LATIN AMERICA: Hunger Strikes Fuelled by Institutional Deafness – IPS ipsnews.net

October 30, 2010 at 10:04 am (Uncategorized)

LATIN AMERICA: Hunger Strikes Fuelled by Institutional Deafness – IPS ipsnews.net.

SANTIAGO, Oct 29, 2010 (IPS) – Protesters ranging from prisoners to government leaders have resorted to hunger strikes in Latin America in recent years to press their demands. Behind the growing use of the extreme protest measure is a lack of institutional responses, according to experts.

No longer is the hunger strike only a radical measure resorted to mainly by prison inmates. Workers, peasants, indigenous people, businesspersons, students, nuns, priests, legislators, judges, reporters and teachers in the region have been fasting for different causes in countries governed by political forces of all stripes.

In Bolivia, the president himself, Aymara Indian Evo Morales, declared a hunger strike in April 2009 to press for passage of a law.

And opposition to another law prompted a group of around 30 journalists to fast this month for 14 days in the eastern Bolivian city of Santa Cruz.

In Costa Rica, a group of environmentalists have been on a hunger strike outside the presidential palace since Oct. 8, to protest an executive decree declaring that an open-pit gold mine in Crucitas, in the north of the country, is in the “public interest,” thus allowing the project to go ahead.

And in the northern Chilean region of Coquimbo, Cristian Flores, spokesman for a group of 11 residents of the town of Caimanes, told IPS that “In 10 years we have never received a response from the state.”

He was explaining why the group decided to declare a hunger strike on Sept. 27, to demand the removal and clean-up of a nearby mine tailings deposit.

A much higher profile hunger strike in Chile came to an end early this month after 82 days. A group of 34 prisoners belonging to the country’s largest indigenous group, the Mapuche, were demanding fair trials.

They called off their protest when charges against them under a strict anti-terrorism law were withdrawn and the government of rightwing President Sebastián Piñera promised they would be tried under standard criminal law.

Although they are not a new phenomenon, hunger strikes are “symptoms of something more serious: that there are segments of the population in Latin America who are invisible and are not being heard,” José Santos, at the Institute of Advanced Studies of the University of Santiago, Chile, told IPS.

On Jul. 23, laid-off members of Mexico’s Electrical Workers Union (SME) lifted a hunger strike in which both men and women participated for different lengths of time, ranging between 34 and 90 days, as part of a struggle to get their jobs back after a state-owned power utility was closed down in the capital.

The protest ended when conservative Mexican President Felipe Calderón agreed to high-level talks to address the demands of the workers, several of whom were in critical condition.

Santos, a philosopher and academic, disagrees with the idea that the peaceful pressure mechanism has become “fashionable.”

He also said there was a difference between indefinite hunger strikes and shorter fasts joined to support a specific cause.

José Aylwin, co-director of the Citizen Observatory, a Chilean NGO, said hunger strikes in the Southern Cone country occurred because of the state’s “serious limitations” in guaranteeing “the exercise of political rights.”

One of these limitations, he told IPS, is Chile’s electoral system, “which excludes not only indigenous people, but also different currents of opinion or thought, from legislative decision-making.” Another is “the tightly controlled access to the media,” he added.

In both Cuba and Venezuela, protesters have died as a result of hunger strikes.

In Venezuela “the hunger strike is no longer just a tool used by prisoners; it has been used by oil workers and workers in other industries in the hands of the state, as well as other segments of society,” Marino Alvarado, coordinator of the Venezuelan Programme of Education-Action in Human Rights (PROVEA), told IPS.

In July 2009, the mayor of the metropolitan area of Caracas, opposition politician Antonio Ledesma, fasted for 130 hours to protest a move by the government of socialist President Hugo Chávez to take over many of the mayor’s duties and offices by creating another post.

And in September, university students fasted to complain against alleged political persecution by the Chávez administration.

Jesuit missionary José María Korta, 81, used the same mechanism Oct. 18-25 to press for the release of three Yukpa indigenous men in prison on murder charges, respect for native forms of justice, and a large uninterrupted Yukpa territory instead of several smaller disconnected ones in northern Venezuela.

The only Venezuelan to die as a result of a hunger strike was Franklin Brito, a 49-year-old farmer and schoolteacher who died on Aug. 30 after fasting for five months, demanding respect for his property rights over his land. In the last few years he had held several previous hunger strikes.

“The protests have not only grown in number, but have also become more radical and coordinated, and people are increasingly defying the state” in Venezuela, Alvarado said.

In Cuba, hunger strikes are used by dissidents protesting against the government of Raúl Castro, which considers dissident groups “mercenaries” at the service of the hostile U.S. policy towards the socialist island nation. According to the independent Cuba Archive, 12 people have died in hunger strikes since the 1959 revolution.

The demands set forth by the hunger strikers have been better prison conditions, recognition as political prisoners, and release from jail. Orlando Zapata, 42, died in prison on Feb. 23 after refusing food for 85 days.

“The government deliberately let Zapata die. It was a death foretold,” Elizardo Sánchez, head of the Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, a dissident group, told IPS.

The government denied responsibility.

Political dissident Guillermo Fariñas was internationally renowned for his repeated hunger strikes. After Zapata died, he declared his own hunger strike on Feb. 24 in his home in the central Cuban city of Santa Clara demanding the release of 26 prisoners with health problems. He called off his protest on Jul. 8 when the imprisoned dissidents began to be released.

Hunger strikes are “a legitimate recourse in extreme situations, resorted to by racial, gender or other minorities,” said Sánchez, who added that “hunger strikes will continue to happen as long as people lack other means to defend their rights.”

