about joshua

Joshua Kahn Russell is an organizer working to bridge movements for ecological sanity and racial justice. He is a strategy and non-violent direct action trainer with the Ruckus Society, and serves communities impacted by fossil fuel extraction.

You can see a list of workshops and trainings Joshua offers at Aid and Abet or leave a comment if you’d like to book him for a training.

He is the co-author of Organizing Cools the Planet: Tools and Reflections to Navigate the Climate Crisis, forthcoming on PM Press, August 2011.

Joshua spends much of his time on the road, building and supporting networks of activist groups across the country, helping develop young grassroots leaders, & coordinating actions and gatherings. He works internationally with the Climate Justice Now! network to bring justice to the U.N. Climate Negotiations and has been a leading voice in the International Youth Climate Movement.

Joshua spent four years as Rainforest Action Network’s Grassroots Actions Manager, campaigning to end our addiction to coal and oil, during which time he helped transform Wall Street by shifting six different banks away from financing fossil fuel projects. He also served on the steering committee of the Energy Action Coalition, a youth led coalition of over 48 groups spanning the environmental spectrum.

He has coordinated and helped build numerous civil disobedience actions, including the 4,000 person Capitol Climate Action in 2009.

Joshua is a regular writer for Znet, Grist, Rabble.ca, WireTap, and It’s Getting Hot In Here, and his articles have appeared in Yes! Magazine, Left Turn Magazine, Peacework Magazine, Upping the Anti, and Z Magazine, among others.

Joshua has contributed chapters to books such as Real Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century, We Don’t Need Another Wave: Dispatches from the Next Generation of Feminists, The Art of Coexistence, and the forthcoming Less Than Settled: Critical Reflections on Travel and Privilege, and forthcoming Next Eco-Warriors. He has written internationally distributed zines, including Zen and the Art of Brownie Baking!, and Excuse Me, Can You Please Pass the Privilege?.

His artwork has appeared on the cover of books authored by INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence, and Noam Chomsky, smartMeme, and in the Celebrate People’s History poster series.

In early 2006, Josh was a core organizer in reviving, launching and building the “new” Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), a national multi-issue youth & student led group, which in less than a year had grown to over 250 chapters and nearly 3,000 members nationwide.

He helped revitalize the Activist Resource Center and other student groups at Brandeis University, where he graduated in 2006 with degrees in Women’s & Gender Studies and Sociology. At Brandeis he coordinated successful university-wide student strikes with the Brandeis Anti-war Coalition in March of 2003 to protest the invasion of Iraq, and again in May of 2006 on May Day in support of Immigrant Rights.

While at Brandeis, he was awarded a fellowship from the International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life; The Elise Boulding Sociology and Social Activism Award; Karpf Peace Award; and Brandeis Class of 1955 Endowment Fund Prize. During that time he has done international solidarity work in Cambodia, Jamaica, and Mexico with groups such as the Womyn’s Agenda for Change and the International Jamaican Council for Human Rights.

Josh Kahn Russell supports the regional coalition Mobilization for Climate Justice West and currently lives in the Bay Area, CA.