Summary
The urgency of addressing the climate crisis has brought greater scrutiny to the role of fossil fuel companies in contributing to environmental harms. A broad spectrum of civil society actors, including grassroots campaigners, NGOs, advocacy organisations and activists are using a range of methods to target and hold these companies to account. This report is designed to support both actors and funders in understanding which interventions are most likely to be effective. It offers a structured overview of tactics, outcomes and contextual considerations, drawing on evidence from existing approaches and similar efforts with parallel targets in the past.
For civil society actors—including campaigners, organisers, and movement strategists—this report offers:
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A synthesis of strategies that have demonstrated tangible outcomes, and the contextual factors that contributed to their success.
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Insights to help avoid duplication of efforts and to identify opportunities for greater strategic coherence.
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Comparative examples from diverse geographic and political contexts to support learning and coalition-building
For philanthropic funders and supporters, this report highlights:
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Areas of strategic opportunity where financial and logistical support could yield high leverage.
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Under-resourced interventions with potential for outsized impact (e.g. insurance market campaigning, intersectoral alliances).
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Approaches that contribute not only to immediate outcomes but also to long-term structural transformations.
This report doesn’t offer a one-size-fits-all formula, but it does provide a strategic map based on evidence, analysis, and lived campaigning experience.
Key messages
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Campaigning and activism has been effective in the past. From tobacco to apartheid, committed, strategic actors working for progress have dismantled harmful industries. Those working to speed the end of the fossil fuel era can learn from history.
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The movement is growing smarter. New pressure points (like the proactive use of the law), bolder demands (like ad bans), and sharper coordination are starting to pay dividends. But there is still a lack of evidence - or conflicting evidence - about what works best.
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There is no single silver bullet. Effective movements use a mix of tactics: protests, lawsuits, lobbying, finance pressure, and coalition-building. Nothing works better in isolation. So a key message is to push for better and more collaboration between different actors: campaigns that unite frontline communities, lawyers, journalists and NGOs are more resilient. Given the importance of sticking with actions over the long term, this makes them more likely to be impactful.
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The logic of some approaches, notably targeting the insurance industry, seems strong enough to merit much greater support.
We would like to send special thanks to Not That Peter Evans for producing all of the illustrations for this report.
Cover photo: Andrew Dykes, supplied by Extinction Rebellion — licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Contents
Three main routes to influence the fossil fuel industry
(ii) Reducing the 'Social Licence' to Operate
(iii) Protecting and Enforcing
Litigation
Public shaming
Worker strikes and pickets
Consumer boycotts
Infrastructure disruption
Disruption of day to day activities
Art and culture actions
Targeting insurers
Bank pressure
Targeting financial investors
Institutional divestment
Regulatory action
Policy lobbying
Media exposés
Ad bans
Rights of nature laws
(i) Could insurance be the Achilles heel of the fossil fuel industry?
(ii) Why collaboration matters
Introduction
The world is running out of time to transition away from fossil fuels. Current climate policies put the planet on track for a dangerous 2.5–2.9°C of warming, far beyond safe limits. Yet most of the world’s governments are showing little urgency: global fossil fuel subsidies reached an astonishing $7 trillion in 2022, and political leaders in major economies continue to backslide (for example, Trump’s campaign pledge to “Drill, baby, drill” and increasing evidence that he meant it; UK politicians wavering on climate pledges). This policy inaction persists despite mounting climate risks – from record-breaking wildfires to intensifying floods – and despite scientific consensus that rapidly ending fossil fuel use is essential to avert catastrophic climate change. Fossil fuel companies are urgently protecting their profits despite these growing threats, knowing that the “risks to the industry directly correlate with progress on climate goals” (Krane, 2017). By Citicorp’s estimate, resource abandonment on the scale required to meet the 2°C threshold would mean these companies forgoing $100 trillion in fossil fuel revenues by 2050.” In their 2025 Wealth Outlook, the bank says that, “Unless a technological breakthrough can restrict carbon releases, the fortunes of the fossil fuel industry and the stability of Earth’s climate will be locked in a zero-sum game.”
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Fig. 1 - Taking action against fossil fuels - a strategy map by 'Not that Peter Evans'
The urgency to phase out fossil fuels could not be greater, but the fossil fuel industry’s influence and resistance remain formidable obstacles. Public attitudes, however, are strongly in favor of climate action. “The majority of people in every country support action on climate, but the public consistently underestimates this share” (Our World in Data, 2023). In other words, most assume that, although they themselves favour more decisive action on climate, others do not agree. There is a gap between private belief and public perception. Helping people understand this misconception could be one of the most significant steps to implementing more progressive climate policies.
