I want to say thank you for being part of our movement this year, and helping to make big change possible.

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Hi John,
Our work isn’t always easy. We know that challenging poverty, inequality and climate change means changing the rules of the global economy. But those rules can seem abstract and complex – too big to make any real difference to.

This year we have proved that we really can make a difference. Our movement has had some stunning victories which show that big change is possible. And I want to say thank you for being part of it.



** Victory 1: the Energy Charter Treaty is crumbling
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We can’t halt the climate emergency as long as corporations have their own special legal system through which they can sue governments for taking climate action. That’s why we’re campaigning against the toxic corporate court system embedded in the Energy Charter Treaty, which exists to protect the interests of the fossil fuel industry.

It’s not easy to get the Energy Charter Treaty over to the media, politicians or the public, so we’ve had to generate all the creativity we can muster. I spent one evening tied to a wooden model of an oil rig covered in face paint. My colleagues made a dozen ’corporate’ sharks from papier-mâché. We’ve marched through Salisbury to protest against one of the corporations suing Italy, under this treaty, for banning offshore oil drilling. And of course, we’ve done a whole lot of lobbying, media work and collaborating with campaigners around the UK and Europe.
Finally, in the last few months, the dominoes have been falling. Germany, France, Poland and Spain are among the countries which have said they’ll withdraw from this treaty in recent months. Our task is now to demand the UK joins them – the final domino that would lead to the collapse of the ECT.



** Victory 2: a first step towards climate reparations
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Dealing with climate change requires justice. Most countries in the world are suffering from climate disasters despite contributing almost nothing to climate change. Meanwhile, the fossil fuel giants are making bumper profits off an energy crisis.

For much of the year we’ve been making the case for climate reparations, forcing those who’ve contributed most to the disaster to clean up the mess. And at COP27, we had a second victory. For the first time, countries agreed to a so-called ‘loss and damage’ fund, through which the biggest polluters would pay to deal with the increasingly serious climate emergencies. Much more work needs to be done, not least ensuring those corporations which continue to exacerbate the crisis pay what they owe. But the agreement to create a fund has been a decade in the making, and we should celebrate, because without this sort of resource transfer from the global north to the global south, there will be no global green transition.


** Victory 3: building a new pharmaceutical system from the ground up
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Through the pandemic, we saw how broken our pharmaceutical system is. Rather than share publicly funded research with the world to ramp up vaccine production, big pharma hoarded this knowledge so they could make eye-watering profits. We have worked for a very different system, based on need rather than greed. And here too we’ve enjoyed victories.
Although the World Trade Organisation, very belatedly and under intense pressure, passed a new policy on intellectual property this year, it was so moderate as to be useless. But that doesn’t mean we achieved nothing. Far from it. With your help, we took an MP to visit South Africa’s cutting edge new mRNA hub. After big pharma’s refusal to share their vaccine know-how, the hub worked to create its own mRNA vaccines. They then did something really radical: sharing their knowledge with scientists from around the world, patent-free. And thanks to your support we’ve been able to champion this ground-breaking new model – in parliament, in the media and among the general public.

Often in a campaign, you don’t get the radical change you demanded. But sometimes you get something even better. That’s what we’ve got with the mRNA hub. And as big pharma fails to provide the drugs we need, at a price we can afford, it points the way to a different model for producing medicines, which could help make basic healthcare a right for all.



** And there’s more…
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There is so much we’ve done besides, most recently putting the government’s scandalous deregulation of commodity speculation on the political agenda.

Across all of our work, we rely on our activists, members and supporters. And sometimes, our activists lead their own campaigns. Just look at the amazing work of Global Justice Bradford, forcing their local councils to divest from fossil fuels. Or our Cumbria group which has committed itself to stopping the opening of a coal mine in their county.

It’s impossible to look around the world today and not feel scared or angry or, at times, despair. But we also need to take heart from the inspirational work activists are doing around the world, and remember: we can and we do win. Without movements like ours, this wouldn’t be possible. So I want to say thank you. I have no doubt that together we have made the world a fairer place this year. Next year, we will do even more.

Have a great rest and see you in 2023.

Nick Dearden
Director at Global Justice Now
** The fight for a fairer future depends on committed and passionate people like you.
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