 The
collapse of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks in Cancun, Mexico
in September of 2003 was no doubt a great victory for the global justice
movement. While it is true to say that the failure to produce a deal at
Cancun was the result of a revolt inside the corridors of the Ministerial
by the G23 of developing nations (led by Brazil, India, China and South
Africa), there is no question that the protests outside on the street
also contributed directly to the fall of the WTO. This article will take
a closer look at the anti-globalisation/ global justice movement as it
mobilised in Cancun; explaining how the infrastructure of resistance was
set up, outlining the aims and objectives of the mobilisation, and evaluating
the impact of the various different forms of protest and direct action
on the general proceedings.
An unprecedented level of unity and common cause was achieved among almost
all the different strands of protesters on the streets. This unity paralleled
the endeavour of the developing nations inside the Ministerial who managed
to scuttle the plans of the US, the European Union, Japan and sundry allies,
stalling the implementation of the latest round of global trade liberalisation.
Outside on the streets, a Korean farmer committed suicide, reminding everyone
that the issues at stake were a matter of life and death. Later, the protesters
spectacularly tore down the fence and a series of impressive direct actions
were carried out. The WTO exited Cancun in disarray, and the protesters
danced in the streets in triumph, joined by official delegates from developing
countries and accredited NGOs (Non-Governmental Organisations) from inside
the Ministerial.
This surprising tactical convergence of uncomfortable allies produced
extraordinary results that have to be taken into strategic account for
future mobilisations.
So how did it happen?
They
make plans, we plan tactics
The stated aim of the mobilisation was to “De-rail the WTO”,
and while this was achieved beyond all expectations (surprising the protesters
themselves!) it needs to be asked - de-rail what exactly? What were the
WTO trying to achieve in Cancun and why was it urgent to de-rail those
plans? What was at stake in Cancun? What tactics could we deploy to put
a spanner in the works?
The 5th Ministerial at Cancun was the WTO’s latest attempt to cobble
together a constitution for the world that will supersede national and
local legislation, and empower transnational corporations to hold down
wages, monopolise markets, wipe out small farmers, and wreak havoc on
the environment. After a disastrous 3rd Meeting in Seattle in 1999, when
protesters famously blockaded the convention, the WTO scurried to the
faraway Kingdom of Doha in the wake of September 11th to try to revive
their fortunes. There they set down a blueprint for future global neo-liberal
plans. The guidelines set down in Doha (the Doha Round) were up for negotiation
in Cancun. These included a set of development issues that didn’t
appear on the table in Cancun, much to the chagrin of the G32, a developing
nations’ coalition led by Kenya.
The stakes were huge. The US, European and Japanese governments and the
big corporations were seeking a major liberalisation of services, agriculture
and intellectual property rights as well as bold new initiatives to copper
fasten control on investment, competition and government procurement.
Suffice to say, what was on the table was an attempt to lock the world
economies more tightly in a neo-liberal regime of privatisation and deregulation,
thus giving ever more control to transnational corporations.
In a script that seemed more out of a Star Wars movie than everyday life,
protesters were confronted with a challenge to bring down the most powerful
rulers in the world, the omnipotent corporations and their lackey armies.
What could be done? How could the neo-liberal empire be stopped?
From the protests at Seattle and elsewhere we learned how people’s
power can disrupt proceedings. By protesting, raising our collective voices
and blockading with our bodies, so we can disrupt the actual workings
of the Ministerial. If we are enough, and our tactics are creative and
daring, then we move from protest to resistance and we can affect change.
If we are few, we need to make alliances and find spaces where we can
make an impact. Ultimately, the Cancun mobilisation fell into the latter
category.
Puente a Cancun,
or building a bridge without supports.
A group of us based in Chiapas, Mexico (Mexican, US and Irish nationals)
moved to Cancun five months beforehand to set up a solidarity space for
the mobilisation. The aim of our group (Puente a Cancun - Bridge to Cancun)
was to support the logistical effort on the ground and provide information
and orientation for people arriving from other parts of Mexico, the US,
and we hoped, all over the world. The situation on the ground we met with
was a shock - there was little local infrastructure with which to hook
into. A new city of 600,000 inhabitants, Cancun was completely geared
towards the tourist industry and its spin-offs, and appeared to have no
community organisations, workers groups, social movements or activist
base.
