 Good evening everyone welcome to this web workshop on how to escalate your divestment campaign My name is Natasha Adams. I am the Europe organizer here at 350.org I'm actually standing in for Emma who normally does this job who's on sabbatical. So I'm just around for a few months But yeah, thank you to everyone joining from wherever you are. Please do sign in and say hello To us in chat so that we can see where you're calling in from we'd love to hear from you and say hi There you will need to the way that this works is you'll need a YouTube account if you want to comment So you'll need to log into YouTube and then you'll be able to put comments into the chat But it should be fairly straightforward if you're having problems and you want to get through to us You can always tweet using the hashtag fossil free at 350 Europe So, yeah, I am joined you will see in the bottom of the screen by two very exciting Divestment campaigners. I'm gonna ask them to introduce themselves to you. Mika. Would you like to go first? Sure So my name is Originally from Bremen at 11. I have been an active professor from Berlin for about two years Two years and yeah, what inspired me to join the movement was actually when I was volunteering for the people's climate march in New York Back then I lived in New York and yeah, that kind of sparked Something so I was pretty excited to continue in Berlin Hi, I'm I'm Kirsty. I'm from Edinburgh I spent kind of all my time at university being involved in Our universities campaign to divest from fossil fuels and then got kind of involved in the national union of students I'm trying to get all universities in Scotland to divest And I know kind of a part of a smaller group called divest William Well, we're trying to get our local authority pension fund divest fossil fuel Thanks, Kirsty. Just saying hello to say hello to a couple of people that I can see joining on the chat We have Frida from the divestment campaign at Cardiff uni Hi Frida and Johannes who was with fossil free Berlin and is now with fossil free Hamburg So hi anyone else joining please do you say hello as you come in? So basically what we're going to do is I am going to talk very briefly about a new resource that I have made To support divestment campaigning Which is an escalation guide so how to a step-by-step guide for how to escalate your campaign and ramp up the pressure of wind Then like it is going to be talking through Fossil free Berlin and how they did that with their campaign and how they won talking about three points at which They encountered some obstacles and then they move forwards and I'm stuck them And Kirsty is going to be talking about the university Edward University occupation that she was involved in and how They wound up the pressure with that campaign to win, which is really exciting There's also an escalation happening right now at UCL I'm going to ask one of my colleagues that's doing backstage tech if they could share the link to the video for that in the chat If you would have a look at that later, but that's an alive and campaign escalation is happening Right now, which is which is really great Okay, so The escalation guide I am going to ask one of my colleagues if they could also share that with you in the chat but it is on fossils were Europe and escalation guide so Yeah, I really hope that this will be useful This is all in the context of the fact that we have a global Divestment mobilization happening from the 5th to 12th of May So we're going to be talking about how to escalate your campaign and ramp up the pressure But we're doing that now because we hope that groups can use That moment in time to really think about what they could do Strategically to escalate their campaign how they could use that period of action to take their campaign forwards to the next the next stage and one of the things we want to emphasize which is really important is that The divestment campaign is not just about winning divestment. It's not about money It's about building people power winning on divestment is a means to an end to building the people power climate movement that we need So if you're building people power, you're already winning and yeah That's basically what escalation is all about the more you escalate your campaign the more people are likely to get involved Now there are lots of different ways that you can escalate your campaign and the guide talks through it doesn't just mean taking direct action we've actually Yeah, I mean that that should be Something that you do after you've exhausted all of the other possibilities If you feel up for that and brave and ready to do that and Kirsty's going to be talking to us about her personal experience of doing that You might not necessarily have to escalate that for but you will need to build people power so The steps for the escalation guide are basic base building how to get lots of people involved with your campaign And then how to kind of attract a little bit more attention. So doing stunts and things like that They're moving on to low-level confrontation So much is rally's kind of slightly edgier things and then finally direct action In that escalation guide there's an action checklist at the end to talk through The steps that we think are useful for you to take like all good campaigns. It's a journey It's good to plan it in advance be flexible review it and remember to rest as you go along And yeah, have fun and be creative and use the skills that you have So I hope the guide will be useful There's lots more examples in the guide of the kind of campaign to talk about and I hope that you'll look at that afterwards but since we have examples right now and Yeah, I'm going to go to Mika first of all just quickly Please do and Mika's