Rising Tide UK
Encyclopedia
Rising Tide UK is the United Kingdom part of the International Rising Tide Network, both of which were created in 2000 to carry out direct action
against the root causes of climate change
, and to work towards a fossil fuel
free future. RTUK takes a no-compromise position and believes that only the complete dismantling of the fossil fuel industry and a shift to low consumption lifestyles will be sufficient to halt climate change.
Rising Tide UK is formed of regional and local groups in the UK, and supports networks of similar groups around the country. Actions carried out by Rising Tide UK groups range from protests and street-theatre style events, to mass occupations
of petrol stations, and blockades of key fossil fuel industrial sites.
by Northern powers, which have created a globalised economy that over-uses resources for the interests of the North, while keeping down equitable development in the South. They work towards these goals through grassroots
and often confrontational direct action, and supporting other groups with similar goals.
Rising Tide’s work has targeted the fossil fuel industry in particular, and aims for an end to new fossil fuel development, and a dismantling of the elements of the current economy that are built around fossil fuel. It advocates an overall economic shift to community run renewable energy
, and believes that reducing consumption in the North is also necessary to achieve a just economic structure.
Rising Tide specifically argue against mechanisms such as Carbon Trading
and many other elements of the ‘Clean Development Mechanism
s’ which were a key part of the Kyoto Protocol
. It shares the view of many other environmentalist groups that these market-based mechanisms are ‘False Solutions’ that allow Northern companies to continue to emit green house gasses while gaining access to new markets in ‘Carbon Sinks’ in the South. RT UK specifically advocates an immediate 60% drop in global emissions, leading to a 90% drop, and argues that mechanisms such as Carbon Trading preclude such a drop.
In 2007 Rising Tide UK adopted the ‘Peoples' Global Action Hallmarks
’ as a way to clarify its position and values beyond its main aims of tackling climate change. Among other things these hallmarks enshrine a “rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism” and “destructive globalisation”, and the rejection of “patriarchy, racism and religious fundamentalism”. They promote a confrontational (rather than lobbying-based) position toward government, a focus on direct action and civil disobedience, and a decentralised and autonomous organisation.
, Australia, Ecuador, Mexico, and Finland.
Rising Tide aims to have a decentralised organisation, with people and groups within it acting with autonomy, and without a formal membership. It works on the principle that any individual who shares its values can be an equal part of its work.
Rising Tide UK is formed into regional groups that run their own meetings and events, but collaborate with each other and meet together once a year. Active regional groups include London, Bristol and Bath, Plymouth, Cleaveland and Whitby, Reading, and Worthing.
The Rising Tide political statement defined the group’s initial position, and allowed an international network to develop around its shared purpose. At an international Rising Tide meeting in Barcelona in February 2002, the statement was updated and re-written. In 2011 the statement is once again being re-drafted to adapt to changing political circumstances and set out an analysis that is shared by all groups in the international network.
has become.
Key targets of this campaign have been oil sponsorship of museums in London such as the Tate museums
and the National Portrait Gallery’s annual Portrait Award, and the London 2012 olympics
. In 2008, campaigning from Art Not Oil, Rising Tide UK and other organisations helped persuade London's Natural History Museum
to cancel its “Wildlife Photographer of the Year
” sponsorship deal with Shell
.
RTUK has focused on the increased involvement of UK-based oil companies, BP
and Shell
. In 2010 they were involved in organising actions to engage the public about tar sands – such as a “Save Canada” mission to Trafalgar Square’s Canada Day celebrations – and supported protests and an anti-tar sands shareholder resolution at the BP AGM.
, which have been campaigning against it.
On the 26th of April 2010, a group of Rising Tide activists locked on to the train tracks and thus stopped the mine from being able to send out coal. After four hours, the police removed and arrested this group, at which point a second concealed group made themselves known and also locked on. By the end of the day no coal had been able to leave the mine, and 18 people were arrested. They were initially charges of Obstruction of the Railway with Intent, which carries a maximum sentence of life, have been dropped. 13 then pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of Obstruction of the Railway, while all charges against 5 others were dropped.
