Why this matters
Current climate policies put the world on track for 2.5-2.9°C of warming, while global fossil fuel subsidies reached $7 trillion in 2022. With governments failing to act at the pace the science demands, pressure from civil society - targeted directly at the economic underpinnings of the fossil fuel industry - is increasingly essential. This report maps the full range of tactics available and identifies where the highest-leverage opportunities lie.
What we found
Three overarching strategies underpin effective activism against fossil fuel companies. The first is squeezing the money: making it harder for fossil fuel companies to obtain financing, insurance, and investment - through divestment campaigns, bank pressure, and targeting insurers. The second is reducing the social licence to operate: delegitimising and stigmatising the industry through public shaming, media exposés, advertising bans, and cultural interventions, building on a growing global normative turn against fossil fuels. The third is protecting and enforcing: using litigation, regulatory action, and policy lobbying to create new legal constraints and hold companies accountable for climate damages. The report examines 16 specific tactics in detail, and includes two deep dives - on insurance campaigning (identified as a particularly under-exploited leverage point) and on collaboration (illustrated through the English anti-fracking campaign, which achieved a national moratorium in 2019 through a coalition spanning local residents, NGOs, and national networks).
What it means for funders and campaigners
No single tactic is sufficient on its own - the most effective campaigns combine approaches that reinforce each other across financial, social, and legal domains, and sustain pressure over the long term. For funders, the report highlights several under-resourced areas with strong potential: insurance market campaigning, intersectoral coalition-building, and support for litigation efforts. It also makes the case for trust-based, long-term funding that enables grassroots groups to sustain engagement through the extended timescales these campaigns require. For campaigners, the key message is that collaboration across tactical divides - between radical direct-action groups and insider advocates - significantly amplifies impact.
Read the full report
The findings above are a summary. The full report, including methodology and supporting evidence, is available on socialchangelab.org.
Read the report