Copenhagen
Dec 15th, 2009. Copenhagen. The day before what CNN referred to as “the most hotly anticipated action of the summit”, nearly a thousand activists huddled together in a Danish squat - which became the focal point of grassroots mobilization against the United Nations’ annual Climate Change Conference [COP]. Lisa, an American activist and veteran of Seattle, gave a final pitch for the plan of action:
“We will use the combined mass of our bodies to push through the police lines and then break through the fence. Once we are inside the U.N. grounds we will secure a safe space where delegates coming out from the conference can join us and together we will form a People’s Assembly.”
Maps were distributed. Blocs were in the final stages of formation. There was one last heated debate over the adopted consensus of 'confrontational non-violence'. Participants filled with anticipation at the thought of being part of a plan to change the course of history.
These actions in Copenhagen were the beginning of the Toronto People’s Assembly. As much as has been written and said about the day of Reclaim Power, it was the two weeks of frantic meetings, alliance building, and constant striving to create an inclusive and horizontal process which created a new model for organizing that could be exported around the world.
Cochabamba
Next, seeds were sown for the People’s Assembly in Cochabamba, where Bolivia hosted the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in April of 2010. Toronto activists in Cochabamba observed a conference that, while engaging the grassroots participation of 30,000 activists from across the world, was largely implemented from the top down. The People’s Assembly drew much inspiration from Cochabamba, but the conference also acted as a compass for the Assembly to be critical of its own process.
The main development which came out of Cochabamba was a collective understanding of the beginning of a new effort based on the principle that the best way to answer the international call is to build your local struggle. One of the lessons drawn from Bolivia, was the need to put in place impactful structures and formations to maintain and build a movement that is more substantial, consistent, and long-term. The call from Cochabamba was to begin the building of a worldwide climate justice movement.
Back in Toronto, the weeks in May immediately following Cochabamba, and in June prior to the G20 were a crucial and transformative period for the social and climate justice community. Talks and discussions were ongoing to evaluate which elements could be drawn from Cochabamba. Raul Burbano, an organizer of the June 23rd Assembly, explains how “the People’s Assembly is an extension of the dialogue, organization, and mobilization that took place in Cochabamba. It’s an instrument through which local activists can create new spaces, and generate new possibilities.” As conferences, panels, and report-backs raged on, local organizers, young and old, converged with a fresh and renewed sense of purpose; an understanding that we needed to start building. Consciously or not, the People’s Assembly kept evolving through new and different channels
Toronto G20
In Toronto after the COP, during the early months of 2010, post-Copenhagen burn-out was a factor for many organizers, and initial attempts to reconstruct the People’s Assembly process never materialized. This was due partly to the need to convince Toronto-based organizers that an Assembly needed to be a priority, that one organized around a completely horizontal process could be successful, and partly because many organizers shifted their efforts to that other summit on its way to town, the G8/G20.
As June and the G20 grew closer, a call was put out through the Toronto Community Mobilization Network for a day of resistance for climate and environmental justice. Responding to this call, a circle of non-aligned CJ and environmental organizers started meeting weekly in a park outside the 519 Community Centre. Two plans for action emerged. One was a rally that would become known as the Toxic Tour. The other was the People’s Assembly on Climate Justice.
Together with allies as part of the growing community mobilization against the G20, the first People’s Assembly was formed on June 23rd, 2010.
The G20 hit Toronto like a storm, and in the aftermath the organizing community suddenly found itself in a new environment, with new conditions. The collective response in Toronto was quick and widespread, and the resounding call to establish new relationships was not only heard, but understood. In July and August with the intensity of organizing remaining high, with action camps happening across the country, and with various groups in Toronto together stressing the immediate need for movement building, there was no longer any doubt that a second People’s Assembly would take place.
The People’s Assembly on Climate Justice
Enter the Toronto People’s Assembly on Climate Justice (PACJ). Taking elements from Reclaim Power and Cochabamba, the Toronto manifestation of the PACJ has since held two successful Assemblies, one immediately before the G20 summit, and another on the December 4th, 2010 Worldwide Day of Climate Action. The first focused on defining the meaning of Climate Justice, while the second focused on the collective work of building a stronger movement for Climate Justice in Toronto. For both Assemblies the starting point was the 'Framing Question', a direct importation from the Reclaim Power Assembly. The framing question is simply a general suggestion for direction, a starting point from which participants can begin to generate ideas.
The main innovation introduced in Toronto was an additional round of breakouts, which allowed more space for the Assembly’s horizontal process to both generate ideas and to orient itself for action. Beginning with the second Assembly, Toronto activists took the working group model that emerged from Cochabamba and re-framed it as a series of permanent action-oriented bodies known as People’s Councils. During the December 4th Toronto Assembly, People’s Councils were created on Movement Building, Outreach & Education, Group Coordination, Building Alternative Spaces, Mass Action & Political Pressure, and Personal Development. Both assemblies generated more than 200 participants, and over 40 endorsements from community groups in Toronto.
Radical Horizontality – Inside the People’s Assembly
The movement inside the Assembly is an open collective dialogue which organizers have termed radical horizontality. Within the Assembly, radical horizontality is a two-pronged process which allows participants, through two rounds of break-outs and intermittent plenaries, to first generate ideas, and then to develop and form them together in order to establish mandates for the People’s Councils. This concept of radical horizontality also extends to everyday life, beyond the Assembly, and seeks to establish shared responsibility and accountability in the entire community, in order to make local resistance and organizing more sustainable.
From the beginning the Assembly stressed the need for a point of convergence inclusive to a wide range of organizations, from women’s groups and anti-poverty, to environmental justice and food security, cyclists, migrant justice, co-operatives, collectives, etc. To effectively transform communities, the Assembly posited a lack of separation between activism and everyday life. Raul Zibechi, a Uruguayan socio-political theorist, explains how “in the new pattern of action... mobilization starts in the spaces of everyday life and survival, putting in movement an increasing number of social networks or, that is to say, societies in movement, self-articulated from within.” The People’s Councils were modeled on the hope of facilitating the establishment of this sort of organizing on a permanent basis; to make the leap from simply activism to organized communities.
The post-G20 realities of community organizing in Canada presented us with a challenge, and a dynamic that calls for activists to develop, out of necessity, new methods of organizing. This requires ingenuity, responsibility, and a long-term willingness to sculpt a new grassroots paradigm. Small beginnings of creative examples were observed in Canada during the following months.
Various action camps took place throughout the country during the summer of 2010 themed around climate justice, indigenous solidarity, non-violent direct action, and Tar Sands/pipeline resistance. Organizers worked to build links between cities and to strengthen regional networks. Simultaneous people’s assemblies were held in December, 2010, throughout the country, organizers in Montreal began to develop the idea of a climate justice co-op, and the climate justice community in Toronto started establishing the People’s Assembly on a permanent basis. Climate Justice organizers have used the momentum coming out of the G20 to create their own grassroots infrastructure.
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The People’s Assembly in Toronto emerged on the tide of a paradigm shift towards popular assemblies as an alternative to the complete failure of international institutions and nation-states to address the urgent global threat presented by the climate crisis. At the same time, a global Climate justice movement has grown organically; determining its own shape through horizontal structures and differentiating itself from mainstream environmental voices through a deeply rooted anti-capitalist analysis.
The year 2010 also presented the organizing community in Canada with two major mobilizations to mount, one in Vancouver for the Olympics and one in Toronto for the G20. Toronto organizers took this confluence of factors as an opportunity, and the People’s Assembly was one element of the outcome.
