Date: Thu, 13 Feb 2003 10:52:42 +0100
From: Laura Fiocco <fiocco-AT-unical.it>
Subject: Re: AUT: RE: Research towards an anti-militarist project


Chris et al, 
you may be right that in the US "we still do not have anything on the level
of a sustained social movement(s)", but I whouldn't be so sure. A movement
is a process feeding itself by the inclusion of different contents of
different persons and groups, which feel they have some values, desire,
present and future expectations in common.
Vietnam's war became a catalizzatore ??? of the world movement in the 60's
because it became (product of the movement itself -hegemony) the
rappresentation of death against life, hate against love, authoritarism
against freedom, power (capital) against selfvalorisation.
Each person deals with those oppositions from the stand point of his own
life and position in the social context. This can be true also now, but the
social context has changed, so that we cannot expect that the movement will
be made by the same social forces that were present in the past. I think
that to find the new social forces we have to look at the "no global"
movement, including the new forces created by this specific war coalition,
such as the Arab American and Pakistani groups you refare to.

By the way, what doesn't help the movement(s) is to label the anti-war
movement as a "anti-war coalition". It is not a coalition (where does this
name come from?). My fiends and I are not a component of a coalition, we
are in the anti-war movement, Berlusconi governement is in a war coalition.
And it is not a simple problem of names. Giving names to things is part of
the strugle, it is a product of a process of hegemony making (common
sense-sense of life).
ciao laura



 



At 20.51 11/02/2003 -0600, you wrote:
>If the estimates of the anti-war marches so far are accurate (around
>375,000 in DC and 200,000 in San Francisco), then these demos are nearly
>as large as the 1969 DC anti-war marches during the Vietnam War, which
>were about 500,000 (larger if you combine both cities, but I do not know
>what went on in San Francisco during the 1969 DC demo.  That was at the
>peak of the anti-war movement, not at its beginning (or rather, in
>anticipation.)
>
>That is certainly significant and opposition is certainly much larger,
>on that level if not on one of general social upheaval, than during the
>first 3-4 years of the Vietnam War.  
>
>One difference, however, is the lack of a large mobilization of other
>sections of the population because by 1968 the mass struggles of the
>African American population had been going on for 14 years, with ebbs
>and peaks, but with tremendous impact, and the wave of wildcat strikes
>which would shake auto, steel, mining, telecommunications and other
>sectors had also begun by then (and was inextricably linked with the
>shift to the idea of Black Power, as well.)
>
>So while we should be aware of the very different level of protest in
>terms of demos (in part a legacy of the previous anti-war struggles, in
>part a question of the volume of information flowing around the planet
>quite rapidly), we still do not have anything on the level of a
>sustained social movement(s).
>
>Even so, there is a demonstration here in Chicago this weekend in the
>Indian/Pakistani community on the northside of the city in defense of
>immigrants being harassed by the state and maybe I will have a better
>feel for what really exists here in Chicago at that point, as the major
>liberal-left anti-war coalition is calling this one with some
>coordination with Arab American and Pakistani groups.
>
>If it is interesting, I will report on it to give people a sense of what
>is going on here.
>
>Cheers,
>Chris
>
>On Tue, 2003-02-11 at 08:38, Adrian Wilding wrote:
>> Taking up Chris^s idea of sharing information we could use in anti-war
>> leaflets, I wonder if any of you have information on the history of
>> political demonstrations in the US and UK in terms of sheer numbers. Am
>> I right in thinking that if Saturday^s London rally reaches 0.75
>> million, that it will be the largest ever political demonstration in the
>> UK? Does anyone have comparable measures for the US? Chomsky was
>> interviewed the other week saying that the anti-war movement in the US
>> at the moment is considerably larger than at a comparable time during
>> the Vietnam War.
>> 
>> Ta
>> 
>> Adrian
>> 
>>  
>> 
>
>
>
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