A revolt to live: post-structuralist anarchist resistance against the G8.(Group of Eight )

Publication: Anarchist Studies

Publication Date: 09/22/2006

Author: Farrer, Linden

COPYRIGHT 2006 Lawrence & Wishart Ltd.

ABSTRACT

In the summer of 2005 the Group of Eight most industrialised nations (G8) held their annual summit, this time at the luxurious Gleneagles Hotel in Scotland. Despite a concerted public relations offensive aimed at persuading people that the Summit was about helping the poorest in the world, this meeting was met by resistance from a broad range of protesters, just as previous meetings had been for almost a decade. This paper argues that an ethnographic approach offers a suitable means for understanding a movement (or 'movement of movements') that is often perceived in network terms. It then gives an ethnographic overview of how activists at a set of convergence (meeting) spaces organised themselves, and what their motivations were for being there. It ends by arguing that the anti-globalisation movement has two broad divides, with one side being well connected to the state and political parties, and the other being socially experimental in terms of its culture, and characterisable as a form of post-structuralist anarchism.

1 ANTHROPOLOGY, GLOBALISATION, AND RESEARCH ON GLOBALLY NETWORKED MOVEMENTS

1.1 Overview

Anthropology from its inception attempted to understand cultures from the perspective of the 'native', and generally carried out its work to uncover the cultures and social systems of 'exotic and distant peoples'. Yet a plurality of developments going under the title 'globalisation' have increasingly put a strain on anthropological theory that sometimes lapsed into treating cultures as bounded, unchanging and pristine. Whereas in the past, the native might have been considered as 'settled persons whose lives could be conceptualized in terms of cultural wholes of shared values and meaning, unfolding within a closely linked web of integrated social relations' (Olwig, 1997:18), anthropologists now argue that the notion of the native is 'anthropological imagination' (Appadurai, 1988:39) and that the entire world should be viewed as one global space in a state of flow (Gupta and Ferguson, 1992).

Two issues have been raised by the increasingly apparent processes of globalisation. Firstly, the development of theory that seeks new perspectives from which to view these processes and examination of what the plurality of seemingly valid perspectives might actually reveal. Secondly, in response to the difficulties posed by theory that increasingly gives emphasis to the transient, interconnectedness and complexity of social life, a search for methodologies suited to such emphases. These issues are at their most salient when conducting research on cultures that appear ungrounded and unbounded, and it is to one such movement (or movements)--the so-called anti-globalisation movement--on which this study concentrates.

1.2 Globalisation and Social Movement Theory

It is possible that the anthropological coming-to-terms with processes of change and the permeability of 'bounded' social and cultural entities may have occurred as part of the natural development within the discipline. (1) Yet it has undoubtedly been catalysed by processes such as the deregulation of capital movements, the development of new means of transport, new and increased patterns of migration, and the rapid development of information communication technologies (ICT). Whilst these processes are by no means new, they are marked by an 'intensification of world-wide social relations that link distinct localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa' (Giddens 1990:64, quoted by Cheater, 1995:124), and 'have made us aware of the fact that the principle dynamics of culture and economy have been significantly altered by unprecedented global processes' (Escobar, 2001:141). Despite this, there are no single features that are the most striking about globalisation: what may be striking to a person in one part of the world or to one set of social circumstances may not even be applicable to another somewhere else.

Increasing awareness of the acceleration of processes of change has placed pressure on social science to seek alternative perspectives from which to conceptualise research. While it might have been possible in the past to push to the periphery questions regarding the changing nature of the field when studying social movements that were seemingly rooted in place, now even the most 'localised' movement must be posited within a global system. Difficulties are most prominent when attempting to conceptualise movements that do not appear to be rooted in any particular locality, and instead appear--or claim--to be rooted globally. For example, the anti-globalisation movement encompasses groups, networks and individuals as varied as the Movimento Sem Terra (a Brazilian rural workers movement carrying out land reform), indigenous anti-mining activists in Papua New Guinea, anti-sweatshop activists on US university campuses, and various anarchist, socialist and ecological activists throughout Europe. (2)

Researchers use new metaphors to describe the nature of these movements, some stating that 'webs' best convey the intricacy and precariousness of the various arrangements and ties established among movement participants, organisations and other actors in civil society (Alvarez et al, 1998:16), while others draw on the metaphor of the rhizome--'a subterranean plant growth process involving propagation through the horizontal development of the plant stem'--connecting autonomous groups engaged in all kinds of struggle that were previously disconnected and separate (Cleaver, 1999). Development of information technology in particular has allowed for the creation of what has been termed a 'global electronic fabric of struggle' consisting of global networks that 'leap over the barriers of isolation and bridge spatial distances' (Soyez, 2001:11), allowing movements to seek out ways to make their efforts complement those of others (Routledge, 2003; Cleaver, 1994 & 1995).

1.3 Network Perspectives Vs Ethnography

It is not surprising that the internet is now identified as a suitable field for research about the anti-globalisation movement: relatively inexpensive to many people in the world (though clearly inaccessible to others), participation in electronic communication networks has become an important component of the identities of those involved. One of the ways that activists involved keep in touch and up-to-date on issues of shared importance is through Independent Media Centres (IMCs). The now-common sight of Indymedia collective banners at demonstrations, IMC watermark logos on digital videos in circulation, and the 166 Indymedia sites (and collectives maintaining them) (3) point to the importance placed on the creation of an autonomous repertoire of news, knowledge and debate. Kahn and Kellner looked at such networks and groups in the run-up to the Iraq war and argued that the counter-hegemonic appeals of the internet facilitated the emergence of the anti-war and 'anti-capitalist' movements and is now 'an important domain of current political struggles that is creating the base and the basis for an unprecedented worldwide antiwar/pro-peace and social justice movement during a time of terrorism, war and intense political contestation' (Kahn & Kellner, 2005:80).