going to speak for a little while then we will take questions Comments and we'll have a bit of a discussion So please do write in your questions and comments as we're going along as things occur to you Yeah To ask Mika and then yeah, take it away Cool. Thank you, Tata. So I've got three examples of when we got stuck with fossil fuel and during our campaign And how we moved forward So the first example is when we actually had Contacted the mayor of Berlin. It was relatively at the beginning of the campaign started in 2015 and so we had contacted the mayor of Berlin and asked him to please respond to a question of well, which fossil fuel what which investments does the Berlin pension fund have and What is the percentage of fossil fuels among these is there any information on this? So we try to reach them various times and like local ways as in like a public meetings Where citizens could ask questions or like also reached out of course via email, etc. But no response One day we got a response, which was negative. So it was a response that was quite A common one so it was more like an excuse. So what we then did was we This is actually my first slide. I don't know if we can show it. Oh, yeah, it's there so We built a little social media campaign. So we chose a selection of Berliners in this case authors experts One politician there was as well who are like already involved with the topic of renewable energy So who are advocates of renewables and who have like some political stance already here? So what we did is we asked them to join us for a meeting So we put a chair and at two chairs and a table and one chair There was this person sitting and the other chair said well Where is the mayor like with a big arrow and asking so these pictures we put on our social media and Channel so Facebook and Twitter we have and we tagged Those organizations as well represented by those people sitting there and also the mayor's office always So this was one way to create a little buzz and to also get the ball rolling as in like more attention actually on the topic Then Already move on to the second one. Yeah, okay, so I'm also sending you a link where you can actually check this in a video because it's much nicer to view the video so The second example is when we had a few months later gotten an answer from The finance senator that he is already looking into this topic somehow But like very vaguely like oh apparently it's not a new topic, but what exactly they are doing We weren't sure so we were waiting and waiting and waiting for months, and we didn't get any answer Again and again, so what we then did is we Well, we were a little lucky. I must say We found out that that was via contact in the Green Party that The topic of divestment already had made it into a report so a Committee a political committee was working on a topic in Berlin called new energy for Berlin It was a 300 pages report which one day then finally was actually presented in public And you can see those pictures There they show a little bit our yeah the audience and what actually happened So we attended this meeting when the report was presented was a public meeting and just in that moment when Divestment was mentioned in a very very tiny paragraph What we did is like we stood up applause like big applause went to stage Grab the microphone and thank the politicians or there was a selection of politicians and one external kind of expert thank them to please look into the topic further and like kind of well done and we gave them our t-shirts and Then Yeah, that was like a little a little a little milestone for us because it was very exciting and And yeah, so it was also in public and so Yeah, I'm a little proud of that action and so then the third example is Was actually happening towards the end of the campaign. So I'm also sending you guys a link There's more pictures to see on our Facebook here for this one. So we again use social media To How do you call this? Well, it was Okay, so maybe I'll begin with the context so we Had to work on two levels. So one was a finance senator and one level was the parliament of the city of Berlin so the parliament of course Has so many different parties and we had the conservators blocking our idea and so we were wondering then Okay, so how can we convince them and it was a really like kind of new thing for us to get into politics and talk to politicians and Be in touch and present ourselves, etc. So then what we did at the end We were coming towards the end of the elective How do you call it elective period? So election period and then it was getting really tight. So we knew okay, we've got another month For the to convince the parliament to say yes to the vestment. So Then we were thinking of okay, how can we create more more even more attention and awareness? To for the topic and we took our petition We had like I think maybe two thousand signatures or so Roughly and we printed this petition on this massive Money bill you can see there in the pictures and so tiny signatures on this massive bill and this was like well the the idea of a symbol of resistance for like against dirty money basically and we toured with this bill with well with with our NGOs and We took pictures and then again we pushed them on social media tagging the NGOs and the politicians as well So that was the last kind of like the size of turn around and then we were so lucky that the parliament actually did vote Yes at the on the very last day of the election period and How am I doing in time? I think I have one my last slide That is actually a recommendation I wanted to give everyone on behalf of someone else in our group called Louise and so We Well, I think everybody knows this so when you're working on such a campaign It's