This year has brought with it a proliferation of different political mobilisations across the world. This edition of the newsletter Corporate Watch contains accounts of personal experiences from the frontline and examines the political effectiveness of a variety of large-scale demonstrations and convergences in the context of a global economic and political turmoil.

Firstly, we have an account from the recent G8 protests in Italy, which, without an international call-out, had a different dynamic to previous responses to G8 and G20 summits.

On the terrain of climate change activism, the momentum, organisation and commitment to halting runaway climate change continues apace with the concept and organisational structure of the Camp for Climate Action growing rapidly in popularity and being adopted by activists globally. 2009 has seen and will see camps in England, Wales, Scotland, Germany, France, Belgium, India, Switzerland, Ireland, Finland, Ukraine and Australia. Future camps are also planned for Ecuador and New Zealand. Here, grassroots climate activists focus on the need to target the financial structures that gave birth to and facilitate lucrative and corrosive emissions trading schemes.

This December will witness the UN Climate Change Conference (COP15) in Copenhagen, which will also be one of the last big mobilisations of the year, when activists take on the promotion of false and destructive solutions to climate change at the summit, confronting the government and corporate interests that dominate the elite climate agenda. Belen Balanya of the Corporate Europe Observatory examines the role of corporations in this ‘seminal’ UN conference.

The newsletter also features detailed accounts from camps and campaigns struggling to end the divisions and oppression imposed on people by borders and immigration controls. It also contains accounts from those working to end the arms trade, exposing and targeting companies profiting from western militarism.

From the G8 and Climate Camps through Disarm DSEi and the Anti-Militarist Network to the Stop Deportation network and the Calais No Border camp, we hope to give you some insight into effective ways to mobilise.