Fight for the future: our best climate protest photos

The fight against climate change is a decades old struggle. For years and years, environmentalists have taken action to try to protect our natural world, encourage leaders and multinational corporations to leave fossil fuels in the ground and, more recently, prevent irreversible and devastating climate change.

The last few years have seen an explosion of those movements. The 2018 IPCC report which stated we had just 12 years to avert catastrophe became a huge calling card for many. Hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets behind the banners of mass movements like Extinction Rebellion and Fridays for Future.

We’ve seen co-ordinated marches across the globe, the targeting of events like Fashion Week as well as mass civil disobedience campaigns which have led to thousands arrested. Many, spurred on by the terror of what unabashed fossil-fuel use means for them and their families, have taken action for the first time on the climate over the last few years, calling on leaders here and across the globe to act.

Through all of it, we’ve been there, reporting from the ground, capturing the action and the struggle. As the world’s eyes are on Glasgow for this month’s COP26 summit and as activists gear up for a huge weekend of action in the city and across the world, we bring you some of our favourite photos of climate protests that we’ve published over the past few years.

XR protest 2018. Photo by Theo McInnes

Extinction Rebellion blockade the bridges of London, November 2018. Photo by Eva Clifford

Global Climate Strike in London. Photo by Theo McInnes

XR’s Red Rebel Brigade, October 2019. Photo by Peter Brooks

Extinction Rebellion blockade the bridges of London, November 2018. Photo by Eva Clifford

Extinction Rebellion blockade the bridges of London, November 2018. Photo by Eva Clifford

Climate protestors block roads to ‘disrupt’ Fashion Week, February 2019. Photo by Theo McInnes

XR block a London junction, August 2021. Photo by Aiyush Pachnanda

Global Climate Strike, London. Photo by Theo McInnes

XR block a London junction, August 2021. Photo by Aiyush Pachnanda

XR protest, 2018. Photo by Theo McInnes

XR block a London junction, August 2021. Photo by Aiyush Pachnanda

Climate protestors block roads to ‘disrupt’ Fashion Week, February 2019. Photo by Theo McInnes

XR block a London junction, August 2021. Photo by Aiyush Pachnanda

XR protest, 2018. Photo by Theo McInnes

COP26 takes place between 31 October – 12 November 2021. Keep an eye on Huck’s live coverage of COP on our Twitter and Instagram, and read more about our climate takeover here.