Despite this, treating the Internet as the primary field of research fails to take account of those who do not use or do not have access to it, brushes over the fact that most activists are not wired 'Matrix-like' into cyberspace 24 hours a day, and skims over the local, regional, international and global intersections of culture, history and economics that is obscured or even hidden by research solely utilising the internet. In addition, the fragmentary nature of these networks ensures that 'no individual, nor any one group, can competently grasp the whole in its particulars' (Cleaver, 1995), and even if they could, the materials available for analysis on the internet may not necessarily represent the debates, tensions and actions of those individuals or groups in the real world due to unequal powers of representation and voice. Indeed, despite the internet's undoubted importance and ability to help shape actors' identities and perceptions, power is in the last instance defined by social, economic, and political relationships that are played out in the real world (Ribeiro, 1998). Rather than searching for the 'essence' or 'characteristics' of movements on the internet, it should be seen as a tool for connection, triggering global political opportunities and acting as a resource by providing a crucial network base, rather than as the prime location for conducting research. As noted in regards to environmental direct actions and other anti-globalisation protests: 'It would be wrong to surmise, as the national media did, that these protests were solely triggered through online activity. Rather, pre-existing networks of activists used IT to mobilize a fast-expanding base of online potential activists' (Plows, 2004:111).

1.4 Conceptual Tools: The Plateau and Convergence Space

If the prime research focus for the anti-globalisation movement should not be the internet itself, (4) then what kinds of conceptual tools are available to help understand and research periods of activity in space from an ethnographic perspective?

Chesters and Welsh conceive of the global social movement against capitalism as a 'network of networks, with nodes consisting of social movement organisations, groups and occasionally individuals, expanding across an 'n' dimensional space' (Chesters & Welsh, 2002). Yet coterminous with this network, certain collective actions are conceived of as 'plateaus'--'moments of temporary but intensive network stabilisation where the rhizomatic substance of the movement(s)--groups, organisations, individuals, ideologies, cognitive frames--are made manifest in extended temporal and spatial contexts constituting an ecology of action' (Chesters, 2003:45). In such a manner, a concept developed by anthropologist, social scientist and cyberneticist Gregory Bateson in 1973 is used to understand events such as protests, gatherings of one type or another, as chaotic and intense nodes within the 'network of networks' yet separate from its usual workings.

Another concept that has been devised to deal with moments of network stabilisation is the 'convergence space'. The concept of the convergence space recognises that local groups and networked movements periodically work towards globalised local actions and localised global actions, and that the physical coming together of people for collective action represents a convergence of networks, in a host space affected by its history, culture and so on (Routledge, 2000 & 2003). This is also the term that organisers involved in the anti-globalisation movement use for the spaces for people to congregate and organise in.

The original concept of the convergence space developed from research about the First Intercontinental Meeting for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism that took place in the autonomous region of Chiapas (Mexico) in 1996. News of the encuentro (encounter) was disseminated through activist networks and resulted in over three thousand activists from over forty countries spanning five continents gathering in specially built conference centres to discuss ways to combat neoliberalism (Routledge, 2000 & 2003). (5) Another example of a convergence can be found in an article about the preparations for the anti-IMF and World Bank convergence in Prague (2000). It describes how preparation was largely coordinated through the Iniciativa Proti Ekonomicke Globalizaci (Initiative Against Economic Globalisation) that existed for up to a year before the convergence took place. The convergence processes led to a strengthening of the links that local groups and movements had with others elsewhere (Days of Dissent, 2004). Participation by social movement researcher Jai Sen in the preparations for the 2004 Mumbai World Social Forum is another example of convergence. He describes his involvement with an organisational structure that was heavily influenced by the political culture of India rather than the World Social Forum's Charter of Principles, how the local political cultures and wider social landscape of India affected the eventual proceedings, and how groups and individuals external to India interacted with and were affected by this Indian context (Sen, 2004).

In conclusion, research on the anti-globalisation movement does not require use of a network perspective. It is possible to choose points or locations from which to conduct research on groups and individuals that may previously have been apparent solely through internet networking, allowing for more detailed observation than would be possible than through more spatially distant methods. Yet sites where activities are to be observed, such as at anti-summit mobilisations, are clearly affected by the actions of people in far-off places. It is here that the concept of the convergence space offers a tool for ethnographically assisting understanding of such gatherings.

2 FIELDWORK CONTEXT

2.1 An introduction to Peoples' Global Action and the Dissent! (6) Network

I was involved on a mostly-local level with the Dissent network as part of the preparations for the anti-G8 convergence, though it is not my intention to write about the way that the network organised in the run-up to July 2005. This is because I was not involved at that point as a researcher. Despite this, information about how the network operated can be found on the main websites, and I outline this information to give a context to the political culture of those involved.

Dissent formed in 2003, and consisted of a number of local collectives across the UK, with close contacts with a number of groups in other European countries. In its own words the 'Network has no central office, no spokespeople, no membership list and no paid staff. It's a mechanism for communication and co-ordination between local groups and working groups involved in building resistance to the G8, and capitalism in general. It hopes to exist long after the world leaders have returned home in the early summer of 2005'. (7) Decisions were made every two months at gatherings that were hosted by different local groups and a different process group took on the task of formulating an agenda. In between, people stayed in touch by email or face-to-face communication, and others toured the country as part of awareness building, training and educating about the G8. Others formed various process groups that dealt with different aspects of the mobilisation such as publicity and media, though a rotation of tasks appeared to be favoured. (8)

The network itself was based around the hallmarks of Peoples' Global Action (PGA), and the only criterion for a person or group to get involved was adherence to--though not necessarily agreement with--these hallmarks:

1) A very clear rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism; all trade agreements, institutions and governments that promote destructive globalisation.

2) We reject all forms and systems of domination and discrimination including, but not limited to, patriarchy, racism and religious fundamentalism of all creeds. We embrace the full dignity of all human beings.

3) A confrontational attitude, since we do not think that lobbying can have a major impact in such biased and undemocratic organisations, in which transnational capital is the only real policy-maker.

4) A call to direct action and civil disobedience, support for social movements' struggles, advocating forms of resistance which maximize respect for life and oppressed peoples' rights, as well as the construction of local alternatives to global capitalism.