Social norms are beginning to turn against unconstrained fossil fuel expansion. In recent years, expanding coal, oil, and gas has come to be seen as morally and socially unacceptable in many contexts. For instance, a recent study (Fitzgerald, 2023) finds an emerging “global normative turn against fossil fuels” – a growing belief that this industry’s activities lack a legitimate social license.
Fossil fuel companies have spent decades trying to shape public perceptions and deflect blame from themselves. Notably, the oil giant BP (with creative help from Ogilvy & Mather) popularised the term “carbon footprint” in the early 2000s. It was an extremely effective, if cynical PR move that shifted responsibility for the climate crisis onto individuals’ lifestyle choices. These sorts of tactics have fostered a dominant narrative that “we are all to blame” for climate change, obscuring or minimising the dominant role that fossil fuel corporations play themselves. The fossil fuel industry’s tactics of ‘Deny, doubt, delay’ (itself a facsimile of the tobacco industry’s playbook; Baxendale, 2018) have been highly effective (Supran, 2021), but their narrative is weakening as public awareness of their misinformation tricks grows.
While it is undoubtedly good to have the public onside, relying on public opinion to automatically translate into political action is a naïve and often ineffective strategy. Some even argue that the public is marginal to the policy making process; that’s how there can be majority support for things like higher minimum wage, reduced military spending, and taxing polluters but no concomitant policy shift. Equally, many historical battles, such as the struggle against slavery, labour rights, civil rights, women’s rights did not have majority support at the time. As Young (2024) puts it, “politicians are subordinate to economic elites”; they often follow rather than spearhead change. Political systems tend to respond to shifts in economic power more readily than to shifts in popular opinion. Many landmark social changes were driven not by passive majorities or top-down leadership, but by committed minorities taking direct action. The abolition of slavery, the civil rights movement, and the fight for women’s suffrage all involved a core of determined activists who worked very hard and took great risks to make the status quo untenable. Only then did the political system follow.
In the climate arena, if governments are dragging their feet, the pressure is likely to have to come from elsewhere. In Martin Luther King Jr.’s words, “the political power structure listens to the economic power structure.” For climate campaigners, this implies that direct activism against the fossil fuel industry – targeting it from every conceivable angle and in particular its economic underpinnings – may be necessary to compel political change. The most effective climate activism “must impose direct and sustained costs on the fossil fuel elite sectors” say Young & Thomas-Walters (2024).
The authors outline three key qualities of these campaigns: they should (1) inflict tangible economic or operational costs on the fossil fuel industry, (2) sustain that pressure over time, and (3) deploy a range of tactics that reinforce each other. Disrupting fossil fuel business-as-usual – in multiple ways and over the long haul – can shift the economic calculus for industry and create pressure on policymakers to act.
This report examines how a range of civil society actors are pursuing this mission. We outline three main overarching approaches and dive deeper into two more specific strategies. In doing so, we illustrate the potential for targeted campaigns to play a significant role in shaping the trajectory of the fossil fuel industry.
Three main routes to influence the fossil fuel industry
In our research we identified three main strategic approaches underpinning effective activism to influence fossil fuel companies. These approaches are complementary: campaigns often achieve the greatest impact when they reinforce each other across these domains.
The logic is simple: if new coal mines can’t get insured, if oil drillers can’t get loans, if pipeline builders face constant work stoppages and worker strikes, many fossil fuel projects will become unprofitable or too risky to pursue. By raising the cost of capital and the risk of doing business, activists aim to make fossil fuel expansion financially non-viable.
Direct disruption tactics like worker strikes and consumer boycotts fall in this category, as they leverage the economic power of ordinary people to inflict losses on fossil fuel companies. For instance, workers refusing to drill or transport fossil fuels can halt production, and consumers refusing to buy from complicit companies can dent revenues. These grassroots disruptions have an immediate financial impact on industry operations. The Norwegian oil workers strike in 2020 cut Norway's output by around 330,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Following the Deepwater Horizon disaster, consumer backlash contributed to a 50% decline in BP’s brand value and public trust. The Standing Rock protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline Protests, which continue to bring severe punishments to those involved, showed the impact of mass mobilization: delays, added security costs, and investor wariness ultimately dragged the project timeline and drew global attention. A radical flank of that movement also engaged in the more controversial tactic of sabotage, deliberately damaging DAPL equipment, temporarily halting construction and causing millions of dollars worth of damages. Workers have also resigned from the fossil fuel industry in high profile ways that couple injury to the organisation with public shaming.
(i) Squeezing the Money
The first pathway employed by activists focuses on stemming the fossil fuel industry’s lifeblood: money. “Squeezing the money” means making it harder for fossil fuel companies to obtain the financing, insurance, and investment they need to operate and expand.
