On Sept 26, take action to stop money from going into industries that manufacture violence, including guns, weapons, nukes, prisons, and fossil fuels. Plan an action at a bank, public office, or university to ask them to move their money out of violence. These toolkits and databases (weapons, nukes and fossil fuels) can help identify how groups can get their city, school, bank, or pension fund to divest from violence and invest in a different future. Join forces and amplify voices with other divestment groups. Mobilize a joint action at a location, delivering a petition or letter calling for the institution to divest from violence. Co-organized with World BEYOND War, CODEPINK, DivestED, and ICAN.

Get trained! 

Watch the Divest From Violence, Reinvest In a Just World Training. This webinar brings together divestment organizers from fossil fuel and weapons divestment campaigns. Helpful at any time, this training is also designed to help YOU prepare for action in September. Led by DivestEd, CODEPINK, and World BEYOND War. Watch here.

Want more info? Watch a Divest From the War Machine webinar here.

You can also watch this video that Divest Ed and students worked together on. It explains the wider goals of the fossil fuel divestment movement. 

Step 1: Do Your Research

Use the Weapons Free Funds database to see if your 401(k), retirement plan, or personal portfolio is invested in weapons manufacturing.

Use this Global Fossil Fuel Divestment database to find out if your university or bank has divested from fossil fuels. 

Use the Fossil Free Funds database to see if your 401(k), retirement plan, or personal portfolio is invested in fossil fuels.

Download the Banking on Climate Chaos report and explore all of the data here.

Use this Don’t Bank on the Bomb database to find out if your bank is profitting from nukes. 

Use this Don’t Bank on the Bomb database to find out if your bank has divested.

Read Why Divesting From Nukes Makes Sense to get talking points you can use.

Step 2: Make a Plan

Check out these pro-tips to working on nuclear divestment from ICAN. 

Learn from Divest from the War Machine’s Guide to weapons divestment.

Check out this guide to Personal Divestment from nuclear weapons.

Explore how to Get Your City To Divest from nukes.

Dig into the stories, tools, and strategies for weapons divestment from World BEYOND War.

Here’s a sample resolution for a city council (or other government) on weapons divestment.

Step 3: Take Action

Note: You can adapt these sample scripts to urge decision makers to divest from weapons, nukes, guns, fossil fuels, etc. all at once. 

Copy or adapt ICAN’s Sample Letter To Banks for Nuclear Divestment for emails or letters. 

Use ICAN’s call script to ask for nuclear divestment.

Repost these social posts targeting nuclear weapons manufacturers. Share this 1-min animation on why nuclear divestment matters. 

Hold a rally outside a bank, university, investment group, or city hall. 

Deliver a letter or petition calling for divestment from violence.

Reach Out To:

Many groups are working on divestment campaigns. The Sept 26th Action Day is a chance to reach across our issues and take action together. Connect with climate activists, anti-militarism campaigns, peace activists, prison abolitionists, anti-nuke activists, youth and elders, senior citizens, and more.

Posters:

Download, print, and paste these posters onto signs: Nonviolence Means Build Windmills Not Weapons, Nonviolence Means Invest In Renewables, Divest From Fossil Fuels, 

Tactics To Try:

If organizing multi-site demonstrations, make giant banners that read: DIVEST FROM VIOLENCE to link your actions together. 

Hold signs that specifically name what kind of violence the institution or bank is invested in. 

Do a Creative Petition Delivery in costume, with giant props, a drum group or a brass band.

Share the toolkit for this specific Action Day.