The Cancun Welcoming Committee, the local group supposedly organising
the protests involved a handful of NGO types and environmentalists, whose
mobilising capacity never seemed to rise above… a dozen. A little
investigation by La Jornada, Mexico’s left-wing daily, revealed
that the Committee was an opportunistic front for some local PRD (opposition
party) politicos to make a name for themselves (and maybe a few dollars)
by hopping on the anti-globalisation bandwagon. These suspicions were
confirmed when the Committee closed the gates of its offices in late August
to activists and only ‘welcomed’ press and a few well-endowed
NGO figures. As D-day approached, the Welcoming Committee, (riven by splits
and now consisting of maybe a half dozen operatives) had ceased to be
a main player and was ignored by most protesters. Ironically, preparations
for the Cancun mobilisation were made autonomously of the ‘official’
local organising body. The lesson to take away? Sometimes our movement
of movements can be hijacked by bandwagon shysters. Beware opportunists!
From early on, things were looking bad on the ground in Cancun. Several
meetings in our new Puente space broke up with ugly altercations between
rival personalities within the Welcoming Committee as various insults
as well as accusations of infiltration were thrown around. It became clear
that if the organisation was left to this lot, it would be a disaster.
Were there infiltrators involved? Yes, probably. This is inevitable in
mobilisations like this with so much at stake for the authorities. But
sometimes it’s hard to distinguish infiltrators and provocateurs
from wing-nuts or hot-heads.
In Cancun accusations flew, and it was damaging to the early organisational
efforts. We had no mechanism to deal with suspicion or infiltration; people
severed, broke up and worked independently. Since the mobilising effort
was transparent and our aims and intentions public, there seemed no fundamental
damage an infiltrator could wreak. More blatantly however, both the Welcoming
Committee offices and the Puente a Cancun house were under surveillance
from security forces. Some slick thieves broke into our house and carried
off a lap-top computer and some bits and pieces. Cops? Maybe.
So right up to the very cusp of the Ministerial, some three weeks beforehand,
we still didn’t have the infrastructure for the expected 20,000
protesters nailed down. We needed a large convergence space for meetings,
an alternative forum site, camping facilities with a water supply and
toilets, a media centre, a medical centre, legal help. We had nothing;
the organisation on the ground resembled a big black hole.
The local Cancun municipal government dragged their feet negotiating with
the Welcoming Committee as even they realised that the Welcoming Committee
didn’t represent the arriving protesters. Adding to the confusion,
the local mayor began concurrent negotiations with representatives from
the farmers’ organisation Via Campesina. This organisation promised
to bring 10,000 militants for the campesino march (September 10th). They
had already had a quarrel with the Mexico City NGOs and their name was
not popular in Chiapas with the Zapatistas, where our sympathies lay.
Nevertheless, sectarianism aside, we were in this together, so alliances
had to be formed. Meanwhile, students and anarchists from Mexico City
threatened to ignore all the official negotiations for space and camping
and go ahead and squat the city centre when they arrived.
But eventually things came together: a small group of experienced and
disciplined cadre arrived and together with the group formed around Puente
a Cancun, made things happen. Some money came from a rich donor and activists
dug deep in their pockets. A big convergence space, a media centre and
a medical house were rented, camping facilities were nailed down in the
local sports centre free of charge from the Mayor’s office, and
a city park was booked for the duration of the protest actions - for camping,
political and social events.
Just a few days before the Ministerial, the infrastructure was secured,
and now all that was needed was the arriving multitude to fill up the
space. Would there be sufficient space for the expected 20,000 arrivals?