Alvarado said “The hunger strike, an expression of desperation and civic protest in which people risk their health and life, is a sign that the game between government and the governed is stuck, that people are not finding a solution to their demands, and frequently not even institutional responses. It is a negative symptom, dangerous to society.”

 

Leave a Comment

How Activists Can Shape Politics (Part 5)

October 28, 2010 at 11:55 am (Protest, reformist, Social Movements, Strategy)
Tags: , , , , ,

As the last segment of this summary of Felix Kolb’s book Protest and Opportunities, I will be exploring the last method of how social movements can make an impact on government policy.  Parts 1-4 covered the Disruption Mechanism, the Public Preference Mechanism, The Political Access Mechanism, and the Judicial Mechanism.

Now we will be covering the International Politics Mechanism which discusses the importance of the international arena in facilitating social change in a given country.

 

The International Politics Mechanism (p. 89-92)

Kolb suggests 4 ways in which the international arena can be used to benefit activists in achieving their goals:

 

-  pressure on global markets (boycotts)

ex.     – International boycott against aparthaid South Africa

 

- putting pressure on international orgs and treaties which commit member states to rules              they may be violating.

ex.        – Civil Rights movement appeals to the UN regarding descrimination

 

- informing individuals and advocacy orgs in other countries to put pressure on your         government.

ex. –    Amnesty International’s human rights campaigns try to inform all countries                                   of specific human rights violations.

 

- the international political situation can be taken advantage of by the movement.

ex. -      the Cold War was used by the Civil Rights Movement as the Soviet Union                                  used racism in the US to win over countries of color and the Civil Rights                                  Movement argued desegregation and voting rights would hurt the USSR

 

Kolb does not go into more detail regarding this mechanism but certain ideas come to mind regarding activists abilities to use the 4th process of social change listed here – using the current political context.

 

Internal security is supposed to be a key policy point regarding international relations since Sept. 11.  Activists can use the argument that war, torture and Islamaphobia are increasing the likelihood that another attack is going to happen on American soil.

Leave a Comment

Hunger Strike in Venezuela

October 28, 2010 at 11:50 am (Protest, Strategy)
Tags: , , ,

Here is a very interesting case in how activists use the right techniques at the right time to win their goal – or at least to have a meeting with the government.

Activists in Venezuela have (so far) successfully used a hunger strike to gain an audience with President Hugo Chavez regarding the release of 3 prisoners who were convicted of murder in the state court rather than the indigenous courts as promised by the new constitution.

Since the new constitution was based on the concept of indigenous rights, the public views Chavez as a crusader for the indigenous community.  This allowed a hunger strike to be successful since hunger strikes are tactics that are to be used against those who support you.

Hunger strikes were popularized by Gandhi but the use of them is frequently misinterpreted.  Many believe that his hunger strike was a way of pressuring the British to give India its independence but actually Gandhi used hunger strikes to protest the violent riots between Hindus and Muslims.  His hunger strike was a way of asking the Hindu and Muslim people who were his devoted fans to be nonviolent.

The story regarding the hunger strike in Venezuela is reprinted below:

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53290
Hunger Strike Off as Gov’t Agrees to Talks on Native Demands
By Humberto Márquez

CARACAS, Oct 25, 2010 (IPS) – An 81-year-old Jesuit missionary in Venezuela ended a week-long hunger strike Monday after the government agreed to high-level talks to negotiate the release of three indigenous prisoners facing murder charges and to discuss land claims by Yukpa communities.

José María Korta told journalists outside Congress in Caracas, where he was holding his fast, that in “the dialogue that we have held with government leaders, the main reason for our hunger strike has received a response.”

In the company of two young activists who joined him in the hunger strike over the last three days, the elderly missionary said he felt fine and that he could have “continued the strike, and may still take it up again.”

Korta called off his protest after Vice President Elías Jaua promised to meet with him to listen to his concerns and seek solutions to his demands, along with leftwing President Hugo Chávez, who returned from an 11-day international tour Sunday.

“We hope the dialogue and negotiations with representatives of the government and other branches of the state will bring about the release of Sabino Romero, Alexander Fernández and Olegario Romero,” three indigenous men in prison for murder since a year ago, Lusbi Portillo, with Sociedad Homo et Natura, an environmental group that has been involved in the Yukpa cause for 25 years, told IPS.

But “We also need a road map to overcome the underlying problems, like the defence of indigenous forms of justice and the handing over of ancestral indigenous land occupied by cattle breeders or granted to mining companies in concession,” he added.

Sources in Congress said legislators are working with Supreme Court judges on measures in favour of the three indigenous inmates.

During his hunger strike, Korta told IPS that “Since 1999, when the new constitution –which is very beautiful but has hardly been enforced — was approved, indigenous people like the Yukpa have been awaiting the demarcation of their territories.”

The constitution, which was rewritten under Chávez by an elected constituent assembly that included delegates of indigenous organisations, requires the demarcation of indigenous territories. It also stipulates for the first time that the legislature must include representatives of native groups.

Korta said the Yukpa “are victims of the colonialist viewpoint that predominates among many officials.”

The Yukpa, a Carib-speaking Amerindian population of around 12,000, are one of the five native groups living in northwestern Venezuela, between the Sierra de Perijá mountains, which mark part of the border with Colombia, and Lake Maracaibo.

While some Yukpa leaders and communities have accepted land and other aid distributed by the government, more radical groups led by Sabino Romero — such as the Chaktapa village, of which he is chief — continue to demand legal recognition of a larger, continuous Yukpa territory, instead of areas granted to separate communities.

