Global Just Recovery Gathering Kicks Off to Harness 'Collective People Power' and Create a 'Better Future for All'

A three-day event called the Global Just Recovery Gathering kicked off Friday and is aimed at being "a space to design new pathways for a better future for all."

"People around the world are coming together to collectively reimagine our future."
--Fenton Lutunatabua, 350.org

"There is nothing we can't achieve if we pool our collective people power together, and create the forces of change necessary for a just recovery for all," organizers declare.

The free and virtual event, scheduled with time zones around the world in mind, features 200 interactive sessions and high-profile progressives including Vandana Shiva, Bill McKibben, Greta Thunberg, and Nnimmo Bassey.

Event-goers can take part in workshops such as "Follow The Money: Tracing Climate Injustice to Fossil Finance in the Pacific," "Student Climate Activism as Civics Education," "How Do We Build Solidarity in Environmental Movements Between the Global North and South?" and "Building Labor Climate Coalitions for a Just Recovery."

The opening panel, entitled "Just Recovery for All," featured Hakima Abbas, Naomi Klein, Amitav Ghosh, and Dominique Palmer.

"The pandemic has exposed the deep inequities of our existing economic system and opened a pathway to leave these injustices behind," reads the panel description. "We need to come together and push for a world that puts people before profit. Now it's the time to turn the corner away from harmful practices that destroy our climate and the living world around us."

350.org, one of the organizations hosting the virtual event, encouraged people on Friday to sign up for the ongoing gathering:

"It's been tough times, but if there's one thing these times have shown us [it] is that when we stand together, we are powerful," a promo for event reads. "It's time to gather that power. It is time to recharge, rebuild, and reconnect!"

Tethering the gathering are five principles:

• Put people's health first, no exceptions;
• Provide economic relief directly to the people;
• Help our workers and communities, not corporate executives;
• Create resilience for future crises; and
• Build solidarity and community across borders--do not empower authoritarians.

"People around the world are coming together to collectively reimagine our future," Fenton Lutunatabua, head of regions at 350.org, said in a statement released ahead of the event, which he called "an invitation for us all to build a movement that is massive and that shakes the foundations of power and money and greed that seem to hold all the cards right now."

"We must move with grace and patience with each other to build lasting relationships that truly build collective power," he continued. "We must be continually willing to do things differently and learn from each other."

"We want to stop the worst effects of climate change, we want to see every fossil fuel project on Earth stopped and the just transition take hold. We want the social license of the fossil fuel industry gone forever--and we need this to happen soon," said Lutunatabua.