.
in Essex – the largest refinery in England – for over 7 hours. The action attracted more than 500 people, and in an attempt to outmanoeuvre the police utilised a new tactic of keeping the location secret to the participants until they were on their way to it, a tactic experimented with on Rising Tide actions earlier in the year.
's Licence to Spill.
, the first of which was at Drax power station in 2006. RTUK and its members have since been closely involved with Climate Camp and their activities, including the 2007 Heathrow Camp which contributed to the 2010 decision to scrap airport expansion at Heathrow
.
Direct action
Direct action is activity undertaken by individuals, groups, or governments to achieve political, economic, or social goals outside of normal social/political channels. This can include nonviolent and violent activities which target persons, groups, or property deemed offensive to the direct action...
against the root causes of climate change
Climate change
Climate change is a significant and lasting change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging from decades to millions of years. It may be a change in average weather conditions or the distribution of events around that average...
, and to work towards a fossil fuel
Fossil fuel
Fossil fuels are fuels formed by natural processes such as anaerobic decomposition of buried dead organisms. The age of the organisms and their resulting fossil fuels is typically millions of years, and sometimes exceeds 650 million years...
free future. RTUK takes a no-compromise position and believes that only the complete dismantling of the fossil fuel industry and a shift to low consumption lifestyles will be sufficient to halt climate change.
Rising Tide UK is formed of regional and local groups in the UK, and supports networks of similar groups around the country. Actions carried out by Rising Tide UK groups range from protests and street-theatre style events, to mass occupations
Occupation (protest)
An as an act of protest, is the entry into and holding of a building, space or symbolic site. As such, occupations often combine some of the following elements: a challenge to ownership of the space involved, an effort to gain public attention, the practical use of the facilities occupied, and a...
of petrol stations, and blockades of key fossil fuel industrial sites.
Key Values & Goals
The aim of Rising Tide UK and the International Rising Tide Network more widely is to confront the root causes of climate change, by bringing about a socially just transition to a non-carbon society. They see the issue of climate change as directly linked to colonial-style economic dominationNeocolonialism
Neocolonialism is the practice of using capitalism, globalization, and cultural forces to control a country in lieu of direct military or political control...
by Northern powers, which have created a globalised economy that over-uses resources for the interests of the North, while keeping down equitable development in the South. They work towards these goals through grassroots
Grassroots
A grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures...
and often confrontational direct action, and supporting other groups with similar goals.
Rising Tide’s work has targeted the fossil fuel industry in particular, and aims for an end to new fossil fuel development, and a dismantling of the elements of the current economy that are built around fossil fuel. It advocates an overall economic shift to community run renewable energy
Renewable energy
Renewable energy is energy which comes from natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, and geothermal heat, which are renewable . About 16% of global final energy consumption comes from renewables, with 10% coming from traditional biomass, which is mainly used for heating, and 3.4% from...
, and believes that reducing consumption in the North is also necessary to achieve a just economic structure.
Rising Tide specifically argue against mechanisms such as Carbon Trading
Emissions trading
Emissions trading is a market-based approach used to control pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants....
and many other elements of the ‘Clean Development Mechanism
Clean Development Mechanism
The Clean Development Mechanism is one of the "flexibility" mechanisms defined in the Kyoto Protocol . It is defined in Article 12 of the Protocol, and is intended to meet two objectives: to assist parties not included in Annex I in achieving sustainable development and in contributing to the...
s’ which were a key part of the Kyoto Protocol
Kyoto Protocol
The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change , aimed at fighting global warming...
. It shares the view of many other environmentalist groups that these market-based mechanisms are ‘False Solutions’ that allow Northern companies to continue to emit green house gasses while gaining access to new markets in ‘Carbon Sinks’ in the South. RT UK specifically advocates an immediate 60% drop in global emissions, leading to a 90% drop, and argues that mechanisms such as Carbon Trading preclude such a drop.
In 2007 Rising Tide UK adopted the ‘Peoples' Global Action Hallmarks
Peoples' Global Action
Peoples' Global Action is the name of a worldwide co-ordination of radical social movements, grassroots campaigns and direct actions in resistance to capitalism and for social and environmental justice...