Indirect economic tactics target the broader financial system that supports and maintains the fossil fuel industry: persuading banks to stop lending, insurers to stop underwriting, pension funds and universities to divest from coal, oil, and gas. By cutting off investment and insurance, activists attack the lifelines that allow fossil fuel expansion to continue. One recent analysis revealed that since the Paris Agreement, the world’s 60 largest banks have provided $5.5 trillion in financing to fossil fuels. Campaigns like Stop the Money Pipeline have emerged to try to choke off this flow of capital.
Campaigners have pressured major banks to stop lending to coal mines and oil fields, urged institutional investors (like pension funds and university endowments) to divest from fossil fuel stocks, and pushed insurance companies to withdraw coverage from polluting projects. Over the past decade, the fossil fuel divestment movement has persuaded 1,500 institutions managing around $39 trillion in assets to commit to some form of fossil fuel divestment. These actions not only pull capital out of fossil fuels but also stigmatise the sector, sending a signal that coal, oil, and gas are risky investments.
Climate activists bring the message "Insure Our Future" to COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, UK, on 6th Nov 2021. Image available here under CC0 1.0 Universal license
Banks have likewise come under fire: activists have shamed banks like JP Morgan Chase and HSBC for being top financiers of fossil fuels, leading some to announce restrictions on coal financing or Arctic drilling loans. Insurers, as we discuss in detail later, are also feeling the heat, with many major insurers now refusing to insure new coal projects following activist and shareholder pressure.
Squeezing the money approaches recognise that forcing change does not always require majority public approval in the short term. As analysts of past movements note (Young, 2024), campaigns can be effective when they mobilise a passionate minority to disrupt the economic pillars of the status quo. Even if many people remain passive, a well-placed campaign that, say, scares off a pipeline’s investors or causes a company’s stock price to drop can have outsized impact. History gives us parallels: for example, the international boycott and sanctions campaign against apartheid South Africa in the 1980s helped cripple its economy and push the government to the negotiating table. Likewise, anti-fossil fuel activists aim to raise the cost of doing business for the coal, oil, and gas industry, whether by strikes, boycotts, or choking off finance, until maintaining the fossil fuel status quo is more painful for decision-makers than embracing clean alternatives. Squeezing tactics aim to raise the costs and risks of fossil fuel projects - ideally to the point that keeping carbon in the ground becomes the only economically prudent choice.
(ii) Reducing the 'Social License' to Operate
Even when fossil fuel companies have deep pockets, they ultimately rely on a “social licence” to operate. This relates to their public legitimacy and approval, the idea that society deems activities acceptable.
A prime example is the change in the social acceptance of the tobacco industry, as their efforts to downplay and deny the health consequences of smoking has been revealed.
This second approach employed by activists seeks to delegitimise and stigmatise fossil fuel companies, eroding their social licence and thereby paving the way for stricter limits on them. If coal, oil, and gas companies are widely seen as social pariahs for their destructive practices, it becomes easier for politicians, investors, and cultural institutions to cut ties with them.
As with ‘squeezing’, activists have employed a range of tactics to shift public norms and narratives about fossil fuels. This includes public shaming of industry executives and lobbyists, media campaigns to expose decades of climate disinformation, creative protests in museums and cultural venues, and pushing to ban fossil fuel advertising. All serve to change the story around fossil fuels – from seeing these companies as respectable to casting them as rogue actors threatening the health of the planet. Recent years have indeed seen the beginnings of a global normative turn against fossil fuels, one which “fundamentally questions the legitimacy of an industry because of its major impact on climate change” (Fitzgerald, 2023). Major publications now routinely expose companies’ disinformation campaigns, and phrases like “Big Oil knew” (akin to Big Tobacco) have entered public discourse.
Reducing social licence often involves generating public outrage and moral pressure. Tactics like high-profile divestment campaigns combine economic and moral messaging – for example, university students argue their school should divest because it’s wrong to profit from climate destruction. Youth strikes for climate / Fridays for Future were effective in gaining attention and sympathy partly through harnessing the moral power of young people. Satirical films such as Don’t Look Up, theatre exposes such as Kyoto and many other art and cultural events have also chipped away at the notion that fossil fuel business-as-usual is acceptable or inevitable. Over time, as public norms shift, fossil fuel projects face greater community resistance, and institutions from art galleries to churches distance themselves from the industry. In Ireland, for instance, public opinion swung so strongly that new fossil fuel exploration was seen as illegitimate, contributing to a ban – a reflection of how anti-fossil fuel norms can develop rapidly.