By eschewing traditional hierarchical forms, the open and inclusive process of the Assembly is an invitation for community members and organizers to come together in an effort to build solidarity, share skills, and develop increased coordination. The aim of the People’s Assembly in Toronto is for the climate justice community and its allies to utilize it as a vehicle or a space through which it can operate as a movement, a self-articulated space that will allow it to remain a movement.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Opening Address to the December 4th People's Assembly on Climate Justice - Toronto
by Julien Lalonde
In April of this year, Cochabamba, Bolivia hosted the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, which saw a convergence of 35,000 participants; workers, farmers, students, peasants, activists, and people from all walks of life. Beyond instilling a prevailing sense of international solidarity, this summit brought forward a sense of duty, and the sense that perhaps something new was beginning to take shape. The message to come out of Cochabamba was to pass from simply understanding the reality of the climate crisis, to implementing the agenda needed to reverse it, by positioning ourselves strategically as communities, and by arming ourselves with the capacity to effectuate the systemic change that is required. That is what this Assembly will attempt to do; to move from information, to theory, to action. The inspiration from the powerful social movements of Bolivia, and the voice of the peoples of the world, called for and initiated the construction of a Worldwide Climate Justice Movement. Climate Justice because it is no longer only people who are under attack, but Mother Earth herself.
This means that international chapters of this giant movement building exercise must be started all over the world, and the slogan of think global act local suddenly becomes very relevant. Speaking on international solidarity, Marcos of the Zapatistas has said that “the best thing you can do is to build the struggle in your own country, and when we’re done here we will go help you over there.”
Today’s Assembly is in response to international calls. When we think of Community organizing as a response, we can think of People’s Assemblies = rich history of People’s Assemblies tied to social movements around the world and predominantly in Latin America. And when you think of People’s Assemblies an example that comes to mind is the radical south-west region of Mexico; the states of Oaxaca and Chiapas. Oaxaca in 2006, in response to state repression and injustice, formed the insurrectionary Popular Assembly of the People’s of Oaxaca which comprised social movements of sectors, shades, and sizes from all across the state of Oaxaca, and with grassroots control, community empowerment, and neighborhood councils, dispersed the state and entirely took control of their land and their cities for several months. The Zapatistas, for their part, in the state of Chiapas, have controlled for more than a decade large rural areas, and have persisted through their communal modes of living, resisting constant harassment and violence by paramilitary and state forces. And most recently, in Honduras, following the June 2009 military coup that put the country in the hands of dictatorship, the people formed the National Coordinating Committee of Popular Resistance, a strategy building space which operates like a People’s Assembly.
Clearly, these examples are not comparable to our process of movement building here in Toronto, and in Canada, but what is worth noting is that all these examples I’ve mentioned of community organizing and people’s assemblies are all still operating today. This comes to show that grassroots community organizing, often manifested through Popular Assemblies, if carried out with the right process, intent on continuation, and true to principles of horizontality, can be very powerful, effective, and enduring.
Post G20, the social and climate justice communities in Toronto began increased discussion on the need for a more unified movement in Canada. The elites and the forces of capitalist globalization had once again thrown more money and more violence at us. They were elevating their attacks, we had to respond by continuing to organize still more effectively. In Toronto, we became cognizant that there were so many different groups doing so much great work, but that most of them were operating largely separate from each other. From that, the present day idea for the People’s Assembly took shape as a mechanism through which the entire community could operate together toward collective dialogue and community empowerment.
Over 40 different groups have endorsed the People’s Assembly, faith-based, cyclist groups, food groups, social and climate justice of all sorts, migrant justice, anti-poverty, and all realize that protecting our planet is a duty we all share by necessity. They all bring varying experiences, resources, and knowledge. The presence of so many different groups here today and the collective manifestation of this unique feature of the movement illustrates the power of diversity.
We want our community organizing to create the capacity to effectuate change in all aspects of our everyday lives. Shopping at farmers’ markets, riding your bicycle, or growing your own food, for example, these acts in themselves don’t make a measurable difference, but when many people do this, and when we combine our organizing efforts on all levels, we will eventually begin to see results. That is why we have organizations here today from all spheres and orbits, to provide knowledge and resources, in order to facilitate the possibility of changing the way we run our community in Toronto. I read recently, and I’m quoting from a book; “Revolutionary change does not come as one cataclysmic moment....but as an endless succession of surprises, moving zigzag toward a more decent society. We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.” That’s a quote by Howard Zinn. What we’re saying is that we can rebuild and recreate our city and our world, today, by carving out community spaces, by building urban gardens, by nurturing a culture of life, by reclaiming our communities library by library, community centre by community centre, block by block, and neighbourhood by neighbourhood. The belief and the vision is that People’s Assemblies can be a vehicle or a channel through which we can give life to this process of empowerment. We also want to stress that the People’s Assemblies, and the building of a movement, are both linked to process, and that process takes time. This will be an ongoing and long-term project.
There is a saying that ‘you must first be organized in your own life if you wish to organize in your community, and internationally. Well, it is clear that in this system of overproduction, overconsumption, overprice, overwork, and overstress, people don’t have much freedom to nurture and to practice the things that matter to them. With the Assembly we want to create a situation where there is one element of organizing to match every one aspect of everyday life. We need to begin the building of collective networks of support, so that we can start relying on ourselves and on our communities, to empower through self-sufficiency, instead of depending on the state and the system that aim to make us compliant and dispensable. To do this we must identify that the chains of oppression, but also the keys to self-determination, are omnipresent in the way we live. There should be no division between our community organizing and our everyday lives. We have to stop wasting our energies into the system that blanks us and drains us, and instead release and invest our creative energy into the community infrastructure and ideas that can empower us, with the potency to resist, and the capacity to create our own world.
The state aims to cut down and to commodify our spaces. That is less space for leisure, less space for education, less space for cyclists, less space for growing food, less space for culture, less space for people. That is why we must organize ourselves in a way to retake these fundamental elements of our community, and to rebuild them if they have been slashed.
The Assembly is placed at your disposal today to become a collective expression of the community, as one unified yet diverse voice. We are presenting the Assembly as a hollow shell to be filled; the content, the inspiration, the substance, the ideas, and the flesh of the Assembly, have to come from you, have to come from people.
In April of this year, Cochabamba, Bolivia hosted the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, which saw a convergence of 35,000 participants; workers, farmers, students, peasants, activists, and people from all walks of life. Beyond instilling a prevailing sense of international solidarity, this summit brought forward a sense of duty, and the sense that perhaps something new was beginning to take shape. The message to come out of Cochabamba was to pass from simply understanding the reality of the climate crisis, to implementing the agenda needed to reverse it, by positioning ourselves strategically as communities, and by arming ourselves with the capacity to effectuate the systemic change that is required. That is what this Assembly will attempt to do; to move from information, to theory, to action. The inspiration from the powerful social movements of Bolivia, and the voice of the peoples of the world, called for and initiated the construction of a Worldwide Climate Justice Movement. Climate Justice because it is no longer only people who are under attack, but Mother Earth herself.
This means that international chapters of this giant movement building exercise must be started all over the world, and the slogan of think global act local suddenly becomes very relevant. Speaking on international solidarity, Marcos of the Zapatistas has said that “the best thing you can do is to build the struggle in your own country, and when we’re done here we will go help you over there.”
Today’s Assembly is in response to international calls. When we think of Community organizing as a response, we can think of People’s Assemblies = rich history of People’s Assemblies tied to social movements around the world and predominantly in Latin America. And when you think of People’s Assemblies an example that comes to mind is the radical south-west region of Mexico; the states of Oaxaca and Chiapas. Oaxaca in 2006, in response to state repression and injustice, formed the insurrectionary Popular Assembly of the People’s of Oaxaca which comprised social movements of sectors, shades, and sizes from all across the state of Oaxaca, and with grassroots control, community empowerment, and neighborhood councils, dispersed the state and entirely took control of their land and their cities for several months. The Zapatistas, for their part, in the state of Chiapas, have controlled for more than a decade large rural areas, and have persisted through their communal modes of living, resisting constant harassment and violence by paramilitary and state forces. And most recently, in Honduras, following the June 2009 military coup that put the country in the hands of dictatorship, the people formed the National Coordinating Committee of Popular Resistance, a strategy building space which operates like a People’s Assembly.
