Being Shortlisted for Climate Week Award
Being shortlisted for a Climate Week award - some brief thoughts on global corporations, competitive awards and leadership from Transition Network Chairman Pete Lipman.
I’ve been nominated and then shortlisted for an “inspiring leader” award in Climate Week . This led to discussion at Transition Network about involvement in Climate Week and agreement that it might be useful for me to explain some of my thinking about it.
There’s been a lot of controversy about Climate Week, mainly because of companies like the Royal Bank of Scotland being a supporting partner. After all, RBS could do more about climate change if they stopped funding the exploitation of the tar sands.
And of course it isn’t just about the tar sands – companies like Tesco and RBS represent a particular, globalised way of doing business which undermines communities’ attempts to re-localise.
On top of that having an award for being an “inspiring leader” raises different kinds of questions. As George Monbiot said recently in a commentary on an Observer “eco-power” list
[awards can be] ... invidious. They extract a few characters from a vast collective effort: generally those who are skilled at taking credit for other people’s work...
What sort of values do awards that pick out individuals foster?
I’ve been using Common Cause (for a summary read George Monbiot's review) to help me think more strategically about what I do. In it Tom Crompton looks at the difference between extrinsic values, which relate to how we are perceived by others, and intrinsic ones, which aren’t focused on self-interest. I see a danger that participating in an inspiring leader award will tend to foster extrinsic instead of intrinsic values.
So why have I decided to stay in?
Partially because I don’t see what we gain by labeling others as being solely responsible for what we all face, when engaging in modern life means that we end up participating in the systems which of course include banks and supermarkets. Also I’d like to get the chance to continue the discussion about climate change and the tar sands, and in particular to raise with RBS how their actions are viewed by people active on climate change in communities around the world. Similarly, I’d like to raise with Tesco not only how sustainable and resilient their business model is in the long term for Tesco, but also what its wider impact is.
There’s another, linked, discussion that’s important to me about what leadership could mean.
Over and over again, when people discuss how to respond to the challenges we’re facing, a lack of leadership comes up. My thinking about this was helped by a distinction made by Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze in their recent article 'Leadership in an age of complexity' between “leader-as-hero” and “leader-as-host”. They argue that we shouldn’t be looking for leaders who are visionary, inspiring, brilliant and trustworthy to follow and that the idea of such heroic leadership rests on the illusion that someone, somewhere, can be in control. In contrast, they suggest that hosting leaders create change by relying on everyone’s creativity, commitment and generosity – and if I win this award, I’ll talk about that, as for me it is core to what underpins Transition.
For me, responding meaningfully to what we face comes through community based action, and the crucial, critical role that communities have to play needs far greater recognition.
If I win the award, I’ll talk about that, and how my life has been transformed by working at/with an amazing range of organizations including Sustrans, the Centre for Sustainable Energy, Transition Network, Transition Bristol and the Communities and Climate Action Alliance [a network of networks, including amongst others the Low Carbon Communities Network, the Green Communities Network and Climate Challenge Fund communities in Scotland as well as Transition Network].
The organisations and communities that give me so much, and that I’m so proud to work with, aren't striving to make small changes while keeping the basic structure of society the same. They’re setting out to transform society on the basis of local communities working to create a more sustainable and resilient lifestyle for themselves. I’ll be delighted if that is recognised.
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Comments from Otesha, People & Planet, Magnificent Revolution
18 March 2011 - 11:22am — Ben BrangwynThis came through on email to us at Transition Network.
Dear Climate Week Supporters, Sponsors, Organisers and Judges,
We are writing to you because of your involvement with March 2011 Climate
Week. This signifies a clear commitment to taking strong action on climate
change, and we applaud you for this. Whilst we are completely behind the aims
of Climate Week, we have concerns about Climate Week’s corporate sponsors,
the Royal Bank of Scotland in particular. Some organisations who were invited
to enter the Climate Week awards, including the Otesha Project and
Magnificent Revolution, have been unable to do so because they feel that the
association of RBS with Climate Week constitutes ‘greenwash’.We support Climate Week’s intention to ‘shine a spotlight on the many
positive steps already being taken in workplaces and communities across
Britain’ and use these examples to inspire others. However we do not agree
that RBS is ‘supporting the transition to a low carbon economy’.
Unfortunately any positive steps taken by RBS in their business operations
and in their investment in the renewable energy sector are far outweighed by
RBS’ continued investment in carbon intensive industries. Whilst
sponsorship of Climate Week could constitute a welcome first step on a
journey to more sustainable practice for a bank which self-identifies as
‘The Oil and Gas Bank’ (see RBS’ own website
www.theoilandgasbank.com/en), there is currently no evidence to suggest that
this sponsorship represents anything more significant than ‘greenwash’.