We
are everywhere (but sometimes not that many of us)
The 20,000 never came. Maybe a quarter of that made it. The massive caravans
from Mexico City never materialised, nor the mass nationwide student mobilisation,
nor the 10,000 campesinos from Via Campesina, nor the Zapatistas, nor
the thousands expected from the US and Canada and Europe.  Instead
we got modest numbers of all of the above. None of the expected popular
Mexican bands turned up, and few of the luminaries of the anti-globalisation
movement came - not even stalwarts like José Bové, Arundhati
Roy, Michael Franti or Manu Chao. Why did the mobilisation not attract
a big turnout?
Primarily, there was the financial expense involved - Cancun is an expensive
place to reach. But also we should take into account the uninspiring logistical
organisation on the ground from early on, that resulted in a general lack
of confidence that the whole thing could be pulled off. Furthermore, there
was the conflict in Mexico City causing a split between the more NGO types
and the campesino/activist grouping. The long silence from Chiapas did
not help, as we expected the Zapatistas to put out a call to mobilise,
and send a delegation. Neither was forthcoming. The icing on the cake
was some US NGOs putting out the word to the activist community NOT to
travel to Cancun, but to concentrate on local organising, specifically,
against the FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas) Summit in Miami in
November.
Meanwhile, the Mexican authorities were busy trying to dissuade people
from coming. Byzantine visa requirements foiled many Central and South
Americans. For those who could make it, memories of the vicious beating
of protesters at the hands of the riot cops at the World Economic Forum
(WEF) in Cancun in 2001 lead to a real fear of police brutality, injury
or even death. The less than generous human rights record of the Mexican
security forces (including the massacres at Acteal and Aguas Blancas)
were not forgotten. Local police forces boasted in the press that they
were ready to ‘trade an eye for an eye’ with protesters, and
rumours circulated that the local bullring was being prepared as a gulag
for activists. It was an almost foregone conclusion that thousands would
be rounded up, security forces would be out of control and that we would
be lucky to get out of the tourist Mecca in one piece. Predictably, as
the opening day of the Ministerial approached, the climate of intimidation
increased.
Despite all this, spirits were ebullient as the few thousand protesters
- farmers, activists, students and a handful of locals - mustered in Cancun
City. An unsettling sense of the morbid pervaded the proceedings as if
the anti-globalisation movement was here to attend its own funeral. Critics
had argued that this Ministerial could be the graveyard of the WTO, but
now the gravediggers appeared to be dressed in riot gear as they trundled
around in armoured vehicles.
Soccer in a Time of Global Crisis
Let us employ the metaphor of a game of soccer to describe the situation
on the ground in the week preceding the Ministerial. Our team, Anti-Globalisation
United, were trailing badly. The hostile environment of Cancun was an
away game - 1-0 down already. Our weak defence, the Welcoming Committee
let in an early goal - that’s 2-0 to the WTO. Half our team not
turning up to play, low numbers - that’s another goal conceded,
3-0.
However, hard work on our side to organise the Huracan Alternative Media
Convergence attended by hundreds of people participating in workshops
on subjects ranging from radio transmitter construction to the history
of Indymedia, brings us an opener. That’s 3-1. The construction
of a small model ecological village at the camping ground by green-bloc
activists put us on the attack again. Our autonomous media-bloc flyered
the local communities and made a few creative radio slots for local stations
conveying our positive and constructive vision - putting home a goal for
the Anti-Globalisation side, 3-2. The WTO were rattled and brought out
the heavy artillery, flooding Cancun with cops, and putting fear into
the heart of the Anti-Globalisation attackers. A heavy fence was erected
around the venue, allowing the security forces to score another goal for
the WTO - 4-2. But Anti-Globalisation United rallied and snuck a naughty
one in with players taking to the beach in the forbidden Red Zone and
spelling out “No WTO” with their naked bodies. The local media
loved it! 4-3! Then as Anti-Globalisation United gathered for a big strike
- the opening campesino march, the soccer game got cancelled as greater
forces invaded the pitch. The Koreans had arrived and things got deadly
serious. Game over
.
