Extinction Rebellion’s tactics are working like a charm – even if you don’t happen to like them

From Emily Thornberry to Priti Patel, Extinction Rebellion’s blockade of newspaper printing presses has been roundly and rightly condemned. As someone broadly sympathetic to many of the movement’s goals, every instinct tells me this episode, along with their record of disruption, is only doing harm to the cause.  

How many swing voters in Nuneaton are going to look at what happened last night and suddenly pledge their support to Extinction Rebellion’s mission? Even Tim Farron, once leader of the pro-environmentalist Liberal Democrats, warned “XR by alienating the majority are making the climate catastrophe more likely”. Surely then, Extinction Rebellion is breaking every rule of campaigning 101.  

But judging Extinction Rebellion by how well-liked they are is to miss the point. Earlier this year, Public First was commissioned by the Wellcome Trust to look at the key elements of a successful campaign.  As part of that, we polled public attitudes to a series of different campaigns – from the Living Wage campaign, to Stonewall’s Rainbow Laces. At first glance, that polling confirmed what you might expect. Of all the campaigns we tested, Extinction Rebellion was by far the least popular – in fact, it was the only campaign which more people said they opposed than supported – and by an almost 2-1 margin at that. A seemingly damning indictment. Looking at another metric, however, tells a different story.  

When we asked people which of those campaigns they have heard of, Extinction Rebellion was by far the most well-known. Over 57 per cent of UK adults knew what Extinction Rebellion was, an incredible degree of awareness for a campaign, and over 20 points higher than the next most recognised, with many other campaigns failing to top even 10 per cent recognition.  

So, what matters more? Being well-liked or being well known? Well, it depends on what you’re trying to achieve. Extinction Rebellion sits in the long lineage of campaigns which set out very deliberately to cause disruption in order to raise awareness of a perceived injustice – in this case, the climate emergency. Crucially for these campaigns, it does not matter whether they or their brand is liked or not. And we see that with Extinction Rebellion, we may not like their tactics, but is anyone seriously going to press for us to burn more fossil fuels as a result?    

The evidence suggests it’s the opposite. Every time Extinction Rebellion cause disruption, they certainly attract scorn, but they also raise awareness of the climate crisis and get people talking about issues like net-zero targets in a way that no other campaign has been able to match. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if you like Extinction Rebellion because that doesn’t affect how you feel about their issue.

You only have to look at how many of those who have condemned Extinction Rebellion over the past 48 hours have also made pains to point out they support the cause of tackling climate change. The prime minister pointed out that a free press was vital in holding the government to account in the fight against climate change, while The Sun newspaper pointed out the irony that their blockaded edition carried an interview with David Attenborough on the urgency of tackling the climate crisis.  

Looking at it from that perspective, Extinction Rebellion’s tactics are even more successful than it seems. By being the outlandish outriders of the climate emergency, they start to make anything just short of blockading roads to tackle emissions look more acceptable. So, consciously or not, they shift the so-called “Overton window” of policies and approaches to tackling the climate crisis that are acceptable to the public. None of that might happen as quickly or as dramatically as Extinction Rebellion might want, but many other campaigns would look at the way climate change, and public desire to take action on it, has shot up the agenda with real envy.  

None of which is to say that Extinction Rebellion’s antics are desirable or good for democracy. Nor is it electorally wise for politicians to express their support for Extinction Rebellion as some have – after all, politicians, unlike campaigns, need you to vote for them personally, not just support the issues they talk about. But too often when it comes to analysing campaigning, we confuse what we like with what works. Extinction Rebellion is proving the opposite, sometimes being disliked is the best tactic of all.

 Luke Tryl is a director at research organisation Public First