George Monbiot | |
|---|---|
 Monbiot in 2013 | |
| Born | (1963-01-27)27 January 1963 (age 62) London, England |
| Alma mater | Brasenose College, Oxford |
| Occupation | Journalist |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 2 |
| Awards | United NationsGlobal 500 Award (1995) |
| Website | monbiot |
George Joshua Richard Monbiot (/ˈmɒnbioʊ/MON-bee-oh; born 27 January 1963) is an English journalist, author, andenvironmental and political activist. He writes a regular column forThe Guardian and has written several books.
Monbiot grew up inOxfordshire and studiedzoology at theUniversity of Oxford. He then began a career ininvestigative journalism, publishing his first bookPoisoned Arrows in 1989 about human rights issues inWest Papua. In later years, he has been involved in activism and advocacy related to various issues, such asclimate change, British politics andloneliness. InFeral (2013), he discussed and endorsed expansion ofrewilding. He is the founder ofThe Land is Ours, a campaign for theright of access to the countryside and its resources in the United Kingdom.[2] Monbiot was awarded theGlobal 500 in 1995 and theOrwell Prize in 2022.
Born inKensington, Monbiot grew up inRotherfield Peppard, Oxfordshire.[3][4][5] His father, Raymond Monbiot, was a businessman who headed theConservative Party's trade and industry forum.[6][2] His mother, Rosalie (daughter ofGresham Cooke MP), was a Conservative councillor and former leader ofSouth Oxfordshire District Council.[7][8] His uncle, Canon Hereward Cooke, was theLiberal Democrat deputy leader ofNorwich City Council.[9]
After preparatory boarding school atElstree School,[10] he was educated atStowe School, inBuckinghamshire.[11][12] He won an open scholarship toBrasenose College, Oxford.[13] Monbiot has stated that his "political awakening" was prompted by readingBettina Ehrlich's book,Paolo and Panetto, while at his prep school[14][15] and that he regretted attending Oxford.[16]
After graduating with a degree inzoology, Monbiot joined theBBC Natural History Unit as a radio producer, makingnatural history and environmental programmes. He transferred to the BBC'sWorld Service, where he worked briefly as acurrent affairs producer and presenter, before leaving to research and write his first book.[17]
Working as aninvestigative journalist, he travelled in Indonesia, Brazil, and East Africa. His activities led to his being madepersona non grata in seven countries[18] and being sentenced to life imprisonmentin absentia in Indonesia.[19]In these places he was also shot at,[20] brutally beaten up and arrested by military police,[20] shipwrecked[20] and stung into a poisoned coma by hornets.[21] He came back to work in Britain after being pronounced clinically dead inLodwar General Hospital in north-western Kenya, having contractedcerebral malaria.[22]
He joined theBritish roads protest movement and was often called to give press interviews; as a result he was denounced as a "media tart"[23] by groups such asGreen Anarchist andClass War. He claims he was brutally beaten and attacked by security guards, who allegedly drove a metal spike through his foot, smashing the middle metatarsal bone. His injuries left him in hospital.[24] SirCrispin Tickell, a former United Nations diplomat, who was thenWarden atGreen College, Oxford, made the young protester aVisiting Fellow.[25]
In November 2012, he apologised toLord McAlpine for his "stupidity and thoughtlessness" in implying, in a tweet, that the Conservative peer was a paedophile.[26][27][28]
In 2014, Monbiot wrote an article on the theme ofloneliness.[29] This led to a collaboration with musicianEwan McLennan. Together they released an albumBreaking the Spell of Loneliness in October 2016 followed by a tour of the UK.[30][31] Folk Radio described it as "an enthralling album" where "Each song is a short, eloquent and thought provoking essay on the destruction of our humanity and how it can be regained".[32]
Monbiot narrated the videoHow Wolves Change Rivers[33] which was based on hisTED talk of 2013[34] on the restoration of ecosystems and landscape (rewilding) whenwolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone Park.[33] In 2019, Monbiot co-presentedNature Now,[35] a video about natural climate solutions, withGreta Thunberg. Monbiot appeared in the documentaryThe Cost of Living: Does Britain Need a Basic Income?, a companion piece to the filmThe Future of Work and Death, aboutUBI in the UK – released on Amazon Prime in 2020.[36][37] He appeared in the 2021 Netflix documentarySeaspiracy, which focuses on thehuman impact on marine life andfishing, and defended it from critics.[38]
In 2021, Monbiot created the live documentaryRivercide, highlighting the lamentable state of the UK's rivers, and in particular the River Wye.[39]
While describing the filmDon't Look Up in early 2022, Monbiot explained how difficult it is to campaign for the preservation of Earth in the face of what he sees as overwhelming inaction.[40]
In 2024, Monbiot appeared in the British documentary filmI Could Never Go Vegan.[41]
In the early 2000s, Monbiot predicted that global production of oil "willpeak before long". In his article, titled "The Bottom of the Barrel", he wrote:
The most optimistic projections are the ones produced by the US Department of Energy, which claims that this will not take place until 2037. But the US energy information agency has admitted that the government’s figures have been fudged: it has based its projections for oil supply on the projections for oil demand,(5) perhaps in order not to sow panic in the financial markets. Other analysts are less sanguine. The petroleum geologist Colin Campbell calculates that global extraction will peak before 2010.(6) In August the geophysicist Kenneth Deffeyes told New Scientist that he was “99 per cent confident” that the date of maximum global production will be 2004. Even if the optimists are correct, we will be scraping the oil barrel within the lifetimes of most of those who are middle-aged today.