WTO
Kills Farmers - “Todos Somos Lee”
From Korea had come 200 small farmers and trade unionists. This group
knew how to demonstrate and had a lot of experience of militant resistance
and hard struggle. All of them embraced radical direct action as a way
of protesting against the WTO, and all were prepared to physically combat
the riot cops. But none of them expected the individual action of one
of their number, Lee Kyung Hae.
On September 10th, as the campesino march reached the barricade, Lee climbed
up on the fence separating the protesters and the WTO, seven kilometres
from the Convention Centre and there, at a point called kilometre zero,
committed suicide by plunging a knife into his heart. Everything changed,
changed utterly, and suddenly the gravity of what the protests were all
about became stark. So too the business behind the fence. Before falling,
Lee held up a placard - “WTO Kills Farmers”, and led the chant,
“Down Down WTO.”
What impact did Lee’s sacrifice have on the WTO and the protests?
“The sacrifice by Lee marked the difference,” said Mario Menéndez,
editor of a local newspaper, “When he died, the WTO died with him:
we called it the symbolic death of the oppressors.”
Lee’s death also had an enormously radicalising effect among those
who had come to protest. The world turned upside down. The scattered militancy
of the first mobilisation evolved over the next few days into a more coherent
tactical unity. Militancy inspires more radical politics. The obvious
affinity between the Korean and Mexican farmers was augmented by the participation
of sundry direct action groups, anarchists, black bloc-ers, students from
Mexico City and a motley variety of others. The whole was infused with
a moral authority engendered by the power of Lee’s ultimate sacrifice.
Strengthened by the emotional unity born of the shared grief, the demonstrators
were inspired not only by his death but also by its symbolic register
of the millions of deaths which his gesture evoked: “Todos somos
Lee.”
All week long, hundreds of hours had been invested in meetings to determine
what exactly we would try to achieve here. The ‘Day of Direct Action’,
September 9th, produced a day of almost no action. The internationals
had concocted a daring plan for shutting down the WTO, but nobody was
willing to actually put themselves out to do it. The Mexico City students,
the supposed ‘direct action’ crew, politely refused the role
of fall-guys for the internationals’ plan, saying “their plan
is effective, but it’s not ours…” The failure to do
anything on the ‘Day of Direct Action’, the disunity and bad
feelings left from the breakdown in communication among the protesters,
became moot as almost everyone unified behind the Korean delegation in
an unscripted but singular objective: to destroy the fence.
As a motley crew of militants, led by the Koreans, tore down the fence
and attacked police lines with sticks, bricks, appropriated police batons
and not a few well aimed karate kicks, why did the security forces not
respond? They kept their line, ten deep, and the water cannon remained
idle. Gas was not fired, nor rubber bullets - nothing. The cop lines took
a pasting all afternoon and responded only by swinging batons and chucking
rocks back.
Probably the word came from above for no more blood to be spilt. Lee’s
action rattled the Mexican authorities and the WTO officials. From here
on in, it was going to be kid gloves with the protesters. In this sense,
Lee’s sacrifice also saved countless arrests and injuries. Over
the next few days a variety of daring, creative and provocative actions
took place and the sum total of arrests and serious injuries remained
zero.
Protesters
on a Move: We are Winning
The next day, a rambunctious ‘cacerolazo’ of 1,000 people
snaked its way across downtown Cancun. Some black bloc-ers took advantage
of the event to smash up a Pizza Hut, causing the usual immediate arguments
in the ranks about property destruction. When the police responded by
sending hundreds of riot cops to the vicinity, a sense of unity amongst
the marchers was re-established. Emboldened protesters were not intimidated
and the police dispersed, allowing the dance to continue into the wee
hours under the warm tropical sky.
The following day showed a great increase in activity. An audacious early
morning banner drop in front of the Convention Centre demanded “Que
se vayan todos!” - “They ALL must go!”, a slogan from
the Argentina uprising. Inside the Ministerial, accredited NGOs continued
to disrupt proceedings and an African delegation led by Kenya was threatening
revolt. A WTO spokesperson held a press conference during which he intimated
that the Ministerial Conference was almost unsalvageable. That evening
about 100 demonstrators posing as tourists infiltrated the Red Zone and
blocked the road in front of the WTO Convention Centre. The front line
locked arms and sat facing traffic while the rest sang and danced behind
them, reclaiming the real sense of the place, the so-called Party Zone.
