People who care about the climate crisis face a huge menu of possible actions, but too much choice creates confusion and inertia. People who are anxious about the future–and there are many of us–don’t know how to translate our worry into action. And many people are turned off by angry protests.
One World One Vote (OWOV) is a new campaign with a very simple call-to-action and a positive tone. With COP26 fast approaching, it seeks to give politicians the push they need to make bold decisions. The campaign simply asks supporters to take the following pledge:
”The climate crisis will be my number one priority in the next election. Everything else comes second.”
“Even the most well-meaning political leaders will not take bold action if the people are not demanding it. Bottom line is that politicians want to get elected. If we want them to take bold action, we need to help them by showing that we’ll vote on it. OWOV is intended to tip the balance—to give leaders the nudge they need and hold them accountable at election time,” explains Martin Boroson, the creator of OWOV.
Supporters will unite in displaying the OWOV logo at least until November 12, 2021, the end of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26). They can then display this logo in the runup to any election where they live, until the climate catastrophe has been averted.
Political but not partisan, the campaign is not coming from any climate change group, nor does it propose any specific solution. Rather, it simply says that finding solutions must be the number one priority.
OWOV recognizes that while independent (“bottom up”) behavior has value, averting a catastrophe requires more than each person carrying their own bottles to the bottle bank. It requires “top down” political decisions that will incentivize and regulate new behavior on a large scale. But we need to show leaders that we want those “top down” solutions.
“We cannot let the complexity of the problem make us look away or abdicate responsibility. We cannot let denial become nihilism. We can choose to put our energy behind the process of finding solutions, even though the solutions are not clear,” says Martin.
Martin Boroson, a leadership consultant and former psychotherapist, says he started this campaign because he believes that “Although the climate crisis is a threat unlike any other that humanity has faced, it is also an opportunity, a transformational moment. Smart politicians will seize this moment on behalf of their constituents, and lead us in developing new capabilities, new business opportunities, new technology, and better ways of thinking, relating, and caring. But it requires that we face our worst fear and focus on just one thing–the most important thing.”
Supporters can take the pledge and download the OWOV logo from the One World One Vote website.
#EverythingElseComesSecond
