GREG POWELL, 26 OCT 2009

I've been mulling this question over in my head for a while now.

"What's the best way to motivate a politician to take action on climate change?"

Every politician is unique: some are motivated exclusively by votes, and others are motivated by their sense of duty or morality; some are motivated by ideals, and others are motivated by campaign financing. I do know, however, that we can't expect a single letter to sway the politics of an issue of the order of climate change. Only a social movement will do.

I am a firm believer that every letter counts, but do we really believe writing a single letter will solve our issue? Let's consider this question relative to other social movements of the past.

I have difficulty believing that a cleverly written letter would have ended segregation in the southern US. I also doubt that  a sharply penned piece of prose would have successfully and single-handedly led the second wave of feminism. A single letter clearly never would have accomplished what a million-people-strong movement achieved in both of these cases.  A letter is not sufficient; only a social movement will do.

Then there's the other form of action: personal action. Yes, recycling our waste is important (after reducing and reusing). However, thinking that recycling alone will avoid dangerous climate change is akin to a white person during apartheid thinking that giving her place in line to a black person will end the bloody race-based exploitation that plagued societies. And yes, shorter showers do indeed conserve energy and are an important commitment to a healthy environment. However, thinking that reducing showering time from 10 minutes to 8 minutes will be sufficient to cap global warming at a safe level of 2 degree C is like a man offering to let his wife select the candidate, but he'll do the voting himself.

Recycling and reducing shower times are both necessary and effective. However, neither one (nor both together) is sufficient. If we take the science seriously, we must recognize that avoiding a climate catastrophe requires all hands on deck. Our industries must make drastic changes to the way they operate. Our transportation choices must move away from the personal car as quickly as GM convinced us to move to the personal car. The products we buy, how we produce and move goods, the laws governing environmental releases - all of these must come under scrutiny. We will not solve this challenge by simply writing letters or limiting change to our personal lifestyle. Only a social movement will do.

Ultimately, engaging our representatives requires us to be in their face, constantly and respectfully. We must risk our reputation of being "nice" to gain a legacy of being part of the generation that took climate change seriously enough to prevent it. We must annoy some people to demonstrate compassion toward the world's poor, future generations and other species. We must be politically incorrect to achieve the morally correct. We will not solve this challenge with a luke-warm level of commitment.

Visiting a constituency office five minutes before closing time and staying for an hour, day after day, would ensure the message gets through. Appearing in costume at every public appearance a politician makes would encourage others to ask the right questions. Getting friends and family to participate in flash mobs allows our representatives know we're serious. Putting power back in the hands of citizens (which is analogous to the power shift that both the civil rights and women's movements sought) will require even more intense action.

Every politician responds to a different set of motivators. Keeping our representatives accountable to citizens requires shifting power back into the hands of the people. We must not be fooled into thinking that a handful of citizens dabbling here and there will generate the necessary power shift. If we think putting in a few hours of discretionary time every couple of months will shift power the way we need to shift power, we are fooling ourselves. We must see tackling climate change as a social movement. Only a mass social movement will do — and we must all participate.