100 Campaigns that Changed the World Steve Tibbett
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- Sciences
A podcast showcasing the best advocacy campaigns from past and present. Learning the lessons from social and political campaigns that have made an impact. A tool for campaigners and those that are interested in how change happens.
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Infected Blood Campaign
In the 1970s and 80s, 4,689 British haemophiliacs were treated with blood products contaminated with HIV and Hepatitis C. More than half of them have died. At the time, the medication was imported from the US where it was made from the pooled blood plasma of thousands of paid donors, including some in high-risk groups, such as prisoners. If a single donor was infected with a blood-borne virus such as hepatitis or HIV then the whole batch of medication could be contaminated. Official documents presented to the inquiry revealed this therapy was given as part of clinical trials.
Jason Evans is my interviewee on this episode. He is the Director and Founder of the campaigning organisation Factor 8, which is seeking justice for the familes impacted by the scandel. Jsson is also the lead claimant in the Contaminated Blood Products Group Litigation currently before the High Court and a Core Participant in the Infected Blood Public Inquiry. Jason's Father, Jonathan, died when Jason was just four years old, in October 1993. Jonathan was infected with both Hepatitis C and HIV from infected Factor VIII blood products. Growing up without his father, it was during his teenage years that Jason began to understand the circumstances around how his father came to die from AIDS.
You can find out more about the scandel and the campaign here. There is also an excellent TV documentary.
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Anti-Apartheid Movement
The British Anti-Apartheid Movement was at the centre of the international movement opposing the South African racial segregation system, Apartheid . By the late 1980s the UK Movement had unleashed a number of campaigns and branches and become one of the most powerful international solidarity efforts in history.
In this interview we feature three prominent UK anti-apartheid activists and organisers from the time: Chitra Karve, who was an Anti-Apartheid Movement staff member from 1986 to 1989 and helped organise the 1988 Nelson Mandela: Freedom at 70 campaign, Suresh Kamath who was formerly Vice-Chair of the Movement, and helped to organise the Mandela freedom concert at Wembley Stadium in April 1990, and Tim Oshodi who was Chair of the London School of Economics AA Group and took part in an occupation of the LSE, and was a member of the Black Solidarity Committee.
The three interviewees give some really fascinating insights into what was one of the most important and ultimately successful campaigns of the 20th Century, and reflect on what what went well, what went wrong and what contemporary campaigners can learn from their experience.
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Freedom Rides
Emilye Crosby, professor of history and the coordinator of Black Studies at SUNY Geneseo, and Hasan Kwame Jeffries, Associate Professor for the History Department in the Ohio State University, reflect on the tactics and strategies of the Freedom Riders. The Freedom Rides were a key part of the American civil rights movement of the 1960s and the Riders rode buses through the American South in 1961 to protest against segregated bus terminals. They tried to use “whites-only” restrooms and lunch counters at bus stations in Alabama, South Carolina and other Southern states. Along their routes, the freedom riders were met with violence and confrontation by police and white protestors (many of whom were members of the Klu Klux Klan. The protest drew international attention to the civil rights movement and was a pivotal moment in the wider civil rights struggle.
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Mum's for Lungs
Tackling air pollution in a city like London is a big and important job. Mum's for Lungs founder Jemima Hartshorn explains how setting up and running a community-based, grassroots campaigning organisation on a part-time basis is both inspiring and challenging. Crowdsourcing campaign ideas and operating a parent-friendly model are some of the ways in which Mum's for Lungs stands out. Jemima also reflects on issues like the ULEZ (London Ultra Low Emmissions Zone) and how the issue has become politically weaponised in recents months.
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Jubilee 2000 Debt Campaign
Jubilee 2000 was an international coalition movement in over 40 countries that called for cancellation of poor country debt by the year 2000. The campaign was hugely successful, leading to large quantities of debts being cancelled. Here I speak with Adrian Lovett, formerly Deputy Director of Jubilee 2000 and leader of the successor organisation, Drop the Debt. Adrian, now CEO of Development Initiatives, which seeks to harness the power of data and evidence to end poverty, talks about how the Jubilee campaign became very high profile, getting noticed by world leaders and finding media coverage through celebrity engagement, and combined that with mass mobilisation, policy and evidence. We pick out some lessons for campaigners and reflect on what worked and some things that didn't.
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Together for Yes: Abortion in Ireland
Together for Yes is an abortion rights campaign group in Ireland. It campaigned successfully for a Yes vote in the 2018 referendum to remove the Eighth Amendment's constitutional ban on abortion in Ireland.
In this episode I talk with Ailbhe Smyth, an Irish academic, and the founding director of the Women's Education, Resource and Research Centre at University College Dublin. As well as being involved in campaigns on women’s liberation in the 1970s and on equal marriage she was named as one of the Time 100 most influential people, which she helped found and which was the umbrella organisation for the campaign for repealing the 8th amendment of the Irish constitution which had afforded the unborn the same rights as a pregnant woman. .
There is lots of interesting stuff in this interview. The campaign was hugely successful and Ailbhe was one of the people directing it and making sure it didn't make the mistakes that a lot of coalitions make.
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