Early November 2015

Writers Memo Early November 2015

Climate Justice Writers Network Memo Early November 2015 Dear Climate Justice writers, Thank you for being part of a network working to raise consciousness about the climate crisis and about the movements working to bring about a just transition to a more equitable and ecologically sustainable society. We’re helping lift up the voices of participants in the It Takes Roots Campaign, which is sending a delegation of activists from frontline, low-income and people of color communities to be part of the upcoming climate negotiations in Paris this December. Your efforts can help bring the messages of climate justice activists to a larger audience, and hopefully can inspire more people to take action for change.

The campaign seeks to highlight the following themes, and our regular memos and website will provide you with suggestions along these lines. We also encourage you to think of other ways to bring these themes into your writing for local and other particular audiences (see links for story ideas on each theme):

• Stories and leadership of grassroots frontline, fenceline, communities of color. Special attention to Indigenous peoples.
• Calling out the United States and other "climate criminals" at the Paris climate negotiations (COP)
• Gender justice--how climate change is impacting women--not with victim frame, lifting up their solutions.
• Just transition to a low-carbon society
• Keep fossil fuels in the ground

Story Ideas November 3, 2015

Elections

People around the country recently elected new public officials and are considering the upcoming presidential race. Let’s hold elected officials and candidates to the real needs of our communities for a just transition to a warming world. Climate Justice writers’ op-eds and essays can discuss the realities of climate change and how U.S. policies are out of step with both science and international public opinion. Climate justice calls not only for better international policies to recognize the disproportionate contributions of rich countries to global warming, but also for more just and equitable policies to address the needs of frontline communities—who are mostly low-income and people of color—for a just transition. As climate justice organizers have observed: "Inadequate action and false solutions will result in extreme consequences for the planet that will have notably disproportionate impact on the peoples of the Global South, as well as working class communities, communities of color, and indigenous and marginalized peoples living on the frontlines of the escalating climate crisis." (See the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance petition).

Bolivia and Peoples Movements take Bold Leadership in Global Climate Negotiations

From 10-12 October, more than 15,000 people gathered in Tiquipaya, Bolivia for the World Peoples Conference on Climate Change and the Defense of Life. The conference was organized by the Bolivian government of Evo Morales, who will bring the messages from the conference to the UN climate negotiations in Paris in December. The meeting follows a similar gathering of government leaders and social movements in 2010 in Cochabamba, which Morales organized in response to the persistent failures of the UN process. Both conferences produced powerful statements calling for world leaders to confront the reality that capitalism is the real cause of climate change. New models for organizing our societies around buen vivir, or living well and in harmony with the earth, and prioritizing a “culture of life” over economic growth were discussed at the conferences and outlined in the Peoples’ Declarations. While Morales will bring the messages from the Conference attendees to government leaders, the emphasis is on building global movements to advance concrete projects such as achieving a Universal Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth, implementation of climate justice indicators in negotiations over emissions reductions, an International Climate Tribunal, climate science that serves humanity and Mother Earth, not capitalism, and the strengthening of the non-commercialization of nature.

• Conference Website
• Statement of the Peoples World Conference on Climate Change and the Defense of Life
• UN Press Release
• Statement of the UN Secretary-General

Low-Income, Latino Communities Across US Living in Air Pollution 'Sacrifice Zones'

This article reports on a recent study on the unequal effects of our high-carbon society and the climate change it produces. This new data should heighten the urgency of calls for more people to step up and take action for climate justice and for a just transition to a sustainable, low-carbon society. This article provides a good example of how to link broader discussions about the climate change issue with the movements working for social transformation. It ends with a reference to the It Takes Roots to Weather the Storm campaign:

“In response to the disparate impact of ecological harm and climate change, the people living within so-called "sacrifice zones" in the U.S.—and across the global south—are levying demands for environmental justice in the lead up to the COP21 United Nations climate talks in Paris this November and December. "Inadequate action and false solutions will result in extreme consequences for the planet that will have notably disproportionate impact on the peoples of the Global South, as well as working class communities, communities of color, and indigenous and marginalized peoples living on the frontlines of the escalating climate crisis," the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance declared in a recent petition.” (Read more)

BE SURE TO LET US KNOW the impact of our writers network: Send your stories (PDF or link/URL) to cjwriters [at] inosa.mayfirst.org

More content is available on http://ggjalliance.org/ https://www.facebook.com/Grassroots-Global-Justice-Alliance-111576575522611/