Fridays for Future in Latin America: An analysis of collective action frame adaptation by the Peruvian climate movement Viernes por el Futuro Perú

Abstract

Fridays for Future (FFF) school strikes inspired thousands of young people worldwide and catalyzed a transnational climate movement with local groups in many countries. Despite this global dimension most research on FFF has focused on cases in the Global North, especially in Europe. Little is known about the mobilizations and activists’ participation in local groups in the Global South. The Latin American region and particularly the Andean country Peru is highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. From the perspective of transnational movement diffusion and framing processes, the study analyses how the activists of Viernes por el Futuro (VPF) in Peru frame the climate crisis and why their collective actions frames are different from those of European FFF groups. For this purpose, qualitative data was gathered conducting semi-structured interviews with youth activists of VPF. Findings reveal how the activists employ a strong social justice frame through frame bridging and alliance-building with indigenous and other movements. Results also show the strong agency and aim of activists to create their own movement based on Peru’s social realities instead of using a ‘copy-paste’-model of the Global North. Furthermore, the historical context of colonialism and unequal North-South relations plays an important role for their framing activities. The thesis suggests that further research about FFF in Latin America and about transnational movements in general should take post- or decolonial perspectives as a starting point in order to overcome the Eurocentrism in academic studies and to highlight the diversity within transnational movements.