Hi all,
It was great to be on the march on Saturday through London. It's always inspiring to see and hear others who feel as strongly about this issue as you do yourself.
I read that this was the biggest march in this country about this issue by a long way. That is great. However, I must confess that when we arrived at Grosvenor Square I was really disappointed at the turn out. This led me to wonder about how many people were actually aware of the event beforehand.
I didn't know about it until the last minute, and I take a very active interest in this issue. (Though I wasn't aware of the CaCC before this event.) A lot of people I've spoken to didn't hear about the event until it was too late.
I've found CaCC now, and I expect a lot of others have too because of the march, but I'm just wondering if it's possible to link with other organisations to publicise these events. I get regular emails from Greenpeace for example, but didn't hear about the march through them. Are the environmental organisations talking to each other?
Any thoughts?
All the best,
Mike
Publicising marches and
That's a good point. Unfortunately environmental organisations (like any other human organisation) are often beset by different (competing) agendas and egos which get in the way of effective cooperation. One of the good things about CaCC is that it is actively trying to break out of this insularity and build a genuinely grass roots movement.
outreaching to green groups
Mike
We did an enormous amount of outreach, especially green outreach before the event. 100 people went to a planning meeting in Oxford two months ago and it was through that group, outreach was initiated. Some of those present were probably greenpeace activists but the process was a bit hit and miss. FOE plugged the march in their regular email updates for activists but not to their supporters. Not sure about greenpeace but I did read on a London Greenpeace email list that lots of greenpeace actvists were coming and I think they were there. Nathalie Koerfer also wrote to a list of other greenish NGOs about Dec 3. But I believe that most of the NGOs do not see promotion of other organisations' events as something they should or need to do. The pressure to publicise an external event really has to come from members of that organisation.
When people register here, we do ask whether you can outreach into particular groups, that should put us in a much better position next time around both to spread the message and to check that the message has been spread.
If you have some ideas about we can better reach all the greenpeace activists, do tell us.
outreaching to green groups
Hi John,
I didn't mean to denigrate anybody's efforts. Obviously a lot of work has gone in to make the march the success it was. I think the outreach options on registering is a really good idea too.
Re. your point:
"But I believe that most of the NGOs do not see promotion of other organisations' events as something they should or need to do."
Probably true but pretty sad! Hopefully we will be able to overcome this kind of attitude in the future - maybe by giving the event joint "ownership" in future? The issues are bigger than any of the organisations...
Outreach to green groups.
Hi Mike + John,
I would like to concur with the general message of this post, more is needed in terms of outreach, both co-ordination with other green groups-obviously its insane for greenpeace/wwf/foe not to highlight these events to all of there memebs. More work also has to be done in terms of co-ordinating with non-core groups with a stated interest in climte change. As my e-mail to the CCC-London Yahoo! group states i also see fund raising and advertising as vital to the cause.
I am however at pains to stress that i shaddow John in not "meaning to denegrate anyones efforts". I was at the Oxford meeting on and know full well the enormous effort that has gone into staging the UK's largest climate change march in London, and the priority place on outreach. From a personal point of view, i can confirm that organising an event such as that carried out by CCC-Aberdeen is not made any easier by the resistane of developmental organisations to see climate change as a priority, despite there stated understanding. Outreach isnt easy, and i have often found it frustrating but it must continue.
Keep up all the good work everyone!
outreach to green groups
hi all!
i think one message that really needs to go out strongly after the triumph of dec 3rd is to keep building the network of local groups and to get them working towards mobilisation for next time. people need to be asking what can i do to help swell the demo? wherever they are, and well in advance! just think of it this way, if everyone who came comes next time and brings just one more person who didn't that would instantly double our numbers.
Stop Climate Chaos
Mike
Actually the key to reaching the 1 million odd members of all the green groups might be Stop Climate Chaos. They have only just got their feet under the desk but I think we are now a member of this coalition and a demonstration with joint "ownership", as you say, might work.
cards?
john's a&s.
any chance of knocking up a downloadable christmas card? might respect let us use the blair with flaming pudding image? could we ask for a donation for them?
cards?
Stop Climate Chaos
That looks really promising. Great stuff.
Stop Climate Chaos
Good. Glad to see they are on board now. They could help us make all the difference for next time.
outreaching to green groups
Please see my comments on "On working with NGOs", under "On media, outreach...". Here I suggest how to bring green groups more wholeheartedly on board including Greenpeace.
As regards FoE, they did mention the march as a supporter action in Earth Matters and, I believe, on their website.
People and Planet also plugged the march to their email activists.
Outreach
Re: Reaching Greenpeace or other activists.
A message definitely came down within greenpeace saying that they had no problem with people attending but they weren't actively supporting it because the UK march had a different message from the one they were going to be pushing in Montreal. I believe they supported the Montreal march because they agreed with the message.
There is a comment on the "On media outreach" topic discussing the need to have an agreed message that brings groups. This I believe is one of the main challenges in getting that sort of outreach working - you have to check what the NGO's will accept as an aim or demand.
We tried a large number of local groups and had quite an amount of success in getting Berkshire groups to raise the march to activists or those who attended their meetings - but didn't have much luck in getting entries in newsletters. We also managed to reach local press, tv and radio.
What became clear was a continuing campaign to get into the national offices of the NGO's was needed. Perhaps Stop Climate Chaos is the answer - however we pushed them a couple of times about the march and they were happy to simply list the event on the website. I suspect that CACC would have to pass control and messaging to SCC if SCC were to be convinced to be directly involved.