This very effective action demonstrated our ability to breach police lines
and cause more than just symbolic disruption. Some WTO delegates and NGOs
came out to applaud the action.
Though pressure increased from police throughout the action, the kid gloves
strategy remained - demonstrators managed to negotiate an exit from the
blockade in which they were provided with luxury buses that carried them
to kilometre zero and a festive welcome from the Koreans and mourners
at the memorial site for Mr Lee.
Tactically astute as ever, groups of Koreans would intermittently (and
throughout the night) arise from their mourning rituals at the kilometre
zero site, to go off and attack the fence. This mischievousness kept the
cops on their feet, uncertain, confused, and probably well intimidated
by these determined Korean cadre kicking and beating the fence at regular
intervals.
That same day 400 people reclaimed an abandoned building downtown. Several
dozen riot police gathered nearby. However the mood remained festive and
non-confrontational. Traditional music was played and free food served.
By the time of the big march, The ‘Global Day of Action’ against
the WTO, September 13th, we were brimming with confidence and knew the
WTO was on the rack. The local media had moved over somewhat to our side
and the local people began to come out. The Korean delegation led the
10,000 demonstrators to the reinforced eight foot fence the police had
erected to replace the one dismantled on the 10th. A far more formidable
blockade, it was actually three fences, one behind the other. Everyone
was united and clear in the aim of this protest - to destroy that fence.
We went about our work gleefully. First up, a couple of hundred women
amassed along the long barricade and set about it with many bolt cutters.
Next, heavy ropes were attached, and through a great communal effort of
hundreds of disciplined and spirited activists, the fence was pulled to
the ground. The atmosphere was otherworldly as the mammoth structure began
to buckle and sway, and a great collective “oh my god, we’re
really fucking doing it!” gripped the crowd. The fence torn asunder,
lines of riot cops edgily filled in the gaping holes, batons drawn. What
now?
In an unorthodox but tactically brilliant move, the protesters surprised
all by turning their backs and sitting down. We had achieved our aims.
Another battle with the cops would be counter-productive. A ceremony was
held for Comrade Lee and then the electrifying news was announced in Korean,
Spanish and English that not only had a group of Koreans made it into
the Convention Centre but also that the G21 had declared their refusal
to support the proposal of the USA and the EU. We are winning!
Lessons from
Cancun
I learned that nobody respects someone who negotiates with his head bowed.
Nobody respects anyone who negotiates as a lackey. With our heads lifted,
defending our self-interest, we shall be able to grow and open extraordinary
spaces…”
President Lula da Silva of Brazil, September 16th speech about the collapse
of the WTO Meeting in Cancun.
“The derailing of trade agreements at Cancun was crucial for us.
Though our governments try and take the credit, we know that it was the
result of years of struggle by many millions of people in many, many countries.
What Cancun taught us is that in order to inflict real damage and force
radical change, it is vital for local resistance movements to make international
alliances. From Cancun we learned the importance of globalising resistance…
Radical change will not be negotiated by governments; it can only be enforced
by people.”
Arundhati Roy, World Social Forum, Mumbai, January 24th 2004.
And that is the lesson of Cancun. The summit mobilisations are the tip
of the iceberg, representing the ant work that has been done beforehand,
with each and every local struggle contested at community, municipal or
city level. The sum of all these struggles leads to a critical mass of
resistance where even the national governments must take heed, and the
combined pressure of all these little struggles comes to bear on these
global summits.
What do we marching in the streets have in common with strange bedfellows
like the G21? There is no common ground between anti-capitalists and the
ruling class cut-throats of countries like China, Colombia, Nigeria, Pakistan,
or Guatemala. The dissenting delegations of the G21 were no doubt the
product of many years of pressure exerted by the anti-globalisation movement.
