Last week, as a prelude to Climate Week, hundreds of climate activists staged demonstrations on Wall Street, targeting the financial industry—specifically CitiBank and BlackRock, both of which continue to invest massively in the fossil fuel industry— with confrontational direct action. They blocked the entrances to Citigroup’s headquarters and shut down all traffic in front of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager and a top fossil fuel financier.
Tens of thousands of people also turned out on Sunday for a massive march in Manhattan, put on by a broad coalition of groups, from Sunrise, 350, Extinction Rebellion, Fridays for Future, Third Act, the Sierra Club, and the Audubon Society to less-known Indigenous, faith, and environmental justice groups, to labor unions like District Council 37 (public-sector workers) and District Council 9 Painters and Allied Trades, or IUPAT. Protesters chanted, celebrated, danced, and waved butterfly signs but also presented an unusually clear and unified message: no more fossil fuels. Many signs addressed Biden by name—reference to the president’s continued approval of fossil fuel projects, a huge weakness in his climate policy. Others demanded that the president declare a climate emergency.
These actions, in their messaging, represented a robust departure from the amorphous please-do-something energy of past large Climate Week protests. I see them as a signal that the movement has outgrown raising awareness and moved on to the more urgent and political matter of assigning blame, naming the problem, and making clear demands.