Workers Solidarity Movement

ICTU general secretary David Begg condemned the anti-bin tax campaign. He did this at the same time that the state was jailing protesters and refusing to collect rubbish from thousands of households in Dublin.

The 'anti-globalisation' movement has sometimes been characterised as 'One No, many Yesses', meaning that while everyone disagrees with the way things are now they all have different ideas on what they would like to see replace the present state of affairs as well as on the tactics needed to get there. The World Social Forum, and the spread of social forums around the world, in some respects is a reaction to this. One of the ideas of this concept is to allow a space for dialogue for the different actors (trades unions, Non Government Organisation's, social movements etc) to try to hammer out some common ideas on how to reach the future society. However, the process has not been unproblematic and has led to controversies and to accusations that the structure and functioning of these bodies are undemocratic and unrepresentative of 'the new movement'.

The Grassroots Gathering is a weekend series of meetings and social events which brings together anti-authoritarian left wing activists. This summer saw the fifth one in two years and with over 165 people registering for this one (27th-29th June, Dublin) we can finally say that there is a movement of libertarian activists, a movement that has rejected hierarchical ways of organising. The previous Gathering had happened in Limerick in the middle of the fight against the war and suffered as a consequence.

On Sunday May 18th Argentineans went to the polls and elected Nestor Kirchner - widely considered a puppet of the former populist president Eduado Duhalde. Yet on December 19/20th 2001 Argentineans "churned through 3 presidents in a row" as thousands poured into the streets. Their slogan: "que se vayan todos" (everyone must go). Yet quite clearly "everyone", in the shape of an old school populist president, is back. This begs two questions. Firstly how did such a formidable protest/popular movement evolve, and secondly where is it now?

The fourth Grassroots Gathering happened at University of Limerick on the St. Patrick's bank holiday weekend. It was a glorious weekend of weather and once again I came away from the experience of meeting fellow activists with renewed vigour for the struggle. The Grassroots Network has succeeded in creating a space for non-hierarchical libertarian groups and individuals to gather and share information and conduct workshops on various tactics used.

In December protests were held at the EU summit in Copenhagen. Ian Lynch attended the demonstrations and tells Workers Solidarity a little about it.

Anarchists are not particularly interested in protesting against the evils of the world - we would prefer to abolish them! Political parties, of both left and right, are happy to make statements and mount ineffectual protests that are intended to achieve little more than a bigger profile for their own party. And when their party gets big enough they will sort out everything for us. That might be alright for those who merely want to change their rulers. It holds no appeal for anarchists who want to abolish the division of people into bosses and workers, rulers and ruled.

Globalise This! is one of the more important and informative books to come out of the Battle of Seattle. Published by Common Courage Press ("Our Goal is to turn pens into swords") the thrust of the book from the very beginning is towards the activist and 'the citizen' interested in doing something about what is wrong on this planet. As the blurb says "The WTO, World Bank and IMF must - and can - be stopped. This book tells us how."

Globalise This! - The Battle Against The WTO and Corporate Rule by Kevin Danaher and Roger Burback (Common Courage Press )

The publication of No Logo was perfectly, if unintentionally, timed. Just as the N30 demonstrations in Seattle made headlines around the world, No Logo arrived to explain some of the reasons for that movement. So although Naomi Klein has made it clear that she is not an 'official' spokesperson for the movement - that this movement has no official spokespeople - at a time when observers (and even some participants) wondered what was going on, No Logo provided some answers.

No Logo - by Naomi Klein (Flamingo Press, ~ €14/stg£8.99)

Amsterdam, Geneva, Cologne, Seattle, London, Washington, LA, Prague. What do these cities have in common? In the last four years they have been the site of a new phenomenon, the Global Protest. For decades, the organisations that manage capitalism have met to divvy up the world among themselves. For the first time, their role as dealers of poverty and misery has been exposed by thousands of angry protesters. The symbolic value of these protests cannot be under estimated. If only for a brief period of time, a few days here and there, people have come together to say 'Enough!'.