When effectively implemented, these approaches not only pressure investors and politicians, but also embolden regulatory action: governments find it easier to impose tough restrictions on an industry that the public has turned against. Undermining the fossil fuel sector’s social licence to operate works alongside financial strategies, adding cultural and ethical dimensions that further constrain the industry's legitimacy.
(iii) Protecting and Enforcing
The third strategic approach employed by activists centers on leveraging the law and political power – both to enforce existing constraints on fossil fuel activities and to create new ones.
This includes pushing for better enforcement of environmental laws, suing companies for climate damages or fraud, advocating for policies like ending subsidies and enacting carbon taxes, and establishing new legal rights for climate and nature. It involves defending existing protections against fossil fuels while also playing offense in the political arena to curb the fossil fuel industry’s expansion.
One major tactic being employed here is climate litigation. Around the world, lawsuits have proliferated to hold oil, gas, and coal companies accountable – for example, cities and states suing companies like ExxonMobil for climate-related damages or deception. Climate change litigation has “grown exponentially in the last decade,” according to legal scholars (Peel & Osofsky, 2020). In 2021, a court in the Netherlands ruled that Shell must cut emissions by 45% by 2030. Though Shell won its appeal against the decision, it remains a landmark ruling that sent shockwaves through the industry. Litigation can directly force changes (through injunctions or damages) and set powerful precedents; for example ClientEarth’s shareholder suit against the energy company Enea led to their suspending funding to the Polish coal plant Ostroleka C. Even when lawsuits don’t win, they raise public awareness and keep pressure on companies and regulators.
Another approach being employed is to target government decision-makers, from regulators to legislators, to strengthen the rules protecting against many of the ill effects of fossil fuels. Activists lobby and protest to stop the approval of new pipelines or coal mines, to tighten safety and pollution standards, and to prevent industry-friendly rollbacks. They also push for proactive policies that phase out fossil subsidies, instituting moratoria on drilling, or enacting high carbon prices. When effective, these political actions box in the industry’s ability to operate freely. For example, activists in multiple countries have won bans or moratoria on fracking by mobilising public opposition and forcing politicians’ hands. Every such policy win protects communities and climate by putting parts of the fossil fuel reserve base off-limits.
Crucially, this approach also involves ‘defending the defenders’. As the fossil fuel industry’s social licence erodes and pressure mounts, the industry often fights back by leveraging its political clout to punish activists. In the U.S., for instance, dozens of state-level laws have been lobbied for and in some cases introduced, to criminalise pipeline protests and label protesters as “terrorists”. Fossil fuel companies have also filed retaliatory lawsuits (SLAPP suits) against campaign organizations. Activists work to uphold democratic protections – fighting anti-protest laws, defending free speech, and ensuring the right to dissent. This approach encompasses innovative legal ideas like the “Rights of Nature” – granting legal personhood to rivers, forests, or ecosystems so they can be defended in court. Around the world, this proactive legal approach has gained traction: the Whanganui River in New Zealand (Kramm, 2020) and the River Ethiope in Nigeria have been granted legal rights, allowing communities to sue on their behalf. For the fossil fuel fight, such measures create new legal avenues to stop harm (e.g. suing to block a mine because it violates a river’s rights). The Rights of Nature movement essentially seeks to expand the legal obligations of governments and companies toward the environment, part of the broader strategy to embed climate protection into law.
These approaches use formal power – lawsuits, legislation, regulation, and rights – to constrain the fossil fuel industry. They “play politics” by pushing climate up the political agenda and building power for their movement, and “protect” by ensuring legal systems are fully harnessed to defend communities and the climate. The approach recognises that to lock in wins for the long term, activists must translate movement energy into lasting legal and policy change.
Tactic Sheets
With these three strategic pillars in mind, we now turn to the full tactical toolbox open to climate activists. Click below to see detailed ‘tactic sheets’ which describes how each tactic works with its theory of change, examples of when it has been effective in the past, details of groups currently using it, and a summary of its pros and cons and the conditions when it is most likely to be effective. The purpose of these tactic sheets is to give more information to activists and their supporters about the different options available, find out more about who else is taking a similar approach, and form alliances.
Deep Dives
In this section, we consider in more depth two approaches that could prove particularly effective. These are 1. Pressuring insurance companies - an economic pressure point for fossil fuels that works both to squeeze the money and to reduce social licence, and 2. The power of collaboration, where we show how diverse activists working together can amplify many approaches highlighted above.
(i) Could insurance be the Achilles heel of the fossil fuel industry?
Insurance companies are a key leverage point in the fight against fossil fuel expansion
Insurers are critical gatekeepers for the fossil free industry. Major infrastructure like coal mines, oil pipelines, and gas terminals all require insurance for permits and financing; if insurers refuse coverage, these projects often cannot proceed. This gives insurers exceptional power to stop new carbon-intensive developments at the source.
