why

campaign?

“The activity of seeking to bring public pressure to bear on institutions and individuals so that they act differently than they would otherwise have done without the influence of the campaign”

“Perhaps the best analogy for campaigning now is not war, but surgery. The campaign strike should be as surgical as possible. Localised, precise, the most successful surgery on the body politic is minimally invasive”

Campaigning = Democracy in action

Power and strength in numbers

trust

campaigners who have changed the

world

Mohandas Karamchand (1869–1948) was a major political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian independence movement. He was the pioneer of resistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience, firmly founded upon total non-violence which led India to independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. He is officially honoured in India as the Father of the Nation; his birthday, 2 October, is commemorated there as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday, and worldwide as the International Day of Non-Violence.Gandhi first employed non-violent civil disobedience as an expatriate lawyer in South Africa. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, for expanding women's rights, for building religious and ethnic amity, for ending untouchability, for increasing economic self-reliance, but above all for achieving Swaraj—the independence of India from foreign domination. Gandhi famously led Indians in the Non-cooperation movement in 1922 and in protesting the British-imposed salt tax in 1930, and later in calling for the British to Quit India in 1942. He was imprisoned for many years, on numerous occasions, in both South Africa and India.

Albert Arnold "Al" Gore, Jr. (born 1948) is an environmental activist who served as the the 45th Vice President of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton. He is an author, businessperson, Nobel laureate, and former journalist. Gore also starred in the 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth, which won an Academy Award in 2007.Gore was involved in American politics for 24 years, serving first in the U.S. House of Representatives (1977–85) and later in the U. S. Senate (1985–93). Gore was the Democratic nominee for president in the 2000 presidential election. He won the popular vote by approximately 500,000 votes, but ultimately lost the electoral college to George W. Bush.

He is currently the founder and chair of Alliance for Climate Protection, and was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, which was shared by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The award was given "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change" on October 12, 2007.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910–1997), was an Albanian Roman Catholic nun with Indian citizenship who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata (Calcutta) in 1950. For over 45 years she ministered to the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying, while guiding the Missionaries of Charity's expansion, first throughout India and then in other countries.By the 1970s she had become internationally famed as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and India's highest civilian honor, the Bharat Ratna, in 1980 for her humanitarian work. Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity continued to expand, and at the time of her death it was operating 610 missions in 123 countries, including hospices and homes for people with HIV/AIDS, leprosy and tuberculosis, soup kitchens, children's and family counseling programs, orphanages, and schools.Following her death she was beatified by Pope John Paul II and given the title Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

Dr. Wangari Muta Maathai (born 1940) is an environmental and political activist. In 1977, Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, a grassroots environmental non-governmental organization, which has now planted over 40 million trees across Kenya to prevent soil erosion. She has come to be affectionately called "Tree Woman" or "The Tree Mother of Africa." Since then, she has been increasingly active on both environmental and women's issues. During the regime of President Daniel arap Moi, she was imprisoned several times and violently attacked for demanding multi-party elections and an end to political corruption and tribal politics. In 1989 Maathai almost single-handedly saved Nairobi's Uhuru Park by stopping the construction of the 60-story Kenya Times Media Trust business complex.

In 2004 she became the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for “her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace.”

Maathai was an elected member of Parliament in her home country of Kenya, and served as Assistant Minister for Environment and Natural Resources in the government of President Mwai Kibaki between January 2003 and November 2005.

Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928) was a political activist and leader of the British suffragette movement. Although she was widely criticised for her militant tactics, her work is recognised as a crucial element in achieving women's suffrage in Britain. She became involved with the Women's Franchise League, which advocated suffrage for women. She also worked as a Poor Law Guardian, where she was startled by harsh conditions in Manchester workhouses.

After her husband died in 1898, Pankhurst founded the Women's Social and Political Union, an all-women suffrage advocacy organisation dedicated to "deeds, not words". The group quickly became infamous when its members smashed windows and assaulted police officers. Pankhurst, her daughters, and other WSPU activists were sentenced to repeated prison sentences, where they staged hunger strikes to secure better conditions. In 1918 the Representation of the People Act granted votes to women over the age of 30.

