[mobglob-discuss] Call to Action for the G8 Summit

[Garth Mullins]

Mac. Nice piece, I quite agree with your thesis that "summit hopping" is
strategically obsolete and elitist, and that we must have a strong presence at
Kananaskis itself.
However, the lack of coverage of dissent is not so much a media conspiracy as it is
a reflection of a broader political reality, a reflection that editors are happy to
facilitate.
Further, we should not feel the need to apologize for suggesting that both regional
events and a presence at the summit are appropriate.This is neither "radical
tourism" nor "summit hopping." Rather, a direct threat to our right to protest on a
certain geographic and political piece of landscape has been made, and we need to
answer to it with militancy and numbers or face increasing repression.

Cheers, g

Macdonald Stainsby wrote:

> Call to Action for the G8 Summit.
> Macdonald Stainsby,
> External Relations,
> Douglas College Students Union
> (private opinion)
>
>     The upcoming meetings in Kananaskis, Alberta Canada -- meetings of the
> leaders of the G8 countries on June 26 and 27-- will prove to be something akin
> to a watershed moment in our young and advancing movement. Since the July 20,
> 2001 actions against the G8 meeting in Genoa, Italy that culminated in the
> murder of our fellow activist Carlo Guliani, the preparations by both local and
> international activist forces have been underway. The main organisers were and
> are stationed in Alberta: Calgary and Edmonton (with co-ordinating being done in
> and around Red Deer quite often). It should, of course, come as no major
> surprise that upon discussions with the activists in these cities I discovered
> that there was a steep drop off of participation immediately following the
> attacks of September 11 on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.
>
> What has followed in the terms of activism in general -- never even mind the
> "anti-globalisation" movement -- has been an unprecedented attack on civil
> liberties here in nice, peacekeeping Canada. Security Bills -- to ostensibly
> "fight terror"-- have been put through the legislature and now allow the
> government the latitude to label almost any dissenting actions as a form of
> terrorism. This, in concert with the new tack being used by the rulers of the
> world in how they deal with the "anti-globalisation" movement paint a radically
> different picture about how the upcoming demonstrations are to possibly pan out.
> Our global rulers have adopted a new approach to how they wish to stifle the
> rising awareness and opposition to their plunderous rule. While before the
> attacks of 9-11 the attempt was to mock, ridicule and occasionally insult the
> motives of our new activist consciousness, today the unwritten rule is to omit
> our very existence. The choice to simply not report on our activities more than
> necessary has been so consistent it would be a tremendous leap-of-faith for us
> to believe that it wasn't a conscious decision. A decision such as this does not
> come from rank and file journalists; to achieve this form of consensus it must
> come from higher up editorial orders, something that can be obtained only now
> that the daily independent national press has shrunk from hundreds of outlets to
> four in the last thirty years. This must be noted for us to be clear as to what
> is happening.
>
>  Unconvinced? I only make one reference for you -- March 16, 2002 saw a meeting
> of the EU in Barcelona, Spain that saw the opposition of five hundred thousand
> protesters. Let me use blunt numerals here: 500 000 people converged on the
> Spanish city and consciously linked their demonstration to the larger, first
> world resistance movement. It was not an action against the Spanish government
> but was pronouncedly "anti-globalisation" (and even anti-imperialist war). This
> was the single greatest victory our young movement has seen so far. Despite the
> Italian Carabinieri murder of Carlo, despite the scare tactics of the war on
> terror -- and despite the about face of the "popular" media in regards to our
> concerns for the environmental and social issues put at risk by the acronyms of
> death -- we had our largest convergence yet. It is a cause for great joy, pride
> and ever more optimism about our current situation, and our growing
> understanding of "connecting the dots" between war, globalisation and
> imperialism itself as a construct rather than a policy. However, the main lesson
> we can draw over here on the Pacific coast is simple: THE MEDIA MADE ALMOST NO
> MENTION OF THIS GREAT DAY. Surely this action was a major media story, but we
> heard not a peep more than what trickled through. Myself, I didn't know about
> this until an email was sent my way regarding the issue.
>
>  So what are we left with? Well, it is almost a year on from when we saw a white
> man in the First World get shot through the head for opposing the G8 in Genoa.
> It is now almost nine months since the world situation entered a period of deep
> right wing reaction where war has become "fashionable" and movies that come out
> of Hollywood regularly celebrate militarism and whitewash the true nature of
> imperialist wars in the still-colonised in all but name Third World. The silver
> lining in many parts of the First World is simply that these brutal realities
> have made great lessons that books could not. A lack of innocence now permeates
> our activities. In other words, the gift from the ugliness of reality is an
> understanding of just how ugly imperialism actually is. We now know a lot
> better, as a result of the tragedies in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania,
> how the rest of the world suffers. We are still here -- and in greater numbers
> in many cases-- despite the attacks on our rights, our movement in general and
> our right to speak our minds. We didn't run and hide because the governments
> imposing corporate take-overs allowed their police forces to kill one of our
> own. We remained despite the fact we were called "anti-American", people who
> thought the American people "deserved it", people who want a throw back to the
> days of Stalin, people who are "terrorists" and "terrorist lovers", etc. We
> heard the names and have remained convinced of the justice of our cause. Now
> here's the real catch. As we begin not to look for the carnival atmosphere any
> longer, but instead are trying to build a long term movement which can gain
> steam through community organising, building sustainable roots among the masses
> of the people -- we have begun to learn that activism does not take place only
> at these meetings of misleaders but on a day to day basis, in our
> neighbourhoods, our cafes and even our !gasp! shopping centres. The problem we
> face right now, in contradiction, is the immediate threat being posed to our