Insurers also pride themselves on assessing and managing risk, positioning themselves as society’s “risk managers.” This role creates a contradiction: on one hand, insurers are highly exposed, paying ever-growing claims for climate-driven disasters (floods, wildfires, storms); on the other, they continue underwriting and investing in the very fossil fuel activities driving those disasters. For example, U.S. insurers held over $536 billion in fossil fuel assets in 2019 – investments that contribute to climate change risks which boomerang back as insured losses.
They are themselves acutely aware of this contradiction - and of the risks. A board member (Günther Thallinger) of Allianz - one of the world’s biggest insurers, recently made the position extremely clear. He warned that global heating is fast approaching levels where the whole insurance industry becomes untenable because so much of the world will be uninsurable. No insurance, he says, “means no more mortgages, no new real estate development, no long-term investment, no financial stability.” In essence, without insurance, capitalism itself cannot function. He is not an outlier. In their annual report, Zurich says it is “essential” for the world to reach net zero by 2050.
Activists highlight this hypocrisy: many insurers have already begun dropping coverage in high-risk areas (like wildfire-prone California or flood-hit Florida) due to climate extremes, yet they continue to insure new oil rigs and coal mines that worsen those extremes. Unlike banks, insurers can’t pretend to escape the real world; if they misjudge rising climate risks, they go bankrupt paying claims. They know this reality all too well, as climate change has already caused over a third of insured disaster losses this century (about $600 billion).
Insurers are uniquely aware that continuing to underwrite limitless fossil fuel expansion is ultimately unsustainable – both for the planet and for their own balance sheets. Activists know that targeting them goes for a key choke point: cut off insurance, and you cut off the lifeline for fossil fuel expansion
Insurance companies have weak spots. Campaigners are applying pressure on a number of them
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Reputational risk: Insurance companies highly value public trust and their image as responsible risk managers. Climate activists have made insurers’ fossil fuel involvement more visible, threatening their reputation. Extinction Rebellion warned it will not let insurers “fly under the radar”: if they keep enabling coal and oil projects, “there will be reputational damage.” This public shaming can sway insurance company leaders and customers who don’t want to be associated with climate destruction.
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Regulatory and legal pressure: Regulators and lawmakers are increasingly scrutinizing insurers’ climate risks. In California, a watchdog petition is urging authorities to mandate disclosure of fossil fuel underwriting and even impose fees on insurers who continue to back high-carbon projects. The European Union is discussing higher capital requirements for insurers holding risky, stranded fossil assets. These measures make insuring fossil fuels less attractive and more costly. Insurers also fear litigation if they’re seen as complicit in climate harms or if they misrepresent climate risks to investors
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Financial exposure to climate disasters: Climate change is hitting insurers’ core business. Roughly a third of all insured losses from 2002–2022 (an estimated $600 billion) are attributable to climate change, and that share is rising. In 2022 alone, US insurers paid out over $100 billion for climate-related catastrophes. These mounting losses threaten profitability. A recent analysis found that for 28 top insurers, their climate-related losses (~$10.6 billion) almost equaled the premiums they earned from insuring fossil fuel clients (~$11.3 billion) in 2023. In over half of those companies (including industry giants Allianz, AXA and Zurich), climate disaster losses actually exceeded the fossil fuel premiums. Insuring fossil projects is already a losing proposition for many insurers – a glaring weak spot.
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Small revenue share from fossil fuel underwriting: Insuring fossil energy is a tiny part of most large insurers’ business (often under 2% of total premiums). Most of their portfolios are in car, home and health insurance. Dropping fossil fuels would barely dent their own revenue but could have a major impact on the fossil fuel sector. This low dependence makes it easier for insurers to walk away and many European insurers have already acknowledged this: virtually all have stopped underwriting new coal, and some (like Zurich and AXA) are exiting new oil and gas projects as well. When faced with public pressure, sacrificing 1–2% of revenue is a cheap price for avoiding toxic publicity and long-term climate risks.
How pressure on insurance companies can lead to carbon reduction
Activists’ ultimate goal when pressuring insurers is to force a meaningful reduction in carbon emissions by stopping fossil fuel projects from seeing the light of day. If insurers withdraw coverage, fossil fuel projects cannot secure financing or permits, and will be delayed or cancelled outright. When insurers un-insure a new coal mine or oil pipeline, this raises the odds that the project becomes a stranded asset (never built or never operated at full capacity). The carbon stays in the ground.