5) An organisational philosophy based on decentralisation and autonomy. (9)

PGA describes itself as a tool to facilitate resistance to capitalism, and arose (indirectly) out of the encuentro in Chiapas (1996). Since its formation, it has called various days of global action that have seen anti-summit mobilisations and solidarity actions across the world. Indeed, a call was made at the 2004 European PGA conference for a day of action to coincide with the opening day of the G8 summit in 2005. It called for 'people to converge in Scotland to disrupt the conference and for actions to be taken simultaneously in villages, towns and cities worldwide'. (10) A further call for convergence and action was then made at the Assembly of the Caracol Intergalaktica (youth camp) at the World Social Forum in January 2005. (11)

2.2 Convergence Spaces

Although anti-G8 activities were planned to take place across much of Scotland, I was based at the convergence spaces organised by Dissent. These had been acquired for the three main sectors of protest and coincided (at least in theory) with the areas that needed to be blockaded in order to disrupt or stop the G8 conference: Glasgow, Edinburgh and Stirling.

Edinburgh -- Edinburgh Students Union made their Teviott building available for use as a space to hold meetings and share information. The fact that it was organised for Dissent (it had commercial kitchen staff, CCTV cameras, closed in the early evening and had security staff on the doors) led some to comment that it was incompatible with the politics of the network.

Glasgow -- The convergence space in Glasgow was a large abandoned warehouse in an industrial/mostly-derelict area of the city with two large interior halls. The front space consisted of a reception area, an open 'living room' with lots of sofas, a large kitchen, Indymedia area and smaller rooms for other uses. The space at the back of the building was for sleeping and storing clothes, etc.

Stirling -- The Stirling space, consisting of a large field bordering the edge of an industrial estate in Stirling, was perhaps the most interesting as it had no pre-existing structures. Its location was kept secret until just over a week before the summit to avoid it being shut down by the police.

3 POLITICAL CULTURE OF DISSENT

3.1 Material Culture

The network produced a number of different pieces of publicity in the period building up to the convergence. One of the earliest flyers was produced about a year before the summit and was titled 'No Limits'. It described the birth of the G8 in 1975, concluding that 'all around us we see the impacts and effects of a system to which the G8 attempts to bring longevity: mindless work, war, famine and destroyed ecologies. A system whose very survival means that none of us can live our lives to their true potential. A system that is resisted daily, everywhere'. Essentially awareness-raising in nature, it gave three reasons why people might like to protest against the G8: 1) because it would give people an opportunity to take direct action against the world leaders and their entourages and stop them from meeting; 2) to delegitimise (through protest and actions) the morally bankrupt system that the G8 leaders promote; 3) to expand possibilities of living together, if only temporarily, with 'no limits'. A second leaflet titled 'Resist the G8'was produced a few months before the summit and functioned as an update on the groups and collectives involved in the network and important dates leading up to the Summit in July 2005. This time it stated that the G8 meetings were a means for world leaders to reach a consensus on issues such as war, tariffs, debt, intellectual property rights, whilst creating a smokescreen for continued inaction on climate change and the continuation of capitalism. A third leaflet produced in the month or so leading up to the summit drew upon the popular Channel 4 reality TV show Big Brother, asking participants to 'evict the G8' from Gleneagles. It was primarily a source of information for people who had decided to come and protest against the G8. A final piece of material was the 'Make History--Shut Down the G8' handout. This used the same font and lettering as the mainstream Make Poverty History (MPH) coalition and was handed out at the MPH march on 2 July. This leaflet diverged slightly from earlier materials in that it advocated a strategy of lobbying for change, stating that: 'More is needed as marches are often ignored: think back to the mega-marches against the Iraq war. The G8 needs to be given a message they can't ignore. They can't ignore us blocking the roads ... disrupting their meetings.' Although it would be possible to describe other materials produced, it is more interesting to look at the ways that local groups envisaged the relationship of anti-G8 actions to the summit that was taking place at the same time. The examples I choose here are selective, but--excluding the Faslane Blockade--do cover the main actions (in terms of numbers participating) and were organised by groups associated or involved with the Dissent Network itself. (12)

On 4 July a Carnival for Full Enjoyment was organised by the Working Group Against Work (13) (and others) to take place in Edinburgh. A leaflet advertising the event was subtitled 'No wage slavery, no benefits slavery, no arms slavery, no debt slavery', and called on workers, students, migrants, benefits claimants, pensioners and others to bring drums, music and imagination for action against the G8 'that expresses our resistance in work, out of work, and wherever we live'. Asserting that 'Gleneagles isn't the only place we can see international capitalism at work--it's here on the high streets', it identified banks, Job Centres, private and government agencies that harass claimants to accept low paid work, army recruiters and others' as places against which to demonstrate. During a meeting at the Edinburgh space, an organiser stated that, like the planned blockade of nuclear naval port Faslane, the action was against conscription--in this case, economic conscription by the government and private agencies. He then gave a brief outline of the group he was part of, that had its roots in the anti-Poll Tax movement and ran alternative advice centres for people being harassed by Job Centres and social security 'spies'. Another organiser drew links with movements elsewhere in the world, such as the Zapatistas and the movement in Bolivia fighting oil-privatisation, saying that they were all fighting against 'the real criminals ... those who have stolen the planet off us'. This slant was also taken in another handout on the day attacking HM Love (sheriffs officers), contrasting Edinburgh Claimants' work as part of the anti-Poll tax movement with the mass 'proletarian shopping' (shop-lifting) of the Italian autonomous movement in the 1970s and its continuation today by groups like Yo Mango in Spain, resistance against the privatisation of water in Bolivia, and non-payment for electricity by the Zapatista movement in Chiapas (Mexico). Completing a defiant message in favour of direct action it ends:



Our message to the banks, councils, credit companies, electricity and
gas suppliers and all other profit obsessed institutions trying to rob
the poor to pay the rich is simple--WE OWE YOU NOTHING. YOU HAVE
STOLEN THE WORLD FROM US. NOW WE ARE ORGANISING TO TAKE IT BACK. WE
WILL NEVER PAY!


