"Not yet the end of the world": political cultures of opposition and creation in the global youth climate justice movement

Authors

John Foran
Summer Gray
Corrie Grosse, College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-2017

Disciplines

Civic and Community Engagement | Climate | Environmental Studies | Place and Environment | Politics and Social Change | Sociology

Abstract

Based on participant observation and in-depth interviews with two dozen young climate justice activists at the U.N. climate summit COP19 in Warsaw, Poland, in November 2013, this research uses the concepts of “political cultures of opposition and of creation” to analyze the political orientations, discourse, and actions of global climate justice activists attempting to impact the negotiation of a universal climate treaty. Capturing relationships among experience, emotions, ideology, idioms, and organization, the concepts of political cultures of opposition and of creation shed light on the ability of these actors to fashion social movements of their own making. Through an analysis of actions in which youth delegates from divergent political cultures within the global climate justice movement worked collectively to realize a common vision, the formation and frictions of the larger global climate movement is made more legible to observers.

Copyright Statement

This article is published under the Creative Commons “Attribution Non commercial No derivatives” license, which allows others to download it and share it with others as long as the author is credited and the original piece is linked to. Such pieces cannot be changed or used commercially without the author’s express permission.

Recommended Citation

Foran J, Gray S, Grosse C. 2017. "Not yet the end of the world": political cultures of opposition and creation in the global youth climate justice movement. Interface: a journal for and about social movements 9(2): 353-379. http://www.interfacejournal.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Interface-9-2-Foran-Gray-Grosse.pdf