Green Alliance is pleased to announce that Mike Davis will take up the post of CEO of the think tank Green Alliance on 23 September 2026.

Until last month, Mike led the investigative campaigning organisation Global Witness, where he spent 23 years, the last six as CEO, overseeing a major shift in strategy and innovation in its campaigning, focusing on climate justice globally.[1]

Mike succeeds Shaun Spiers OBE who led Green Alliance for eight years and Green Alliance’s deputy executive director Blanche Shackleton is the interim executive director until September.

Green Alliance continues to work across political parties on live UK issues. Among current work, it is focused on protecting the political mandate for climate action, fair energy pricing for consumers and businesses, securing a new peat free law, ensuring farmers are well supported to achieve food security and nature recovery, and pressing for the delayed Circular Economy Growth Plan to be published. [2]

Green Alliance’s chair Laura Sandys said:

“We are delighted Mike will be joining Green Alliance at such a pivotal moment.  We know that we will benefit from his leadership and commitment to climate, nature and resource efficiency, and his experience of working in complex political environments.  As we work to protect and grow cross party ambitions on climate and nature for the benefit everyone in the UK, in an increasingly complex political environment, his vast experience as a campaigner and strategist will be an enormous advantage.”

Mike Davis said:

“I’m excited and hugely honoured to be joining Green Alliance in September. I’ve always been a great admirer of the organisation’s distinct blend of policy credibility, political acumen and powerful partnerships and I really look forward to leading its talented team, working right at the heart of the country’s most crucial environmental debates.”

Notes

1. For over six years, until early May this year, Mike Davis led Global Witness, an investigative campaigning organisation that helps shift the balance of power from big polluting industries to the people on the frontlines of the climate emergency. During his time as CEO, he led a major shift in strategy, strengthened the organisation’s governance, substantially increased its annual income and oversaw a range of innovative new campaigns, including on the role of oil and gas in the war in Ukraine, the scramble for transition minerals and protection of environmental defenders around the world. Earlier in his career at Global Witness as a team leader, and then director of campaigns, Mike managed teams in Cambodia, Myanmar, China and London on issues including deforestation, conflict minerals, supply chain corruption, environmental standards and human rights.
2. Green Alliance is an independent think tank and charity focused on ambitious leadership for the environment. Since 1979, it has worked with the most influential leaders in business, NGOs and politics to accelerate political action and create transformative policy, working towards a vision for the UK where people and the environment thrive together.