Clearly, these examples are not comparable to our process of movement building here in Toronto, and in Canada, but what is worth noting is that all these examples I’ve mentioned of community organizing and people’s assemblies are all still operating today. This comes to show that grassroots community organizing, often manifested through Popular Assemblies, if carried out with the right process, intent on continuation, and true to principles of horizontality, can be very powerful, effective, and enduring.
Post G20, the social and climate justice communities in Toronto began increased discussion on the need for a more unified movement in Canada. The elites and the forces of capitalist globalization had once again thrown more money and more violence at us. They were elevating their attacks, we had to respond by continuing to organize still more effectively. In Toronto, we became cognizant that there were so many different groups doing so much great work, but that most of them were operating largely separate from each other. From that, the present day idea for the People’s Assembly took shape as a mechanism through which the entire community could operate together toward collective dialogue and community empowerment.
Over 40 different groups have endorsed the People’s Assembly, faith-based, cyclist groups, food groups, social and climate justice of all sorts, migrant justice, anti-poverty, and all realize that protecting our planet is a duty we all share by necessity. They all bring varying experiences, resources, and knowledge. The presence of so many different groups here today and the collective manifestation of this unique feature of the movement illustrates the power of diversity.
We want our community organizing to create the capacity to effectuate change in all aspects of our everyday lives. Shopping at farmers’ markets, riding your bicycle, or growing your own food, for example, these acts in themselves don’t make a measurable difference, but when many people do this, and when we combine our organizing efforts on all levels, we will eventually begin to see results. That is why we have organizations here today from all spheres and orbits, to provide knowledge and resources, in order to facilitate the possibility of changing the way we run our community in Toronto. I read recently, and I’m quoting from a book; “Revolutionary change does not come as one cataclysmic moment....but as an endless succession of surprises, moving zigzag toward a more decent society. We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.” That’s a quote by Howard Zinn. What we’re saying is that we can rebuild and recreate our city and our world, today, by carving out community spaces, by building urban gardens, by nurturing a culture of life, by reclaiming our communities library by library, community centre by community centre, block by block, and neighbourhood by neighbourhood. The belief and the vision is that People’s Assemblies can be a vehicle or a channel through which we can give life to this process of empowerment. We also want to stress that the People’s Assemblies, and the building of a movement, are both linked to process, and that process takes time. This will be an ongoing and long-term project.
There is a saying that ‘you must first be organized in your own life if you wish to organize in your community, and internationally. Well, it is clear that in this system of overproduction, overconsumption, overprice, overwork, and overstress, people don’t have much freedom to nurture and to practice the things that matter to them. With the Assembly we want to create a situation where there is one element of organizing to match every one aspect of everyday life. We need to begin the building of collective networks of support, so that we can start relying on ourselves and on our communities, to empower through self-sufficiency, instead of depending on the state and the system that aim to make us compliant and dispensable. To do this we must identify that the chains of oppression, but also the keys to self-determination, are omnipresent in the way we live. There should be no division between our community organizing and our everyday lives. We have to stop wasting our energies into the system that blanks us and drains us, and instead release and invest our creative energy into the community infrastructure and ideas that can empower us, with the potency to resist, and the capacity to create our own world.
The state aims to cut down and to commodify our spaces. That is less space for leisure, less space for education, less space for cyclists, less space for growing food, less space for culture, less space for people. That is why we must organize ourselves in a way to retake these fundamental elements of our community, and to rebuild them if they have been slashed.
The Assembly is placed at your disposal today to become a collective expression of the community, as one unified yet diverse voice. We are presenting the Assembly as a hollow shell to be filled; the content, the inspiration, the substance, the ideas, and the flesh of the Assembly, have to come from you, have to come from people.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Honduran Resistance Moving Forward
About a year ago, a month after a military coup in Honduras sent democratically-elected president Manuel Zelaya in to exhile, I wrote this:
"Zelaya during his presidential campaign in 2005 and early 2006, ran on promises of economic empowerment for the citizenry, and of empowering the people socially, culturally, and politically, a formula together which he refers to as citizen power. His progressive policies in the past few years have included a sharp increase of minimum wage, free school lunches for children, and the lowering of the price of public transportation. He has also talked about citizen participation, which he claims is the reason why he had called for the referendum on a constituent assembly. This is a program which the rightist military and ruling elites of Honduras simply could not tolerate."
Those are the real reasons behind the June 28th, 2009 military coup. The allegations that Zelaya was power-hungry and attempting to manipulate legality to allow an extension of his term in office, were only fabrications to justify the taking of power by force.
Two months ago, because the World Cup was in full swing, the one year anniversary of the Military coup in Honduras went under the radar, and even more so in Canada because Toronto was simultaneously hosting the G20; the undemocratic clown show where 8 predominately white men made decisions for 6 Billion people.
In 2004, Venezuela and Cuba joined to form ALBA, the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, to counter the U.S sponsored free trade area of the Americas or FTAA. Today, renamed the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, ALBA is an 8 member organization composed of Latin American countries that aims to provide empowerment through social programs and continental solidarity for political sovereignty and economic independence. On August 25th 2008, Manuel Zelaya and Honduras signed an agreement to join ALBA. For the Honduran elite, this was the tipping point.
With the 2009 coup, the business class aimed to restore ‘economic order in the country. These men in Honduras represent what some analysts have termed a transnational capitalist class; they are the local pillaging chapter of neoliberalism.
What they have done since the coup has been mainly a maintenance of consistent violence and repression, and a restriction of all freedoms. But the complete laissez-faire economic policies they wished to reinstitute have scarcely been reapplied because the resistance has been so adamant.
The coup government has proposed a number of pro-business laws and has granted an additional 500 mining concessions, many of which went to a subsidiary of transnational mining company Goldcorp Inc. Goldcorp is a giant in extractive industries based out of Canada, a country which boasts the unfortunate reputation of being headquarters to 75% of global mining.
Neither has the de facto government even attempted to operate secretively in its tyranny; impunity is chronic. Since January, for example, at least nine journalists have been killed, and no one has been held to account.
Most recently, a number of striking professors, after being tear-gassed and savagely beaten, were arrested, detained, and charged on several counts.
The Honduran teachers had also held some significant strikes in the months leading up to the June 28th, 2009 coup, and now, much like the teachers' unions did in the Oaxaca uprising in 2006, are playing a huge role in fighting state terror and impunity in Honduras. People's Popular Assemblies are involved in both cases, only difference being the Honduran resistance has done it on a national scale.
Traditionally Honduras has been reputed as one of the least politicized countries in Latin America, lacking the militancy generated in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua in the 70s and 80s, and having been trapped for decades in a two-party patronage system resembling something like a cross between Mexican PRI clientelism and pre-Chavez Venezuelan Punto Fijismo.
But Hondurans have really come to understand that their time must be now, and they have demonstrated organizational capacity and a high level of political maturity over the past year.
The "Citizen Declaration" of the National Popular Resistance Front (FNRP), for example, has garnered massive popular support calling for an inclusive constituent assembly to rewrite the Honduran constitution. This pledge has gathered so far nearly 700,000 signatures, and is on track to symbolically surpass the number of votes officially received by Honduran President Porfirio Lobo in last November's presidential elections.
A popular organization called the Bloque Popular, headed by Juan Barahona, a prominent union leader, has spearheaded the National Coordinating Committee of Popular Resistance (CNRP); the CNRP is a strategy building space which operates like a people’s assembly.
The CNRP is the official decision-making body of the Frente, and various organizations from across the country send delegates for participation. The committee garners a great deal of strength from the labor movement—especially the teachers, public-sector workers, banana workers, and bottling-plant workers—its grassroots base lies in the social movements from a range of sectors: the women’s movement; the LGBT community; indigenous and Afro-indigenous peoples; human rights groups; and the campesino movement, which is closely linked with environmental justice activism. The Frente has also divided the country up into regions, each of which sends delegates to the national coordinating committee
The inclusive politics of the FNRP and the solidarity power of the CNRP have really allowed for the cross-pollination of different currents in the broad process of building a movement.