The supply of oil will decline, but global demand will not. Today we will burn 76 million barrels; by 2020 we will be using 112 million barrels a day, after which projected demand accelarates [sic]. If supply declines and demand grows, we soon encounter something with which the people of the advanced industrial economies are unfamiliar: shortage. The price of oil will go through the roof.
— George Monbiot, The Guardian, 2 December 2003[42]
Monbiot believes that drastic action coupled with strong political will is needed to combatglobal warming.[43] He supports the introduction of the crime ofecocide to theInternational Criminal Court stating “I believe [a crime of ecocide] would change everything. It would radically shift the balance of power, forcing anyone contemplating large-scale vandalism to ask themselves: ‘Will I end up in the international criminal court for this?’ It could make the difference between a habitable and an uninhabitable planet.”[44][45][46]
To reduce his personal impact on the environment, he has transitioned to avegan lifestyle and encourages others to do the same.[47]
Monbiot has criticisedmedia coverage of climate change and environmental issues, in particular that of theBBC and its nature documentaries.[40][38] He has alsocriticised the BBC for what he views as its political bias.[48]
Monbiot made an unsuccessful attempt to carry out acitizen's arrest ofJohn Bolton, a former US ambassador to the United Nations, when the latter attended theHay Festival to give a talk on international relations in May 2008. Monbiot argued that Bolton was one of the instigators of theIraq War, of which Monbiot was an opponent.[49]
After Monbiot visited the remoteBaliem Valley and criticised theIndonesian government'stransmigration program and other policies in occupiedWestern New Guinea, Indonesian authorities sentenced him in absentia to life imprisonment.[50]
Monbiot is a critic ofneoliberalism.[38] In January 2004, Monbiot andSalma Yaqoob co-foundedRespect – The Unity Coalition (later formally the Respect Party) which grew out of theStop the War Coalition.[51] He resigned from the group the following February when Respect failed to reach agreement with theGreen Party not to stand candidates in the same constituencies in the forthcoming2004 European Parliament election.[52]
In an interview with the British political blogThird Estate in September 2009, Monbiot expressed his support for the policies ofPlaid Cymru, saying "I have finally found the party that I feel very comfortable with. That's not to say I feel uncomfortable with the Green Party, on the whole I support it, but I feel even more comfortable with Plaid."[53]
In April 2010, he was a signatory to an open letter of support for theLiberal Democrats, published inThe Guardian.[54] Prior to theMay 2015 general election, he was one of several public figures who endorsed the parliamentary candidacy of theGreen Party'sCaroline Lucas.[55] In the election he also endorsed the Green Party as a whole.[56] In August 2015, Monbiot endorsedJeremy Corbyn'scampaign in theLabour Party leadership election.[57] In April 2017, he announced his intention to vote for the Labour Party in the2017 general election.[58][59][60] In August 2021, he endorsedTamsin Omond andAmelia Womack in the2021 Green Party of England and Wales leadership election.[61]
Monbiot, who has warned that Britain is at risk of becoming afailed state,[62] is a supporter ofScottish independence,Welsh independence andIrish reunification.[63] On 11 February 2021, whilst onBBC Two'sPolitics Live, he said, "If I lived in Scotland, I'd want to get out of this corrupt, dysfunctional, chaotic union as quickly as possible. And the same applies to Wales, the same applies to Northern Ireland. I can't see the point of staying in the United Kingdom, of being chained to the United Kingdom like a block of concrete, as the boat begins to founder."[64][65]
Monbiot has criticised linguist and political activistNoam Chomsky, arguing on Twitter in November 2017 that "Part of the problem is that a kind of cult has developed around Noam Chomsky andJohn Pilger, which cannot believe they could ever be wrong, and produces ever more elaborate conspiracy theories to justify their mistakes."[66]
Monbiot offered public support to protest groupPalestine Action when the UK government was considering proscribing it as a terrorist organisation in June 2025[67].
