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Observer Ethical Awards 2015: nominees for campaigner of the year

This article is more than 8 years old

This category recognises the public-facing campaigner who has made the biggest difference to Observer readers and put ethical issues on the global agenda. Who in our top ten do you think should be campaigner of the year?

Mark Berry

Mark Berry
Mark Berry

Mark Berry, more famously known as Bez, the legendary dancer from Happy Mondays and ‘Celebrity Big Brother’ winner, grew up in Salford and recently felt compelled to take action in support the problems that local people are facing, and campaign for change. Bez decided to use his position within the glare of the media spotlight for the greater good, and is now running The Reality Party, and running for office as an MP in Salford and Eccles (alongside his ongoing music career with Happy Mondays) and tending to his smallholding where he keeps bees, grows crops and practices sustainable living.

Shami Chakrabarti

Shami Chakrabarti
Shami Chakrabarti

From taking the security services to court for secret snooping and securing new inquests into the deaths at Deepcut barracks; to making significant inroads into modern slavery and questioning unsafe and unfair counter-terrorISM policy, it has been a challenging year. In addition, Shami also published her first book, On Liberty.

Leonardo DiCaprio

Leonardo DiCaprio
Leonardo DiCaprio Photograph: Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP

At times over the last decade, the actor has been a lonely Hollywood voice raising environmental issues onscreen (11th hour) and off. A credible climate campaigner, his presence arguably forced climate change on to a fickle news agenda at the New York climate summit. “I pretend for a living, but you do not,” he told assorted leaders. “Now it’s your turn.”

Bianca Jagger

Bianca Jagger and Mauricio Ruiz planting a tree at Tingua Bocaina Biodiversity Corridor, Brazil.
Bianca Jagger and Mauricio Ruiz planting a tree at Tingua Bocaina Biodiversity Corridor, Brazil.

Bianca Jagger has been a tireless campaigner for human rights, social justice and environmental protection throughout the world for over three decades. In 2005 she set up the Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation to be a voice for the most vulnerable. She is deeply committed to the abolition of the death penalty as Council of Europe Goodwill Ambassador. Currently she is at forefront of the Bonn Challenge, the largest restoration and reforestation initiative in the world. Bianca Jagger is a staunch defender of children’s, women’s and indigenous people’s rights. She supports fossil fuel divestment and renewable energy investment, and campaigns against fracking. She writes for the Huffington Post and is on Twitter - @BiancaJagger.

Naomi Klein

Naomi Klein Photograph: Kourosh Keshiri

Naomi Klein took climate beyond the choir with This Changes Everything, her international bestseller arguing that the climate crisis is an urgent call to build a more just economic system. From mainstream news to frontline movements, Naomi’s hopeful vision for system change is inspiring big debates and bold new alliances.

Lewis Pugh

Lewis Pugh
Lewis Pugh

Endurance swimmer Lewis Pugh campaigns tirelessly for the creation of Marine Protected Areas. Most recently he put his life on the line with a series of swims in Antarctica, and is now working to break the political deadlock preventing the creation of the world’s biggest marine protection area in the Ross Sea. His endeavours have already captured the hearts of the Russian public leading him to coin the term speedo diplomacy.

Mary Robinson

Mary Robinson

The former President of Ireland (and the first woman) and a former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson has spent most of her life as a human rights advocate. Appointed by Ban Ki-moon in July 2014 as the UN’s Special Envoy for Climate Change she has said, “I follow the science very closely. We have very little time left. We are the last generation to be able to do something about climate, and the first generation to understand how serious it is.”

Boyan Slat

Boyan Slat

Despite his youth, Boyan Slat has put the plastic pollution problem firmly on the agenda and managed to engender global support for a cleanup. Boyan founded The Ocean Cleanup to develop technology for removing marine plastic. The “passive” system utilizes marine currents to concentrate plastic, is substantially more efficient than available alternatives and is suitable for widespread deployment. Recipient of the UN’s highest environmental award, voted one of the Most Promising Young Entrepreneurs Worldwide.

Carry Somers and Orsola de Castro

Carry Somers and Orsola de Castro

Inspired to act after the Rana Plaza disaster, two sustainable fashion business women, Carry and Orsola have built Fashion Revolution into a global coalition calling for systemic reform of the fashion supply chain. Now in 68 countries, Fashion Revolution is using the power of fashion to create permanent change in the industry #whomademyclothes?

Emma Watson

Emma Watson Photograph: Xinhua News Agency/REX

Many A-listers take up ambassadorial roles involving global development but few make a mark like Emma Watson. She used her inaugural speech as a UN Global Goodwill Ambassador for the UN in September 2014 to make an impressive speech on gender equality, launching HeForShe. Previously Emma has mixed substance with style, contributing ethical fashion collections for Fairtrade brand, People Tree. Seasoned activists reckon there is plenty more to come.

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