like you get to a point where you really down you don't move forward It's like kind of you have the feeling that it's not going anywhere. And so this is a recommendation to create a little momentum to strengthen the team so and there is a lady who specialized in this and She set up this website also and wrote many many books. I'm John Joanna Macy She is yeah, so a scholar of Buddhism general systems theory and What is it called? Ecology as well. Sorry. I'm like a little new to this but what we did is like We had a little ritual with the team on a strategy meeting and it was beautiful and very connecting and it strengthened us as a group a lot and so Yeah, this is something we can we can recommend as well to look into a different way of Connecting and strengthening the group and gaining like this motivation again And I'm also putting a little link for that website and Yeah, so I didn't really look at the time, but I hope I was in the seven minutes Thanks so much Micah, it's really inspiring to hear about and the campaign With the last I just have a couple of questions for you. So with With the last example when you said you did the social media reaction and you wanted to try and persuade the conservatives Do you think that I mean it sounds like how do you think that what you did kind of contributed to them than voting? Well, there are any other steps that you didn't mention Because I know that yeah, we asked you to speak for seven minutes and this campaign took a long time And there were so many things involved so Yeah, good point. Yeah, so it's really hard to actually answer as in How much did it contribute and we know that We know that of course their social media teams for political parties managing their account And they don't necessarily communicate who anyone take to everyone who sits in Parliament So I would say it did contribute To a certain extent there was an awareness with us and the NGOs the partners and it strengthened the partnership with the NGOs that was definitely a positive side effect and We were able to really Bring up more awareness For our group and the actual also alongside like quite a Decisive point was that we were in touch with the politicians in the Parliament and one co-like member of mine in first free as well. He kind of specialized a little bit in the lobbying part, so It's something that kind of develops organically, so I would say Creating a buzz and having something to show on your social media Definitely helps in the terms of in terms of okay There will be someone maybe checking your Facebook and sometime and we also got comments from like green politicians pretty high up For example, who then were able to give us information on what's actually happening in Parliament and who's blocking and then We could find out someone else from someone else from an NGO that there is someone in the Conservative Party who is actually pro Renewable energy pension so Then these kind of links bring you forward then again to understand the patterns in politicians and political parties So Yes, so it was a mix of both really but being in touch with the politicians certainly is totally key Yeah, if that answers your question a little bit Yeah, thank you. I think that does answer And yeah, I mean we haven't got I haven't got any other questions to ask from the chat yet So I'm just gonna ask you a couple and then we'll move on But please all of you do ask if you have anything you'd like to know more about I would just like to say like if you had top tips to people Yeah, starting out and Like fairly early on in their divestment campaign or maybe a little bit further forwards and they're a bit stuck Just like what kind of general advice would you give? To other people having campaign on this for a good long time yourself So from a psychological point of view I think it's really important to Go for drinks in between to do something fun to hang out and to Spend some time like alongside the working because you feel like you're working in a way and So kind of stick to it like don't give up hope be consistent Don't give up There's been there's so many old moments when you feel like you could you could give up because it feels like oh This is so draining but really like everyone has been through this and the campaign really takes a long time We were working on it for 500 days and it really is I'm sure there's longer campaigns as well To actually well reach our goal with the Linda summer Yeah, so that is that and then also I Think there's a lot of straight strategic tools and I don't know if I'm the best one to talk about this But I know there's something called the spider web A strategy for example to actually find out and approach the topic from an angle where You actually look from the outside and see okay What is the what does the network look like of the person you are actually you know who has the responsibility You already know that I mean that is a phase to find out first and then like yeah So what is the net look like how is this person linked to other people and what kind of influence could they have and what kind of Interest do they have and how could we reach them offline online? And then also find allies find NGOs allies talk to people It really is a little bit of a miracle again and again This world is like tiny and small and people are linked to each other. So that is definitely Another advice I would say like yeah Yeah, the networking part Great That sounds like good advice. We're getting some questions that are coming through In the chat now the first one was how many people were part of your divestment group I guess did it kind of change and expand over time or could you talk about that? We yeah, it really did change. I personally joined a couple of months