Monbiot once expressed deep antipathy to thenuclear industry.[68] He then rejected his later neutral position regarding nuclear power in March 2011. Although he "still loathe[s] the liars who run the nuclear industry",[69] Monbiot now advocates its use, having been convinced of its relative safety by what he considers the limited effects of the2011 Japan tsunami on nuclear reactors in the region.[69] Subsequently, he has harshly condemned theanti-nuclear movement, writing that it "has misled the world about the impacts of radiation on human health ... made [claims] ungrounded in science, unsupportable when challenged and wildly wrong." He singled outHelen Caldicott for, he wrote, making unsourced and inaccurate claims, dismissing contrary evidence as part of a cover-up, and overstating the death toll from theChernobyl disaster by a factor of more than 140.[70]
In October 2013 Monbiot criticised the selection of ageneration III reactor design for theHinkley Point C nuclear power station due tocost as well as for a half century requirement ofuranium mining andtransuranic waste production; he contrasted this with twogeneration IV reactor concepts: "ifintegral fast reactors were deployed, the UK's stockpile of nuclear waste could be used to generate enough low-carbon energy to meet all UK demand for 500 years. These reactors would keep recycling the waste until hardly any remained: solving three huge problems – energy supply, nuclear waste and climate change – at once.Thorium reactors use an element that's already extracted in large quantities as an unwanted byproduct of other mining industries. They recycle their own waste, leaving almost nothing behind."[71] (cf.similar comments by James Hansen)
Monbiot's weekly column forThe Guardian has covered a variety of issues, concentrating on political philosophy in relation to ecological and social problems, particularly in the United Kingdom.[72]
Monbiot's first book wasPoisoned Arrows (1989), concerning the partiallyWorld Bank-fundedtransmigration program on the peoples and tribes ofWest Papua. It was followed byAmazon Watershed (1991), which documents the expulsions of Brazilian peasant farmers from their land. His third book,No Man's Land: An Investigative Journey Through Kenya and Tanzania (1994), documented the seizure of land and cattle fromnomadic people in Kenya andTanzania.
In 2000, he publishedCaptive State: The Corporate Takeover of Britain in which Monbiot argues that corporate power in the United Kingdom is a serious threat to democracy. His fifth book,The Age of Consent: A Manifesto for a New World Order, was published in 2003. The book is an attempt to set out a positive manifesto for change for theglobal justice movement.[73]
Monbiot's next book,Heat: How to Stop the Planet Burning, published in 2006, focused on the issue ofclimate change.Feral: Searching for Enchantment on the Frontiers of Rewilding was published in 2013, and focuses on the concept ofrewilding the planet. In the book, Monbiot criticisessheep farming.[74] The book received favourable reviews inThe Spectator[75] andThe Daily Telegraph.[74] It won theSociety of Biology Book Award for general biology in 2014.[76] Monbiot's 2022 bookRegenesis focuses on theenvironmental impact of agriculture andsustainable approaches.[77]
In 2024,The Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism (& How It Came to Control Your Life), by Monbiot and Peter Hutchison, an American documentary filmmaker and professor atNYUTisch School of the Arts,[78] was first a film[79][80][81] and then the book was derived and published.[82][83]
Monbiot has mostly lived inOxford, but for a few years from 2007 he lived in alow emissions house in the market town ofMachynlleth, Montgomeryshire, originally with his then-wife, writer and campaigner Angharad Penrhyn Jones, and their daughter.[84] His new partner lives in Oxford and Monbiot returned there by 2012.[85] The couple's daughter, Monbiot's second, was born in early 2012.[86] In December 2017, Monbiot was diagnosed withprostate cancer; he had surgery in March 2018.[87][88] In 2022, he moved to South Devon.[89]
In 1995,Nelson Mandela presented him with a United NationsGlobal 500 Award for outstanding environmental achievement.[90] He won theSir Peter Kent award 1991 prize for his bookAmazon Watershed. In November 2007, his bookHeat was awarded the Premio Mazotti, an Italian book prize, but he was denied the money given with the prize because he chose not to travel to Venice to collect it in person, arguing that it was not a good enough reason to justify flying. In 2017, he was a recipient of theSEAL Environmental Journalism Award for his work atThe Guardian.[91]
In 2022, Monbiot was awardedThe Orwell Prize for Journalism.[92]
Tom Heap meets a man determined to rid the world of plastic and replace it with a biodegradable fungus.
| External videos | |
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 Neoliberalism, Climate Change, Migration: George Monbiot in conversation with Verso onYouTube |
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