On Aug. 18, thousands of Honduran workers marched in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula on to demand an increase in the minimum wage and to show solidarity with teachers who were in the 14th day of an open-ended strike. Also on Aug. 20, the FNRP and the three main labor confederations set up a national strike committee and regional committees to prepare for a national general strike around a seven-point program. The resistance has said that no official date has been said, but that the strike is imminent. On the same day, the campesino movements will mobilize around land issues.
The FNRP plans for another country wide mobilization in all 18 departments of Honduras on September 15th.
Juan Barahona, one of the Frente’s most prominent leaders has warned that repression, murders and torture will not stop the transformations in Honduras towards a new society.
We demand the immediate release of all political prisoners in Honduras, and an end to the killings of FNRP members. We urge the Latin America and Social Justice communities now as much as ever to stand firmly behind the Honduran Resistance.
"Zelaya during his presidential campaign in 2005 and early 2006, ran on promises of economic empowerment for the citizenry, and of empowering the people socially, culturally, and politically, a formula together which he refers to as citizen power. His progressive policies in the past few years have included a sharp increase of minimum wage, free school lunches for children, and the lowering of the price of public transportation. He has also talked about citizen participation, which he claims is the reason why he had called for the referendum on a constituent assembly. This is a program which the rightist military and ruling elites of Honduras simply could not tolerate."
Those are the real reasons behind the June 28th, 2009 military coup. The allegations that Zelaya was power-hungry and attempting to manipulate legality to allow an extension of his term in office, were only fabrications to justify the taking of power by force.
Two months ago, because the World Cup was in full swing, the one year anniversary of the Military coup in Honduras went under the radar, and even more so in Canada because Toronto was simultaneously hosting the G20; the undemocratic clown show where 8 predominately white men made decisions for 6 Billion people.
In 2004, Venezuela and Cuba joined to form ALBA, the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, to counter the U.S sponsored free trade area of the Americas or FTAA. Today, renamed the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, ALBA is an 8 member organization composed of Latin American countries that aims to provide empowerment through social programs and continental solidarity for political sovereignty and economic independence. On August 25th 2008, Manuel Zelaya and Honduras signed an agreement to join ALBA. For the Honduran elite, this was the tipping point.
With the 2009 coup, the business class aimed to restore ‘economic order in the country. These men in Honduras represent what some analysts have termed a transnational capitalist class; they are the local pillaging chapter of neoliberalism.
What they have done since the coup has been mainly a maintenance of consistent violence and repression, and a restriction of all freedoms. But the complete laissez-faire economic policies they wished to reinstitute have scarcely been reapplied because the resistance has been so adamant.
The coup government has proposed a number of pro-business laws and has granted an additional 500 mining concessions, many of which went to a subsidiary of transnational mining company Goldcorp Inc. Goldcorp is a giant in extractive industries based out of Canada, a country which boasts the unfortunate reputation of being headquarters to 75% of global mining.
Neither has the de facto government even attempted to operate secretively in its tyranny; impunity is chronic. Since January, for example, at least nine journalists have been killed, and no one has been held to account.
Most recently, a number of striking professors, after being tear-gassed and savagely beaten, were arrested, detained, and charged on several counts.
The Honduran teachers had also held some significant strikes in the months leading up to the June 28th, 2009 coup, and now, much like the teachers' unions did in the Oaxaca uprising in 2006, are playing a huge role in fighting state terror and impunity in Honduras. People's Popular Assemblies are involved in both cases, only difference being the Honduran resistance has done it on a national scale.
Traditionally Honduras has been reputed as one of the least politicized countries in Latin America, lacking the militancy generated in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua in the 70s and 80s, and having been trapped for decades in a two-party patronage system resembling something like a cross between Mexican PRI clientelism and pre-Chavez Venezuelan Punto Fijismo.
But Hondurans have really come to understand that their time must be now, and they have demonstrated organizational capacity and a high level of political maturity over the past year.
The "Citizen Declaration" of the National Popular Resistance Front (FNRP), for example, has garnered massive popular support calling for an inclusive constituent assembly to rewrite the Honduran constitution. This pledge has gathered so far nearly 700,000 signatures, and is on track to symbolically surpass the number of votes officially received by Honduran President Porfirio Lobo in last November's presidential elections.
A popular organization called the Bloque Popular, headed by Juan Barahona, a prominent union leader, has spearheaded the National Coordinating Committee of Popular Resistance (CNRP); the CNRP is a strategy building space which operates like a people’s assembly.
The CNRP is the official decision-making body of the Frente, and various organizations from across the country send delegates for participation. The committee garners a great deal of strength from the labor movement—especially the teachers, public-sector workers, banana workers, and bottling-plant workers—its grassroots base lies in the social movements from a range of sectors: the women’s movement; the LGBT community; indigenous and Afro-indigenous peoples; human rights groups; and the campesino movement, which is closely linked with environmental justice activism. The Frente has also divided the country up into regions, each of which sends delegates to the national coordinating committee
The inclusive politics of the FNRP and the solidarity power of the CNRP have really allowed for the cross-pollination of different currents in the broad process of building a movement.
On Aug. 18, thousands of Honduran workers marched in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula on to demand an increase in the minimum wage and to show solidarity with teachers who were in the 14th day of an open-ended strike. Also on Aug. 20, the FNRP and the three main labor confederations set up a national strike committee and regional committees to prepare for a national general strike around a seven-point program. The resistance has said that no official date has been said, but that the strike is imminent. On the same day, the campesino movements will mobilize around land issues.
The FNRP plans for another country wide mobilization in all 18 departments of Honduras on September 15th.
Juan Barahona, one of the Frente’s most prominent leaders has warned that repression, murders and torture will not stop the transformations in Honduras towards a new society.
We demand the immediate release of all political prisoners in Honduras, and an end to the killings of FNRP members. We urge the Latin America and Social Justice communities now as much as ever to stand firmly behind the Honduran Resistance.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
People's Assembly on Climate justice: Toronto's Challenge to Build the Movement
The burning questions to be considered moving forward:
Are the working groups an effective and practical way of operating?
Should the next gathering be just one more, one-time event, another conference, or should it be a People's Assembly, a permanent open space for ongoing collective dialogue, and a tool for movement building?
The People's Assembly needs to be a regularly scheduled, routinely-occurring gathering, to be held every two months, or preferably monthly.
Should we try to provide themes and content, or create goals and actions, or leave that task to the Assembly?
Before I get into thoughts and ideas from today, here are some notes I wrote down during our last organizing meeting:
"Invite all the endorsing groups and organizations -- endorsers of all the Cochabamba Report-Back events, and all the endorsers from the June 23rd Assembly -- looking to build a very large, broad-based People's Assembly. This is the beginning of a giant exercise in Movement Building for Climate Justice and beyond in Toronto. Its going to be a people's horizontal process fueled by popular power, and a lot of its success is going to be based on numbers. As such we are inviting all social and climate justice groups and organizations in the city who want to become a part of this process, and we urge them to send not only one or two representatives or delegates just to have presence at the Assembly, but to include their entire organization, all their members to swell our ranks."
"If we can accomplish that, then the assemblies will become a huge exercise in reciprocal capacity building. Imagine what all these affinity groups and organizations can do with these large numbers of participants at their disposal, and imagine how valuable for all these people to have all these resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience available to them. The People's Assembly can join these two forces together and give birth to something very effective and very significant in Toronto."
What is the difference between a conference and an Assembly? There are similarities between the two, but one important distinction to make is that a conference is a one-time temporary affair, an event. An Assembly is a permanent body or space for continuing and ongoing dialogue. This is what we need if we stand a chance to build an effective movement.
When the Cochabamba conference was announced last year, Evo Morales didn't say we are organizing this international people's conference for people to go back home and set off a long series of speaking events and conferences. He said we are hosting this conference to initiate the process of beginning to build a worldwide Climate Justice Movement. If we have just one more conference with working groups and then we let this go away, then we might as well forget about everything we learned and all the lessons we brought back from Cochabamba, because thats not what Cochabamba set out to do.