’ as a way to clarify its position and values beyond its main aims of tackling climate change. Among other things these hallmarks enshrine a “rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism” and “destructive globalisation”, and the rejection of “patriarchy, racism and religious fundamentalism”. They promote a confrontational (rather than lobbying-based) position toward government, a focus on direct action and civil disobedience, and a decentralised and autonomous organisation.
Organisation
Rising Tide UK is the founding group behind the International Rising Tide Network, which also has groups in North AmericaRising Tide North America
Rising Tide North America is a grassroots network of groups and individuals in North America who take action against the root causes of climate change and work towards a just transition to a non-carbon society. Rising Tide North America is part of an international network dedicated to building a...
, Australia, Ecuador, Mexico, and Finland.
Rising Tide aims to have a decentralised organisation, with people and groups within it acting with autonomy, and without a formal membership. It works on the principle that any individual who shares its values can be an equal part of its work.
Rising Tide UK is formed into regional groups that run their own meetings and events, but collaborate with each other and meet together once a year. Active regional groups include London, Bristol and Bath, Plymouth, Cleaveland and Whitby, Reading, and Worthing.
Origins (2000) and Political Statement
Rising Tide UK and the International Rising Tide Network are a significant part of a wider environmental and social justice movement that started to crystallise in the new millennium, fuelled by increasing concern about climate change and the inaction of governments to deal with it. Rising Tide formed around a political statement written by a coalition of groups who came together in November 2000 to organise protests and events at the United Nations Climate Conference of Parties (COP6) in The Hague. COP6 was the 6th UN conference on climate change, which ended up collapsing over US proposals for Carbon Sinks in order to avoid reducing its emissions.The Rising Tide political statement defined the group’s initial position, and allowed an international network to develop around its shared purpose. At an international Rising Tide meeting in Barcelona in February 2002, the statement was updated and re-written. In 2011 the statement is once again being re-drafted to adapt to changing political circumstances and set out an analysis that is shared by all groups in the international network.
Campaign Against Fossil Fuel Companies’ Sponsorship of Public Institutions
Among RTUK’s primary targets since its inception have been institutions and events in the UK sponsored by the fossil fuel industry – an element of the industry’s public face that is particularly vulnerable to action from within the UK. Alongside various other environmentalist groups in the UK, RTUK has aimed to make fossil-fuel sponsorship as unacceptable as tobacco sponsorshipTobacco advertising
Tobacco advertising is the advertising of tobacco products or use by the tobacco industry through a variety of media including sponsorship, particularly of sporting events. It is now one of the most highly regulated forms of marketing...
has become.
Key targets of this campaign have been oil sponsorship of museums in London such as the Tate museums
Tate
-Places:*Tate, Georgia, a town in the United States*Tate County, Mississippi, a county in the United States*Táté, the Hungarian name for Totoi village, Sântimbru Commune, Alba County, Romania*Tate, Filipino word for States...
and the National Portrait Gallery’s annual Portrait Award, and the London 2012 olympics
2012 Summer Olympics
The 2012 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the "London 2012 Olympic Games", are scheduled to take place in London, England, United Kingdom from 27 July to 12 August 2012...
. In 2008, campaigning from Art Not Oil, Rising Tide UK and other organisations helped persuade London's Natural History Museum
Natural History Museum
The Natural History Museum is one of three large museums on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London, England . Its main frontage is on Cromwell Road...
to cancel its “Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Wildlife Photographer of the Year
Wildlife Photographer of the Year is an annual international wildlife photography competition owned by the Natural History Museum and BBC Wildlife. Its sponsored name is currently Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year...
” sponsorship deal with Shell
Shell Oil Company
Shell Oil Company is the United States-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, a multinational oil company of Anglo Dutch origins, which is amongst the largest oil companies in the world. Approximately 22,000 Shell employees are based in the U.S. The head office in the U.S. is in Houston, Texas...
.