The Carnival was thus billed in such a way as to make the links between financial institutions and profit obsessed institutions, the G8 summit, and the hardships felt by those marginalised by the capitalist and statist system: not a single-issue protest, nor an abstract march against capitalism, but an attempt to draw links between local institutions that enforce capitalism and the national governments and transnational organisations and corporations that dictate the rules.

The next main day of action was the opening day of the Summit itself on 6 July, for which Dissent advocated something different to the other main political groupings in Scotland for the G8 Summit--MPH and G8 Alternatives. MPH held huge pop concerts that were beamed to television screens across the world, and a large but rather tedious march around Edinburgh in the days leading up to the summit, ostensibly to lobby the G8 for greater debt relief for African countries and a reduction in barriers to free trade for developing nations. (14) G8 Alternatives organised a march around the G8 summit with police and the local council, with the purpose of 'shaming' the G8 leaders, reminding them of people's objections to their wars, and lobbying them for change. (15) In contrast, those involved and associated with Dissent advocated direct actions to stop the summit, including a mass blockade of the roads and lock-ons to cars to prevent the thousands of delegates and journalists from being able to attend the summit (though not the world leaders who were flown in by helicopter). It makes a clear statement that stopping the summit is preferable to it taking place, even one that supposedly has 'the plight of Africa' and climate change at the heart of its agenda. The notion that blockading was a form of 'extreme lobbying', whereby disruption might lead to a change in policy by the G8 leaders, was not something that anyone I spoke with at the Dissent spaces seemed to accept. (16)

A final example I draw upon is the 'Boogie on the Bridge' street party that took place on the last day of the summit. This was billed as an opportunity to celebrate the end of the summit and refuse an extension of the M74 motorway through Glasgow, environmental destruction of the planet, and the G8 itself. Like the Carnival for Full Enjoyment, it framed local concerns in a global context, drawing links between a sham 'public enquiry' used to get the motorway extension approved and 'big institutions ignoring the voices of local people in the name of progress and economic development. All over the world, land is bulldozed, communities are ripped apart, air and water are polluted, people pushed out of their homes.' Citing the example of the BP oil pipeline that displaced 30,000 people in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey, indigenous communities fighting against a government planned coal mine in Venezuela, and environmentally and socially disastrous tree plantations in Brazil as part of carbon trading schemes, the publicity material concluded that 'These are seemingly different battles raging in disconnected places around the world. But the forces driving these destructive projects are the same profit-seeking companies, power-hungry politicians and international institutions that constantly put the needs of people and the environment last.'

3.2 Culture of Decision Making and (Self-)Organisation

At all three of the spaces decisions were made according to principles of consensus as part of a wider system of 'horizontalism'. That is, when a meeting took place, everyone was offered the opportunity to speak rather than relying on delegated authorities to speak for them. The process of decision-making began by defining the problem or decision that needed to be made, generating possible ideas including further questions or clarifications, discussing identified options, modifying others and then eliminating the rest. After this, the merits of the remaining proposals were discussed so that everyone had the opportunity to contribute, acknowledge minor objections and then begin the process of implementing a decision. If there were objections people were able to 'stand aside' (opting out of the agreement), veto or 'block', though this was generally used to stop decisions from being taken that might cause the group to splinter. (17)

This system of decision making was used at all of the Dissent spaces, and was used to coordinate activities between various affinity groups during the blockades, share information about the state of the convergence in Scotland as a whole, and organise affinity group or food collective activities. Meetings operating under consensus had either one or two facilitators who took contributions from those in attendance, and summarised the state of the debate. Because there were no assigned 'key speakers', it was necessary for people to sit in such a way so that everyone had equal opportunity (within reason) to see everyone else. Even in the very largest meetings--perhaps with one hundred or more in attendance--people sat in large circles; the use of podiums and a division between speakers and listeners was not evident. When more than a hundred or so people needed to be involved in a decision, spokespersons were chosen by respective groups or friends to attend the meetings, discuss options and report back. A meeting could split ('break out') or reconvene several times before decisions were made. This mostly happened at the Hori-Zone camp due to the number of people present.

Hand-signals were another innovation that helped the facilitator(s) to decide who was to speak next. These included something similar to a waving action (the 'twinkle') to show agreement, a hand raised to make a point, 'T' sign to make a technical point (speak immediately) and two hands raised to make a direct response (speak next). A few new ones were introduced by a minority, including the upside-down 'twinkle' to show disagreement though this was not widely used. Facilitators sometimes also asked people to raise their hands in favour of certain plans or proposals, but this was done purely to indicate levels of consensus. Some meetings lasted for up to an hour, and indeed, most of the people at the spaces spent a good proportion of the day engaged in meetings, sometimes to the detriment of taking action--resulting in the often heard grumbles about 'too many meetings'.

At the 'self-organised' spaces in Stirling and Glasgow there was also room to create new organisational structures. At the Glasgow space, meetings took place in the morning where people volunteered to take on preparing various meals or anything else that might need doing. There was a tension between those who favoured a more communitarian space (arguing for specific times for group activities) and those who felt people should get involved if they felt the inclination, though the space ran harmoniously and was described as inspiring by people unfamiliar with such forms of organisation.

At the Stirling campsite--called the Hori-Zone (or eco-village by the media)--there was more room for innovation. The site was described in a welcoming pamphlet as 'a zone of resistance to the G8: self organisation, horizontal decision-making, ecology and autonomy in action. It is based on organising in an open and participatory way, inviting all to take part in the creation of their own futures.' Partially due to the scale of the project (up to five thousand people stayed there), and also because the zone consisted of a field next to a river, the site operated a specific organisational form based around the neighbourhood or 'barrio' system. These were to strive for self sufficiency and contribute to the running of the entire site. Issues were discussed within the barrio and then taken to the camp-wide spokescouncil meetings that took place on a regular basis, where collective voices were represented. Most barrios had a communal kitchen or camp-fire around which people congregated and socialised. Requests for volunteers or materials from the spokescouncil were taken to barrios, where people could volunteer to take on roles such as propmaking or guarding the main gate. This organisational model appears to be borrowed from the VAAAG anti-G8 camp in 2003, (18) and perhaps from the No Borders Camps that have taken place throughout Europe. The term 'barrio', however, comes from the Argentinean popular assemblies, and reflects the influence that neighbourhood organisations in post-economic crash (early 2000s) Argentina had on the grassroots globalisation movement in Europe.