The only way the People's Assembly is worth organizing, and the only way it can be useful in building a movement, is if it exists on a permanent basis. If we don't decide on establishing the Assembly on a monthly basis, or to hold it every two months, then we will yield nothing new, no growth, no building, no continuation, and even if we organize another mass event similar to June 23rd, with working groups or without, it will not be an assembly, it will be just an event, just another conference.
__________________________________________________
Working Groups?
Would working groups, for our purpose, be an effective and practical way of operating? Since we have already agreed on putting together an invitation letter to send out to affinity groups and organizations, then it seems we agree that this should be the driving feature of the Assembly. Here is something I wrote a couple of weeks ago:
"Take for example the working groups that were formed during the first Assembly; Tar Sands Resistance, Indigenous Rights, and cap and trade to name just a few. It doesn't make sense in terms of efficiency and effectiveness to start these newly formed groups with individuals who may or may not know a lot about the issues pertaining to their working groups, and who are starting from nothing, from scratch, and to charge them with the great task of building up solidarity around the issue in the city of Toronto. There are already dozens of groups and organizations in the city, experts and veterans who have been working and campaigning around specific issues for months and years. It would be more effective to communicate with all these groups, and to have them come be an integral part of the Assembly process, thereby providing all Assembly participants with already-existing resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience, and to allow them to choose where they would best fit in, for them to identify which patch on the community solidarity quilt is best suited for their interests and abilities. Working groups might end up being the appropriate format for the Toronto People's Assembly, only time will tell, but if so, I think those experienced affinity groups and organizations should be incorporated into them not as the lead, but in the middle actively working with the people in a nexus support role. The Assembly needs to be a horizontal space to facilitate the consolidating and organizing of solidarity. It will also be a place for exchange and education."
Working groups rather, could be used as a convertible feature of the assembly for larger campaigns or initiatives that require specific organizing and more time and energy invested, such as the popular consultation for example. The working group could be like an attachment on a Swiss Army knife, or like a subcommittee to be convened whenever needed. Working groups, or break-out sessions are better suited to conferences, not to a People's Assembly.
___________________________________________________
Should we be suggesting goals or actions for the Assembly? The Assembly for sure will be a vehicle through which we can plan single, united, large, impactful actions, and to be sure, if we put hundreds of motivated, energetic, creative people in one room and ask them to share ideas, thoughts, and tactics for the movement, you will have a mass of people lining up to speak. People want to share their vision, and contribute to and witness its collective embodiment. We as organizers don't come with specific themes or ideas, these actions and campaigns will be suggested and planned by the Assembly, not by us the organizers. Our job is to focus as little as possible on specifics and content, that will be created by the assembly itself. Our task is to create the most functional format, the structure, and the space for the assembly to fill, but the creative content, the ideas, and the inspiration will come from the people, not from the organizers.
In terms of bringing the content forward from the june 23rd Assembly. Unfortunately the working groups did not band, did not follow through on email lists to continue developing their working group themes. The content we gathered is simply a sheet with thirty or so few-word statements and ideas randomly thrown together. The content and the ideas were not organized or categorized. And, since it is looking likely now that the assembly format will not be working group-centric, the content and ideas will recreate themselves around whichever new format we agree on.
We don't have to make the assemblies theme-centric, to center one assembly around the municipal elections for example. Of course we will talk about these things, but the Assembly together will make those decisions. The theme IS the People's Assembly; the theme is the creative process that will manifest itself through the People's Assembly. Our task is simply to create the capacity to facilitate this process. A city-wide permanent collective space for groups, organizations, and individuals, tailored as an effective tool to manifest creative energies. Essentially we want to create a skeletal mechanism, and hand it to the community. They will provide the flesh and the substance. The People's Assembly is like a massive blank canvas for everyone to paint on together, or like a potluck of ideas. It is like a beehive where everyone goes outside and collects pollen from hundreds of different flowers, and then they all come together to create honey.
At the moment we have dozens and dozens of Affinity groups and organizations who do different types of work around climate justice, doing different types of campaigns, but for the most part they all work individually. They organize their own events, and focus on their own efforts, and as a result of this our energies are scattered, and to a degree being wasted. An organization will hold an event, and then another group will hold a conference, and so on and so forth, and those events might be good and educational, but after they're over, they're over, and nothing much really happens, precisely because our energies are overly spread out. What we want to do with the assembly is to create a large network of efficiency, and organization, and collaboration to make sure that our efforts are not squandered.We have to pool all of our talents, abilities, specialties, resources, strengths and weaknesses, and make them work for us together as one united movement, not as separate units. We have to move from scattered and secluded separately operating groups, to movement building. The goal is to be united, and to achieve increased and improved communication and coordination between all are various groups. Its not that we don't understand the concept of solidarity, and unity, and collaboration, its just that our generation in this country has yet to do it effectively. That is our challenge.
The two words that have to be central to everything we do moving forward with developing the People's assembly from now are; Movement Building. I have been to a few meetings in the last couple weeks with different groups, and some are talking about potentially merging with other groups, some are talking about networking, but essentially these are all just different words expressing the same desire; a need for organized solidarity, and improved communication and coordination. Rainforest Action Network Toronto is talking about Movement Building, the Latin America Solidarity Network is talking about Movement Building, OCAP is talking about Movement Building, No One Is Illegal is talking about Movement Building, the people are talking about Movement Building. Events, conferences, and periodic rallies on their own will no longer do; they maintain only the status-quo, and the status-quo is not good enough because our opponents at this time hold the upper hand. We have to move beyond the status-quo by creating an entity with a character of synthesis and empowerment.
We have an immense and imperative duty and responsibility to respond to the next level of the system of injustice, oppression, and inequality. The next level of neoliberalism, the next level of austerity measures, cuts to social spending and the economic and social attack on the poor, the migrants, the indigenous, the women, the workers, the students, and the disadvantaged of this world. While the concentrations of wealth, and the supremacy and domination of the elites is getting greater, our possibilities to harmonize with Mother Earth, our access to water, food, employment, and education, our ability to create a healthy and sustainable world, our freedom, and our living spaces are getting smaller. Reflecting on a past experience, and analyzing the conditions which marginalized communities are increasingly subjected to, a local Toronto activist commented that "what is really beginning to crystallize is that prison is like a concentration of our everyday realities." That same brother also identified that the extraordinary conditions which we are exposed to in today's world are catalyzing a generation, and spurring the necessity of a people's movement beyond anything we have seen before in this country. In response to these forces in movement, the permanence of a People's Assembly in Toronto must be fundamental.
"The Future belongs to those who prepare for it today."
Are the working groups an effective and practical way of operating?
Should the next gathering be just one more, one-time event, another conference, or should it be a People's Assembly, a permanent open space for ongoing collective dialogue, and a tool for movement building?
The People's Assembly needs to be a regularly scheduled, routinely-occurring gathering, to be held every two months, or preferably monthly.
Should we try to provide themes and content, or create goals and actions, or leave that task to the Assembly?
Before I get into thoughts and ideas from today, here are some notes I wrote down during our last organizing meeting:
"Invite all the endorsing groups and organizations -- endorsers of all the Cochabamba Report-Back events, and all the endorsers from the June 23rd Assembly -- looking to build a very large, broad-based People's Assembly. This is the beginning of a giant exercise in Movement Building for Climate Justice and beyond in Toronto. Its going to be a people's horizontal process fueled by popular power, and a lot of its success is going to be based on numbers. As such we are inviting all social and climate justice groups and organizations in the city who want to become a part of this process, and we urge them to send not only one or two representatives or delegates just to have presence at the Assembly, but to include their entire organization, all their members to swell our ranks."
"If we can accomplish that, then the assemblies will become a huge exercise in reciprocal capacity building. Imagine what all these affinity groups and organizations can do with these large numbers of participants at their disposal, and imagine how valuable for all these people to have all these resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience available to them. The People's Assembly can join these two forces together and give birth to something very effective and very significant in Toronto."
