The Bush-era Green Scare did a lot to defang the environmentalist movement. There are still some great resources that they made, like A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching, and some good lessons learned, such as the above-ground/underground group dichotomy.
I honestly don’t remember where I read it. It was either some insurrectionary anarchist thing or an ELF/ALF thing. The gist of it is:
You have two organizations that legally never meet. One stages protests, does community outreach, fundraising, and all of your standard environmentalist org stuff. The other does illegal direct action activities, divided into independent cells and/or affinity groups. The above-ground network serves to raise funds and recruit for the underground network, but the key is that the leadership of the above ground group can never be connected to the actions of the underground group. This gives a lot more wiggle room to both groups than if they were to go it alone.
The Bush-era Green Scare did a lot to defang the environmentalist movement. There are still some great resources that they made, like A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching, and some good lessons learned, such as the above-ground/underground group dichotomy.
Where would you recommend to look into this more?
I honestly don’t remember where I read it. It was either some insurrectionary anarchist thing or an ELF/ALF thing. The gist of it is:
You have two organizations that legally never meet. One stages protests, does community outreach, fundraising, and all of your standard environmentalist org stuff. The other does illegal direct action activities, divided into independent cells and/or affinity groups. The above-ground network serves to raise funds and recruit for the underground network, but the key is that the leadership of the above ground group can never be connected to the actions of the underground group. This gives a lot more wiggle room to both groups than if they were to go it alone.
That’s an interesting idea, thanks!
I remember George Jackson detailing something like this in Blood in my Eye, but it was mostly theoretical
Thanks, I’ve been meaning to read that!