Welcome to Movement Monitor

What do you picture when you think about the Australian climate movement? Is it the most recent protest you took part in? A creative action you just saw on the news? Perhaps it’s the group members you meet with once a week in your local community space? But what if you could see the whole movement at once? All the groups, all the campaigns, and all the tactics that have been driving climate action over the past 12 months. Here at the Movement Monitor project, that’s exactly what we’re working towards. We’ll be using that data to measure the impact of Australian climate activism, year after year, helping to build a stronger, more strategic and more aligned movement. 

The Movement Monitor is a two year project that will develop a movement measurement methodology and apply it to the Australian climate movement. Across this two year period we will be gathering data from multiple sources to build a comprehensive view of the climate movement. This will include information about:

• The size of the movement
• The focus and activities of the movement 
• The diversity of the movement 
• Strategic alignment and connectivity between groups 
• Means and capacity to mobilise and engage numbers of people in strategic action 
• Narrative power and levels of passive support, including ability to shift the story, beliefs and assumptions
• Outcomes of movement activities

What we’re sharing on the Movement Monitor website

We’re currently building a powerful database of climate activism in Australia. Over the last few months we’ve been focusing on the groups, campaigns and tactics being used throughout the movement. You can see some of that data here on the website already through the Groups and Campaigns pages. 

There’s so much rich movement history to dive into. Have a look through historical campaigns, like AYCC’s 2007 “Adopt a Politician” campaign, where young people all around Australia “adopted” their local candidates to teach them about the urgent need to act on climate change. Or the Leard Blockade, an early coal mine blockade camp which saw communities pull together to try to protect the Leard forest from Whitehaven Coal’s Maules Creek mine. Or perhaps you’d like to browse more recent campaigns, like Act On Climate’s plans for a Community Climate Adaptation Fund for Victoria, the Our Islands Our Home campaign led by Torres Strait Islander activists, or 350.org’s campaign to Fix Our Climate Laws and protect water in WA and NT from fracking.

What to expect over the next few months

Over the next few months, you’ll see us adding even more groups and campaigns to the website for you to browse. If you see a gap that needs to be filled, or a group or campaign that we need to hear about, make sure you let us know via the contact form. There will also be regular updates, articles and interviews with climate campaigners shared via the blog, so make sure you subscribe to keep up to date.  

There are many other elements of the climate movement we’ll be measuring and reporting on. As we continue with this research and analysis, we’ll start to share more of our dataset and findings with you through the website. Shortly, we’ll release a movement wide survey for organisations and groups to participate in, and in the middle of this year, we’ll share our interim report card on the Australian climate movement. 

We can’t wait to share our findings with you over the next two years. Here’s to continuing to learn from each other and build our capacity towards a thriving, unstoppable climate movement. 

In solidarity,
The Movement Monitor Team

About the team

Movement Monitor is made possible by funding from the Sunrise Project and Boundless Earth.
The project is coordinated by Holly Hammond (Commons Library Director) with Dr Robyn Gulliver (Research Lead) and Sophie Hartley (Researcher), with the invaluable support of Antje Dun (Information Management & Design), Iain McIntyre (Movement Historian) and Glenn Todd (Web Developer).

Holly Hammond
Director – Commons Library
Holly directs the Commons Library: developing and implementing strategy, overseeing library operations, tracking social movement needs, forging project partnerships and building the financial sustainability of the organisation. She is one of Australia’s foremost activist educators

Dr Robyn Gulliver
Research Lead
Dr Gulliver is a Research Fellow at the Universities of Queensland and Australian National University. Dr Gulliver is an award winning writer and activist who has written extensively on the Australian environmental movement and has a deep understanding of best practice campaigning and training with regard to climate change activism. 

Antje Dun
Information Management & Design (Librarian – Commons Library)
Antje maintains the library, creates and adds new content, supervises volunteers, does graphic design and contributes her information management expertise to special projects. She has worked in many specialist libraries and is also a graphic designer.

Sophie Hartley
Researcher
Sophie is a researcher on the Movement Monitor project, helping to measure the impact of the Australian climate movement. She draws on her years of experience researching climate activism and working in various community organising and activism roles.

Iain McIntyre
Historian & Researcher
Iain brings past social movements stories to present day change makers through social media posts, articles, campaign case studies and research projects. He is a social movement historian and author of several books.