India, for example, joined the G21 because the struggle waged by its massive
farmers’ movement, which uses suicide and the mass destruction of
GM crops as tactics, was simply greater than the pressure coming from
Washington.
With peoples’ movements marching in the city center and NGOs demonstrating
hourly inside and outside the convention hall from the opening session
on, Cancun, as Walden Bello pointed out, became a microcosm of the power
of global dynamics of states and civil society. The collapse of the Ministerial
was a confirmation, not of the democratic nature of the WTO, nor of the
faith we hold in our government representatives, but that global civil
society is emerging as the worlds second superpower.
And as if to reinforce the notion of civil society (or the global justice
movement) as an emerging global player, the final act of the day of global
action against the WTO was the burning of a US flag. This action symbolized
the shift of focus of struggle of the movement from global neo-liberal
institutions to once more confronting the US war machine and its aspiration
for empire.
The United
Colours of Resistance and the Global Mob
But let’s not get carried away as to the extent of the success at
Cancun. As a Korean delegate said, “This was a victory that was
handed to us, not won by our strength…” The impact of Lee’s
extraordinary action cannot be underestimated, but nor can suicide enter
the movement’s repertoire of tactical deployments. So what can we
take from Cancun, as an inspiration for future mobilisations and for the
movement in general?
Let us remember September 13th 2003 at the fortified metal fence that
excluded the protesters from reaching the WTO Convention Centre. Let us
remember how many hands helped to weave dozens of little ropes into a
half dozen 50-metre boa-constrictor-like super-ropes. And as that sturdy
rigging was carried to the fence, let us remember the autonomous action
by the groups of women who went ahead with bolt cutters to set about dismantling
the fence. Confronting the lines of riot police, the women succeeded in
weakening the fortification enough so that when the huge ropes were attached,
already the fence was buckled.
Let us remember that while it was the Korean delegation who led the direct
action, it was the anarchist contingent who protected their flanks, armed
with sticks and their bodies to repel any pre-emptive police charge. And
as the musicians played and the drummers beat out liberating rhythms,
and as the majestic puppet of Chac the Mayan God guarded over our actions,
let us remember and cherish a very beautiful few hours as hundreds of
people, egged on by thousands of others, pulled on the ropes to tear down
the mighty fence. It was like a vision from a fanciful Sub-Commandante
Marcos communiqué as the brown, yellow, black and white arms heaved
in harmony, the sweat running down people’s faces, this hard labour
made light by the unity of men and women, young and old, and piece by
piece the great odious fence was dismantled by the united colours of resistance.
Farmers from Korea and punks from Mexico City, fishermen from the Yucatan
and AIDS activists from South Africa, indigenous from Oaxaca and media
workers from Japan, NGOs from the USA and anarchists from Europe, campesinos
from Honduras
and land squatters from Brazil, all united in one act of creative destruction.
A few ex-guerrillas from Central America, a few Zapatistas, a few Marxists,
some students, some hooligans, and many, many everyday people - the guy
in the photocopy centre, the labourer on the hotel site, the waiter in
the pizzeria, the lady selling ‘tortas’ in the market, the
artisan vendor, the sex worker - all united, all heaving on that sturdy
boa constrictor of a rope to pull down that fucking fence and announcing
- Behold the global mob, the new communists, the old masses, the future
inheritors of the earth, the revolutionary class… and the other
world that is now possible.
On a sunny day in Cancun, we saw walls come crashing down.
By Ramor
Ryan/ Writers Bloc
Resources
and Further Reading
‘Cancun: The
Collapse of the Neo-Liberal Offensive’ by Immanuel Wallerstein (October,
2003)
‘WTO Collapses in Cancun: Autopsy of a Fiasco Foretold’ by
John Ross, www.counterpunch.org
‘Poor Countries Set a Precedent for How to Beat Impositions by the
Wealthy Countries’ by Al Giordano, www.narconews.com/Issue31/article872.html
‘Victory in Cancun’ by Kevin Danaher, September 18th 2003,
www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/wto/1062.html
‘Postcard from Cancun’ by Christian Parenti
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