This chain reaction is not just theory. It has been evidenced in practice. For example, in the case of the huge Adani Carmichael coal mine in Australia. Due to its huge carbon impact and fierce pressure from the #StopAdani movement, more than 70 financial institutions – including 40 insurers – withdrew from or refused involvement in the project. This mass pull-out (no insurer wanted to be the last one insuring a notorious coal mine) delayed the project for years and forced Adani to scale down its ambitions. Even an insurer that initially provided cover, Probitas, announced it had ceased its Adani involvement after sustained activist inquiries. This highlights how effective sustained pressure can be.
Similarly, 15+ insurers bailed on the Trans Mountain tar sands pipeline in Canada, to the point that the operator had to request permission to keep its remaining insurers secret (to prevent further drop-outs). While Trans Mountain is still proceeding, campaigners significantly raised its costs and highlighted the project’s frailty – a warning to investors of a potential stranded asset.
The coal sector as a whole has seen dramatic shifts due to insurer action. By 2022, so many insurers had exited the coal business that new coal mines and plants in many regions struggled to find any insurance at all. Dozens of insurers (representing over 60% of the reinsurance market) now refuse to cover new coal projects, effectively making coal expansion “uninsurable” in much of the world. Reuters have reported that some coal companies, cut off by insurers, have had to set aside millions for self-insurance – a last resort that makes operations more costly and risky.
Insurers have been pressured to change in other harmful industries as well. A notable parallel is the tobacco industry. In 2016, French insurance giant AXA announced it would divest about €1.8 billion from tobacco companies, citing the “tragic” health impacts of smoking and its duty as a health insurer to support public well-being. AXA not only sold off tobacco stocks but also pledged to stop new investments in the sector, and it called on its peers to follow suit. This was a landmark moment: an insurer voluntarily withdrawing support from a profitable industry on ethical and risk grounds. Likewise, some insurers have limited or excluded coverage for asbestos and risky chemicals after public outcry and liability concerns. These precedents show that insurance companies can be moved by public pressure and moral arguments, especially when the business case (long-term risk vs. short-term gain) supports a shift.
Who is working on this approach?
This strategy of targeting insurance is being spearheaded by a number of organizations and movements worldwide. Foremost is the Insure Our Future campaign – a global coalition of over two dozen groups dedicated to pushing insurers out of coal, oil and gas. Insure Our Future (originally launched as the Unfriend Coal campaign) includes environmental NGOs and frontline community organizations across many countries, including Reclaim Finance (a Paris-based finance watchdog), Public Citizen (U.S. consumer advocacy), Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and grassroots groups on the climate frontlines. Each year, Insure Our Future releases a detailed Scorecard evaluating the world’s top 30 insurers on their fossil fuel policies. It “names and shames” laggards and praises leaders, leveraging insurers’ concern for their reputation. The coalition also engages insurers directly with letters, petitions, and shareholder pressure, and it organizes public mobilizations like the Global Week of Action in late February 2024, which saw protests in 31 countries calling out insurers’ ties to fossil fuels.
© Eduardo Pérez Vidal for Ekō – licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0).
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
Reclaim Finance is a key player providing analysis and advocacy within Insure Our Future. They have published reports exposing insurers’ continued support for fossil projects and inconsistencies in climate commitments. For example, Reclaim Finance helped reveal that while many European insurers claim net-zero goals, some were still insuring controversial projects – spurring campaigns to hold them accountable. Reclaim Finance’s work, alongside partners like Urgewald in Germany and Solutions For Our Climate in South Korea, has built the case that insuring expansion of coal and oil is incompatible with climate safety.
In the US, where insurers lag behind Europe in climate action, groups like Insure Our Future U.S., Rainforest Action Network, and Consumer Watchdog are active. They highlight how firms like AIG and Liberty Mutual continue insuring fossil fuels while raising homeowner premiums due to wildfire and hurricane losses. Public campaigns, including shareholder resolutions and state-level hearings, have pressured US insurers to make their first-ever restrictions – for instance, Chubb’s 2023 decision to limit oil and gas drilling in certain sensitive areas came after engagement by RAN and others.
A broad alliance is now working to turn the insurance industry away from backing fossil fuels The movement has already pushed many leading insurers to exit coal and reconsider oil and gas. Their methods blend insider engagement (talks with insurance executives, investor pressure) and outsider activism (media exposés, rallies and legal petitions). To date,notable outcomes include commitments from leading European insurers (Allianz, AXA, Generali, Zurich, and others) to stop underwriting most new coal projects and to begin phasing out oil/gas expansion from their coverage. Each announcement by a major insurer adds momentum and puts pressure on competitors to follow suit. The campaigners’ endgame is to make insuring any new fossil fuel project as unacceptable in the industry as insuring asbestos or cluster munitions – and they are rapidly moving in that direction. With a growing climate-conscious public behind them, challenging insurance companies represents a potentially high-leverage mechanism for constraining fossil fuel expansion.