They are demanding a territory of 285,000 hectares located between the Sierra de Perijá and the fertile plains from which they were gradually driven in the 20th century by the expansion of cattle ranching and oil prospecting.

They don’t want to end up “like ham in a sandwich,” Portillo said, referring to tracts of land offered by the government that are wedged between border areas reserved for military use and the plains along the lake, which are covered by ranches.

Some of these groups have come down from the mountains in recent years and occupied idle land on cattle ranches that they claim as their traditional territory.

Wayúu, Yukpa and Barí communities living on the Venezuelan side of the Sierra de Perijá, from north to south, are also opposed to the coal-mining concessions granted to companies in the area, and maintain that the government is delaying the demarcation of indigenous territories because it would hinder plans for mining activities and the construction of railways and ports.

The Yukpa communities led by Romero are asking the government to pay ranchers compensation for the improvements they have made to the land occupied by the indigenous protesters, such as houses, barns, fences, artificial lakes, dikes, electric wiring, rural roads and fixed machinery.

The ranchers have agreed to give up the land if they receive not only compensation for the property itself but also for the improvements.

But in its agrarian reform effort, the government argues that landowners must be able to show an unbroken chain of land titles that can be traced back many decades, and refuses to pay for improvements to expropriated rural property if the owners cannot do so.

There is thus a political stand-off between the Chávez administration and the cattle breeders along the shores of Lake Maracaibo.

On Oct. 12, 2009, the government handed over communal land titles to 41,600 hectares to three of the more than 100 Yukpa communities.

The next day, a violent incident broke out between Sabino Romero and several of his family members and friends, with people from the community of Guamo Pamocha, led by a rival chief, Olegario Romero.

The heated argument over land spiralled into violence, and two people were shot and killed — Sabino’s son-in-law and Olegario’s 16-year-old pregnant sister — and several were injured.

The courts ordered the arrests of Olegario, Sabino and Alexander Fernández, a member of the Wayuú community who is married to Sabino’s daughter.

They were first held in a local military garrison. But when pressure mounted from the indigenous groups and organisations that back their cause, the three men facing murder charges were transferred to a prison in the city of Trujillo in the country’s western Andes highlands.

This year, Homo et Natura has been fighting in the courts for the three men to be returned to their communities and tried under indigenous criminal justice systems, which were recognised by the constitution.

Article 260 of the constitution establishes that “The legitimate authorities of indigenous peoples can apply in their territory forms of justice based on their ancestral traditions (in cases) that only involve members of their communities, according to their own customs and procedures, as long as they do not run counter to the constitution, the country’s laws and public order.”

The Yukpa justice system is based on reparations rather than punishment. For example, it requires the offender to work several years for the victim’s family, Portillo explained.

According to Sabino Romero’s defence attorneys, the evidence of what happened on Oct. 12, 2009 was altered; the interpreter used in the trial was not fluent in the Yukpa dialect spoken in the village of Chaktapa; and the chief is being held in a cell with evangelical inmates who press him to join them in prayers and rites that differ from his own beliefs.

The Spanish-born Korta is known as Ajishama, “the white ibis who shows the way” in the Ye’kuana language, by students at the Indigenous University he founded.

There are some 600,000 indigenous people from 36 different ethnic groups in this South American country of 28 million people. Just over half live in communities in border regions. (END)

Leave a Comment

How Activists Can Shape Politics (Part 4)

October 20, 2010 at 12:58 pm (reformist, Social Movements, Strategy, Theory)
Tags: , , ,

This series of articles has looked at the ways in which social movements can change government policies based on Felix Kolb’s book Protest and Opportunities.  Part 1 covered how disruption could change policy.  Part 2 discussed the importance of winning over public opinion and part 3 discussed the role of working within mainstream electoral politics.  Part 4 will now cover how the judicial branch of the government can institute political change.

 

The Judicial Mechanism

2 basic benefits of sing the judicial mechanism is that you could win the case (1) or the government could make concessions in order not to lose the case (2).

However, the effectiveness of the mechanism has been debated.

Those who think that it is a good means of political change argue that the judicial branch of government is generally not counting on public opinion since they don’t get elected to office (the Supreme Court for example).  Therefore, issues that are not supported by the public can won in court.  Courts must also hear all arguments and the case itself could raise public awareness.

Others (in particular Gerald N. Rosenberg in his book The Hollow Hope: Can Courts Bring About Social Change?) say there are 3 big reasons why courts don’t work well for social movements.

 

1) Normally – the argument made to the court must be regarded to the denial of some rights that already exist in law.

For example, the California’s current battle of same-sex marriage is about overturning the popular support for the ban with the argument that it is unconstitutional because it breaks with equal rights – rights gained through social movements.    Had those rights not previously been won, their would be no argument to overturn such legislation.

2) The judicial branch lacks independence

While it is relatively independent from public opinion institutionally, it rarely makes decisions that go against public opinion.  If they do, the Congress can also overturn their decisions.  Even the selection process for cases that are to be heard is influenced from beyond the judicial branch.

3) Perhaps most importantly, the judicial branch does not have much power to implement their decision.  Lower level courts have some say in how the decision plays out and other elites who are accountable to the public (and therefore must factor in public opinion into their decision) play a role.

While the Brown V. Board of Education decision was favorable to the Civil Rights Movement, the implementation was a slow and painful process that really relied on public support before real change could be seen.

For each problem there is a (slow) solution:

To overcome the problem of nonexistent rights – precedence must be won at some level and in some way.

To overcome the lack of independence – support for the president or from Congress must be won.