Perhaps this rebranding is a response to continued criticism from numerous
NGOs and grassroots campaigns, which has led to more widespread negative
publicity for the bank. However it is concrete action, not rebranding, which
is required.RBS cites its high ranking by the Carbon Disclosure Project as testimony to
its environmental credentials. Unfortunately the CDP ranking does not appear
to have sufficient scope to capture the entirety of carbon emissions for
which a company such as RBS is responsible: only the energy usage within bank
branches and offices is taken into account. Whilst every action taken to
reduce carbon emissions is important, it is vital that we do not allow the
championing of RBS’ weak energy saving measures to obscure the far more
damaging practices financed by RBS, such as the coal, oil and gas industries.
We are particularly concerned with RBS’ financing of the Canadian Tar
Sands, the exploitation of this resource is trampling indigenous rights,
destroying vast areas of ancient boreal forest, and has the potential to
cause runaway climate change (for more information see
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/03/canadian-oil-sands/kunzig-text).Sponsorship from companies with such weak green credentials lends legitimacy
to the flawed concept that one small action is a sufficient reaction to
climate change and that changing the light bulbs allows us to continue
‘business as usual’.
We urge you to reconsider your involvement with Climate Week and to raise
these concerns with others involved in Climate Week.If you would like to discuss any of the points raised in this letter further,
please contact Jo Clarke (jo@otesha.org.uk).Your Sincerely,
Jo Clarke, Change Projects Manager, The Otesha Project UK
www.otesha.org.ukLouise Hazan, Campaigns Manager, People & Planet
peopleandplanet.orgBarbora Parkova, Director, Magnificent Revolution
www.magnificentrevolution.org
Climate Week and RBS sponsorship
21 March 2011 - 7:16pm — Liz BattenThank you to those people who have brought this situation to my attention. I had not realised (a) that Climate Week is sponsored by RBS and (b) that RBS invests so heavily in coal and oil tar sands. I feel I must comment.
Over the past couple of years I have supported the work by the Co-operative Bank and RAVEN trust in Canada to help the Beaver Lake Cree Nation in their legal attempts to prevent the use of their land for oil tar sands. See www.raventrust.com for more information. If you watched Bruce Parry's documentaries about what is happening in Canada, you will have seen the total destruction that is being brought about, and the way in which the indigenous people are being compromised by offers of money by the oil companies that they feel helpless to refuse.
When I consider what is going on in Canada, and especially when I look at the pictures of the annihilation of the landscape, I have a very strong physical reaction: I get a really strong heart ache and I feel sick in my gut. I cannot bear that we are letting this happen.
If we associate ourselves with any company that sponsors this devastation by any means, we will take a position which is untenable. After years of work in tobacco control, I am fully aware of how wealthy companies manipulate the environment within which they promote their deadly wares. This feels exactly the same to me. In the 1980s, some very brave Australians began the BUGAUP (Billboard Utilising Graffitists Against Unhealthy Promotions) Campaign to undermine the image of the Marlborough cowboy and other adverts which portrayed tobacco as sexy, etc by "re-facing" them with the truth. Their courage began a movement which resulted in us as a society beginning to clearly see what those companies were up to. I think we must similarly take a stance - we must undermine the efforts of big companies to portray themselves as friends of the environment when they are so patently intent on destroying it. Receiving an award from, or sponsored by, RBS feels to me like we are being put in the same position as those aboriginal peoples in Canada.
against accepting this award
21 March 2011 - 7:15pm — Nick BardsleyHi Peter,
I think your justification does not stand up. What's at issue here is not complete non-participation in systems involving banks and supermarkets, which seems extremely difficult for most people and organisations as you point out. The (first) issue is, rather, publicly endorsing, legitimising and in some sense profiting from those ecologically and socially malign organisations. This takes one way beyond levels of engagement that are unavoidable, and risks making you (and by extension us) accomplices in their greenwash and destructive activities.
Secondly, I would ask what right does a leading light of the Transition network have to receive this award on behalf of Transition town members if many (perhaps even most?) of those members will be flat out opposed to any association with these corporations?
Third way?
23 March 2011 - 11:18am — Peter Wardley-RepenIf you get up on a stage sponsored by RBS and speak about all the wonderful people you've worked with, you just allow them to claim kudos by association, which was their objective in sponsoring the event in the first place. They win, we lose.
Why not just turn up and make a speech denouncing RBS et al's actions (and, if you have time, setting out the alternative, mentioning all the people you mention above) and rejecting the award? More publicity all round, more opprobrium for RBS. Simples.
If you refuse the award without turning up, they'll just give it to someone who's more likely to be on-message.
And I have to say I'm not convinced of the effectiveness of the
...we shouldn’t be looking for leaders who are visionary, inspiring, brilliant and trustworthy to follow...
argument espoused by Wheatley, Frieze et al. Whether we in the Transition movement (or any other movement for change) like it or not, the reality is that people still do need heroes and inspirational leaders (our own dear Mr Hopkins being a case in point, however much he may dislike it), and they still do get their information/opinions/prejudices from prominent people who tell them what they want to hear - if they didn't, the world would be a very different place.
By all means let us work to change that (and Common Cause is a very good base to start from), but in the meantime we have to play by the rules as they are, not as we would wish them to be.
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