been about more than just music. It is about bringing the people of Europe together through a language which we all share - music - in solidarity, diversity, justice and respect.
Climate collapse is putting all these values at risk, and the Danish government is actively escalating this collapse. Let the song we sing to our European neighbours be one of solidarity and climate justice.
This month, our group got involved with the farmers’ protest. At the beginning we were really unsure which position to take, but we quickly decided to take the farmers’ side.
Why? Since the beginning, politicians have tried to use this protest to push their anti green deal agenda, but they don’t have the right to become the farmers’ spokespeople.
We spoke to some committed farmers and even attended one of their protests. On TV, we said that we understood the root causes of the protest: huge inequalities, the need for fair compensation and the uncertainty brought by the climate crisis.
Yes, the farmers' movement is heterogeneous and at points contradictory, as some of their demands are incompatible with sustainability. Nevertheless, taking their side was the right thing to do. We shouldn’t let politicians turn citizens against each other: we are all only asking them to protect our future.
It’s only February, and Canada’s news agencies are warning us that “low snowpack and high temperatures forecast [are] already raising wildfire concerns,” with even right-wing newspapers warning of extreme danger come spring 2024.
We demand that the Canadian government creates a national firefighting agency that trains and employs 50,000 people to help us fight wildfires, and you would imagine that the government would agree given the context. However, every single politician in this fossil-fuel-addicted extractivist nation is keeping their head in the sand, so it’s up to young people to take action.
This month Last Generation Canada swung back into action in Ottawa and received a lot of media attention as Gillian set a stroller on fire on Parliament Hill and Etienne splattered pink paint on dinosaurs in the Nature Museum in Ottawa. Amy, Ben, Xavier, and others were arrested for peacefully sitting on the road. We also welcomed back Dan from prison - you can listen to his story here.
On Valentine's Day, two Declare Emergency supporters, Kroeger and Jackson, covered the case protecting the US Constitution with red powder in the National Archives. This was a hugely successful action in getting the media’s attention as dozens reported on us, including the Washington Post, Forbes, and the Huffington Post.
Kroeger, was put in jail for this and two other actions, where he remains until his next hearing in March.
This February, we have been taking over the public space with a new poster campaign.We included two posters with quotes from politicians: the climate minister stating that she’s the “world best at environmental politics”, set over an image of a community in Sweden that has been flooded since last year, and a quote from the prime minister saying “climate activists pretend to care about the climate”.
The third poster was made by a famous Swedish satirist, Max Gustafson, who made an original comic for us that pokes fun at Återställ Våtmarker and highlights the absurdity of complaining about peaceful disruptive climate activists while living in a highly destructive system.
The campaign has been a huge success, with more than 100 people signing up all over the country in just one and a half months. Our aim was to mobilise people and to cause disruption in response to current events and it’s working! We’ve already created breaking news in Karlstad, where 100 posters were put up in one hour on Tuesday night last week.
Not all the successes of our resistance are immediately clear. Sometimes, a huge victory doesn’t happen during an action but outside of it.
This is what happened in February. The supreme court of the state of Bavaria ruled that a lower court had unjustly imposed a two month prison sentence on four supporters of the Last Generation. Maja, Christoph, Karl and Max, for blocking a road once.
They had all taken part in other Last Generation protests, but had not yet been convicted for them. A lower court judge ruled that they must be imprisoned for two months as political offenders, but a higher court ruled overruled the previous sentence, giving us faith that the courts can still act responsibly when they look carefully at the facts.
You can read Maja’s words here…
“For months, I have been waiting for a letter telling me to immediately go to the nearest prison to serve two months' imprisonment. I adjusted my plans for the whole year. I started meditating again and asked friends for support during my incarceration. I felt prepared and ready. But every time I talked to my co-defendants about the preparation, my chest tightened, and fear and anger rose inside me.
When I received the news that our appeal had been successful against all expectations, I felt an enormous weight fall from my shoulders. What it meant for us was clear: it was confirmation that peaceful protest, even if it can be annoying, should not simply be put behind bars. The psychological pressure and threats that the court wanted to use to break us don't work. We know what is at stake.
Nothing can stop us from doing the right and least we can in the face of the climate catastrophe. We have learnt once again that it is worth continuing our resistance even in court.”
On Thursday 8 February, Eric splashed the Federal Palace (seat of the Swiss government and Parliament) with orange paint to make their responsibility in the unfolding climate catastrophe visible.
At the time, Nikoko was still in prison in Vaud for filming an action in 2021, and we organised more than 20 actions in support of his innocence. He was released on Saturday 10 February after almost three months, and went straight back to sticking posters on the walls of Vaud’s High Council only eight hours after he had been freed.