(ii) Why collaboration matters
Groups engaged against fossil fuel companies span the tactical spectrum, from radical direct-action groups to insider advocates. Despite extensive evidence of the benefits of collaboration - amplifying resources, legitimacy and public support (Van Dyke, 2022) - these groups often struggle to work together. How can those standing seeking to challenge the fossil fuel industry collaborate more effectively?
A case study of collaboration: The anti-fracking campaign in England
The anti-fracking campaign in England (2011-2019) offers valuable lessons for other movements opposing fossil fuel expansion. What began as isolated village protests against hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) evolved into a coordinated national movement that pressured the government to impose a fracking moratorium in 2019.
A wide range of actors united to challenge the nascent shale gas industry in England: local residents, lifelong activists, the self-styled “anti-fracking nanas”, celebrities, and NGOs. Their tactics were just as diverse and included conventional protest, song and dance, petitions, opposition to planning submissions, insider advocacy, strategic litigation, and civil disobedience and law breaking.
Despite this wide range of approaches, the campaign was widely praised for its collaborative character. Activists described a “perfect mixture of ingredients” , where different groups worked together towards a shared goal. Common challenges in activist coordination–ideological rifts, competition for resources, “Not In My Backyard” localism–were largely overcome by a strong sense of unity. As one participant put it, the movement avoided parochial mindsets by embracing a collective ethos: “We’re all in this together”. The result was a campaign that not only stopped fracking but also became a “watershed moment” for environmentalists and communities, demonstrating the power of coalition-driven activism (Rowell, 2019).
Photo: Ryan Anderton (13 Oct 2018) — licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/
We distil four key strategies employed during the campaign:
1. Activists united around a clear adversary and a common goal
Nothing unites like a common enemy (Corrigall‐Brown and Meyer, 2010). In the anti-fracking campaign, the presence of a formidable external threat – government-backed shale gas development – was a powerful motivator for disparate groups to pull together. When the UK Government overturned Lancashire County Council’s decision to reject local fracking applications, groups across the spectrum–local residents, NGOs, national networks–united in protest. One campaigner recalled: “I think it always helps to have a common enemy… when you know that the government’s not gonna cut you any favours…you may as well come out strong”. The movement’s narrative became one of ordinary people vs. powerful interests, which fostered solidarity across divides.
The campaign also united around a concrete objective, a national fracking ban, which groups with varied ideologies could all endorse. Defining the stakes in simple, urgent terms can bring unlikely allies together. Once that immediate goal is won (pipeline cancelled, etc.), it is important to be mindful of maintaining this shared purpose. The anti-fracking coalition struggled to remain cohesive, post-victory.
2. Campaigners invested in relationship-building across difference
Social movements today often bring together diverse constituencies–indigenous land defenders, rural landowners, urban climate strikers, scientists, etc. Building trust and solidarity among distinct groups can be crucial. During the anti-fracking campaign, the NGO Friends of the Earth spent time in communities listening to their concerns, holding regular meetings, supporting residents to build campaign strategies, and becoming part of the fabric of local life.
Activists must also often bridge generational, racial, or class divides. The anti-fracking coalition was largely white and rural; newer movements have the opportunity to centre equity and include a wider range of voices.
Activists should also be prepared to support allies even when the concerns are not directly connected to their own primary issue (for example, climate activists supporting workers likely to be displaced by the net-zero transition). This can strengthen the coalition fabric for when a big fight with fossil fuel interests inevitably comes.
3. Resource sharing and “leading from behind”
In the anti-fracking campaign, well-funded green organisations provided resources–funding, legal aid, research, media capacity– to grassroots and frontline groups, and trusted them to manage them, rather than micromanaging. Trust-based funding with minimal strings attached can empower local activists and build goodwill. In practical terms, this can mean simplifying grant reporting requirements, offering core support for organising efforts, and being willing to cover unglamorous needs (travel costs, meeting spaces, bail funds) that are vital on the ground.
Some larger NGOs use their clout to amplify local voices, rather than speak over them. During the anti-fracking protests in Lancashire, NGOs were credited with providing resources—legal support, funding, media training—without trying to control the direction of the movement. A local activist said NGOs had “done wonders…but they haven’t stepped in to claim credit.” The anti-fracking case showed that when locals feel ownership and credit for victories, the coalition stays strong.
4. Activists prepared for the long haul and guarded against burnout
The anti-fracking fight lasted many years. Other contemporary fossil fuel battles (like stopping major pipelines) are similarly protracted. NGOs can play a crucial role in sustaining movements over the long term, providing financial resources, staff support, and institutional stability that allow grassroots groups to stay engaged even through periods of fatigue.