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (born 1918) was the first President of South Africa to be elected in a fully representative democratic election, serving in the office from 1994–1999. Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of the African National Congress's armed wing Umkhonto we Sizwe. The South African courts convicted him on charges of sabotage, as well as other crimes committed while he led the movement against apartheid. In accordance with his conviction, Mandela served 27 years in prison, spending many of these years on Robben Island.

Following his release from prison, Mandela has supported reconciliation and negotiation, and has helped lead the transition towards multi-racial democracy in South Africa. Since the end of apartheid, many have frequently praised Mandela, including former opponents. Mandela has received more than one hundred awards over four decades, most notably the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993. He is currently a celebrated elder statesman who continues to voice his opinion on topical issues. In South Africa he is often known as Madiba, an honorary title adopted by elders of Mandela's clan. The title has come to be synonymous with Nelson Mandela.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) was a clergyman, activist and prominent leader in the African-American civil rights movement. His main legacy was to secure progress on civil rights in the US and he is frequently referenced as a human rights icon today.A Baptist minister, King became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957.King's efforts led to the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech. He raised public consciousness of the civil rights movement and established himself as one of the greatest orators in U.S. history.In 1964, King became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end racial segregation and raciall discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means. By the time of his death in 1968, he had refocused his efforts on ending poverty and opposing the Vietnam War, both from a religious perspective.King was assassinated on April 4, 1968.

Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (1913 –2005) changed America forever when she was arrested for refusing to yield her seat to a white patron on a Montgomery, Alabama city bus. Mrs. Parks was found guilty of disorderly conduct and that lead directly to the famous Montgomery bus boycott. However, Mrs. Parks was not the "quiet seamstress" as the media has often portrayed her. In 1943 she became a member of the Montgomery chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and she served as its secretary until 1956. After the Bus Boycott, Mrs. Parks lost her job and relocated to Detroit in 1957. In 1965 she joined the staff of U.S. Representative John Conyers of Michigan and worked until her retirement in 1988. In 1999 she was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor, the highest honour a civilian can receive in the United States.Parks's act of defiance became an important symbol of the modern Civil Rights Movement and Parks became an international icon of resistance to racial segregation. She organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including boycott leader Martin Luther King, Jr., helping to launch him to national prominence in the civil rights movement.

Elizabeth Fry (1780-1845) was a Quaker and a prison reformer. When she heard about the conditions and the way women were treated in Newgate Prison, visited the prison. She discovered 300 women and their children, huddled together in two wards and two cells. Although some of the women had been found guilty of crimes, others will still waiting to be tried. The female prisoners slept on the floor without nightclothes or bedding. The women had to cook, wash and sleep in the same cell.She began to visit the women of Newgate Prison on a regular basis. She supplied them with clothes and established a school and a chapel in the prison. Later she introduced a system of supervision that was administered by matrons and monitors. The women now had compulsory sewing duties and Bible reading. She also campaigned against capital punishment and helped improve the conditions for those being transported.

John Howard (1726-1790) was appointed High Sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1773, initially for a one-year period. He inspected the county prison himself and was shocked by what he found. He began to inspect prisons throughout England. Of particular concern to Howard were those prisoners who were held because they could not pay the jailer's fee - an amount paid to the owner or keeper of the prison for upkeep. He took this issue to parliament, and in 1774 Howard was called to give evidence on prison conditions to a House of Commons select committee. Members of that committee were so impressed that, unusually, Howard was called to the bar of the House of Commons and publicly thanked for his 'humanity and zeal'.Having visited several hundred prisons across Europe, Howard published the first edition of The State of the Prisons in 1777. It included very detailed accounts of the prisons he had visited, including plans and maps, together with detailed instructions on the necessary improvements.He soon discovered that all across the country the situation was just as bad. Despite the dangers of travel, he continued on his journey and became influential as far as Europe, America and Russia. The Howard League for Penal Reform was named after him and continues to work to improve the penal system.