This month, undercover journalists pretended to expose our (already public) plans to hold politicians to account at their workplaces, in the street or at their homes. The plan to take power back from our “leaders” wasn’t a secret, but the outrage about our strategy brought us back into the national conversation.
Politics is broken, the British people know that. So we used the attention to announce our plans to support ordinary people in this year’s election, as well as the creation of citizens assemblies to give the public a voice to demand real action on the emergencies facing humanity.
Apart from our plans for the UK’s democracy, we’re preparing our biggest action plans yet. This summer, when the heat is unbearable, the grass is dry and water is rationed, we’ll be taking action at airports to shine a bright light on the biggest consumers of oil and gas and bring the people into resistance with us. More details are coming soon…
- Opens in a new pageNewsletter January 2024
2024 will be a year full of new protests. We will continue to be disobedient and organise mass protests all over the country. But this time we will do it without our high-visibility jackets and stickers. Our aim is to hold disruptive gatherings with as many people as possible in locations where protest cannot be ignored, and to stay there until the federal government recognises we can do better.
We will also confront politicians and powerful people at events about their silence on the climate crisis, like we did at a trade fair with Friedrich Merz, the leader of the oppossition party in Germany. We will draw up a declaration for leading politicians to agree to and that anyone in the country can sign.
The climate crisis, growing fascism and social injustice threaten our coexistence. The question in 2024 is: are you one of those who accept injustice, or one of those who will stand up against it?
Lina, on how she confronted Friedrich Merz at a trade fair:
“We sat in the audience with our hearts pounding, surrounded by suit-wearing politicians. Friedrich Merz entered, shook hands with everyone in the front row - including some of us - before sitting down. When he took the stage for his speech on German agriculture, everything happened very quickly. He talked about securing agriculture and food in the future. How can he seriously claim that? How can he knowingly ignore the fundamentals of this planet so much and still tell the fairy tale of a perfect future?
We joined him on stage peacefully, one by one, and confronted him with these questions as we opened two banners, until we were stopped. We interrupted because we need change. We asked simple questions that require answers from those in power.”
In January, we executed a total of six protests: two road blockades, two highway blockades and two cultural protests.
The road blockades took place in Copenhagen to reach as many people as possible, while the highway blockades were located on one of the 15 highways that the Danish government plans to expand. We also disturbed a Danish media event to demand that the media industry takes responsibility for its influence on the discourse around the climate collapse. Finally, we disrupted the ceremony after the Queen of Denmark's final New Year's speech, which was seen by over 2 million Danes - that’s 35% of our nation's population!
Each of the protests sparked responses from citizens and politicians, including the Danish transport minister, Thomas Danielsen. He says he doesn’t know how to fix Denmark’s transport issue, but we have one clear recommendation: don’t spend 26 billion crowns on building 15 new highways in the middle of a climate collapse!
My name is Vera, I am 21 and have just finished my second month as a Nødbremsen supporter.
Like many others, I had protested against the inaction of our governments in a civil, obedient manner throughout my life. But I remained pessimistic. After reading a newspaper titled “The climate fatalist is the modern day climate denier,” I was convinced I had to do something with my hopelessness. I chose to escalate my protest and join Nødbremsen.
This month I have been part of my first road blockade and cultural protest, where we interrupted the guards ceremony after the queen’s speech at new years which was broadcasted all over Denmark. I have been met with both rage and praise for protesting, and both make me feel that I am now part of something important. I believe civil disobedience is the best strategy to resist oppression and fight for our future.
We started 2024 with two viral actions that gained international media attention, including disturbing another ski competition in Bischhofshofen by invading and throwing orange powder on the slope, and organising a street protest in a luxury ski resort.
It was so cold during the protest that the police gave us blankets to make sure we were okay, and our video of this moment made the news in Germany and Switzerland, and got 220k views on Twitter alone!
We will continue to dirsupt ski events that are in the international media’s attention.
My name is Roman. I’ve been part of Letzte Generation Austria for the past five months. In my “normal life”, I study chemistry and work as a project manager in the steel industry.
These five months, and especially the last one, have been full of ups and downs, but being given a blanket by the police and seeing them behave in such a humane way gave me a lot of hope.
Yes, there are downs, but from the past month of strategic planning and protests alone I can say that I’ve never been happier to be a part of something, and that I’ve never been more convinced that when we link up with the A22 Network we can make a crucial difference.
One of our rebels who took action in Ottawa was just sent to prison for 14 days for trying to paint Save Old Growth on a bridge last year in K'emk'emeláy (Vancouver). Although the crown asked for jail time, we never seriously considered that he would get anything more than probation or house arrest.