before the actual group was founded Roughly were hmm. It really changes So maybe at average over time we're 10 people 15 so we've got three or four people who cannot join every meeting but who are there if we need them or so they Really involved with family or so But then yeah, so it really does change. I mean Berlin is like coming and going like every big city people come and go So I think it's quite Interesting that you can yeah, you can actually really Get things going even if you're a small group. So Certainly, yeah Thank you, I'm going to stop asking your questions in a minute, but I just have a couple more for you. So Yeah, what what next for Berlin fossil free? Are you taking part in the global divestment? mobilization and what are you actually campaigning on at the moment, mm-hmm So we don't like we formed a little task force and we are planning a couple of things so It sounds a little much, but we're like very ambitious so we have We started with a movie night Then we'll have a workshop on divestment the next day We'll have some core action coming up the following days during that entire week The core action plan is actually to give an award the inaugural and inaugural correctly from wrong and Berlin divestment award to the top three best kind of progressive ones ones like organizations and the top three like losing ones and So we want to give this award to those organizations. We don't know how exactly it might be like just Somewhere in front of the office. Let's see it will be creative. So we'll have this award period and then at the end we'll have a protest and a party so Yeah, that's fun very briefly That sounds great until you're doing all of that for the global divestment mobilization period sounds like you have loads of stuff on final question You're gonna be busy, but it sounds amazing. I love that you also have a protest and party at the end That sounds really good Yeah, somebody's asking exactly what you did with Joanna Macy to re-energize your group I know you don't have very much time, but if you could just say briefly now like Be good to get a bit more information on what exactly it was that you did and to Sure, so Yeah, so I'm just talking on behalf of one of our Like X or maybe still members Louise. She's in Ireland right now She has done a lot of work with Joanna Macy and She's really got involved there. So I will also Maybe put her email address like in the chat shortly So you can reach out if you have any more questions on this. So we did a ritual. So we were maybe 15 people or so on a strategy meeting and we were basically looking at our next campaign in Berlin because we had one the last one We were really happy and energizing everything and then we're looking at all what is next target so there was a little bit of work, but also it was just after the election and Well in the US We were all like really just pulled us down a lot. So we did a little ritual and How do you describe it? So basically you find motivation Anyone who meditates out there kind of maybe knows what I'm talking about So you connect as a group you stand in a circle and it was a ritual of light and Louise read a little piece of Text and it really is about connecting to nature and everything that surrounds us So you're actually one with everything and you can gain strength like in that thought and feeling a lot So we stood in a circle and we kind of like took a small quiet moment close their eyes and like Louise read a piece from a book of Joanna Macy and Yeah, it was really beautiful. Like it was really I mean, I love that kind of stuff Some people don't but I can recommend it. So I'll put your email in the chat as long Thank you. That's not amazing. Yeah, I meditate. So I also love that stuff It might not be everyone's cup of tea There's a resource I will share in the chat box in a minute called them finding steady ground that my colleague in the states Daniel Hunter made Which has got like kind of simple things to kind of connect to each other in difficult times when we're feeling burnt out because it's a really big problem In activism, yeah, especially like climate working on climate change has all of its own problems Yeah, thank you so much, Michael. We might come back to you in the discussion in a little bit But now I'm gonna pass over to Kirsty to talk about the Edinburgh University Investment campaign and your occupation and how you want Hey Okay, cool And so I thought we're gonna start by getting like a tiny bit of context that although I think it's kind of obvious it just to make it clear and That this occupation that I'm kind of being going to talk about things right did and came after a kind of four Year campaign we didn't just sit down and decide the first thing we were going to do was have an occupation or campus We've tried and tested loads of different things That's like everything that was happening is like playing by the university rules on so many different ways and We decided that we should just Got the ante and Have an occupation so There's lots of different reasons you can have occupation and one of the big things is also about reclaiming the space and Trying to take that You know, we're saying that this is our university and we we are part of it We are should be involved in decisions and things that happen At the moment the university aren't listening to us and are taking us seriously not So by occupying what it's kind of their senior management building and where the head of the finance and situated And what's the thing that happened in there and we thought we're gonna force them We're we clean this space and force them to talk to us in our terms when we're people Okay, sorry to set the family on connection is really bad I'm just gonna carry on and if it gets worse