Consumption at the sites was marked by vegetarian and vegan foods, a predominance of fairtrade, organic and local produce, and promotion of low-impact means of living. The site was self-powered by renewable energy from bio-diesel. People were asked to use only what they needed from solar and wind points, to recharge phones and batteries during the day to conserve energy at night, etc. In addition it used compost toilets which were no less pleasant than standard portable toilets found at most music festivals, re-used or recycled most materials, and utilised a 'grey water system' which was for cleaning and washing. The provision of food, security, recycling and the running of the Indymedia tent was carried out through the use of volunteers; indeed, most people seemed to be involved in the running of the camp in at least one way. Many of the services available were provided on the basis of mutual aid and solidarity: people who could not afford a donation for food were provided it free, tools were available from specific areas to borrow, transport to Edinburgh and elsewhere was run by volunteers and done on a suggested donation-only basis, and even staying at the site itself was subject to donation. (19)

Inevitably, there were some issues about differential access to power at the site(s). Some barrios were much larger than others yet still had only one spokesperson. Spokespersons had a range of conceptions as to their roles, and the capacities to which they were able to make decisions on behalf of others. Some individuals had greater access to information than others (through social networks, the distribution of mobile radios, etc) though this does seems unavoidable considering the length the project was to last. It was also clear that people had a variety of different levels of involvement, from planning and running of core services from the start, to treating the camp as they would any other commercial campsite--as a place to stay, enjoy and consume. There was also the issue of a blueprint being drawn-up in advance preventing people from innovating from scratch. However, although it may have been interesting to get involved in setting up camps from scratch (as occurred at the Lausanne C'Village for the 2003 G8 convergence (20)) it was much more efficient having people set this out in advance, allowing newcomers to 'plug into' the decision-making process and get involved. It is possible that the movement has developed to such an extent that it is able to ditch methods that failed to work in the past, and stick with a barrio system that has worked relatively well so far, given the nature of the camps so far; it may therefore be an example of a developing cultural norm. What was not clear was how such a form of organisation could be rolled out to encompass a series of different camps, federations of many camps, or neighbourhood equivalents in urban environments. Whether more formal and regulated sets of decision making structures would emerge or be developed to deal with more complex and large scale organisation remains to be seen.

If reasons for protesting against the G8 constitute the 'anti' in the movement, the practical aspects of how participants organised and conducted activities constitute the positive, creative aspects of the movement. This aspect may not be as readily apparent to outsiders but is so central that it warrants ditching the anti-globalisation tag, and replacing it with something much more positive. Indeed, because of the socially-prefigurative forms of organisation, promotion of unmediated links with others around the world, support for asylum seekers, and the right to free movement, a much better--though more verbose-term is the grassroots globalisation movement. (21)

4 ANALYSIS

4.1 Critiques of Summit Resistance

In the build-up to the convergence, discussions were held by various groups about the reasons for opposing the summits of world leaders. The success or failure of an anti-summit mobilisation clearly depends upon what the aims of participants and mobilisation organisations actually are. In brief, a number of different reasons were stated for involvement in the convergence, ordered very vaguely from the anarchistic to the liberal:


Shutting down or hindering the summit to stop world leaders from
furthering the interests of capital.

Putting into practice a set of social and political ethics.

Hedonistic, social, cultural reasons: direct experience of meeting
people, fighting the cops, (22) being part of a larger event and
being inspired, going to parties with people from all around the
world, etc.

Showing solidarity with similar struggles elsewhere in the world.

Undertaking (direct and non-direct) actions to delegitimise the summit
through the organs of the commercial and grassroots media.

Marching to lobby G8 leaders for change.


These reasons are not mutually exclusive. For example, some protesters hoped to shut down the summit, have a great time in doing so, and at the very least register dissent against the G8. Others organised actions to lobby governments, yet must have welcomed any direct actions that raised their event's profile in the media.

Debates regarding the tactic of anti-summit convergences in the build up to the Scotland convergence were similar to those that have taken place elsewhere. Some individuals were concerned that summit mobilisations had become ritualistic, whilst others argued that the G8 was a diversion of energy away from local projects: capitalism, these people argued, could better be found in everyday life--on the streets in consumerism, poverty, and banks--than in meetings of world leaders, especially when the real decisions are made well in advance of the summit itself. Others stated that the tactic of travelling to summits was one that only the privileged can engage in--a privilege that is often afforded overwhelmingly to white people in a white society:


Women with children, people who do not have legal citizenship,
refugees, poor people, etc, face barriers to involvement in large
actions away from home that younger white males with middle class
privilege do not ... The organizing, leadership and campaign decisions
have resulted in the appearance of a white led movement, when in fact,
people of colour and indigenous peoples ... feel the brunt of
imperialist globalization and have been organising against it for
hundreds of years (Dirks, 2002).


Other commentators are similarly sceptical of summit mobilisations as a means to achieve real change, but acknowledge their potential uses. Following involvement in the anti-G8 convergences that took place in various cities of Canada in 2002, a writer for Socialism and Democracy (23) concludes that mass actions allowed people to connect with others, gave participants encouragement by doing so, and were useful for linking various campaigns back to the actions of those attending the summits in an official capacity. Most notable, however, were the prefigurative elements displayed by those involved, how 'Many of our people have made clearly defined choices to live in the now as they want to see the world organised "after"' (Stainsby, 2002).

