Avaaz, if you are not yet familiar with this organization, is one of the biggest activist organizations in the world, popping up almost out of nowhere it seems, and it is growing fast. I actually have not seen the organization mentioned much in my normal green blogging and green activist circles yet, but it has already established itself as a true world leader in activism and apparently the news is getting around.
The Avaaz community is currently growing at about 100,000 people a week! Say what?
And these people are taking about 25,000,000 actions online.
In a recent email to me (and millions of other Avaaz members, I imagine), the organization wrote:
Often we’re choosing impossible battles, with very little time to win. But the rush of sudden, overwhelming engagement of massive numbers of citizens is, issue after issue, making the difference between success and failure. From the Economist to Le Monde to Al Jazeera, the media is remarking upon our “spectacular successes” that are capable of ushering in “a political revolution”. Here are some examples from just the last several weeks:
- Canada (420,000 Avaaz members), we just took on an alliance of a media empire and a prime minister to subvert the independence of the country’s media in their favour, and won.
- Brazil (730,000 members) we took a civil society movement online and drove an anti-corruption law through congress that is putting large numbers of corrupt politicians out of a job – widely hailed as a political revolution.
- Italy (240,000) we rallied opposition to the Prime Minister’s bill to tie the hands of Italy’s corruption investigators – commentators hailed the victory as the first time in Italian history online mobilization had shifted the parliamentary agenda.
- Argentina (60,000) we surged to protect crucial glaciers from what looked like certain destruction by mining companies, and won.
- South Africa (70,000) we built a massive public outcry against sweeping new censorship powers over the press, forcing the government to alter its media regulation law.
- Germany (480,000) thousands of last-minute phone calls from our members helped stop the government from drastically cutting its aid budget.
These are just Avaaz’ victories from the last few weeks.
You can learn more about Avaaz, see press clips, and leave a comment on its global live-chat tool by visiting Avaaz’ Global Victory Report.
Photo Credit: The World Wants a Real Deal via flickr under a CC license; The World Wants a Real Deal via flickr under a CC license