hopefully someone will tell me And okay, so yeah, we had You could try and speak a bit more slowly and a bit more clearly than you would do normally I think that might help but yeah, sorry Kersi, please go on And but yeah, so we have a meeting with our kind of core Well, and we said what we need to do is take some space in the Charles Sturthouse this university management building And there was still some exams and things happening But we thought if we don't do it now for the end of the term the campaign is going to lose lots of momentum Over the summer and the university are going to keep getting away with it So what we kind of said was if we could get at least 15 of us to commit to going into the university building or just a couple of nights and Then that would be good enough for us to do it then once you start to the occupation Obviously, it suddenly appears all over campus. Everybody's interested in it People start hearing about that the idea is then that lots more people will come and join us And that is exactly what happened And it was excellent So when we went in we kind of planned what it was we wanted to do What it was was going to be the end game Why we're doing an occupation that has to be very clear because if you're having an occupation You have to be clear like why you're going to leave what is your demand? But you don't want to leave with your kind of tail between your legs having achieved nothing Because then it's been disempowering experience for people and everyone on campus would really understand Or feel that you're in a super exciting campaign they want to be involved in But we kind of had two things the end goal was that we were going to get the university to divest from coal and tar sands Now we wanted divestment from all fossil fuels But we said we will leave the occupation when you commit to divest from coal and tar sands We can talk about the rest later And if they didn't do that, we weren't going to leave until we got evicted So there's a photo now that you can all see which is And all the people who started our occupation So when the 15 came, which is And turns out everyone wants to be involved in a super exciting occupation We had loads of people And as soon as it happened we had loads more people And we set up lots of things before we started So we made sure we had lots of blog posts ready to go And as soon as we got in, around why we were occupying What we were occupying for We hadn't been able to come after We made sure that press release went out straight away So suddenly we had it all over the media And it was good, we got loads of coverage Our occupation lasted 10 days And we were in the media, we had mainstream Scottish media And quite a lot of time in UK media And every day of the occupation And I think a lot of this was around the fact that every day We didn't just have an occupation that sat there We did other interesting, exciting things that were happening So on the screen at the moment you can see a photo Of these are people who weren't inside the occupation But every day outside the occupation We call it the Giant Solidarity Rally But that takes different forms and some sort of action So this was our massive oiled up Diane That we had one day on the street outside Of all the people who came to support And lots of them had their tops off And were covered in lots of oil for extra funds And this then gave us a new angle to talk to the media about A new thing to press release about Something interesting for students to stop by and camp in Something interesting for passive buyers on the high street To see when they walk past And something else to really piss off the university So kind of despite everything that was going on And a lot of the success that was happening The university kept ignoring us And in fact their measures started getting More and more kind of draconian They brought in external security guards To deal with us One of whom assaulted a student But we then sent them to court And they'd been tried for assaulting the students All sorts of things But this in a weird way Was great for us again We had lots more students on campus Who hadn't known about it Suddenly heard about the issue and came And were like Why is the university going to this effort To protect its investment in fossil fuels This is horrific And then suddenly we had 300 more people Come and join us outside campus And take part in that And we gave our actions Solidarity actions outside fun names So what we had in the evening Was our big divestible Which was our music festival for divestments Which we thought was very funny And people would come and play their instruments We got local drumming groups and things to come So the occupation really came To be on campus To talk about things We held different workshops In the occupation To come and learn things And when the university shut out our access We would have meetings inside To plan what we were going to do about this And you can see a picture on the screen Of one of our meetings So our meetings are closed The doors So the university would try and shut it off But we would break through the security And regain access to the building So we could let new people in the occupation Because it does get quite tiring If the number has dropped to about 15 people Again And you've all been in there for five or six days already So it's really important for your occupation To try and sustain having people Coming in as much as possible So when we see the doors of the occupation You have to have to keep the occupation To the university to shut out your access So the meetings take place from where People sitting all along all the doors To keep access to them And then you have a meeting around them The other kind of interesting and