Friends of the Earth

We believe that environmental crisis, as well as widespread social injustice, are both intertwined symptoms of flawed ideological, economic and political systems that are violating peoples' rights, perpetuating oppression, failing to meet the needs of people and destroying the planet. So it is not enough to only campaign to end environmental harms without addressing what is causing those harms, nor is it enough to win small victories while we lose our planet, or large swaths of humanity, in the process.

To achieve deeper and lasting change, we must work on a systemic level to transform the rules, incentives, and practices of the economic and financial system so that resources are directed and wealth is created in ways that promote well-being and are ecologically restorative, equitable and socially just. At the same time, we must advance forms of political and economic decision-making that are fair, democratic and uphold peoples' rights.

Our Climate & Energy program works to stop the extraction of fossil fuels on public lands and waters, to phase out our use of dangerous nuclear reactors at Diablo Canyon and Indian Point and replace them with renewable energy, and to end federal incentives for the production of fossil fuels. We promote conservation and clean energy — including wind, solar and geothermal power — and fight to end our unhealthy dependence on dirty sources including coal, oil, nuclear and biofuels.

Our Economic Policy program works to create a more environmentally sustainable and socially just world by transforming financial systems, redirecting tax policies and public spending to make polluters pay for the costs of their pollution, and driving the transition to a cleaner, low-carbon economy. When they put their money to good use, investors (both private and public) have tremendous power to push toward a renewable and equitable future. But when they invest in coal, palm oil, or other destructive industries, they drive environmental and social harm.

Our Food & Technology program works to ensure that our food system is sustainable and just, and to convince corporations and governments to embrace the safe and precautionary management of chemicals and emerging technologies—including nanotechnology and synthetic biology. We are saving bees and other pollinators through market intervention to stop the use of bee-killing neonic pesticides and we are working to make the animal agriculture industry more sustainable.

Our Oceans & Vessels program works to protect coastal communities and marine life from harmful vessel air pollution, greenhouse gases, and the sewage, oil, and other water pollutants discharged from cruise ships, cargo ships, oil tankers and ferries. In the Arctic, we are working to create a protective zone to help preserve the Arctic Ocean from vessel pollution and other vessel impacts.

Friends of the Earth's organizational strategies are as follows:

1. Organize to build long term political power

• In order to achieve deeper system change, Friends of the Earth will broaden and deepen our base, and collaborate with broader movements to build long-term political power. This will require a massive increase in people power – and far more than just the environmental movement – to overcome the dominant interests which established, entrench and benefit from the economic and political status quo.

• We will seek to cultivate, engage and grow our activist base from the bottom up; be more strategic in where we build power, and how we transfer power from one fight to another.

• We will run campaigns that work in partnership with organizations engaged in diverse struggles for justice, with an eye towards building progressive power.

• We will design campaigns that, even if we lose in short-term, build the political strength needed to win in the long term.

2. Be a bold and fearless voice

• The severity of our environmental and social crises demands that we be bold in what we stand and fight against and what we stand and fight for. Building political power isn't enough. Without broadly shared political analysis of what's not working, what needs to be fixed, and how, we won't get the progressive systemic change we need.

• We will be a moral voice, standing up for what is right, not just what is easy or politically possible. We will continue to say what needs to be said and advocate for what needs to be done, to challenge our peers and decision makers.

3. Design and win campaigns that build towards larger systemic transformation

• In order to fundamentally transform our economic and political systems, we need to win smaller, strategic reforms that feed into systemic, radical changes. Our intertwined social and environmental crises may eventually force our political and economic systems to a breaking point. As a campaigning organization, our role is to find the sweet spot between winning short- and medium-term victories and laying the foundation for the broader systemic reforms we need.

• We will campaign directly to change the “rules of the game" (e.g. trade, campaign finance, tax policy) that institutionalize oppression, and/or privilege corporations at the expense of ordinary people and harm the environment.

• We will design issue campaigns to win concrete environmental and social gains, while weakening and displacing – not just talking about -- some of the most egregious, corporate-privileging elements of our political and economic system.

