To achieve this objective a new website, Hopenhagen, offers people the possibility to send Twitter-like messages about “What gives them hope for a better planet” in order to pressure world leaders to adopt a meaningful climate treaty in Copenhagen.

This initiative sounds pretty cool, especially as it tries to draw on how Obama created a meaningful/successful movement & grassroots campaign around the ideas of Hope and Change.

Few samples from Hopenhagen: ‘Willingness to change gives me hope’, ‘Sunshine gives me hope’, ‘Love gives me hope’, etc..

Is this powerful and meaningful? Here I see two key issues:

• The Hopenhagen campaign does not really help people connect the dots and clearly understand why December 2009 will be so critical for their future. Why fighting climate change is our biggest challenge ever? Fighting climate change as a global extraction is a very hard sell, it is still seen as very ‘far away’ or ‘incontrollable’ by many people. We need to help these people see how fighting climate change relates to their own lives and those of  their children. We need to connect climate change to what matters to people today and tomorrow. It could be health, job creation, their children’s future, etc.

• Also a key question: what will be needed the most in December, hope or leadership? During his campaign, Obama did not only represent change or hope, he represented the leadership American was desperately needing in very troubled economic times, as much as President Franklin Roosevelt was a leader through the Great Recession.

We will all need great leadership at Copenhagen in December to create a ‘climate of change’. From the EU or the US and of course from China and the other BRIC countries.

Any thoughts? By the way, here is my Hopenhagen post: Leadership gives me hope (that some kind of positive result will come out of COP15).