> movements via the wholly undemocratic (nay, anti-democratic) moves of the
> Canadian government at the upcoming G8 summit next month. We need to pay very
> close attention to how this is being played out, because it is now my contention
> that we need to organise -- more than ever before-- to get our people involved
> directly through further "summit hopping", despite the overall weakness and
> increasing isolationism of such as a tactic. It is often noted, and quite
> rightly, that the movement is talking about eliminating poverty and squalor both
> at home and abroad. This is in direct contradiction to the evolution of going
> from one city to the next, not being a direct part of society and being
> fortunate enough to be able to afford such ventures, be it in time or money
> spent. I am writing to make a call in precisely the opposite direction to our
> evolving strategy (however loose that is).
>
>  Kananaskis will not be seeing the Solidarity Village originally conceived as a
> site for protesters to converge near the conference. The province of Alberta and
> the Federal Government have harassed, intimidated and outright bribed the owners
> and keepers of the lands near the conference site that would have been able to
> accommodate a campground for protest. Thus, that village has begun attempting to
> put together the conceived protest site inside the City of Calgary itself. The
> City of Calgary is trying its best to make it impossible for any action in the
> city to place as well: There is no public right to demonstrate in the City of
> Calgary. The parks have been denied, even to the Alberta Federation of Labour --
> hardly the face of militant, violent activists -- as "political use of the
> parks". The terror bills I previously mentioned have given the state of Canada
> the self-appointed right to arrest anyone on charges of terrorism -- loosely
> defined though such a label is-- without charge, without a lawyer and without a
> phone call. It is more than obvious that these new abilities will be warmed up
> and used for the first time in Alberta. This coincides with the military
> presence -- over 5000 troops, nearly three times the total deployment in
> Afghanistan since the start of the campaign in that beleaguered nation-- who
> have been given the right to shoot to kill. It is highly unlikely (beyond
> highly, in point of fact) that this will be used in the Calgary area (it is
> designed for the mountain fortress of the so-called K Country), but the gauntlet
> to our collective rights has been dropped. In the myriad of attacks by the
> different levels of government to all the activist organisers throughout
> Alberta, a state of psychological terror has been employed against the
> population as much as it has the activists. The media of Calgary is constantly
> issuing thinly veiled threats to the public, most notably the small businesses--
> the mom and pop operations that often vacillate their support between government
> and protester in such situations. Statements about how there will be no Federal
> bailout (ala Quebec City over a year ago) for damages done "as a result of
> riots", but that you'd better go and get insurance. Activists who are trying to
> have small planning sessions are being chased out of cafeterias. I can say that
> I've never walked into a city more than a month before a planned action and
> found people acting nervous and suspicious when you ask questions about the
> radical organising community. Our great strengths have been to operate openly,
> honestly and non-hierarchically -- and that approach has most certainly been the
> main one used for over the last year in Alberta, without question-- but people
> are feeling the warm hand and boot of the capitalist state interfering with
> their work at every single level possible. Without proper co-ordination and
> communications being used in the Calgary area after the labour rally of the
> 23rd, there could be massive chaos. Another problem facing the situation is the
> amount of "diversity of tactics" spouters -- the people in our movement who use
> the phrase as a talisman to toss rocks and engage the police (now, the military)
> regardless of the majority of the demonstrators wishes or even the safety of all
> concerned. This demonstration is NOT QUEBEC CITY. There is not the safety, the
> ability to declare "red, yellow and green zones", nor is there going to be even
> a clearly defined space for protest of any sort-- much less for the adventurous
> of spirit but short of intellect.
>
>  With all of the above reasons, I hesitate but spit out the uncomfortable:
> activists who can do so, the job that needs to be done is to A) get more people
> available to the major demonstrations the "family day"  on the 23rd, but more
> importantly the events afterwards on the start of the summit itself. What needs
> to be done among the capable and experienced activists is serious co-ordination,
> boundary setting and over-all communications, otherwise what will take place
> could be a massive police action, attack a disorganised crowd and sparking
> "resistance" among the crowd itself, which can (and usually does) lead to
> scraps, fights and chaos within the ranks of the very demonstrators themselves.
> Considering, as it was explained to me by a Calgarian organiser herself,
> "thousands of people are coming, and the city can't stop it", it is also of
> great import that people who can travel- even as a simple attendee at the events
> as they unfold -- come out to protect our rights to simple protest, for as the
> saying goes, your rights are only as valuable and as effective as your ability
> to use them. Such actions from all levels of governance against simply the right
> to assemble politically are only countered by people assembling politically.
>
>     This demonstration will hopefully end the chapter in our movement where we
> think revolutionary tourism can win the day. We need to rethink and re-orient
> radically, with losing our initiative or our pro-activity. However, what needs
> to be done now is to help our committed activist brothers and sisters from
> Alberta avert a massive morale crushing defeat in the oil province. The federal
> government wants to crush our rights to continue to denounce and present
> alternatives to the corporate globalisation agenda. We need to answer their
> challenge first, before forsaking the game (as it is currently played) entirely.
> Come to Calgary, stand up for your rights while we have them.
>
> -------------------------------------------
> Macdonald Stainsby
> http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green
> http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international
> --
> In the contradiction lies the hope.
>                                      --Bertholt Brecht
>
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