To overcome implementation problems – a fairly large part of the public needs to support the cause, or the general population must have some small support for it + at least 1 of 4  things:

1- incentives for implementation

2- costs for avoiding implementation

3- the implementation is done through the private sector

4- the courts protect individuals who support implementation but fear the political ramifications

 

 

Leave a Comment

How Activists Can Shape Politics (PART 3)

October 16, 2010 at 6:47 pm (reformist, Social Movements, Strategy, Theory, Uncategorized)
Tags: , , , , ,

This is part 3 of an overview of Felix Kolb’s Protest and Opportunities: The Political Outcomes of Social Movements, which wonderfully describes (and empirically examines) 5 theories of how social movements can influence the outcomes of political policies.  Part 1 covered the Disruptive Mechanism while part 2 discussed the Public Preference Mechanism.  Now in Part 3, I’ll outline what Kolb refers to as the Political Access Mechanism

The Political Access Mechanism (p. 80-5)

This mechanism suggests that victories can be achieved by social movement actors by playing within the mainstream political arena.  There is a simple 2-step process for achieving this:

1. Entering the arena (at whatever level is best suited for your needs)

2. Influencing the agenda once inside (this step suggests that victory may take some time between when access to the political arena is gained and when actual goals are accomplished.)

Kolb focuses on two specific ways this can be achieved:

- Gaining the right to vote (as in part of the Civil Rights Movement)

- Electing the groups own representatives

The first case Kolb looks at using this mechanism is African American during the Civil Rights Movement.  Many African Americans were disenfranchised in the South – movement efforts to increase voter registration in those areas challenged parties to struggle over appealing to new constituencies.  This led to significant reforms national as both the Democratic and Republican parties appealed to African American voters who were (after Roosevelt) much less tightly fastened to the Democrats than today.  This undecided voter factor gave them leverage as both parties were supporting civil rights legislation nationally until the Republicans realized they were loosing too many Southern conservatives.

Once African Americans got the vote, they steadily voted for African American politicians who in turn pushed for laws regarding race issues more so than white politicians.

Again, it is important to look at limitations.  Gaining the vote, de jure (by law) or de facto (in practice) becomes an important political tool only if there is enough new voters to be able or appear to be able to make a difference in the outcome of an election.

Groups need to also be cohesive in their voting to increase the impact.  But again, the more the group changes from one to the other year after year, the more they are catered too by political parties.

If the group doesn’t share the same goals and values, it will be hard for politicians to make concessions to the group as a whole.

Once your group is in government your representative should try to push the median policy preference of the body they work for in order to make a change since their ideal position is likely not to be approved by enough members.  Also, the representative needs to be as high of a leader and on as many decision making bodies as possible to make the greatest contribution.  Also, the minority representatives should work across chambers to help pass laws where as working within only 1 chamber may be only enough to block unwanted legislation.

In his book, Kolb analysis this mechanism using the Civil Rights Movement.  I would suggest reading it for more detailed examples and information.

Leave a Comment

Access to Political Institutions is Not Yet a Victory

October 16, 2010 at 5:02 pm (reformist, Social Movements)
Tags: , , ,

The following article appeared on IPS News on Oct 15th.  It described the opening of political access to NGO’s (and therefore Social Movement Organizations (SMOs) within the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).  However, the article more or less describes this kind of access as victory in itself.  While there maybe evidence to suggest that movements with access to political institutions have a better shot at affecting real change through policy and not simply symbolic change, being heard in a convention is different that actually affecting policy outcomes.  Social Movements need to be aware of this fact and remember what they are really fighting for.

 

The article that follows can be found here:

To Feed the World, Gov’ts Break New Ground with Civil Society
By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Oct 15, 2010 (IPS) – For over a decade, seasoned activist Sarojini Rengam’s efforts to storm the bureaucratic barricades at global food security meetings in Rome hardly produced any cracks. The tightly structured agenda at the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) gatherings she went to were unequivocal about where activists stood – in the margins.

The likes of Rengam, the executive director of the Asia-Pacific branch of global green lobby Pesticide Action Network, were given limited time to air their concerns towards the end of the annual Committee of World Food Security (CFS) meeting. Moreover, this virtual postscript to the conference came after government policy makers had already drafted a final document.

“Civil society organisations were often seen as environmental terrorists,” said Rengam of how groups like her Penang-based non-governmental organisation (NGO) and others from the global South were viewed by government officials who dominated the annual event hosted by the U.N. body in the Italian capital.

But not any more.

In an unprecedented nod toward civil society organisations, this year’s annual FAO event to shape global food security policy rolled out the welcome mat to some 150 activists who took part in the just-finished meeting – on equal footing with government delegates.

“Our inputs were not ignored, as in the past,” Rengam said during a telephone interview from Rome. “Our views were noted down, such as on land acquisition, which is a major problem in Asia. This was a big jump.”

Other activists like Marlene Ramirez are also basking in the new spirit of inclusion that was on display at the FAO’s headquarters, where this year’s high-level intergovernmental meeting of the CFS ran from Oct. 11-15.

“It was very empowering. We had opportunities to intervene simultaneously since we were there as co-equals with the governments,” said Ramirez, secretary-general of the Asian Partnership for the Development of Human Resources in Rural Areas, a Manila-based regional grassroots network. “It has made a major difference for civil society.”

This week’s debates on finding solutions to food security were influenced by “the voices of many civil society sectors,” she revealed during an interview from the meeting site. “Governments got to hear alternative solutions and the need to explore alternative ways.”

Rengam and Ramirez were among 150 civil society representatives from across the world that took part in this week’s groundbreaking meeting. These groups, of which 30 were from Asia, represented regional and international farmers’ organisations, herders associations and indigenous organisations.