The political groupings found at Gleneagles, and replicated before that at previous summit mobilisations ranging from Seattle and Prague to Genoa, point towards a divide within the larger mass of those attending summit mobilisations. As argued by Hardt (2004), one side of the divide is linked to those already in positions of influence and existing political organisations, organises centrally, and argues for the state's role in resisting neoliberalism. The other is linked to social movements, has few links to those in power and argues for a transnational resistance to capitalism through decentralisation of decision-making in opposition to the state. From an emerging body of materials, it seems that Hardt's basic split between two different political constituencies is a characteristic of the global movement wherever it converges. This can be demonstrated in the organisation of the Youth Camp at the World Social Forum (Nunes, 2005), the division between libertarian and anti-authoritarian groups and political parties and NGOs at both World Social Forum and European Social Forum (Farrer, 2004), the organisational process of the 2004 European Social Forum in London (Downling, 2005), divisions in the anti-war movement in the UK between those who tried to organise and carry out autonomous direct actions, and those who favouring the lobbying of 'friendly' politicians and using the trade unions to avert war. And, specific to the 2005 G8 actions, a similar split can be found in the separate workings of Dissent, G8 Alternatives, and Make Poverty History.

4.2 Ideologically Framing the Movement: Post-Structuralist Anarchism

If one divide of the grassroots globalisation movement is archist, the other is anarchist. (24) Andrej Grubacic argues that the three manifestations of anarchist ideology--anti-statism, anti-capitalism, and prefigurative politics--are all present, and that the movement is a manifestation of a 'fifth wave' of anarchism best exemplified in networks such as Peoples' Global Action, the Zapatistas and Autonomen; these groups, while not explicitly identifying with anarchism as a tradition, do correspond with its 'spirit' (Grubacic, 2004); and Graeme Chesters argues that the grassroots globalisation movement is synonymous through its democratic praxis with anarchism and 'indicative of how anarchist principles translate into social behaviours' (Chesters, 2003:45). Anthropologist David Graeber states that practice of democracy, prefigurative models of operation, direct action, and undermining of existing power rather than attempts to seize it are in accordance with anarchist ideals. Furthermore, he argues that


new forms of organization are its ideology. It is about creating and
enacting horizontal networks instead of top-down structures like
states, parties or corporations; networks based on principles of
decentralized, non-hierarchical consensus democracy. Ultimately, it
aspires to be much more than that, because ultimately it aspires to
reinvent daily life as a whole. But unlike many other forms of
radicalism, it has first organized itself in the political
sphere--mainly because this was a territory that the powers that be
(who have shifted all their heavy artillery into the economic) have
largely abandoned (Graeber, 2004 [1]:212; see also Graeber, [2]).


The roots of this form of anarchism have been traced back to a variety of different social movements and subcultures. McKay traces the 'intuitive anarchist' characteristics of non-hierarchical direct action groups to the self-proclaimed 'newness' of the 1960s New Left, the free festivals, travellers, punks and squatters of the 1970s, and the free party scene of the late 1980s and early 90s (McKay, 1998). Purkis and Welsh state that the combination of (often self-depreciating) humour, surreal imagery and non-violence challenges expectations of ordinary protest in a way that can be linked back to the Situationists (Purkis and Welsh, 2003:8-9); and Aufheben notes that British anti-road protesters' refusal of liberal democracy, ravers' pursuit of autonomy, and squatters' refusal of property rights coalescing around anti-Criminal Justice Bill activities in the mid-90s suggested the possibility of these campaigns going beyond themselves into general anti-capitalist struggle (Aufheben, 1995).

These kinds of links between past and current movements are clearly specific to the British context. Undoubtedly, different countries and regions will have had different experiences. Nevertheless, links between national and regional movements around the world are regularly made by movement actors themselves, with common characteristics such as tendencies to work outside of formal political structures (or even an outright rejection of these structures), an emphasis on direct action, making an appeal to a better and more equal world, challenging the assumptions of consumerism, instrumental economic rationality or even modernity itself, and managing to provoke the powerful into revealing the state's propensity for violence often cited as commonalities. Most importantly perhaps, in all its diversity it amounts to a sense of presence--an ongoing opposition to capitalism, the commodity form, and the megamachine (Morland & Carter, 2004:11-12).

Yet the anarchism displayed in the grassroots globalisation movement is as much in-line with older forms of anarchism such as anarcho-communism or anarcho-syndicalism, as it is a new type drawing on post-structuralism (Davies, 1997) or being a form of post-structuralist anarchism (Carter & Morland, 2004; Welsh & Purkis, 2003). Such a union has been noted by academics who argue that anarchism has an (almost) natural affinity with aspects of post-structuralist thought. For example, Koch argues that while classical anarchism was based on a particular conception of human nature, (25) post-structuralism's liberating potential lies with its deconstruction of any concept that makes oppression appear rational, and that, 'Resistance is formulated against a background of plurality. It is plurality that cultural and political institutions oppose as they promote one form of subjectivity over another. This is precisely why poststructuralism can support liberation movements' (Koch, 1993:348). Todd May similarly characterises classical anarchism as having an essentially naive conception of human nature, and the strategic focus of overthrowing the state. Post-structuralism, he states, might inform anarchism by replacing the conception of human nature with an ethical commitment to autonomy, acceptance of the creative and coercive potentialities of power, and refocus from a strategic one of overthrowing the state to a tactical rejection of the concentration of power at a diversity of different levels (May, 1994).

Examples of such a politics can be found in tendencies for organising in self-described networks rather than groups (e.g. Dissent, Peoples' Global Action), identifying power as existing at a multiplicity of sites requiring it to be decentralised rather than destroyed, a rejection of all totalising theories as potential forms of oppression, and in the emerging post-leftist, spiritualist anarchism, and primitivism (mostly from North America). To illustrate with just a few examples some of these forms of post-structuralist anarchism, McQuinn states that 'Post-left anarchists reject all ideologies in favour of the individual and communal construction of self-theory' (McQuinn, 2004:53); and Bob Black argues that anarchism's failures in the past can be put down to residues of Marxism--its belief in technological progress, development of productive forces, work, statism, tendencies to centralised organization--and that anarchism can never be accomplished in the modern city (Black, 1997). This touches upon some of the anti-civilisation currents that can be found in Green Anarchist and the writings of primitivists such as John Zerzan, who argue that the very development of civilisation and language is an 'accommodation to a world of unfreedom' (Zerzan, 1999:34). Another widely circulated post-leftist piece argues that the theorisation of leftists 'bores people to death' and criticises those who involve themselves in activist work out of a feeling of guilt. The author insists instead that anarchist activism 'must be concrete: it must be immediate, it must be obvious to everyone why it is worth the effort, it must be fun in itself. How can we do positive things for others if we ourselves do not enjoy our own lives?' (Nadia, 2002).