What is the difference between a conference and an Assembly? There are similarities between the two, but one important distinction to make is that a conference is a one-time temporary affair, an event. An Assembly is a permanent body or space for continuing and ongoing dialogue. This is what we need if we stand a chance to build an effective movement.
When the Cochabamba conference was announced last year, Evo Morales didn't say we are organizing this international people's conference for people to go back home and set off a long series of speaking events and conferences. He said we are hosting this conference to initiate the process of beginning to build a worldwide Climate Justice Movement. If we have just one more conference with working groups and then we let this go away, then we might as well forget about everything we learned and all the lessons we brought back from Cochabamba, because thats not what Cochabamba set out to do.
The only way the People's Assembly is worth organizing, and the only way it can be useful in building a movement, is if it exists on a permanent basis. If we don't decide on establishing the Assembly on a monthly basis, or to hold it every two months, then we will yield nothing new, no growth, no building, no continuation, and even if we organize another mass event similar to June 23rd, with working groups or without, it will not be an assembly, it will be just an event, just another conference.
__________________________________________________
Working Groups?
Would working groups, for our purpose, be an effective and practical way of operating? Since we have already agreed on putting together an invitation letter to send out to affinity groups and organizations, then it seems we agree that this should be the driving feature of the Assembly. Here is something I wrote a couple of weeks ago:
"Take for example the working groups that were formed during the first Assembly; Tar Sands Resistance, Indigenous Rights, and cap and trade to name just a few. It doesn't make sense in terms of efficiency and effectiveness to start these newly formed groups with individuals who may or may not know a lot about the issues pertaining to their working groups, and who are starting from nothing, from scratch, and to charge them with the great task of building up solidarity around the issue in the city of Toronto. There are already dozens of groups and organizations in the city, experts and veterans who have been working and campaigning around specific issues for months and years. It would be more effective to communicate with all these groups, and to have them come be an integral part of the Assembly process, thereby providing all Assembly participants with already-existing resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience, and to allow them to choose where they would best fit in, for them to identify which patch on the community solidarity quilt is best suited for their interests and abilities. Working groups might end up being the appropriate format for the Toronto People's Assembly, only time will tell, but if so, I think those experienced affinity groups and organizations should be incorporated into them not as the lead, but in the middle actively working with the people in a nexus support role. The Assembly needs to be a horizontal space to facilitate the consolidating and organizing of solidarity. It will also be a place for exchange and education."
Working groups rather, could be used as a convertible feature of the assembly for larger campaigns or initiatives that require specific organizing and more time and energy invested, such as the popular consultation for example. The working group could be like an attachment on a Swiss Army knife, or like a subcommittee to be convened whenever needed. Working groups, or break-out sessions are better suited to conferences, not to a People's Assembly.
___________________________________________________
Should we be suggesting goals or actions for the Assembly? The Assembly for sure will be a vehicle through which we can plan single, united, large, impactful actions, and to be sure, if we put hundreds of motivated, energetic, creative people in one room and ask them to share ideas, thoughts, and tactics for the movement, you will have a mass of people lining up to speak. People want to share their vision, and contribute to and witness its collective embodiment. We as organizers don't come with specific themes or ideas, these actions and campaigns will be suggested and planned by the Assembly, not by us the organizers. Our job is to focus as little as possible on specifics and content, that will be created by the assembly itself. Our task is to create the most functional format, the structure, and the space for the assembly to fill, but the creative content, the ideas, and the inspiration will come from the people, not from the organizers.
In terms of bringing the content forward from the june 23rd Assembly. Unfortunately the working groups did not band, did not follow through on email lists to continue developing their working group themes. The content we gathered is simply a sheet with thirty or so few-word statements and ideas randomly thrown together. The content and the ideas were not organized or categorized. And, since it is looking likely now that the assembly format will not be working group-centric, the content and ideas will recreate themselves around whichever new format we agree on.
We don't have to make the assemblies theme-centric, to center one assembly around the municipal elections for example. Of course we will talk about these things, but the Assembly together will make those decisions. The theme IS the People's Assembly; the theme is the creative process that will manifest itself through the People's Assembly. Our task is simply to create the capacity to facilitate this process. A city-wide permanent collective space for groups, organizations, and individuals, tailored as an effective tool to manifest creative energies. Essentially we want to create a skeletal mechanism, and hand it to the community. They will provide the flesh and the substance. The People's Assembly is like a massive blank canvas for everyone to paint on together, or like a potluck of ideas. It is like a beehive where everyone goes outside and collects pollen from hundreds of different flowers, and then they all come together to create honey.
At the moment we have dozens and dozens of Affinity groups and organizations who do different types of work around climate justice, doing different types of campaigns, but for the most part they all work individually. They organize their own events, and focus on their own efforts, and as a result of this our energies are scattered, and to a degree being wasted. An organization will hold an event, and then another group will hold a conference, and so on and so forth, and those events might be good and educational, but after they're over, they're over, and nothing much really happens, precisely because our energies are overly spread out. What we want to do with the assembly is to create a large network of efficiency, and organization, and collaboration to make sure that our efforts are not squandered.We have to pool all of our talents, abilities, specialties, resources, strengths and weaknesses, and make them work for us together as one united movement, not as separate units. We have to move from scattered and secluded separately operating groups, to movement building. The goal is to be united, and to achieve increased and improved communication and coordination between all are various groups. Its not that we don't understand the concept of solidarity, and unity, and collaboration, its just that our generation in this country has yet to do it effectively. That is our challenge.
The two words that have to be central to everything we do moving forward with developing the People's assembly from now are; Movement Building. I have been to a few meetings in the last couple weeks with different groups, and some are talking about potentially merging with other groups, some are talking about networking, but essentially these are all just different words expressing the same desire; a need for organized solidarity, and improved communication and coordination. Rainforest Action Network Toronto is talking about Movement Building, the Latin America Solidarity Network is talking about Movement Building, OCAP is talking about Movement Building, No One Is Illegal is talking about Movement Building, the people are talking about Movement Building. Events, conferences, and periodic rallies on their own will no longer do; they maintain only the status-quo, and the status-quo is not good enough because our opponents at this time hold the upper hand. We have to move beyond the status-quo by creating an entity with a character of synthesis and empowerment.
We have an immense and imperative duty and responsibility to respond to the next level of the system of injustice, oppression, and inequality. The next level of neoliberalism, the next level of austerity measures, cuts to social spending and the economic and social attack on the poor, the migrants, the indigenous, the women, the workers, the students, and the disadvantaged of this world. While the concentrations of wealth, and the supremacy and domination of the elites is getting greater, our possibilities to harmonize with Mother Earth, our access to water, food, employment, and education, our ability to create a healthy and sustainable world, our freedom, and our living spaces are getting smaller. Reflecting on a past experience, and analyzing the conditions which marginalized communities are increasingly subjected to, a local Toronto activist commented that "what is really beginning to crystallize is that prison is like a concentration of our everyday realities." That same brother also identified that the extraordinary conditions which we are exposed to in today's world are catalyzing a generation, and spurring the necessity of a people's movement beyond anything we have seen before in this country. In response to these forces in movement, the permanence of a People's Assembly in Toronto must be fundamental.
"The Future belongs to those who prepare for it today."
Deeper Roots and Stronger Branches: The Growth of a Local People’s Assembly
When it was announced that Cochabamba and Tiquipaya, Bolivia, would host the first ever World People’s Conference on Climate change and the Rights of Mother Earth, what also emanated from Bolivia was the call to begin the creation of a Worldwide Climate Justice Movement.
At the conference, from April 18th to 22nd of this year, 35,000 people from 140 countries collaborated to put together working documents to serve as a manifesto of Humanity and Mother Earth’s demands to the UN, and to be presented at the subsequent climate talks in Bonn, Germany and Cancun, Mexico. What Cochabamba achieved beyond the tangible declarations and documents that came out of the 17 different working groups, was a sense of international commonality, a universal energy of collective solidarity if you will, which prompted an urgency for the shaping and mushrooming of local chapters of a Movement across the world.