This break from the format of conventional U.N. meetings – where civil society groups are accorded marginal, or at times only symbolic, space – is winning early praise from some government delegates, among them the representatives from the Philippines and Argentina.

“It is very important that finally, member governments have recognised that NGOs and CSOs (civil society organisations) have a role to play institutionally,” said Noel de Luna, current head of the CFS, during an interview. “It serves as an assurance that the voices who we have excluded in the past are heard.”

“CSO are directly in contact with the people going hungry and living in poverty and were able to bring that reality to the discussions,” the delegate from the Philippines added. “In the past, all we heard were only statements by governments.”

The first hint of this push for CSOs to be included in the CFS emerged between 2007 and 2008, as the world was grappling with the confluence of the food and fuel crisis, followed by the global financial crisis.

“There was gradual acknowledgement that food security and food availability issues cannot be solved by governments only,” said Thomas Price, head of FAO’s branch that works with activists. “Governments wanted this body (CFS) to be the lead body on food security issues.”

The outcome, with civil society groups at the policy table for the first time, is “a radical, if not revolutionary change,” he told IPS. “They have been affecting the discourse at the plenary sessions and submitting documents at other proceedings.”

At the same time, he conceded: “Some governments are hesitant and resistant in having CSOs at the table, while others are facilitating civil society participation.”

The FAO’s ready embrace of civil society activists in shaping food security policies echoes in the Asia-Pacific, home to two-thirds of the world’s more than one billion people who went hungry every day in 2009. The region saw the number of people in chronic hunger rise from 609 million in 2008 to 658 million in 2009.

This figure dampens the praise showered on the region known for high economic growth. “Economic growth has benefited the rich and the middle class, but didn’t benefit those living below the poverty line,” Hiroyuki Konuma, the FAO’s regional head, told IPS. “They are the ones who have suffered as the food crisis hit, and then the financial crisis.”

This disparity is widening and gatherings like the CSF help address “not only problems about increasing food production, but the access issue – how farmers could access food to reduce poverty,” he added. “If we are to change the politics, the people in each country must influence the policy direction of new agriculture programmes.”

“Food security issues cannot be solved by U.N. agencies alone, or by individual governments alone,” Konuma added. “We have to build solidarity with different levels of people, including civil society.” (END)

Leave a Comment

How Activists Can Shape Politics (PART 2)

October 13, 2010 at 10:14 am (Social Movements, Strategy, Theory)
Tags: , , , , , , , ,

This marks Part 2 of the discussion on the effectiveness of social movements in affecting political policy based on the work of Felix Kolb (see Part 1 here).  We are looking at the theoretical ways in which activists help to shape society.  This time we’ll look at changing the public’s attitude about an issue as a means to positive social change.

The Public Preference Mechanism (p. 76-9)

This model states that based on the theory that politicians do not simply state their own policy choice but must also appeal to their voting constituency in order to get reelected, social movements can try to change the public’s attitudes and opinions on topics in order to push politicians to also support those causes.

An example: as public sentiment swayed from support of racial segregation to opposing segregation thanks to the civil rights movement (and the integration that occurred in popular culture – sports, music, entertainment), the political climate in the courts and in Congress changed to fit their constituency’s tastes.

Another way the changing public preference could help change government policy is through an election itself – if an issue/or a range of issues becomes really important in the public eye and is not supported by the current government, they may then elect a different politician who does support that/those policy/policies.

After the long  tenure of G.W. Bush as U.S. President a painfully low approval ratings for him and his policies particularly on the war (probably thanks to the popular yet quick-to-distinct antiwar movement), the 2008 election year brought significant victories for the Democratic Party (whether or not this brings substantive change in actual policy is another story – yet highly plausible).

Kolb suggests that the actual level of public support for some policy position is not as important a the perceived level of support.  Social movements can signal to politicians that the public does indeed support their cause whether or not the majority really does support it.  This is really what lobbying, petitions and letters to your representatives are about – you are signaling to them what the public position is.

An important thing to note here is that ANY increase in adding direct democracy measures into the political process (such as referendums, popular initiatives) and such things as proportional representation should increase the public opinion’s influence on policy – this is why these seemingly reformist struggles or actually struggle for nonreformist reforms: the public gains some level of political power which it can then use, with the help of social movements, to advance toward a more just society in other areas.

How can an activist organization and social movement change public preferences?  Through things such as media events (protests, marches, vigils etc…), by canvassing door to door, by talking to friends, family, coworkers, and/or classmates about the issue(s).  Reading groups was one way that (largely middle class) women became aware of feminist thinking, women’s issues, and an array of new ideas and preferences.

But let’s not be too enthusiastic about this method without considering its limitations.  First, if the issue is not seen as important – even if the public is in line with the position of the social movement – their opinions wont matter since the issue wouldn’t influence their vote very much.  Not only does the public have to agree with your issue then, they also have to care about it enough to influence their vote – or at least appear as if it were likely to influence their vote.

Only a small percentage of the public endorses (household) animal abuse and would likely support legislation that works to limit such abuse, but the issue (at this point) is not nearly as important of a concern to most as the economy is, for example.  Therefore, just because a candidate does not support anti-animal abuse legislation does not mean that he will not get elected since the issue is low in public importance.

Second, if elite groups are strongly in support of one position and few if any elite groups favor the social movement position, the chances of legislation being passed in favor of the activists are much less likely.

Think about it this way, suppose in the 1930s, during the time of great political mobilization of radicals in America, instead of being disruptive (see Part 1), the public simply supported a position of anti-capitalism.  Since the major forces were obviously pro-capitalist, little was likely to change without disrupting the peace.  (Others have a different point of view – they say that votes for third parties rather than disruption led to the policy changes of the Roosevelt Administration (see Seymour Martin Lipset and Gary Marks).

