We, Oxford Contemporary Music, declare a Climate and Ecological Emergency

We pledge to work with and support our artists, audiences, community, and local government in tackling this Emergency, and we call on others to do the same.

These are our intentions:

  1. We will tell the Truth

Governments, and their public broadcasters and cultural agencies, must tell the truth about the Climate and Ecological Emergency, reverse inconsistent policies and communicate the urgency for far-reaching systemic change.

We will communicate with artists, audiences and our community to support them to discover the truth about the Emergency and the changes that are needed.

2. We will take Action

Governments must enact legally binding policy measures to reduce emissions to net zero by 2025 and to reduce consumption levels.

We pledge to work towards reducing our emissions to net zero* by 2025.

We will challenge policies and actions of local and national governments and their agencies, where we interact with them, that do not help to reduce emissions or consumption levels.

We will actively work to imagine and model ways that our organisation can regenerate the planet’s resources.

3. We are committed to Justice

The emergency has arisen from deeply systemic injustices. Arts and Culture can imagine and forge shifts in the ways we relate to one another and the world, in our values and behaviours.

We will do what is possible to enable dialogue and expression amidst our artists, audiences and communities about how the Emergency will affect them and the changes that are needed.

We will support demands for more democracy within our civic institutions and government.

We believe that all truth-telling, action and democratic work must be underpinned by a commitment to justice based on intersectional principles led by and for marginalised people.