FAQs and Glossary

Of course!

Extinction Rebellion is made up of people of all ages and backgrounds from all over the world. From under 18 to over 80 year olds – there are thousands of people willing to put their liberty on the line to fight the climate and ecological emergency and protect biodiversity and atmospheric health.

We don’t align with any political party and welcome people who vote for all political parties and none.

We are working to improve diversity in our movement. We don’t think it is helpful to set this up as a fight between the “left” and the “right”, we have an enormous challenge before us, we believe we need to lay down our differences and find our common ground.

Not at all.

All our actions are born from democratic ideals, and based on facts that scientists have been telling us about for 40 years. Extinction Rebellion is not a movement aligned to any political party. Everyone is welcome.

Tell the truth, act now and the citizens assembly are democratic acts.

Citizen’s assemblies have a long history within UK democracy. We are calling for a particularly type of assembly in which the members are chosen at random - like a jury - to reflect the wider population, but reflecting the demographics of our communities (e.g. age, gender, ethnicity, social class).

The climate emergency is everyones problem. We welcome your support, no matter who you vote for, or whether you vote at all. This is not about the conventional political divides. We are all in this together.

This is beyond politics.

Rising Up! was founded by Roger Hallam, Gail Bradbrook, Simon Bramwell and others.

In Winter 2016 we were joined by Stuart Basden, Ian Bray. Other founders of Extinction Rebellion campaign include:

• Robin Boardman
• Clare Farrell
• Nils Agger
• Frieda Luerken
• Sibi

We are a decentralised organisation – anyone can do things in the name of Extinction Rebellion if they agree with and adhere to our principles and values – people don’t need anyone’s permission on that basis.

We have a self-organising system. Power is invested in roles through the use of mandates rather than held by people. It is a creative system that grows in response to the organisations needs.

We organise in circles focussed on actions, political strategy and movement support. Teams focus on Media and Messaging, the Citizens Assembly, Finance and Fundraising, Legal, Training, Actions, Art, Tech and Communities, Internationalist Solidarity team and many more.

Coordinators from the Working Groups meet regularly to share information and resolve issues that lack clarity.

For the rebellion period a Rapid Response Team was established to make faster decisions on strategy and issues, this include representatives from various UK based teams. We are considering how well a structure works at a UK national level. This structure may be useful to copy in other circumstances, but other countries, local groups and so on, in this way a fractal structure. We are figuring all this out with support of a Self Organising System Team.

A list of contacts are available on our how to contact us page

Extinction Rebellion is run entirely by volunteers giving up their spare time.

To stay in touch with news and details of events we are running, join the XR Leeds mailing list by signing up here and checkout our Act Now page for socials and other places we are active.

To find out more about how Extinction Rebellion head to rebellion.global.

Have a look at our Act Now page

For many people a local group is where interest in XR will be best focused - working with other people in your local area to plan actions and outreach that are relevant to you and your local community.

Don't forget to come along to our Monday general meetings to meet us, we're a friendly bunch and we don't bite 🙂

Anyone can take action in the name of XR - you just need to sign up to the 10 principles especially non-violence, actions are best focused around our 4 demands, and find a couple of other people who agree with you to act with you.

Awesome! Join one (or more) of our Working Groups!

A Working Group is a central group of rebels contributing more specalised skills to XR. They work together on a particular theme or idea, for example the “media” working group will be responsible for liaising with the media. Each working group operates autonomously and organises its own mandate and activities.

We have the following Working Groups who are actively looking for people who can get involved and help grow XR in Leeds.

• Actions
• Arts
• Core Operations
• Platforms (i.e. tech)
• Media
• Training and Outreach
• Regenerative Culture
• Rewilding

We are always looking for more people to join and volunteer in our working groups - people who are able to give some regular time and commit to regular meetings (online or face to face) and take on tasks - its a great way to meet new friends and learn new skills.

Each working group organises themselves a bit differently and as they see best, head on over to our working groups page to see how to contact and join each one.

Nobody is asked to do anything they don't want to do. Some rebels go on the front line in actions and risk arrest for non-violent civil disobedience. Others choose to participate in ways that do not risk arrest. All contributions to our actions are equally important.

Don't be! We are a friendly bunch (honest!) and promise to make you feel welcome from the moment you arrive. We operate in a safe space where everyone is treated with respect without any blaming and shaming. And we operate on a regenerative culture - a healthy resilient culture built on care and support.

We also operate a buddy system where new members can buddy up with existing members who will help them find their way around and offer moral support.

A group of people who create an Extinction Rebellion (XR) presence in a local area. Eg. XR Leeds! They build support within their communities through local outreach and actions. They are decentralised and as long as they adhere to the ten values and principles, they can be XR. When local groups are big enough they may set up working groups in order to organise more effectively.

These were setup to enable members to get in contact with other members who associate with that postcode from LS1 all the way through to LS29 so you can easily find, chat, make friends and organise local events.

To find out more info check out our local postcode group page.

Working groups focus on specific areas of work. Some working groups are permanent, and others may arise to organise specific actions, and then dissolve again once they are no longer needed. In Leeds, we have working groups in:

• Actions
• Media
• Training and Outreach
• Platforms
• Political Strategy
• Regenerative Culture
• Core operations
• Arts
• Rewilding
• And many more

An example of a temporary working group is the one which organised the Northern Rebellion.

Affinity groups are for non-violent direct actions, comprising of people doing the actions and their support system. AGs consist of 8-12 people and are completely autonomous in deciding which actions to carry out, as long as they adhere to the ten values and principles. They exist as part of our regenerative culture where we take time to pause and reflect, and are a group of close-knit people who support each other both in and out of actions.

A regional group is designed to support the growth of XR in a particular region of the country. For example, XR North which looks after Leeds and many more places in the north of England.

You can see the full map here which shows the different regional areas in more detail.