Dan is a roofer, a rock climber, a mountaineer and a lover of nature. He watched as temperatures on the Squamish Chief mountain went from a maximum of 26 degrees to a maximum of 42 degrees in 17 years.
In his December trial, he asked every police officer if they would break the law in an emergency. They all said yes. He asked if they take shade under a tree on a hot day. They all said yes. He thought this was an open-and-shut case. But not in the court of Judge Nancy Adams, who was not impressed with Dan's questioning of our "man-made laws".
It took us five days to locate what jail Dan had been sent to. He will be out Tuesday January 30. Please join us in sending much love to Dan, aka Renewable man, for his heroic service to our planet.
I’m Jillian Maguire, a high school teacher, and I was out on the road for Last Generation Canada’s first action phase.
I was horrified recently when our friend Dan, one of the most gentle, caring and principled people, was sentenced to 14 days of jail, a $900 fine, and 18 months probation for trying to paint "Save Old Growth" on the deck of Vancouver's Lion's Gate Bridge with the previous Canadian A22 campaign. It is unconscionable to me that the courts would see fit to put a man in prison for trying to warn society about the dangers of cutting down the last 2.7% of our old-growth trees.
I hope that people are as outraged as I am and that they join us in Ottawa this February. We will demand a national firefighting agency of at least 50,000 people so we are not covered by forest fire smoke, and a citizens' assembly to guide Canada's response to the climate and ecological crisis. We obviously can't trust our so-called leaders to get us out of this mess.
After our last action wave in September 2023, we began work on our new “48 hours” projects, in which we react quickly to trigger events in society as a way to keep our resistance relevant and powerful.
After a month of hard work, our first 48h action took place: Restore Public Transport.
We wanted to capitalise on Swedish people’s anger at the increased cost of public transport while the price of gas is reduced, so our first direct action was to force the subway’s ticket gates open to let people walk through without paying. We created a new sign-up link, a new banner, new leaflets, and a whole new message for people to take part and the response was great!
We received a lot of new sign ups and reached out to organisations already working on this issue that were able to help us spread our message even further.
I am scared, sad and pissed off. I am Malin. I am 51 years old. I am a mother of two daughters, aged 12 and 15. How can I prepare my children for what is coming?
I want humanity to live in peace with earth and one another, within the planetary boundaries. Can we do this right now? At this point, it means living outside of society. But this is because the social contract is already broken. It lies like crumbs around our feet.
I put my physical body in the way. I put my legal body in the way.
To sit on the motorway is an expression of doing everything I can. An act of proportionality of my actions to the urgency of the climate emergency.
But some today are already exposed to the climate hell we, in privileged countries, are only beginning to imagine. In Somalia, Magda Gad, a journalist, describes the end of humanity. She sees mothers burying their children in the sand. Turning a blind eye is unbearable.
I have a voice in society, a privileged place, and a constitutionally protected right to demonstrate. Therefore I also have a moral obligation to use these rights to resist peacefully against the unwillingness of those in power to stop the climate and societal collapse, for my children’s future and the future of all children.
On the 18th of January, the Italian parliament voted in favour of a new law increasing to up to 60,000€ the fines against people carrying out our most common actions of peaceful resistance (especially those involving paint).
Some politicians declared their firm opposition to the law as its only aim is to stop dissent (which should be guaranteed in our constitution). We sent 8000 emails to our president asking him not to sign the new law. But it wasn’t enough.
The law passed, under particularly ironic circumstances: during one of our supporters' trials that same day, the judge recognised the “moral value” of our actions.
My name is Maria Letizia, I’m 63 years old and I’m a researcher. In the Ultima Generazione campaign I work to care for the parents and other relatives of the people taking action, among other things. I think this activity is really important, because it isn’t easy for a parent to accept that their child is taking direct action and risking jail.
Even if many share the values and ideals of our “activists”, they will always worry about the consequences of their actions. Part of my work is to organise moments where everyone can share their feelings and worries and receive support.
We’ve gained a lot of knowledge together over the past two years, so this month our strategy team took time to travel the country and speak with every region and every team in the campaign.
While we plan for the future, we are preparing to start taking back the power from our corrupt politicians. In our local teams, we are close to launching our Wide Awake campaign that will disrupt politicians as they try to gather support for the next election, focusing in particular on the Labour Party. Until they promise to stop all new oil and gas in the UK, we won’t let them rest!
I am Béa. I am mixed-raced of Armenian/Nigerian heritage from London.
I often state my heritage because being mixed-raced has informed my understanding of the world; being of an ancient lineage has connected me greatly to our natural world; but most of all it has influenced what is most important to me and how I bring that to a movement for change: intersectional inclusion and diversity. Without the intersection of social justice our power to change is wounded. We are weakened when we are not united. It is not only about one voice, but listening to all voices.
