������ý

The COP26 climate summit in the UK is a lot. There are thousands and thousands of people in suits and lanyards walking very quickly from room to room. The hastily assembled floor reverberates throughout the day with drumming footsteps. Everything about COP26 is utterly overwhelming, but it isn’t the only event in town.

For the second week of November, Glasgow has been home to an alternative climate summit as well. The is a gathering of activists and campaigners that has hosted talks and workshops – both online and throughout the city – on issues including environmental activism, Indigenous rights and air quality.

I met , a student from Germany, at a workshop on the various forms climate activism can take. The room was cold, starkly lit and on the outskirts of Glasgow. It was filled with about 20 people, some from Belgium, another from Israel, and another who works for Caroline Lucas, a Green member of parliament in the UK.

Gobbelé says she went to COP26 for the first week but didn’t enjoy it. “It was just people in suits trying to look important,” she says. “I didn’t see what the point in me being there was.”

She has been an activist since she joined the movement at age 16 and says the value in meetings like the People’s Summit is that she gets to meet people who care about the same issues as her.

, an 18-year-old activist from Germany, says she came to the People’s Summit because she is scared for her future. “I feel hopeless sometimes, but I feel like we are the actual leaders of the movement, not the people at the climate summit,” she says.

The People’s Summit covered several topics related to climate justice over its four-day programme. One evening lecture about air quality in Latin America highlighted how activists are trying to force the issue to be taken seriously.

, a lawyer from Brazil, gave a talk on the legal action she has taken against the government over air pollution. She is part of the global environmental movement that supports the actions of young activists. “I have two sons,” she said during her presentation. “Will their survival be harder than mine?”

David Tsai, an air quality researcher at the , a non-profit organisation in Brazil, also spoke during the session and says the country needs a national air quality policy.

Ramos says she is confident of eventual victory in the legal case, but that it will be a 10 to 20-year fight.

Like the German activists at the workshop, Ramos is clear about why she is working on what she calls “the front line” of addressing climate change: “We have to do it ourselves. We can’t wait for the government for incentives.”

Sign up for Today at COP26, our free daily newsletter covering the crucial climate summit