fun thing About being in occupation Is there is quite often security guards And people that you don't want to know Your plans all around you So you have to develop new ways of having meetings So we had all of our meetings Where most of the meeting would happen in person And people would put up their hands and things as normal And then they would point to their mobile phones And type things on the online platform we had And everyone would look at that And respond to that for a secret thing That we didn't want security guards For anyone else to know That we were planning on doing So that gave us loads of interesting things That were going on And loads of things to talk about in the media And it really scared and stressed out the university Because we were still publicly in the media Still publicly on campus And being supported by everyone And they were being made to look ridiculous On the fact that when they tried to say Things like oh well you know And we're not sure this is what everyone wants We could turn around and say The university procedures for years And you ignored it So this is why we've done this So it really took action But everybody accepted that what we were doing Was kind of valid because so many other things Had been done and tried And it just created such a wonderful space That really radicalized and inspired And you know from that kind of now A couple of years later on campus All the kind of being activists And people involved in all the campaigns Were kind of involved in that occupation In one way or another Either we set it up to start with Or we just came to the end And talked about it as one of the kind of Finding moments of things that made them realize Like actually we do have power together as people And we can reclaim spaces And we can force people to listen to us So the university then agreed That they would call a meeting Of the investment committee And on that we decided That we would leave our occupation Even if it wasn't exactly what we wanted But we would leave our occupation And until the two days later When the investment committee was happening We would do all sorts of other events All over campus Because the numbers in the occupation Had got quite long and 10 days It was quite exhausting But we left and we didn't stop So there's now a photo Of a banner dropped on Edinburgh Castle And this is just one of many ones We did to make these giant bedsheets That were like four bedsheets by five And to get all over the city All the iconic places And hung it there We didn't quite realize How naughty we were being when we did it On Edinburgh Castle Because it turns out that's military barracks So in fact we're military trespassing Which was a bit nocier Than even I contended But it was fine And we had all the sounds And we did a picket of the buildings We got all the students To come really early in the morning And surround the university management building So none of the staff could get into work that day Which caused a massive amount of disruption For the university So in the end of the day Then the university got very stressed out My phone rang off the hook And they met with us And they agreed to conduct within six months From all coal and tar sands And since then have filled nearly all of their investments In both fields completely So I think it was a big success It was great fun to be part of It made our movement really inspiring We got a word out to so many people Since then we've got to speak also Of other movements From places in Scotland About campaigns, which we do So I would really encourage everyone To get active and think big Don't be limited around what you've done before Or kind of don't be scared Of doing big actions We have the power We can do all of these things Be inspired, be brave, you're all amazing Thank you so much Kirstie I've heard about I've heard this story before From other people in the occupation And it's, yeah Hearing you tell it again Even when I know it It's just so inspiring Yeah, it's really, really exciting It must have been amazing to be involved in that I'm actually going to ask Because your connection's really not very good I'd like to ask you some questions And do back and forth But maybe could you try logging out And see if you come back in again That if that helps your connection So if you do that Then I'm just going to chat for a little bit Okay, so yeah Kirstie will hopefully be back in a minute And then she might Her sound might be a little bit better If you have questions for her Please do post them in the chat But yeah The first thing that I wanted to say was just that I know that, you know I know that Kirstie said this as well But just to emphasise that Edinburgh didn't They didn't go straight into doing this They've been campaigning for a really long time And they've done so much I think that they've got I can't remember the percentage of students That they've got on board With their campaign I think it was something like 70% of students Or maybe even more than that And the survey had said That they wanted divestment to happen They've been negotiating with this committee That had been formed, that was meeting And then after all of this time And all of this effort And really public campaigning And feeling really good about everything They've got this horrible kind of statement Saying that they're going to work with These companies to kind of make them go green And all the usual sort of stuff That you get fobbed off with And it was at that point where they realised They just sort of had enough And then they decided to do The occupation And then managed to get the decision Reversed from saying We're not going to do divestment To actually saying we are And yeah Kirsty, you're back Do you want to say hello And