Sustaining a coalition over long periods also requires attention to morale and burnout. A division of labour helps prevent any one group or person from burning out – tasks can rotate, and different groups can step in when others need a rest. Activists are increasingly adopting self-care and collective care practices including debrief circles, counselling for trauma after harsh policing, and rotating spokesperson duties. Celebrating interim wins is also important to maintain momentum.
The campaign’s ability to re-mobilise quickly in 2022, when fracking was briefly reintroduced, was in part thanks to the infrastructure built over time—including long-standing personal relationships.
The English anti-fracking campaign highlights the potential of sustained, broad-based collaboration in resisting fossil fuel development. Its effectiveness stemmed not from a singular tactic or constituency, but from the ability of diverse actors to coordinate across differences, share resources, and maintain long-term engagement. This raises the question of how more effective coordination might be achieved among actors seeking to challenge fossil fuel interests.
Conclusion
Fossil fuel companies today face challenges from determined activists, frontline communities, and their own investors. This report has surveyed a broad array of tactics – from financial pressure and political lobbying to cultural interventions and physical disruptions – that collectively form a wall of pressure around the fossil fuel industry. The overarching strategies of ‘Squeezing the money’, ‘Reducing social licence’, and ‘Protecting and enforcing’ describe how these tactics converge.
Clearly, no single tactic is a silver bullet, but each has a role in the ecosystem. Divestment and insurance campaigns weaken the industry’s financial underpinnings. Public shaming, media exposés, and advertising bans erode its social legitimacy and ability to mislead. Strikes, boycotts, and infrastructure blockades directly disrupt its operations and growth. Litigation and policy advocacy erect new legal guardrails and hold the industry accountable for its far-reaching harms. And deep collaboration across movements ties all these efforts together, enhancing their effectiveness.
Many of these approaches are proving effective:
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Financial institutions controlling tens of trillions of dollars are pulling out of fossil fuels.
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Coal mines are being shelved for lack of insurance.
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Community resistance is stopping pipelines and fracking, and emboldening governments to enact bans.
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Climate lawsuits are breaking new ground in courts, with polluters on the defensive.
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Major cultural icons have cut ties with oil sponsors, declaring fossil fortunes unwelcome.
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Meanwhile, renewable energy is gaining investments and has the ability to grow and scale at an incredible rate if allowed to do so.
Each of these developments chips away at the power and inevitability of the fossil fuel industry. Fossil fuel companies are increasingly seen as bad bets – financially, socially and morally.
For funders, the insights here highlight some high-leverage opportunities; funding litigation efforts, grassroots coalition-building, or insurance and media campaigns can yield outsized impacts on curbing fossil fuels. Supporting coordination between tactics – for instance, linking legal teams with frontline blockaders or amplifying youth-led cultural protests with communications resources – can multiply outcomes. Funders can also help ensure activism is sustained for the long term - essential given the tenacity, resilience and backbone required.
For activists, this report underscores the importance of a diverse yet unified strategy. Protagonists of different approaches do not have to agree on everything, they just have to be aligned on their goals. Some movements are best when they are creative and bold; others thrive on a more analytic and strategic approach - both can target the pillars that uphold fossil fuels: money, legitimacy, political cover. Activists can also learn from each other – across regions and approaches – and combine strengths. The deep dives into collaboration and insurance exemplify how breakthroughs can occur when activists work together in novel ways and target weak links the industry might prefer are overlooked.
The battle against fossil fuels is David vs. Goliath, but Goliath has many vulnerabilities. A growing global community – indigenous land defenders, scientists, youth climate strikers, artists, lawyers, investors, and even some industry insiders – is finding the pressure points and pushing on them. Fossil fuel companies, once seemingly invincible, are increasingly on the defensive, squeezed financially, socially and politically. Even if they have vocal and powerful political support, this is not backed by majority public support. Activists are collectively seeking to force them to confront a future where their business model has no place.
The task of activists - in many ways, the task for humanity - is to accelerate the arrival of that future – to make the fossil fuel era history, and usher in a just, clean energy era. The approaches in this report – proven, emergent, and synergistic – offer a pathway to do that. By attacking fossil fuel companies on multiple fronts, activists and allies are showing that a world beyond fossil fuels is not only necessary, but achievable.
The message from activists to the fossil fuel industry is clear: we will not quit until you do.
About Social Change Lab
Social Change Lab conducts empirical research on disruptive protest and people-powered movements. Through research reports, workshops, and trainings, we provide actionable insights to help movements and funders be more effective. You can find all of our research projects and resources on our website. You can contact us at info@socialchange.lab.org
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