The gathering which brought together individuals from all walks of life, Bohemians, scientists, writers, observers and spectators, peaceniks, politicians, journalists, activists, and revolutionaries, conveyed and instilled a common web of inspiration and initiative. In April, shortly after returning from Cochabamba I wrote; “to have countless brothers and sisters from all around the world at your disposal to exchange stories, smiles, hugs, handshakes, and ideas is an empowering experience.” And that is what Cochabamba provided, a means by which to mold a common strategy, to establish collective threads to link our efforts and our struggles from continent to continent.
Among the most active and vibrant at the summit were the companeros from the 700-strong Venezuelan delegation. They effectively relayed the militancy and urgency for committed change emerging from Venezuela, and displayed a leadership of work ethic. The Venezuelans were engaging every chance they had, and their activity and participation in the working groups was apparent; their contributions were catalyst to the insistence on the necessity of systemic change woven throughout the declarations.
We also saw in Cochabamba a sizeable presence of people and delegations from Canada; students, affinity groups, indigenous leaders, activists, and unions travelled to take part in the conference. What this group has brought back home, amongst other projects, is the ongoing process of creating a People’s Assembly on Climate Justice in Toronto.
On June 23rd, Toronto’s climate justice community held its first People’s Assembly, which, much like Cochabamba, was structured around working groups. But what we organized on June 23rd, which also happened to be the same week Toronto hosted the G20, was put together to become a People’s Assembly, not just another conference.
Moving forward now, our People's Assembly needs to be a permanent space and a routinely occurring gathering, as it becomes imperative for us to integrate consistency into our organizing. An idea would be to hold the Assembly monthly, or every two months perhaps. It is essential to hold the Assembly regularly because we want to retain momentum, we want to keep the new faces committed, and the public engaged. And, an important point to outline, something a companera pointed out to me, is that the Assembly can be set to convene on a regular schedule but not limited to that. We do not want to place any limitations or restrictions on the Assembly, it is an entity of the people for the people, a mechanism or a vehicle for communication and dialogue that can be called upon by anyone, at anytime, whenever needed.
Another thing to mention is that a structure, or format is needed, but no control; a completely horizontal and unleashed process set free. A little bit of chaos is good, it allows some of the originality and creativity to organically come to life.
We also have to prioritize urgency and timeliness with this endeavour. There are two reasons why our next Assembly needs to happen as fast as reasonably possible, well organized and promoted of course, but sooner rather than later. First, because it appeals to so many different constituencies, Climate Justice at the moment is a unifying force, and an asset for movement building. In Toronto, the first report back from Cochabamba, on May 7th of this year, featuring several summit participants, attracted a lot of unexpected attention, drawing in over 250 people. Then on June 23rd was our first People's Assembly on Climate Justice which was very successful, also producing a turnout of around 250 people. There was very positive energy coming out of the Assembly. Also on the 23rd, the Toxic Tour, a rally targeting Canada’s most environmentally destructive extractive industries and institutions, full on with costumes, flags, and floats paraded through downtown Toronto. So in general, Climate Justice in the city is currently building on momentum.
Second, the reaction to the G20 in Toronto has presented us with a golden opportunity. The G20 invasion affected not only activists and protesters, but impacted people from almost all walks of life. The projection of repression was manifest all over the downtown core and certain other areas, and the absurdity produced many self-declared converts to the cause. And, with Stephen Harper and the Consevatives' track record on environmental issues, this was obviously good news for the Climate Justice Movement in Toronto. Throw the Toxic Tour into the mix, which was Climate Justice's very creative, well orchestrated, and timely cross-pollination of two currents, and it almost seems like G20 week and the Climate Justice Movement were a match made in heaven. At the moment we have momentum and new faces on our side, we should not take that opportunity for granted.
Beyond Cochabamba, what were Toronto’s reasons for moving in this direction? At least in small part, the decision to build a People's Assembly in Toronto was probably an organic response to something the CJEJ community felt was needed. At the moment, Climate Justice has a broad and pertinent appeal that spans internationally over most spectrums of the left, it is the 'hot' issue, if you will. And, in Canada, we have the TSX where more than 70% of global mining capital is headquartered, we have the Tar Sands, and we have a government which is completely indifferent to Indigenous rights and environmental devastation, and doesn't recognize water as a human right. So in Toronto, as in the rest of the country, we certainly have a strong case and a need for increased and improved Climate Justice Solidarity. In part, the energy for the People's Assembly is an expression of that.
Referring back to Cochabamba, we dealt with a format of working groups, and it is imperative that we look back at past creations and examples of People's Assemblies from across the world. However, we are dealing with a unique situation here in Toronto, and a whole new set of attributes and particularities, and we don't know yet if the working group format will work for us. The final product of our assembly might be very similar to a working group structure, or it might look drastically different. Basically, we don't know what our assembly will look like, we are starting from scratch. We have to let the process self-create, with as many people involved as possible.
So what might an alternate Assembly format look like? A permanent, routinely-occurring, city-wide grassroots organizing assembly or forum sectioned by various affinity groups and organizations, or oriented around neighbourhood councils, or even a complimentary combination of both. There are already dozens of groups and organizations in the city, experts and veterans who have been working and campaigning around specific issues for months and years. It would be effective to communicate with all these groups, and to have them come be an integral part of the Assembly process, thereby providing all Assembly participants with already-existing resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience, and to allow them to choose where they would best fit in, for them to identify which patch on the community solidarity quilt is best suited for their interests and abilities. Working groups might end up being the appropriate format for the Toronto People's Assembly, only time will tell, but if so, perhaps those experienced affinity groups and organizations should be incorporated into them not as the lead, but in the middle actively working with the people in a nexus support role. Or, working groups could serve as a convertible feature of the assembly to be convened when needed for more extensive tasks and emergency campaigns.
One final attempt at an all-inclusive definition of the People’s Assembly would be this: A city-wide Assembly as a mechanism of solidarity and movement building, to really start to define and to shape the Movement. The Assembly will be composed of different groups and organizations from all spectrums of Climate Justice, who come together to report and share tactics, strategy, and campaigns in an open horizontal space fueled by popular power, participatory processes, and consensus. The Assembly will serve as a vehicle for an ongoing dialogue of solidarity building, sharing, and collective community decision-making.
The seeds of Cochabamba have ripened to create a fabric of popular resolve from Tanzania to Ecuador to Afghanistan, from cities to jungles, from affinity groups to community centres to cooperatives. A People’s Assembly is the body, the vehicle, and the necessary mechanism to engage us into effective movement building. The idea and the initiative have been laid out for us. It would be a mistake to take that privilege for granted, and to miss the opportunity.
All together, South American leadership in the form of the Rights of Mother Earth Conference has provided us with fodder, with building blocks, with motivation, and with direction. Now, with horizontal impetus we must activate the grassroots to embrace our responsibility to construct something substantial, effective, and beneficial to provide the movement with an opportunity to take flight.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Alvaro Uribe or Juan Manuel Santos; The Truth About Colombia
- Over 14,000 civiliam deaths under Uribe.
- Over 2 million internally displaced people. Highest forced political and economic internally displaced population in the world.
- Paramilitaries taking over local governments.
- Private-paramilitary land grabs exceeding 10 million acres of land, half of Colombia's arable land, going to neoliberal monocropping of palm oil and other biofuel crops.
- Colombia alone is home to 49 % of the killings of trade unionists worldwide.
Check the link.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/10/latin_american_historian_greg_grandin_on
- Over 2 million internally displaced people. Highest forced political and economic internally displaced population in the world.
- Paramilitaries taking over local governments.
- Private-paramilitary land grabs exceeding 10 million acres of land, half of Colombia's arable land, going to neoliberal monocropping of palm oil and other biofuel crops.