Also, policy makers, and other elites, can influence public opinion and preferences.  The strength of these institutions may counteract the social movement and defeat public support for activist causes.  This could simply be done by bringing in a new issue and making it even more important in the minds of the public.

In many ways, the W. Administration was able to pass a whole package of otherwise (probably) unpopular policies by playing up the importance of national security – trumping people’s interests in human rights, freedoms, and international law.

Even if the public does withstand the push from the Right and maintains the agenda of the social movement on a particular policy, and even if the public is serious enough about it to worry politicians into supporting some legislation on the topic, the general public is either uninterested, or more likely poorly informed about the specifics of legislation thereby allowing the politicians to appease the public without enacting strong reform.

The publics current disapproval of the war in Afghanistan may certainly bring Obama to address the people’s concerns, but it hardly means that significant changes are going to occur.  In this case however, time will still tell whether or not this is true.

The Public Preference Mechanism is really about changing politics by changing people’s minds, or at least by making issues more important.  We try to do this every day when we talk politics with our friends and families.  We hardly ever agree on everything.  But to make a real impact on the existing political institutions, politicians have to believe that a strong segment of her or his constituency is supportive of the social movement position and that they are willing to vote based on that policy.

1 Comment

Police Take on the Oakland – Oscar Grant Riots

October 11, 2010 at 9:04 pm (Protest, Strategy, Violence and Non-Violence)
Tags: , , , ,

Oakland Riot Strategy and Tactics (Part 2 of 2)

Oakland PD’s leadership and preparation helps avert worse damage following the BART verdict.

by Robert O’Brien -

Television only captures a small part of the swirling sights, sounds of cacophonic chaos of out-of-control mobs rampaging and destroying everything in their path.

A live broadcast can’t capture the overwhelming up-close, personal fear and adrenaline of being in the middle of a riot. The closest it comes is hearing the fear in the voices of on-scene reporters clamoring for police. Riots are chaotic, destructive, dangerous, and often deadly.

Some riots are predictable, giving police time to plan and prepare a response. Such was the case with the July 8 riot in Oakland. The January 2009 protests-turned-riots in Oakland were a preview of what police could expect depending on the former BART officer verdict.

When a guilty verdict of involuntary manslaughter was announced mid-afternoon on July 8, you could sense “something” was likely to happen. The city of Oakland, and especially the Oakland PD, had been preparing for possible violence for 18 months. During the trial, Bay Area TV stations showed OPD training for possible riots, while not revealing any “strategy or tactics.”

How did OPD plan and prepare for potential rioting? Any plan is only as good as its leadership. OPD’s new Chief Anthony Batts brings a wealth of experience as Long Beach (Calif.) PD’s chief and SWAT commander. He’s assisted by a cadre of able, experienced OPD command personnel.

As with many Bay Area cities, OPD is well trained, equipped and has a wealth of experience in crowd control, demonstrations and riots. This, combined with effective leadership, only needs a sound strategic and tactical plan and implementation to be an effective riot control response.

Anarchists, who played a central role in the January 2009 Oakland/BART riots, would be expected to do it again on July 8. The Bay Area is noted for its many anarchist groups. Anarchists had plenty of recent “practice” causing mayhem, violence, vandalism and confronting police at the 2010 Toronto G-20 Summit and Vancouver Winter Olympics, and 2009 Pittsburgh G-20 Summit.

In 2009, the anarchists were joined by “opportunist”—street thugs using the occasion to wreak their own havoc. Police had every reason to believe July 8 would be no different than January 2009. This time, police would be ready.

July 8 afternoon protests started slowly with only a few, peaceful protesters venting against the “too lenient” sentence. The city of Oakland even provided the City Hall lawn for peaceful demonstrations.

Slowly and steadily, the protest in front of City Hall became larger and louder, but remained peaceful. Meanwhile, not wanting to provoke confrontation, officers remained in hidden staging areas. The first real sign of the massive police presence was overhead TV aerial footage of a large formation of field force vehicles moving slowly in the direction of the growing City Hall demonstration.

The first reports of trouble were reported with nightfall. Strategically located TV reporters provided play-by-play coverage of a number of simultaneous incidents, including at least one confrontation between demonstrators and police.

TV viewers could sense the rapidly growing tension and buildup toward trouble. TV cameras on the ground and in the air showed massive numbers of police in riot gear methodically advancing on foot toward demonstrators—some of whom were throwing objects at officers.

Aerial views showed police were deploying in what can be described as a “collapsing containment” strategy. Slowly herding the now-violent demonstrators into a smaller space and easier containment.

Police were now being pelted with thrown objects, and while field force front lines remained intact, arrest teams of ample officers conducted forays into the mobs to arrest select targets, and then whisked them back behind the lines. These arrest forays were repeated again and again.

Meanwhile, the crowds turned mobs had turned violent, throwing objects at police, wearing the typical Black Bloc “uniform” (all black clothing, bandanas, hoodies and backpacks containing improvised weapons. As organized as police were, the anarchists appeared nearly as well organized, and were clearly acting according to their own plan.

Suddenly, at least one TV station ground reporter said there was a splinter mob breaking into a Foot Locker store, just beyond the police containment area. The reporter provided live coverage as the mob broke windows, ransacked and looted the store. Then, emboldened by their “success,” they searched for more targets. Soon, the mob was rampaging, breaking windows with hammers, looting, spray painting buildings, setting trash-dumpster fires and rioting.