Canadian Tar Sands Campaign (2010 onwards)
In 2010 RTUK started working with a few key partners, such as the UK Tar Sands Network and the Canada-based Indigenous Environmental Network, against companies involved in oil extraction in the Canadian tar sands. Tar sands extraction has been linked to massive water pollution, freshwater depletion, increased cancer rates among local communities, land rights issues and the wholesale destruction of large areas of forests in Canada. These issues, alongside the increased carbon emissions involved in tar sands extraction have led them to dubbed “the most destructive project on Earth”.RTUK has focused on the increased involvement of UK-based oil companies, BP
BP
BP p.l.c. is a global oil and gas company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest energy company and fourth-largest company in the world measured by revenues and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors"...
and Shell
Shell Oil Company
Shell Oil Company is the United States-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, a multinational oil company of Anglo Dutch origins, which is amongst the largest oil companies in the world. Approximately 22,000 Shell employees are based in the U.S. The head office in the U.S. is in Houston, Texas...
. In 2010 they were involved in organising actions to engage the public about tar sands – such as a “Save Canada” mission to Trafalgar Square’s Canada Day celebrations – and supported protests and an anti-tar sands shareholder resolution at the BP AGM.
Blockade of Ffos-y-Fran Coal mine (26-04-10)
One of the most successful Rising Tide UK actions of recent years was Rising Tide Bristol’s blockading of the single train line that transports coal from the Ffos-y-fran Land Reclamation Scheme. Ffos-y-Fran is one of the largest open pit coal mines in Europe, and operates very close to the houses of the local community in Merthyr TydfilMerthyr Tydfil
Merthyr Tydfil is a town in Wales, with a population of about 30,000. Although once the largest town in Wales, it is now ranked as the 15th largest urban area in Wales. It also gives its name to a county borough, which has a population of around 55,000. It is located in the historic county of...
, which have been campaigning against it.
On the 26th of April 2010, a group of Rising Tide activists locked on to the train tracks and thus stopped the mine from being able to send out coal. After four hours, the police removed and arrested this group, at which point a second concealed group made themselves known and also locked on. By the end of the day no coal had been able to leave the mine, and 18 people were arrested. They were initially charges of Obstruction of the Railway with Intent, which carries a maximum sentence of life, have been dropped. 13 then pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of Obstruction of the Railway, while all charges against 5 others were dropped.
.
Crude Awakening (16-10-10)
In October 2010 Rising Tide was one of the groups involved in organising around The Crude Awakening mass action, which blockaded the Coryton Oil RefineryCoryton Refinery
Coryton Refinery is an oil refinery in Essex, England, situated on the estuary of the River Thames some from the centre of London.The refinery is located between Shell Haven Creek and Hole Haven Creek, which separates Canvey Island from the mainland....
in Essex – the largest refinery in England – for over 7 hours. The action attracted more than 500 people, and in an attempt to outmanoeuvre the police utilised a new tactic of keeping the location secret to the participants until they were on their way to it, a tactic experimented with on Rising Tide actions earlier in the year.
Art not Oil
Art Not Oil was set up in 2004 by London Rising Tide, and while it became independent of LRT in around 2008, it has worked in close collaboration with it and the wider national network since then. It encourages artistic works that confront oil companies, the damage they cause, and encourages arts institutions that take sponsorship from them to decline such support. In 2010 it produced a desk diary featuring some of the most powerful work from its 7 years of existence. It now collaborates closely with two new groups campaigning on similar terrain: Liberate Tate and PLATFORMPlatform (art group)
Platform is an interdisciplinary art group that creates projects having to do with social justice and environmental justice. A 1992 project by Platform sparked a local campaign to dig up the River Effra in London, England....
's Licence to Spill.
Climate Camps
RTUK activities helped to pave the way for the wave of climate action that emerged in the UK in 2005 and generated the high profile Camps for Climate ActionCamp for Climate Action
The Camps for Climate Action are campaign gatherings that take place to draw attention to, and act as a base for direct action against, major carbon emitters, as well as to develop ways to create a zero-carbon society...
, the first of which was at Drax power station in 2006. RTUK and its members have since been closely involved with Climate Camp and their activities, including the 2007 Heathrow Camp which contributed to the 2010 decision to scrap airport expansion at Heathrow
Expansion of London Heathrow Airport
The expansion of London Heathrow Airport involved the proposal by BAA Limited to build a third runway and a sixth terminal at Heathrow. The plan was supported by businesses, the aviation industry, the British Chambers of Commerce, the Confederation of British Industry, the Trades Union Congress and...
.