see if your sound is any better? I think you're muted Are you on mute? We can't hear you at all Yes, I was muted that time Hopefully the connection is better now The connection is so much better now That's really good So the first question I saw That came in on the chat was Did you have anyone in the university staff That you worked with? Was there anyone inside Helping you out? Yeah, not to plan the occupation So we were very careful Not to tell any staff Because also that could put them In a very precarious position If it was ever found out that they knew But we'd had Before the occupation We'd had 60 quite prominent Academics at the university Write an open letter to the university About why they should divest And then after our occupation started We emailed these people And said We're doing this occupation on campus And then we had a few staff Come and give speeches at our occupation So that was good We actually had loads of super interesting Come and give speeches At our occupation So we had some early day motions Launched in Parliament And we had the leader Of the Scottish Greens Party We had the leader of the left Of Scottish Labour come and speak We had the directors Of Friends of the Earth Scotland We had the director of WWF in Scotland We had a Nobel laureate Come and speak And loads of university staff And some of the staff brought us Food and things as well So yeah, I think it was Good and much better that we had Some staffs for them to be able to talk to It really made the case And made the public, students And other staff take us a bit more seriously Thank you And I wanted to ask What would be your top tips To other people If they basically got quite stuck With their campaign They've been running it for a long time But there's kind of nervousness About being very confrontational Or taking it the extra mile So going to the end of what we've put In the escalation guide And doing something like this And occupations are not always appropriate It depends where you are But you can kind of do occupations Lock on, that's sort of very confrontational Potentially illegal stuff Where you have to find a lot of risks And those sorts of things What would be your advice to people Kind of thinking about that Having done it yourself For them to think about whether or not What they want to do And how they might go ahead with planning Yeah, so I think There's a lot of steps And the smaller actions That you can kind of do first To build up your trust And you're kind of Just get the group excited About the actions that you want to take So people feel that they can So before doing A whole occupation You could find out when a meeting is That's going to happen And instead do A kind of die in Or a picket of the meeting To stop people going in So they spoke to you Or disrupt the meeting We had things that we called Shot occupations Which are like baby occupations But you don't actually have an intention To stay But they don't know that So you would go somewhere Kind of run around Called chaos Make them think you're going to stay But then actually Ten minutes later Just leave But in some ways You cause them so much panic for a while But that's quite a good way Of just kind of testing it out With your group Getting the adrenaline going Getting people to kind of Experience how empowering It can feel to do it So yeah I suggest doing some smaller things first As a group is definitely The kind of best way To build up to it Great, thank you I think I also asked We're getting like Just lots of positive comments Of people on chat Saying how inspiring the story is Which is awesome to hear Yeah, I had a question Where's it gone? Oh yeah People power So I was going to ask How many people were involved In the campaign As it kind of went along Through different stages And how you use The decision to occupy And all of the escalation Around that to kind of Reach out to new people And then bring them Into what you were doing Yeah So there was I mean The campaign that kind of Existed beforehand There was always Very varying numbers Of people who were involved I mean I think we broadly Always had a kind of Bigger support base Because there was various Campus votes And things of like A couple of hundred people That you know You could like Definitely count on To definitely know What was like We were talking about But before We had the occupation And the planning group Was probably Like the core planning Was probably Seven to fifteen Depending on What was happening And for actions You would have expected Twenty-five And then we had The occupation And suddenly It became Even bigger And more exciting And people were like We can definitely do this We can win this If we all join in now And the group grew massively And we just used it To invite people to come along And speak to us Speak to the campaign We used it as a hub Essentially A giant Turned the university Senior management building Into our divestment hub And said Come here Come and talk to us And people outside it Ask any questions To things you don't understand About what's going on We wrote a different kind of material And we signed loads of people Up to A mailing list And got them involved And then Had some like Giant meetings Following the occupation Of right Now what Where are we going from here We've got all these new people Tell us The exciting ideas And skills That you want to bring to the group And all the things That we wouldn't have thought of yet Amazing Thank you We're coming really close to time So I'm going to wrap things up Really shortly I wanted to ask One question To both of you quickly Before we close Another question that's come in From the chat Is what kind of socials And stuff Did you do to form A group So Kirstie Since you've been