• We will mount inspiring campaigns designed to point the way towards alternatives, and that model some of the new political-economic structures and systems needed in order to bring about deeper transformation.

Friends of the Earth, founded by David Brower in 1969, is the U.S. voice of the world's largest federation of grassroots environmental groups, with a presence in 75 countries. Friends of the Earth works to defend the environment and champion a more healthy and just world. To accomplish our mission, Friends of the Earth works at the nexus of environmental protection, economic policy and social justice to fundamentally transform the way our country and the world value people and the environment. This work is carried out by our staff in our Berkeley, California and Washington, D.C. offices. We are supported in this work by more than one million members, online supporters and activists.

Throughout our nearly 50-year history, Friends of the Earth has often been a pioneer among environmental groups, tackling issues before they become mainstream. Whether it is the presence of nanoparticles in our food, poorly regulated pollution from cruise ships, or bringing about and winning the nation's first climate lawsuit at the Supreme Court, Friends of the Earth stands out in our willingness to be the first to act, and then to recruit others to act alongside us.

Friends of the Earth has worked to address both the symptoms and the root causes of social and environmental problems. Our founder, David Brower, sought to create an environmental organization that stood its ground against all odds. We have provided crucial leadership in campaigns resulting in landmark environmental laws, precedent-setting legal victories and groundbreaking reforms of domestic and international regulatory, corporate and financial institution policies.

At Friends of the Earth, we have reoriented our strategy to meet each new decade of environmental challenges. For example, in recent years we've incorporated a greater focus on social justice, as the fight to safeguard the planet is intrinsically connected to the global struggle for social and economic justice. We are building our political power through grassroots organizing in diverse communities and intersectional alliances with leaders in other movements to diversify our membership and engage other environmental organizations.

1971: we led and won the fight to stop federal funding for the highly polluting Super Sonic Transport commercial airliner.

1981: we played a crucial role in the successful campaign to impose a moratorium on leases for offshore oil drilling in pristine areas.

1990: we took the lead in passing the Oil Spill Pollution Act, requiring double hulls on oil tankers in the wake of the Exxon Valdez spill.

1992: our work with the Lower Elwha tribe in Washington State led to a federal law authorizing the removal of two dams that blocked historic salmon runs.

1999: We persuaded President Clinton to issue an executive order that requires the government to conduct environmental assessments of all future trade deals.

2002: we launched a campaign that has now led more than 1,000 companies to pledge to remove chemicals that harm human health from personal care products.

2003: we helped draft and pass California's Clean Cars Law – the first law regulating the emission of greenhouse gas pollutants from passenger vehicles.

2009: our lawsuit successfully pressured the federal Export-Import Bank to consider — for the first time — climate impacts before making its decisions.

2012: we achieved a ban on cruise ships dumping wastewater while docked at the Port of Seattle.

2013: thanks to our campaign against the GMO apple, McDonald's and Gerber have confirmed that they have no plans to sell or use it.

2013: we succeeded in our fight to stop Iowa from charging ratepayers in advance for the costs of building new nuclear reactors. MidAmerican, the company previously planning on building a reactor, instead announced a $1.9 billion investment in wind power.

2016: 80 major grocery store chains, including Safeway, Kroger and Whole Foods, have made commitments not to sell genetically engineered salmon.

2020: more than 156,000 Friends of the Earth activists succeeded in pressuring Dominion and Duke Energy to cancel the dirty Atlantic Coast Pipeline that would have polluted communities across four states.
December 2020: a years-long battle over the proposed Pebble Mine in Alaska ended when a coalition that included Friends of the Earth successfully pushed the US Army Corps of Engineers to deny a permit for the project.

2021: after over a decade of grassroots opposition and legal battles by Friends of the Earth and others, the Keystone XL pipeline finally met its demise. Collectively, nearly 50,000 Friends of the Earth members sent comments to the State Department demanding it block the pipeline from moving forward.

2021: decades of science has clearly linked chlorpyrifos to brain damage in children, and it poses a threat to farmworkers and more than 1,200 endangered species. After tens of thousands of Friends of the Earth members wrote to the EPA demanding it ban this dangerous insecticide, the EPA finally acted and banned its use in food.