Greenpeace International is an international environmental pressure group that was founded in 1971. It has developed over the years and has organizational in 27 countries. These national organizations fund themselves from membership fees and personal donations. 24% of this income is in turn donated to Greenpeace International. The biggest single contributor is Germany, with the Netherlands second and Greenpeace (UK), with a membership of 100,000, third.
Greenpeace earned its reputation with exciting and dangerous campaigns of direct action in the 1970’s and 1980’s. They started with a protest voyage into the Amchitka nuclear test zone around the Aleutian Islands. Since then, the Greenpeace direct-action until has coordinated countless demonstrations and disruptive (albeit peaceful) actions, such as sailing inflatable boats between armed harpoons of commercial whaling ships and feeling whales; placing volunteers between seal hunters and seal pups; sealing off toxic waste outfalls; and boarding nuclear-powered submarines. Many of these activities received world-wide media coverage and publicity, and fuelled a rapid increase in both membership and contributions.
The sinking or the organisation’s flagship, Rainbow Warrior, by the French Secret Service in 1985 led to further increase in donations and the green boom of the late 1980’s built up membership. Up until 1992, contribution to Greenpeace rose steadily every year since the start.
The flamboyant and often perilous direct actions undertaken by Greenpeace activists have proved extremely popular with young people and in the actions unit such highly publicized actions have the key to Greenpeace’s thriving membership.
However, in 1992, Greenpeace International suffered a sharp fall in public donations and membership fees, and planned to make 25% of the 500 employees, redundant. The organization had cut its budget from to million and its 36-berth ship, Gondwana used in its Atlantic campaigns, has been put up for sale for around .5 million.
Part of the reason for the decline stems from the difficulty in maintaining a high profile Programme of direct actions. Earlier actions by Greenpeace activists certainly brought publicity and a heightening of public awareness, but the organization is finding it increasing difficult to come up with campaigns which can sustain the media interest enjoyed in the early 1980’s. Indeed, many employees of Greenpeace International fear that current actions are more publicity stunts than an embarrassment to polluters, and hence have limited political value.
Many Greenpeace officials now feel that having raised public awareness, the organization should concentrate on more conventional forms of lobbing within national and European parliaments and at international conferences in order to bring about change. However, many members jointed because of the swashbuckling image of Greenpeace and are likely to resent any sign of the organization being ‘sucked into the establishment.’ Herein lies a dilemma.
In order to finance a concerted and effective lobbying campaign, Greenpeace International requires more money from donations and membership fees. Yet, the amount of donations and fees is likely to reduce significantly if such a strategic shift occurs. It is not just members who may react negatively. The organization has always experienced difficulty in attracting and retaining good staff within the non-campaigning areas owing to its relatively sedate and unexciting image. Although adopting a policy of paying reasonable salaries (approximately 66% of an equivalent private sector job) has gone some way to solving this problem, staff motivation is not determined by the thrill of direct-action campaigning. As Alison Reynolds puts it:
‘The most exiting thing is working among people who are really motivated. When there are campaign highs, the officer buzzes and that’s incredibly rewarding.’
So, decision-makers within Greenpeace must make a difficult strategic choice. Already, the organization’s position at the radical edge of the green movement is being taken by a more shadowy group called Earth First! This organization is based in the USA and has adopted a different approach to the structure and organization of jobs. It organizes employees into cells that have no leaders but rely on cell members taking responsibility for their own direct action. It has an estimated 4000 members in the UK.
Questions
You are required to act as a management consultant and prepare an individual report that details the answers of the above questions. The report must be in the correct formal report style.
This case study may assist you in your final assignment by outlining the sort of problems, questions and approach you will required to adopt towards a real-life situation.
Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com
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