Who Are we?
Our History
In February 2019, young people all over the world started taking the streets to demand concrete climate actions and to shout their concern about the environmental crisis. Maastricht built on this momentum and started its own student climate movement. Since the start, many people wanted to get involved in the organization, and in a very short time, we managed to bring a few thousands people on the streets to protest against against weak climate policies. From a few motivated members, we quickly grew into a bigger organization that now undertakes different types of projects that involve protests and actions but also research, policy writing, pressuring the university and general raising awareness projects.
Name ChANGE - WHY?
In March 2020, we changed our name from “Students for Climate Maastricht” to “Maastricht for Climate”.
Why?
Because we care about inclusivity. Students for Climate Maastricht started as a student initiative but always aimed at reaching the entire population of Maastricht. So far, we have always been portrayed as a student movement which has prevented us from really reaching out to the local population. We believe that our name plays a key role in this. For example, the human chain we have organized in November was entitled “200 students in the streets of Maastricht” in the media while half of the participants were adults. Our name was refraining our efforts to achieve our goal to build a large, strong and diverse community of environmentally concerned citizens in Maastricht. We strongly believe that in order to effectively pressure the government to take action, we need to be many, and we need to be diverse. We need to be Dutch and we need to be international, we need to be young and we need to be old. We need everyone. We are Maastricht for Climate.
Our MISSION
We strive for climate justice – the development and implementation of a new global system in which humanity exists within planetary boundaries. We demand social justice, we demand a transition that will limit the sufferings of those most vulnerable to a maximum. We consider the current situation as a violation of human rights – our fight is not solely about protecting our future and the future of future generations. It is about protecting the lives of those who are already suffering the consequences of climate change. This entails letting the most well-off bare the greater costs – Because they can and because they are more responsible for the current environmental crisis. We respect human rights and will not tolerate any violation. We believe in science and demand that scientific findings be at the forefront of all political decisions.
- RESPECT of nature and each other.
- INCLUSIVITY of all that are themselves inclusive.
- TRANSPARENCY about our work, our mission and our values. We ask others to do the same when working with us.
- INTEGRITY towards our vision.