Friends of the Earth International: negotiating a transnational identity

The aim of this article is to assess the relationships between majority (South) and minority (North) world environmental groups by focusing on one of the largest transnational environmental organisations: Friends of the Earth International (FoEI):1 1. For this article I am drawing on data gathered at the FoEI biennial meeting in Croatia in September 2004 and documents provided by FoE Australia on their work in FoEI. View all notes a federation of autonomous groups from 71 countries (see Appendix). FoEI's federal structure gives more power to southern groups than other transnational environmental organisations and FoEI has taken a relatively radical line on issues of global justice. Nevertheless, there have been arguments over strategy and ideology between northern and southern groups. The article examines how FoEI responded to a crisis in its identity over North–South differences in 2002–4. The trust developed through regular international meetings and a distinctive organisational culture allowed the network to rebuild its solidarity, although without ever fully resolving differences of ideology. It is argued that FoEI will be best able to maintain its North–South representation if it accepts that internal conflicts and debates over core ideological questions are normal for social movements

Manufactured vulnerability: eco-activist tactics in Britain

This article examines the development of tactics in radical environmentalist protests against new roads and other environmental issues in Britain during the 1990s. These tactics depend heavily upon the technical creativity of protesters. Their repertoire has been influenced by British traditions of non-violent direct action and by tactics used previously by radical environmentalists in other countries, notably Australia. This form of non-violent direct action is defined here as manufactured vulnerability because of its reliance on technical devices to prolong vulnerability. Much evidence in this case confirms past studies of how new action forms are developed. Evidence also suggests that development of tactics in radical environmental groups is particularly likely to be influenced by latent networks of activists and cross-national diffusion

Covert repertoires: ecotage in the UK

Ecological sabotage (ecotage) has been a feature of the more radical parts of the environmental movement in the Western world for several decades. While it may be perceived as being the preserve of underground cells of 'eco-terrorists', in the UK those who carry out small-scale acts of sabotage are also often engaged in relatively conventional political activity; view sabotage as a complement to other action, not as an end in itself; and are committed to avoiding physical harm to people. Drawing on ethnographic data from research with British activists, this article seeks to define ecotage and to explain its place in the repertoires of the environmental direct action movement in the UK. It is argued that the self-limiting form of ecotage in the UK has its roots in cross-movement debates that have developed over several decades and that national traditions remain important in understanding the development of social movement repertoires

Explaining the fuel protests

We describe and analyse the fuel protests in the UK in September and November 2000. We draw on theories of social movements to explain the success of the first of these protests and the failure of the second. We show how the loose, network forms of organisation contributed to the success in September, and the attempts to impose more formal organisations helped to cause the failure in November. We also show how the success of the protests depended on the articulation of the aims of the protestors with dominant social forces in British politics, in particular the oil companies, the police, and the mass media

Necessity, Non‐Violent Direct Activism, and the Stansted 15: Reasserting ‘Hoffmann's Bargain’

In Thacker and ors the Court of Appeal overturned the convictions of the ‘Stansted 15’ due to a misdirection on the substantive offence. However, the court rejected their necessity defence, following Jones, as their actions were political, outweighing a desire to avoid a risk of death or serious injury; in a ‘functioning democratic state’ their claims should have been pursued through conventional means. This is a reaffirmation of what we call ‘Hoffmann's Bargain’; in Jones, Lord Hoffmann noted that non-violent protestors who act proportionately can expect the state to act with restraint, but a necessity defence is unavailable. We argue that this rejection of the defence is mistaken and overly broad for direct action cases. It also fails to acknowledge Valderamma-Vega, where the Court of Appeal held that defendants who claim duress may act for different motives as long as one is the avoidance of death or serious injury