NI 477 - November, 2014

Big oil RIP?

A note from the editor

Stopping Big Oil in its tracks

Did you go on one of the climate marches in September? As a confirmed march-sceptic, I approached the London event with caution. I’ve long seen marches as one of the least impactful tools in the activist’s toolbox: they are so easily dismissed and ignored, by politicians, the media and non-marchers alike. But this one felt different.

I was in the midst of pulling together this issue, exploring how we bring about the end of the oil age. So it was thrilling to watch from across the pond as the record-breaking 400,000-strong New York march was led through the streets of Manhattan by people at the forefront of the struggle to keep the oil in the ground. First Nations from the tar sands ‘sacrifice zone’ in Canada marched with representatives of Native communities fighting pipelines and Indigenous Amazon villagers threatened by drilling. Young people of colour living next to health-destroying oil refineries marched with Gulf Coast residents devastated by Hurricane Katrina and the BP Deepwater Horizon spill.

The march gave us a glimpse of the movement that could – indeed, must – end the oil age. It’s diverse, enormous, multi-pronged, and led by those who, forced to live daily with the devastation caused by fossil fuels, are genuinely starting to stop Big Oil in its tracks.

Elsewhere in the magazine, the significance of the People’s Climate March is explored in more depth by Mark Engler, and Naomi Klein talks about her brilliant new book on how climate change gives us a shot at a more equal, democratic world.

In the face of multiple ecological crises, hope seems to be rising again. I encourage you to get involved.

Jess Worth for the New Internationalist co-operative.
www.newint.org

The big story

Leave the oil in the soil! Indigenous representatives from communities resisting oil extraction all over the world marched together at the front of the recent 400,000-strong New York climate march.

Photo: Jenna Pope / Bold Nebraska

NI 477 - November, 2014

Big oil RIP?

A note from the editor

Stopping Big Oil in its tracks

The big story

Change is coming. Jess Worth examines whether growing pressure for divestment and disruption can knock Big Oil off its perch.

Features

Fossil free divestment, end oil sponsorship, shut down the tar sands, protect the Arctic and Action Saro-Wiwa.

Around the world, local communities have been hitting the oil monster where it hurts.

Investors are starting to wonder whether oil’s such a good bet, reveals Jeremy Leggett.

Twenty years after the execution of their leader, the Ogoni people are rebelling once more. Patrick Naagbanton reports from the frontline.

Why did an oil company go to such lengths to monitor Jess Worth’s activism? Perhaps we are more powerful than we think.

Graeme Green talks to author and activist Naomi Klein about why global warming is a political issue.

The daily reality of life in Gaza creates unseen psychological scars, writes psychiatrist Samah Jabr.

Opinion

It's a complicated issue, admits Kate Smurthwaite.

Doctors Nayna Patel and Mohan Rao go head to head.

Mark Engler draws lessons from marches past and present.

Agenda

A group of young Chechens is battling to save their social club, reports Alice Lagnado.

Eilis O'Neill on the struggle for free, quality, universal education.

A new initiative is providing safe transport for women in India, reports Hema Vijay.

Government plans could turn the fjords into a dumping ground for mining waste, reveals Tina Andersen.

Fuji's president is sitting pretty - but is his election victory good for the country? wonders Richard Swift.

DNA breakthrough gives hope to Guatemalans still searching for the graves of their loved ones.

There are 17 official neglected tropical diseases, so why aren't we doing more to help? asks Cristiana Moisescu.

Ylenia Gostoli on the British government's latest ploy to spot those 'at risk of radicalization'.

Accountability for casualty numbers could be a thing of the past thanks to 'remote control' military tactics.

Global good news this month.

Regulars

Praise, blame and all points in between? Your feedback published in the November 2014 magazine.

It’s hard to trust official sources of information in CAR, discovers Ruby Diamonde.

Cartoon by Simon Kneebone.

Samantha North assesses a country with a volatile mix of cultural, religious and political influences.

Trayko Popov from Bulgaria with ‘Migration’.

Cartoon by P J Polyp.

The Hungarian Prime Minister is put under the spotlight.

The Afghan photo-journalist is using his own experience of asylum to help others. He speaks to Michelle Slater.

Cartoon by Marc Roberts.

'Africa isn't all refugee camps and windswept savannahs,' says the Nigerian-American journalist and author.

Film, Book & Music Reviews

Animism by Tanya Tagaq; Spirit of Malombo by Julian Bahula.

The Overnighters, directed by Jesse Moss; The Imitation Game, directed by Morten Tyldum.

By Night the Mountain Burns, by Juan Tomás Ávila Laurel; Inequality and the 1% by Danny Dorling; Assata by Assata Shakur; and This Changes everything: Capitalism vs the Climate by Naomi Klein.

Other notable music, film & books.

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