Issue 153
Sep-Oct 2026
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Simon Barrow is a freelance consultant and researcher for Scottish CND. He is former director of Ekklesia, a think tank on beliefs, ethics and public policy. He has co-edited and co-written five books on Scottish and UK politics. Miriam Brett is a Co-Director of Future Economy Scotland. Colin Brown is the Scottish Executive Council Member […]
2026 has seen droughts cover England, and fires sweep across the Cairngorms. Again, the climate movement has been shouting that it is time to realise the dangers of climate change, and seize opportunities we have to make a difference. Every year wasted is a historic failure. Whose failure is this? What does it mean for […]
How the Scottish Government closes the looming fiscal gap is apolitical choice. Miriam Brett argues that climate breakdowndramatically increases spending needs and actively steeringthe economy towards a just transition is not only necessary, butScotland’s greatest opportunity. Scotland sits at the precipice of a challenging fiscal landscape, necessitating an urgent array of difficult decisions for the […]
Fossil Fuel lobbyists and the far-right have channelled North Sea discontent into a toxic nostalgia for the good old days. Ewan Gibbs shows how this cannot hide the inevitable decline of oil and gas Oil and gas have re-emerged as dominant themes of Scottish political debate on a scale perhaps not seen since the heady […]
After ten years of working on the Just Transition Partnership,Matthew Crighton reflects that we cannot solve our majorenvironmental problems without changing the economic systemwhich is driving them. When the STUC General Council in 2016 agreed to the proposal from Friends of the Earth Scotland (FOES) to establish a partnership around “the industrial changes needed to […]
Liz Murray looks at the crossroads between private equity and community power that Scotland faces when building and repowering its windfarms – and why democratic ownership of our energy infrastructure must power any Just Transition worthy of its name. Since it opened in 2008, Whitelee windfarm – the UK’s largest on shore wind farm, just […]
In this interview by Cailean Gallagher and Stephen Smellie, Chris Hamilton sets out how the disappointments and failures after the Grangemouth Oil Refinery Closure has impacted workers, community, and any prospects of working together with the climate movement. The Just Transition Partnership was established in 2016 bringing together Friends of the Earth Scotland with the […]
How does it feel to be invited to discuss the Just Transition in Whitehall? After a decade working offshore, Mike Sarnecki reflectson his experience challenging London’s civil servants, and what it would look like for workers to really be involved in the transition. Earlier this year, my colleagues from Platform and I travelled to London […]
What are the experiences of those working to build unity between environmentalists and the labour movement? Matthew Crighton surveys a diverse range of activists, and shows how the alliance is more urgent than ever. In 2015, Eurig Scandrett and I asked ‘Can green and red unite?’ in SLR issue 89 which we co-edited on the […]
As European governments invest billions in arms and weapons for growth, skilled labour and industry, Simon Barrow shows how this new “military Keynesianism” won’t develop good jobs but it will drive climate breakdown. As geopolitical tensions flare globally, western governments are pivoting sharply toward rearmament. Defence budgets are swelling, state mandates are shifting towards military […]
While both UK and Scottish governments concentrate renewable energy profits in private hands, Gordon Morgan asks what it will take to break the Thatcherite legacy and put power into the Scottish people’s hands. Labour was elected with a policy to remove fossil fuels from electricity in Great Britain by 2030. They are largely on course […]
Sara Cowan argues that the effects of climate breakdown will disproportionately affect women. Climate Change cannot be seen asgender neutral, but the Scottish government has failed to address this. A Just Transition must reimagine who our economy works for. That includes a move away from the neo-liberal market-driven dominance that we’ve witnessed in the last […]
Colin Brown from the Fire Brigades Union reports on what it feels like to fight a burning Arthur’s Seat and calls for investment into Fire and Rescue Services to prepare for increasing wildfires and the effects of climate change. On 25 August firefighters gathered at the Glasgow necropolis to remember the 7 firefighters who lost […]
After many direct action groups failed to sustain their climate activism, Emma Brown reflects on how the attempts by This is Rigged to bridge climate justice with food justice is becoming more urgent every day This is Rigged were a youth led movement that worked to unite the struggles of the climate and cost of […]
Big Tech plans over 20 hyperscale data centres in Scotland. Amidst widespread resistance, Kim Pratt points to the international dimensions of how disastrous the necessary mineral mining is for the environment and for communities affected. Plans for data centres are mounting in Scotland. Our mild climate and plentiful renewables mean that Scotland has caught the […]
Ecuador’s Indigenous people faces a new alliance between the far right and extractivist mining industries. Patricio Mesa reports back on the fight on the frontline of the climate crisis. Ecuador is entering a new phase of even more intense entrenchment of extractive industries. The current reopening of the National Mining Register, the new oil licensing […]
Jim Walker reviews Or Something Worse by Nic Beuret (Verso, 2025) and examines whether it holds ideas our movements need to disruptthe unjust transition. I was recently introduced to the concept of Verso Slop by a friend of mine. In Sunny Lu’s Bad nonfiction, part 1: Verso Slop, she lays out a scathing taxonomy of […]
This is an edited extract from a longer contribution to the discussions of Peoples Against Extractivism, an international coalition of social movements resisting predatory, extractive projects on their territories. The reconfiguration of US imperialism has once again turned the spotlight on Latin America. The 2025 National Security Strategy sets out a shift towards what might […]
Sandra George’s photographs are a poignant reminder of a previous period of social activism in the working class communities of Edinburgh. As Councillor Margaret Graham says, they “offer an invaluable record of Edinburgh and its communities, seen through the eyes of someone deeply committed to social justice, equality, and human connection”. It’s important to add […]