Sixty to 80 businesses were damaged, vandalized, or looted. Ultimately, 78 rioters were arrested for various charges—mostly misdemeanors—but 12 for felonies that included assaulting and/or resisting police, rioting, and looting.

Several business owners criticized police for a “too slow response” and OPD promised to look into how to improve in the future. OPD also said there were communications breakdowns that was due to the 15 participating LE agencies on different radio frequencies and/or unfamiliarity with using borrowed OPD portables.

The plan called for all assignments to come from the Command Post.  However, there were instances where individual non-OPD units responded independently of the CP. Also, one 100-officer contingent was never deployed due to a communication breakdown.

But overall, the OPD plan was executed with disciplined effectiveness that was impressive considering that 15 LE agencies, representing a reported 900 officers, were involved. And as most of us know, “a plan is a plan, until s*** hits the fan.”

I was particularly impressed by the “collapsing containment” tactic that effectively took ground away from rioters. What I was most impressed with was the disciplined professionalism by all the officers I saw. This, despite their being subjected for five hours to non-stop attacks by determined rioters and anarchists.

Former BART officer Mehserle’s sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 5. Meanwhile, 80 Oakland police officers were laid off only days after the July 8 riot, including many who were involved in the riot. Amidst threats of possibly more OPD layoffs, Chief Batts has promised that next time, police will be even better prepared. After what I saw, I’d have to agree.

From PoliceMag.com

Leave a Comment

How Activists Can Shape Politics (PART 1)

October 11, 2010 at 7:31 pm (Protest, reformist, Social Movements, Strategy, Theory, Uncategorized)
Tags: , , , , , , ,

In an excellent book  entitled Protest and Opportunities: The Political Outcomes of Social Movements, Felix Kolb outlines 5 mechanisms social movements can use to affect political change.  In Part 1-5 of this group of posts, I will describe the theories behind each of these  mechanisms.  Later I will explore Kolb’s findings regarding the Civil Rights Movement in the US and the anti-nuclear movement in 18 countries.

According to Kolb, social movements can have an impact on political policy, implementation and outcome through disrupting the status quo, using public opinion to pressure political figures, gaining access to the formal political arena, using judicial bodies to serve the interests of the movement, and working transnationally to help pressure the state.  Each mechanism has its conditions and shortcomings both theoretically and empirically, but they needn’t be used in a mutually exclusive way.  However, depending on the movement and the context of that movement, some mechanisms are more likely to achieve results than others.

The Disruptive Mechanism (p. 73-6)

This mechanism is discussing the ways in which things like protests and riots can generate political change.  This is done by shaking the normal functioning of the state or insititutions important to the state.  For example, a strike is a form of protest in which production of a good or provision of a service ceases – affecting the normal functioning of that business, or – regarding a general strike – a large segment of the economy.

The level of impact made by such disruptive tactics are affected by the degree to which the disruption interveres with others, the degree to which those who are disrupted have resources to give up for a return to normalcy (or the extent they can pressure the state or other institutions to concede to the demands), and whether or not the disruptive group can overcome repressive forces.

For example, the Oscar Grant riots in Oakland were seen as disruptive both economically and reputationally for  the City of Oakland with plenty of potential for more.  Those who were physically disrupted, mostly business and residents of the city, looked to the city government to stop the riots from escalating and repeating.  Since business were attacked and further attacks my scare businesses from setting up shop in Oakland, a strong incentive was given to the city to end the riots.  Ending the riots could come from conceeding to some of movement demands or by repressing the rioters and/or the protesters from becoming rioters.  As the disruptive potential of the Oakland was quite high, the disruptive group was able to overcome the repressive forces – in this case not the police, but rather the city from taking on a policy severe repression.  In the case of the Oscar Grant riots, much of the conditions for success where looking quite good.  Though no thorough analysis has been made of this case, there’s a plausible reason to assume that the first Oscar Grant riot may have resulted in the arrest and indictment of Officer Mehserle (Ciccariello-Maher 2009)

Kolb goes on to say that concessions given to the disruptive group(s) are more likely during periods of ‘electoral instability’ – when elections are up ahead and the results are uncertain.  This is because the people/party in power has to appeal to the individuals and groups being affected by somehow stopping the disruption and they have to appeal to the supporters of the protest (as they also vote) by not repressing the disruptive group.  This of course only applies to disruptions that hold at least some popular support.

Arguably, the property-damaging disruption caused by a small percentage of activists during the WTO protests in Seattle in 1999 was met with repression specifically because they had no support.  Those who agreed with their cause were already supporting the disruptive elements of the protest that were not destroying property and those activists too did not support the property-damaging groups.  As the media was craving the blood of broken windows rather than the unity between environmentalists and unions, the public’s support for the protests waned and repression, rather than concessions, increased.

In his book, Kolb makes another important claim regarding the disruptive mechanism: forces of repression are quick to find ways of curbing the disruptive efforts of the group.  Therefore the innovation of disruptive tactics is very important in winning demands.  Basically, switch up the tactics so the police don’t know what to expect next – and aren’t prepared to handle the current disruption effectively.

If you have enough of a disruption, a crisis can ensue.  This crisis in itself can be a means for winning movement demands as the government’s ideas could be discredited by the crisis and a new government would have a mandate to ennact new laws, the crisis could cause the government to feel that without immediate action things would get worse and/or the fear that people/property could get hurt or a revolution could occur.  In many ways, a crisis situation not caused by the disruptive acts could also lead to social movement victories.  The social reforms of the New Deal may well have come about during such a crises where labor and the unemployed were quickly catching on to the concept of a communist revolution.  Roosevelt was forced to act fast to concede to some of their demands.