speaking Maybe if you want to answer first And then Micah If you could also respond to that Yeah All sorts of things We're a big fan of potluck dinners I don't know if that's a phrase That everybody uses or understands But where everybody brings a dish And then you all have Kind of like dinner together I'm doing that Like after meetings Every so often So Or before the meeting Or a meal Or chat to each other Making sure after an event That always After an event You go somewhere To kind of chill out together And then have some food And having film screenings Well, the main ones Great Thank you Micah Sure So I think there's always An opportunity every week To do a little bit of social We always meet in a restaurant Kind of like we're We're still looking for A different meeting space But depending on how busy people are There's like one opportunity for a beer After the meeting So then alongside I must say it's really nice To change location sometime Yeah, so we were lucky that Two of our ex-members have this Amazing beautiful apartment And are always willing to To offer this space When we have these strategy meetings So when we have a strategy meeting They were really kind and Like said, okay, we can do it here And then everybody brought food And like we had more time To actually really Yeah, just chat and hang out Before like and after this This whole like working phase And then what was beautiful Is that when we won last year We had a party at this It's in the old kind of airport In the middle of Berlin So it's a space It's an open space They used to be an airport And you can now like kind of Stayed and like just hang out there And they have like Final culture gardens and stuff So we had a little party there And it was That was really nice in the sun So I would definitely remember that Yeah That sounds great It sounds like you know how to Have fun together as well Which is so important Well, yeah, thank you both And to everyone who's joined I think we've heard Some really inspiring stories I think from Micah It was really good to hear How you can kind of escalate And ramp up your campaign To get over different humps Without taking it all the way to Direct action and how that's led To the group continuing to do All sorts of other exciting stuff And from Kirsty on How basically occupying The university management building For such a long period of time Was the decisive factor in In turning the In turning the decision on Divestment around Which is just incredible To get that total reversal I think we discussed this When I spoke or maybe I had it From another presentation That university officials Actually came to the group and said If we do this Will you stop occupying things Which I mean it couldn't be Any more kind of decisive Than that really Which is great So yeah, please Use the escalation guide That we've put in this chat box And I'll share it underneath the video When the recording goes up And think about how you can Make your event for the global Divestment mobilization Strategically useful If it's time to escalate Then escalate Register your events At globaldivestmentmobilization.org And join the Facebook event Which we will share in the chat As well And yeah We are having a couple more Webinars to talk about stuff The next one is coming up On Tuesday the 4th of April Where we'll be talking about How you can grow your group And absorb new members After the global divestment mobilization How you can use it to help you grow in size And we had a little bit from Kirsty About how that happened At Edinburgh with the occupation And yeah, I just want to emphasise that Winning on divestment and money Is great and it's a fantastic set But it's actually It's all about people power And kind of coming together And people feeling confident That they can take action And building our power to win A really big fight That we need to win on climate And yes The global divestment mobilization Is the 5th to the 13th of May So you should have lots of time To plan your actions Or to think about how you might change them Between now and then Yeah, thank you all so much Thank you for campaigning with us Kirsty, did you want to say anything Final thoughts? No, I put my email The thing if anyone who didn't understand Because of the connection Does want to ask any questions I've got various things I could send through or show you But just good luck to everyone I love the fossil free movement I'm involved in a lot of things But this is the one that is Constantly the most exciting And inspiring to me Just so many cool things Always happening across the world I love it so much So yeah, good luck everyone Thanks, Kirsty, Micah Yeah, same for me Just hang in there If you're in this phase of Nothing's moving No, there will be something moving Hang in there And connect, get together Have some social stuff Happening in between Something fun to gain energy We're not a battery That can be used all the time Obviously Hang in there Yeah, so what really what helps me a lot Also is like And what I enjoy as well Like realizing that we are Or I am just one person Of thousands worldwide Doing this And it's such an amazing movement It's huge And so yeah So I'm really looking forward To the global diversity And mobilization this year as well The last thing that I said was muted I'm so sorry I just said thank you Thank you to Kirsty and Micah For speaking and sharing your inspiration with us Thank you to my colleagues Who have been helping backstage with the tech And telling me that I'm muted When I'm talking to you And thank you to everybody Who is watching now when this is recorded And to everyone getting involved In the global divestment mobilization You all really inspire me so much Thanks so much for this idea It was great