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We’re supporting the Global Climate Strike #FridaysForFuture

By Jamie Clarke on September 17, 2019

As an organisation dedicated to widening engagement with climate change, we’re fully behind the FridaysForFuture movement.

Melbourne School Strike 4 Climate

Young people have demonstrated the power they have to drive public and political sentiment to back transformative climate action.

In turn, Climate Outreach has supported the movement by providing a training for its national representatives in how to hold effective climate conversations.

We welcome the opportunity to show solidarity with the young activists during the Global Climate Strike on September 20th and are enabling all our staff to support the strikers in whichever way feels appropriate to them. Staff taking part in the strike may for example be offering to support anyone wishing to gain confidence in talking climate – a key action in driving change.

Climate Outreach believes that climate change needs to be turned from a scientific reality into a social reality if we are going to take the necessary steps to safeguard our communities and environment. Public engagement is the key element for building social, political and economic change and requires action across the political and tactical spectrum.

Change often requires disruption. We note that protest movements have often played a critical role in historic system change and the furtherance of human rights – albeit using a wide range of tactics. As an organisation, Climate Outreach recognises and follows the law in all aspects of its operations.

Videos & podcasts

Video

Greta Thunberg praised the aims of the new CAST (Climate Change and Social Transformations) Centre, in which we are one of 5 core partners and co-directors. She described CAST as ‘extremely important and essential’ to helping achieve the drastic changes in our lifestyles to combat the climate crisis.

We’re supporting the Global Climate Strike #FridaysForFuture

By Jamie Clarke

Jamie Clarke was Climate Outreach’s Executive Director for almost 10 years, from 2013 to 2022. Under his leadership, Climate Outreach grew into an internationally acclaimed organisation. As a values-based leader, he provided strategic direction with an empathetic management approach. He is a proven international speaker and considered writer who feels as comfortable addressing the UNFCCC as co-authoring books such as Talking Climate. In his studies as a social scientist, he focused on participatory processes at the nexus of societal and environmental issues. Undertaking extensive research in the Pantanal region of Brazil crystalised his understanding of centrality of effective citizen engagement in change processes.  

Passionate about widening engagement with climate change, he previously worked for advocacy organisations including Amnesty International UK and Practical Action. In these roles he saw how difficult it is for many people to connect with climate change narratives, and how this often underpins apathy and opposition. Determined to address this and the largely under-recognised role that the wider public has in tackling climate change, he previously led a successful youth climate outreach programme that targeted marginalised students studying vocational courses. Jamie lived for many years on a canal boat but now lives on terra firma in Oxford with his family and is rarely off a bicycle.

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