1 Comment

Anti-Semitism on the Left

October 9, 2010 at 1:03 pm (Anti-semitism, Racism, Todd Gitlin)

FROM Mother Jones

The Rough Beast Returns

Anti-Semitism is back, taking the place of intelligent criticism of Israel and its policies. And if that wasn’t bad enough, students are spreading the gibberish.

— By Todd Gitlin

 

The email sent out last month by Laurie Zoloth, director of Jewish Studies at San Francisco State University, was chilling on its face.

“I cannot fully express what it feels like to have to walk across campus daily, past maps of the Middle East that do not include Israel, past posters of cans of soup with labels on them of drops of blood and dead babies, labeled ‘canned Palestinian children meat, slaughtered according to Jewish rites under American license,’ past poster after poster calling out Zionism=racism, and Jews=Nazis,” she wrote — and the details only became more shattering from then on.

I read Zoloth’s words with horror but not, alas, complete amazement, Eleven years ago, during the Gulf War, across San Francisco Bay, the head of a student splinter group at Berkeley addressed a room full of faculty and students opposed to the war, spitting out venomously, “You Jews, I know your names, I know where you live.”

The faculty and students in attendance sat stiffly and said nothing. Embarrassed? Frightened? Or worse — thinking that it wasn’t time to tackle this issue, that it was off the agenda, an inconvenience.

Far more recently, two students of mine at NYU wondered aloud whether it was actually true, as they had heard, that 4,000 Jews didn’t show up for work at the World Trade Center on September 11. They clearly thought this astoundingly crazy charge was plausible enough to warrant careful investigation, but it didn’t occur to them to look at the names of the dead.

Wicked anti-Semitism is back. The worst crackpot notions that circulate through the violent Middle East are also roaming around America, and if that wasn’t bad enough, students are spreading the gibberish. Students! As if the bloc to which we have long looked for intelligent dissent has decided to junk any pretense of standards.

A student movement is not just a student movement. It’s a student movement. Students, whether they are progressive or not, have the responsibility of knowing things, of thinking and discerning, of studying. A student movement should maintain the highest of standards, not ape the formulas of its elders or outdo them in virulence.

It should therefore trouble progressives everywhere that the students at San Francisco State are neither curious nor revolted by the anti-Semitic drivel they are regurgitating. The simple fact that a student movement — even a small one — has been reduced to reflecting the hatred spewed by others should profoundly trouble anyone whose moral principles aim higher than simple nationalism — as should be the case for anyone on the left.

It isn’t hard to discover the sources of the drivel being parroted by the students at San Francisco State. In the blood-soaked Middle East of Yasser Arafat and Ariel Sharon, in the increasingly polarized Europe of Jean-Marie le Pen raw anti-Semitism has increasingly taken the place of intelligent criticism of Israel and its policies.

Even as Laurie Zoloth’s message flew around the world, even as several prominent European papers published scathing but warranted attacks on Israel’s stonewalling of an inquiry into the Jenin fighting, the great Portuguese novelist Jose Saramago was describing Israel’s invasion of Ramallah as “a crime comparable to Auschwitz.”

In one of his long, lapping sentences, Saramago wrote in Madrid’s El Pais (as translated by Paul Berman in The Forward, May 24):

“Intoxicated mentally by the messianic dream of a Greater Israel which will finally achieve the expansionist dreams of the most radical Zionism; contaminated by the monstrous and rooted ‘certitude’ that in this catastrophic and absurd world there exists a people chosen by God and that, consequently, all the actions of an obsessive, psychological and pathologically exclusivist racism are justified; educated and trained in the idea that any suffering that has been inflicted, or is being inflicted, or will be inflicted on everyone else, especially the Palestinians, will always be inferior to that which they themselves suffered in the Holocaust, the Jews endlessly scratch their own wound to keep it bleeding, to make it incurable, and they show it to the world as if it were a banner.”

Note well: the deliciously deferred subject of this sentence is: “the Jews.” Not the right-wing Jews, the militarist Israelis, but “the Jews.” Suddenly the Jews are reduced to a single stick-figure (or shall we say hook-nosed?) caricature and we are plunged into the brainless, ruinous, abysmal iconography that should make every last reasonable person shudder.

The German socialist August Bebel once said that anti-Semitism was “the socialism of fools.” What we witness now is the progressivism of fools. It is a recrudescence of everything that costs the left its moral edge. And, appallingly, it is this contemptible message the anti-Semitic students at San Francisco State chose to parrot.

We are not on the brink of “another Auschwitz,” and to think so, in fact, falsifies the danger. The danger is clear and present, though not apocalyptic. It’s no remote nightmare that synagogues are bombed, including the one on the Tunisian island of Djerba, famous for tolerance, an apparent al-Qaeda truck bomb attack. This happened. It is no remote nightmare that hundreds of Palestinian civilians died during Israeli incursions into the West Bank. This, too, happened. The nightmare is that the second is being allowed to excuse and justify the first.

Laurie Zoloth wrote: “Let me remind you that ours is arguably one of the Jewish Studies programs in the country most devoted to peace, justice and diversity since our inception.”

But anti-Semitism doesn’t care. Like every other lunacy that diminished human brains are capable of, anti-Semitism already knows what it hates.

This is no incidental issue, no negligible distraction. A Left that cares for the rights of humanity cannot cavalierly tolerate the systematic abuse of any people — whatever you think of Israel’s or any other country’s foreign policy. Any student movement worthy of the name must face the ugly history that long made anti-Semitism the acceptable racism, face it and break from it.

If fighting it unremittingly is not a “progressive” cause, then what kind of progress does progressivism have in mind?

Leave a Comment

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.