Opening the Door to Negotiation

Abstract

After examining the styles of contemporary youth leadership in effecting their respective Groundswell Approaches, this chapter will examine the methodologies they use to grow and command their numbers. Many of these means are relatively new to youth activism having not existed prior to the 1990s. The digital technologies of the Internet and personal devices have not only made the world smaller as Marshall McLuhan predicted in 1962 when he coined the term “the global village”, but size, cost, and accessibility have provided instant communication with youth the world over for leaders and followers alike. Gone are the days of mimeographing posters and pasting them to walls to advertise rallies of the 1960s; gone also are the days of relying on the conventional media of radio and television to spread the word of the causes of youth in the 1970s and 1980s. Today’s youth need simply to refer to their phone and open their social media platforms to read the latest message about protest marches near them, often accompanied by geomedia support such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and GPS systems that can direct them to the event in real time. Another significant feature of this ubiquitous digital media is its ability to provide youth with the visible evidence necessary to illustrate the impacts of climate change through photography and video and disseminate these images to those in power leaving little doubt in the minds of today’s youth and environmental policymakers of the importance of climate change action.