Cultivating Just Transition: reflections on a learning journey 

In an earlier blog, the team’s first Just Transition Lead, Rona, offered a definition of Just Transition as a set of principles and practices that work towards a future where justice, care and equity are prioritised alongside climate, ecological and environmental regeneration. 

Transition Together launched a Just Transition online learning journey in April with a cohort of seed-funded Transition groups, to collectively explore what this really means and how we can make this come alive in the projects and work we do. When I, El, joined the team in August, Rona passed on to me the task of holding these monthly spaces to dive into how we Cultivate Just Transition, and I have deeply appreciated this opportunity to continue my own learning and growth alongside you.

The series aimed to support groups in thinking, discussing and actioning social justice; at grassroot community levels, and within wider structural contexts. We wanted to share and cultivate more awareness of the very different impacts current crises have on different communities and individuals marginalised by systems of harm. It sought to grow confidence, and share more of the tools and knowledge needed to ask important questions, to spark the challenging conversations within our groups and with partners, to help us pay attention to our power and privilege, and orient our Transition efforts more fully towards equity, justice and care. 

Over the seven months, we welcomed a number of contributors who offered their wisdom from different areas of activism. Practice circles followed these thought-provoking talks and invited participants to apply what they were learning to their own contexts; to support and to learn from each other.

Our starting point was to understand Just Transition as part of an ecology of international movements and efforts, with origins in US Labour and Environmental Justice movements. Clara Paillard, a member of Unite the Union and the co-founder of Unite Grassroot Climate Justice Caucus,  built upon this in her session on Trade Unions. Clara shared that Just Transition means standing in solidarity with workers. Climate, environmental or ecological justice is only possible with a fair and funded transition for all workers into regenerative jobs. 

Disability and Climate Justice activist Emma Geen joined the group in May. Emma shared how Disabled individuals are more impacted by climate chaos, and how often, measures to adapt often create additional barriers because Disabled experiences are excluded from decision making processes that concern them. She emphasised that Disabled people “have to be given a seat at the table at every stage of the process” in efforts to meaningfully respond to the climate crisis. 

Yet this could be a huge opportunity for generative collaboration between movements, Emma reflected: Disability and environmental movements are working towards common goals of re-organising our society, which offers the biggest opportunity to make society accessible in our lifetimes.

Some participants said Emma’s session had already influenced their groups’ decisions, by prioritising questions of accessibility at the heart of all planning considerations for event venues, food and travel. Another group shared about their recent focus on building wheelchair accessible planters, and ensuring that their events include tasks for all ages and abilities to participate – “so there’s something for everyone”.

The fourth session in the series, I offered some reflections on Climate Justice and Global Just Transition, as inspired by this amazing zine from Scotland Friends of the Earth. While organising at the grassroots, the call is to “act local, and think global”.

Sustainable Starts participated in the series, and really brought that dance across scale to life for me in their reflections. Speaking about their seed-funded project, Liverpool Children’s Clothes Swaps, Gillian shared how “we’re encouraging people not to buy new clothes, and that does affect those within in the fashion industry. So we’re having a look now at how we can make connections with those within the fashion industry to look at slowing down that fashion process rather than them carrying on with it and us trying to battle against it.” 

This feels to me a great example of starting the process of examining impacts of localisation efforts in the context of globalisation, and seeking ways to stand in solidarity with those in the Global South impacted by industries of exploitation.

Our final contributor was Mama D. Ujuaje, a community researcher and facilitator for socially transformative justice. She shared her wisdom with us around themes of power and privilege and the responsibility we are called to when we remember ourselves as part of a living earth. She spoke of a  “deep responsibility to nurture and nourish each aspect of ourselves, be that aspect human or more-than-human….We’re linked. All of us are linked up… And do you know, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. So if we don’t care for each other and nourish each other, then we are actually, in effect, weakening ourselves.”

Reflecting on the series, Pauline O’Flynn noted the ways that her group, Grow Northern Ireland are always thinking about and affirming this sense of collective responsibility, and the quality of relationships and care in their work. She reflected on the impacts of the racialised violence of the riots in summer on many of the people they work with, and that stark reminder of social justice’s vital role in finding ways to care for each other in the day to day; how to build community and be together.

Rakesh from the London Hub shared the limitations of the series for him due to the whiteness of its facilitation. His long-term engagement with social justice issues rooted in lived-experience meant that nothing offered by the series was new information for him. Rakesh’s reflections offer a reminder of the vital role of collaboration across difference in creating learning spaces that don’t just meet the needs of the dominant experience present.

I’m sitting with ongoing reflections around what most caring and responsible practices look like when sharing learnings on social justice issues… I’m holding care around expectations or placing extra burden on folks most impacted by the issues being explored to educate everyone else. Meanwhile I’m so aware of the risks of offering theoretical explorations in ways that might diminish the lived experience already in the space.

Some participants’ reflections spoke of the very first seeds planted in their cultivation of Just Transition. Others’ reflections spoke of established, vibrant and flourishing gardens, tended across dynamic networks of solidarity and care. 

The work of cultivating a Just Transition doesn’t stop here for any of us. It is by no means easy, but it is what is being asked of us all. As welcomed by many participants in the series, a monthly collective peer-led learning space will continue for the group, as we continue to learn from one another and grow into our commitments to cultivating a future where justice, care and equity are nestled at the heart.

Another emerging branch of this commitment is forming as a Just Transition circle. This circle is calling together eight people from underrepresented and marginalised experiences to collaboratively lead on a Just Transition contribution at the Transition Assembly in February. I feel honoured to be facilitating this circle, cherishing the gift of hearing from lived experiences different to my own. The circle offers a place to reflect on barriers and challenges within the movement and welcomes creative responses to them; recognising the deeply rooted presence of creative responses to challenges that bloom among many marginalised groups. I’m excited to see what unfolds in the circle, and be guided by the vital collective wisdom that can flourish when we embrace and celebrate difference. 

Find out more: Looking back, looking forward on our Just Transition project and our Just Transition playlist.