Growing up within civil rights rallies and movements, it became increasingly obvious that racial justice is climate justice, it’s queer liberation, it’s justice for occupied people, it’s migrant justice. Climate catastrophe has its root in colonialism and neoliberal capitalism, therefore justice for the climate is justice only when all of those who are systemically oppressed are liberated. This I’m very passionate about.
Almost a year ago I was asked to fill in for a role at Just Stop Oil. Because of my passion for diversity, I began to organise panel talks that intersected climate issues with other social justice issues, with some huge and notable speakers. It’s been such an honour to do this work, and I hope it continues to encourage people to unlearn, learn, and listen. Knowledge is the enemy of ignorance, and goes hand in hand with compassion and love.
And with love, justice soon comes.
On the 16th of January, Eric and Anthony stuck pages from the IPCC report to the walls of Vaud’s Cantonal Parliament. Other supporters carried out the same action for several days. This was partly done in response to the 60-days imprisonment of Nikoko, who received this sentence for filming a similar action in 2021. We want to show the Swiss government that prison will not stop our commitment to act against the climate emergency.
Hi, my name is Anthony, I’m 21 and I put an end to my studies to devote all of my time to civil resistance for the climate. Why? Because I don’t have a future anyway, and putting my personal comfort above the billions of people who suffer from the climate crisis would be too selfish.
I have several roles in Renovate Switzerland, like coordinating relations between different local communities, leading the Geneva community, and mobilising people for our project calling out Nikoko’s imprisonment.
For two weeks I stuck the IPCC report twice to Vaud’s Parliament and once to the Public Ministry, and every day to various state buildings, to tell the government it should act on the climate emergency instead of sending its whistleblowers to prison.
The first time I took this action was at the end of a parliamentary meeting. I felt calm and confident until we saw the two police officers behind the door, but we did what we set out to do anyway and stuck the report to the walls. In the end, the officers confiscated our tools but they didn’t arrest us, and we stayed by the door to talk with the representatives that came out after their meeting.
I was very happy after we took this action, and determined to do more of them!
On January 19th, four Declare Emergency supporters were banned from Washington DC for the next two years, in addition to suspended jail terms and probation for two years, for blocking traffic on a major DC highway in August.
In August 2019, my friend Kent called me: the news about that spring’s Extinction Rebellion London Bridge blockades had finally trickled down to North Carolina. Within the month we had joined with others working to start local XR chapters. Few moments in life have made me happier than the moment that I joined others to glue-on to the yellow and pink Extinction Rebellion boat within sight of the White House that September.
At one point during our recent trial, the lead prosecutor said: “Getting arrested is a badge of honor for you, isn’t it?”, one of many moments during the trial where the chasm between the officers of the court and that of the defendants was so wide that it was challenging to know where to begin to respond.
That prosecutor could never understand the peace that comes from sitting in the road knowing that you are doing everything you can possibly do to oppose a path of massive suffering.
The work I’ve done for DE over the past two years and for Extinction Rebellion before that has been intense, but working hard to stop humanity’s self-destruction has been the only way I could live with the situation.
I am grateful to those who make this work possible.
This month, we had great news. Norway’s top court said that three recently approved oil and gas projects are illegal and that the government must now consider emissions that come from the burning of oil and gas reserves when approving projects. Some politicians are now arguing that all projects since 2020 should be stopped.
We will continue our resistance with Stopp Oljeletinga, and we are now working towards the next action phase planned for April, focusing on locally-based and student-led mobilisation. To do this we are reviewing our structure to better support our core identity and sense of community.
Luckily a strong core of people is forming, bringing a lot of excitement and potential with it!
Restore Passenger Rail is experiencing its last month under that name. With the election of a right-wing government, we must now turn our focus to local government. This campaign began with a mild disruption to a meeting of the Christchurch City Council, but the largest change is yet to come.
We have begun the process of rebranding ourselves, and we will soon have a new name which will highlight our broader focus. Instead of focusing on a large, single issue, we will focus on a variety of climate-related transport issues from a local to a national level. An added bonus is that we may even be able to entirely evade an order by the Advertising Standards Authority (a non-governmental oversight authority for advertising) to take down our "offensive" posters.
The final news for the Restore Passenger Rail group is positive; one of the last headlines to which our name will be attached is that one of our supporters who sprayed a luxury car dealership has been discharged without conviction.
RESOURCES
Shared resources (Wikis) enable projects to build structure, share skills/experiences and cultivate alignment – making each project more efficient and effective! Here are some examples.
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