Landstreicher gives an outline of such a minimal post-leftist anarchism stating that revolutionary activity is not a program, but a struggle for the individual and social re-appropriation of the totality of life, a rejection of organisationalism, the grand-narrative of progress, identity politics, and even a rejection of ideology itself


that is to say, the rejection of every program, idea, abstraction,
ideal or theory that is placed above life and individuals as a
construct to be served. The rejection, therefore, of God, the State,
the Nation, the Race, etc., but also of Anarchism, Primitivism,
Communism, Freedom, Reason, the Individual, etc. when these become
ideals to which one is to sacrifice oneself, one's desires, one's
aspirations, one's dreams (Landstreicher, 2002:51).


The importance attributed to the present, rather than building for the future, points to the importance also of 'peak experience' rather than subsumption to struggle. A logical implication of this can be illustrated with a quote by Hakim Bey, who argues that


revolution has never yet resulted in achieving this dream. The vision
comes to life in the moment of uprising--but as soon as 'the
Revolution' triumphs and the State returns, the dream and the ideal
are already betrayed ... even if we replace the revolutionary approach
with a concept of insurrection blossoming spontaneously into anarchist
culture, our own particular historical situation is not propitious for
such a vast undertaking. Absolutely nothing but a futile martyrdom
could possibly result now from a head-on collision with the terminal
State (Bey, 2003:98).


Leaflets produced by the Dissent network displayed such elements to their propaganda through the use of visuals of people celebrating revolt, breaking down fences and escaping confines, rather than struggle, mass marches and banner waving. (26) Indeed, responses by those at Dissent spaces emphasised the importance of a practice of prefigurative politics rather than being defined as acting under the auspices of any specific ideology--not only because means were considered as important as ends, but also because prefiguration was rewarding and represented the testing and development of social theory. One activist at the Horizone rejected socialism, liberalism and anarchism, and stated that he 'wouldn't want to be working under NGOs or political parties because part of being involved in these things is figuring out your own ideas. It's positive to see a project through by building infrastructure, sorting it out and having it come together; it's far more rewarding than simply doing what someone asks you to do.' The importance placed by Dissent (and previous movement organisations) on obtaining space to self-organise, experiment and experience point simultaneously towards immediacy rather than the future, and autonomy from external sources of power in doing so. A quote from Shut Them Down, a book published after the convergence by Dissent puts it as follows:


The whole idea of the counter-summit wasn't really about protesting
about the G8. For us, it wasn't even directly about abolishing global
poverty. It was about life. It was about being a becoming human. It
was about our desire. No matter how 'well paid' or 'secure' our
employment, as we shuffle pieces of paper as we gaze out of the window
in a meeting, as we trudge around the supermarket we think 'there must
be more to life than this ...' We never felt this in Scotland, no
matter how frustrated we became in one or two meetings, however pissed
off we got with a few individuals or angry at the state. This was
living; this was being human ... this process of creation, invention
and becoming isn't a 'feeling', it's a material reality. The new
capacities we experience at these events don't just disappear. They
are there to be accessed during the rest of our lives ... if we can
work out how to reach them again (The Free Association, 2005:17).


Somewhere between the academic prose, movement literature and the actions of participants, it is possible to conclude that one side of the divide in the grassroots globalisation movement is post-structuralist anarchist in nature. This is not to say that the movement is specifically post-leftist, or spiritualist anarchist, and nor is it my intention to label all of the people at these spaces under one category. Despite this, rejection of grand narratives and the embrace of a multiplicity of alternatives to statism and capitalism rather than single solutions or conceptions of revolution, the way that activists conceive of their own involvement in the movement, and a focus on the local, the particular and the sporadic as a means for disrupting the normal order of things rather than a wider view or grand plan are distinctive of the movement. The actions of Reclaim the Streets, drawing on Bey's conception of the Temporary Autonomous Zone, the development of subversive zones on the internet such as open-publishing sites, and creation of free software as a means of subverting the economic structure by making the principle means of control--the programming code--'visible' to the public (Truscello, 2003) (27) are further pointers as to how the movement can be likened to post-structuralist anarchism.

4.3 Post-Structuralist Anarchism: Some Implications

Such developments in anarchist praxis are not without criticism. In one of the most acrimonious debates of the contemporary anarchist scene, Murray Bookchin lambastes so-called 'lifestyle anarchists' who find their


principal expression in spray-can graffiti, postmodernist nihilism,
antirationalism, neoprimitivism, antitechnologism, neo-Situationist
'cultural terrorism', mysticism, and a 'practice' of staging
Foucauldian 'personal insurrections'. These trendy posturings, nearly
all of which follow current yuppie fashions, are individualistic in
the important sense that they are antithetical to the development of
serious organizations, a radical politics, a committed social
movement, theoretical coherence, and programmatic relevance. More
oriented toward achieving one's own 'self-realization' than achieving
basic social change, this trend among lifestyle anarchists is
particularly noxious ... The black flag, which revolutionary social
anarchists raised in insurrectionary struggles in Ukraine and Spain,
now becomes a fashionable sarong for the delectation of chic petty
bourgeois (Bookchin, 1995:20).


Reification of struggle at a multiplicity of levels in this sense can be used as an excuse for failing to build larger projects, of celebrating rebellious acts over less immediate activities that might result in a qualitative move towards some end goal, or of an inability to expose and undermine vulnerable sites and sources of domination. The development of post-structuralist anarchism can also be seen as a response not only to increased flows of people and developments in ICT, but also to the undeniable strength and reach of capital, forcing struggle against the system out of the open and into whatever cracks are left open to it within the current system.

Despite criticism of the approach taken by the grassroots globalisation movement, the long-term activities of those involved and the conviction and purpose displayed by those attending can scarcely be described as consisting of short-term 'trendy posturings' or 'personal insurrections', given that participants were almost all involved in a variety of different campaigns when not protesting against the G8--from anti-oil and arms campaigns and acting as human shields for Palestinians, to creating spaces for people to live in alternative communities and developing sustainable bases of counter-hegemonic knowledge. Decades of being told to stop and wait for the right time to take action and build a movement for change has led in most instances to stagnation, increasingly aggressive forms of capitalism, and a general failure to make an impact. It is only natural that people seek more immediate responses as a result. As the processes of globalisation continue to develop and traditional political choices narrow, the experimentation of the grassroots globalisation movement potentially stands to offer the most for those seeking an alternative to the current order, whilst at the same time providing participants with much needed respite from the daily monotony of work, submission to authority, and inane consumption dished up by neoliberal capitalism. If the movement is successful in any of its aims or goals as it continues to experiment, learn and experience, so much the better.

NOTES

1. This is admittedly a generalisation, not least because different anthropological schools (e.g. French, British, American) had different conceptions of the 'boundedness' and dynamics of cultures (Lewis, 1999).

2. See for example Klein (2000), Starhawk (2002), Notes from Nowhere (2003), Kingsnorth (2003), Mertes (ed., 2004).

3. On 28 June 2006, there were 5 African, 11 Canadian, 48 European, 17 Latin American, 12 Oceanian, 2 South Asian, 61 United States, and 5 West Asian Indymedia sites listed on  https://uk.indymedia.org. This does not include 'regional' or 'city district' sites that might operate under any one of those just mentioned.

4. This would clearly not apply to research concentrating on internet sites and activities per se.

5. See also Kingsnorth (2004:25-37), and Notes from Nowhere (eds.) (2003:34-37, 74-79).

6. For purposes of clarity, I will remove the '!' from the name for the rest of this paper.

7. See  http://www.dissent.org.uk/content/view/62/52.

8. An in-depth account of how the network formed and operated, and many of the main events during the course of the convergence can be found in Trocchi et al (2005).

9. PGA Hallmarks, at  http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/agp/free/pga/hallm.htm.

10. Resist the G8 // Global Action Callout //, at  http://www.dissent.org.uk/content/view/60/63/.

11. See 'Assembly of the Caracol Intergalaktica', at  http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/agp/resistg8/actions/caracol_en.htm.

12. Since writing this paper, other reports have mentioned the importance of an initiative by people involved in Dissent to involve local residents in Glasgow in community outreach events such as the Cre8 Summat actions. See Trocchi et al (2005).

13. Also known as 'Dissent Against Work'.

14. The Make Poverty History coalition consisted of a large number of NGOs and charities. It received backing from many politicians including the Labour Chancellor Gordon Brown, and refused the Stop the War Coalition from joining because it might embarrass some of its political backers. For a critique of this organisation, see Hodkinson (2005). Indeed, its politics were so mainstream that one press-officer announced that their march was 'not a march in the sense of a demonstration, but more of a walk. The emphasis is on fun in the sun. The intention is to welcome the G8 leaders and ask them to deliver trade justice, debt cancellation and increased aid to developing countries' (Bruce Whitehead, spokesperson for Make Poverty History, 28/01/2005, quoted by Hewson (2005)).

15. G8 Alternatives was a coalition consisting of various socialist political parties and an assortment of unaligned individuals. When the police tried to call the march off G8 Alternatives refused to do so, calling the police's bluff. In fact, the eventual march around Gleneagles led many to successfully tear down parts of the fences around Gleneagles and invade the hotel grounds.

16. The first day of the summit did suffer considerable disruption, with roads and train-routes around Gleneagles closed, and many delegates and journalists reportedly unable to attend much (or all) of the first day due to the blockades.

17. Graeber describes variations of this system used during anti-summit convergences in North America (Graeber, 2004: 212-214).

18. See The Vaaag: A Collective Experience of Self-Organisation, in Days of Dissent (eds.) (2004).

19. Considerable amounts of fundraising also took place in the year or so before the convergence.

20. See for example, Friends of Phil and Toby (2003).

21. The name 'anti-globalisation' is nonsensical unless one equates globalisation wholly with neoliberal economics (and not freedom of movement and global solidarity). Even people and groups involved in the movement who advocate use of the state as a way to resist the pressures of international finance can only really be described as 'anti-economic globalisation' because they are equally in favour of refugee rights and freedom of movement. The only real anti-globalisation political standpoint is that of the anti-migrant, anti-global solidarity, anti-international finance strands of political thought found within the orbits of populist nationalist and fascist politics. Other names include the movement for social justice, the movement of movements, and the alter-mondialist movement in French speaking regions.

22. For an investigation of the political use of riots, see Mueller T (2004).

23. See  http://www.sdonline.org/.

24. Some critics argue that the movement displays a heavy mix of liberalism. Although lots of analysis could be devoted to dissecting anti-capitalist and anti-statist rhetoric from practical activity, for the purposes of this paper I consider a rhetorical and (as far as possible) practical advocation and practice of prefigurative anti-statism and anti-capitalism as anarchism, regardless of whether certain activists or certain sections favour mediation with the state or worry about media image over and above other possible courses of action. Some of the least vocally radical activists engage in some of the most radical activity, whilst the opposite situation is also be true, making analysis of aims and directions of movements rather difficult.

25. The notion that 'classical' anarchism--as exemplified in Proudhon, Bakunin and Kropotkin--had an essentially benevolent view of human nature is convincingly disputed by Morland (1997) and Hartley (1995), but this does not invalidate the argument that there are differences between 'classical' and poststructuralist anarchism.

26. The lack of reference to 'anarchism' in this material is described by Trocchi et al (2005) as an attempt to avoid excluding council communists and situationists from the network.

27. Sections of the US Government actually consider open source so dangerous to US capitalist interests that they have asked members of Congress to support a letter stating that Linux is a threat to national security. See Strangelove (2005) for a study of how subversive, anti-privatisation (piracy, hacking, cracking, information dissemination, etc) activities on the net relate to the anti-capitalist movement, and Vaidhyanathan (2004) for argument that the struggle on the internet is best characterised as being between oligarchy and anarchy (with the author coming down on the side of a rather ill-defined 'soft anarchism').

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