- Colombia alone is home to 49 % of the killings of trade unionists worldwide.
Check the link.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/10/latin_american_historian_greg_grandin_on
Monday, August 9, 2010
Vegetarians and Vegans Wanted!
To all the non-veggies out there. Check it Out! Eat with the Planet for the planet. Love....
Article Reproduced from guardian.co.uk
UN urges global move to meat and dairy-free diet
Lesser consumption of animal products is necessary to save the world from the worst impacts of climate change, UN report says.
Felicity Carus
A global shift towards a vegan diet is vital to save the world from hunger, fuel poverty and the worst impacts of climate change, a UN report said today.
As the global population surges towards a predicted 9.1 billion people by 2050, western tastes for diets rich in meat and dairy products are unsustainable, says the report from United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) international panel of sustainable resource management.
It says: "Impacts from agriculture are expected to increase substantially due to population growth increasing consumption of animal products. Unlike fossil fuels, it is difficult to look for alternatives: people have to eat. A substantial reduction of impacts would only be possible with a substantial worldwide diet change, away from animal products."
Professor Edgar Hertwich, the lead author of the report, said: "Animal products cause more damage than [producing] construction minerals such as sand or cement, plastics or metals. Biomass and crops for animals are as damaging as [burning] fossil fuels."
The recommendation follows advice last year that a vegetarian diet was better for the planet from Lord Nicholas Stern, former adviser to the Labour government on the economics of climate change. Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has also urged people to observe one meat-free day a week to curb carbon emissions.
The panel of experts ranked products, resources, economic activities and transport according to their environmental impacts. Agriculture was on a par with fossil fuel consumption because both rise rapidly with increased economic growth, they said.
Ernst von Weizsaecker, an environmental scientist who co-chaired the panel, said: "Rising affluence is triggering a shift in diets towards meat and dairy products - livestock now consumes much of the world's crops and by inference a great deal of freshwater, fertilisers and pesticides."
Both energy and agriculture need to be "decoupled" from economic growth because environmental impacts rise roughly 80% with a doubling of income, the report found.
Achim Steiner, the UN under-secretary general and executive director of the UNEP, said: "Decoupling growth from environmental degradation is the number one challenge facing governments in a world of rising numbers of people, rising incomes, rising consumption demands and the persistent challenge of poverty alleviation."
The panel, which drew on numerous studies including the Millennium ecosystem assessment, cites the following pressures on the environment as priorities for governments around the world: climate change, habitat change, wasteful use of nitrogen and phosphorus in fertilisers, over-exploitation of fisheries, forests and other resources, invasive species, unsafe drinking water and sanitation, lead exposure, urban air pollution and occupational exposure to particulate matter.
Agriculture, particularly meat and dairy products, accounts for 70% of global freshwater consumption, 38% of the total land use and 19% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, says the report, which has been launched to coincide with UN World Environment day on Saturday.
Last year the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation said that food production would have to increase globally by 70% by 2050 to feed the world's surging population. The panel says that efficiency gains in agriculture will be overwhelmed by the expected population growth.
Prof Hertwich, who is also the director of the industrial ecology programme at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said that developing countries – where much of this population growth will take place – must not follow the western world's pattern of increasing consumption: "Developing countries should not follow our model. But it's up to us to develop the technologies in, say, renewable energy or irrigation methods."
Article Reproduced from guardian.co.uk
UN urges global move to meat and dairy-free diet
Lesser consumption of animal products is necessary to save the world from the worst impacts of climate change, UN report says.
Felicity Carus
A global shift towards a vegan diet is vital to save the world from hunger, fuel poverty and the worst impacts of climate change, a UN report said today.
As the global population surges towards a predicted 9.1 billion people by 2050, western tastes for diets rich in meat and dairy products are unsustainable, says the report from United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) international panel of sustainable resource management.
It says: "Impacts from agriculture are expected to increase substantially due to population growth increasing consumption of animal products. Unlike fossil fuels, it is difficult to look for alternatives: people have to eat. A substantial reduction of impacts would only be possible with a substantial worldwide diet change, away from animal products."
Professor Edgar Hertwich, the lead author of the report, said: "Animal products cause more damage than [producing] construction minerals such as sand or cement, plastics or metals. Biomass and crops for animals are as damaging as [burning] fossil fuels."
The recommendation follows advice last year that a vegetarian diet was better for the planet from Lord Nicholas Stern, former adviser to the Labour government on the economics of climate change. Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has also urged people to observe one meat-free day a week to curb carbon emissions.
The panel of experts ranked products, resources, economic activities and transport according to their environmental impacts. Agriculture was on a par with fossil fuel consumption because both rise rapidly with increased economic growth, they said.
Ernst von Weizsaecker, an environmental scientist who co-chaired the panel, said: "Rising affluence is triggering a shift in diets towards meat and dairy products - livestock now consumes much of the world's crops and by inference a great deal of freshwater, fertilisers and pesticides."
Both energy and agriculture need to be "decoupled" from economic growth because environmental impacts rise roughly 80% with a doubling of income, the report found.
Achim Steiner, the UN under-secretary general and executive director of the UNEP, said: "Decoupling growth from environmental degradation is the number one challenge facing governments in a world of rising numbers of people, rising incomes, rising consumption demands and the persistent challenge of poverty alleviation."
The panel, which drew on numerous studies including the Millennium ecosystem assessment, cites the following pressures on the environment as priorities for governments around the world: climate change, habitat change, wasteful use of nitrogen and phosphorus in fertilisers, over-exploitation of fisheries, forests and other resources, invasive species, unsafe drinking water and sanitation, lead exposure, urban air pollution and occupational exposure to particulate matter.
Agriculture, particularly meat and dairy products, accounts for 70% of global freshwater consumption, 38% of the total land use and 19% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, says the report, which has been launched to coincide with UN World Environment day on Saturday.
Last year the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation said that food production would have to increase globally by 70% by 2050 to feed the world's surging population. The panel says that efficiency gains in agriculture will be overwhelmed by the expected population growth.
Prof Hertwich, who is also the director of the industrial ecology programme at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said that developing countries – where much of this population growth will take place – must not follow the western world's pattern of increasing consumption: "Developing countries should not follow our model. But it's up to us to develop the technologies in, say, renewable energy or irrigation methods."
Saturday, August 7, 2010
War as a means of waste for the productive energies and resources of Mother Earth and Humanity
Whether its the Petroleum complex, extractive industries in general, war itself or the war industry, just another example that links well with Talib Kweli's new Ballad of the Black Gold (below this post) on how humanity's creative potential, labour, resources, and energy are wasted away everyday to try to keep people permanently on the subservient brink. The foundation of the system that benefits only the top 10% of the population.
Enough with over-consumption and over-production, enough with War! Enough with waste, enough with the destruction of Mother Earth! Enough with the depletion of our natural resources while the concentration and maximization of profits and wealth continues unabated. End Wealth! We don't want the corporate monsters and the lethargic devils! Our population has to rid itself of its crippling apathy and complacency. Enough with the abuse of the Indigenous keepers of our land, enough with environmental racism and Cultural Genocide!
Thoughts inspired by Talib Kweli and George Orwell. Please check these two posts.
"The Essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, of sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent. Even when weapons of war are not actually destroyed, their manufacture is still a convenient way of expending labour power without producing anything that can be consumed. A floating fortress, for example, has locked up in it the labour that would build several hundred cargo-ships.... in principle the war effort is always so planned as to eat up any surplus that might exist after meeting the bare needs of the population. In practice the bare needs of the population are always under-estimated , with the result that there is a chronic shortage of half the necessities of life; but this is looked on as an advantage. it is a deliberate policy to keep even the favoured groups somewhere near the brink of hardship, because a general state of scarcity increases the importance of small privileges and thus magnifies the distinction between one group and another..... The social atmosphere is that of a besieged city, where the possession of a lump of horseflesh makes the difference between wealth and poverty. And at the same time the consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival."
"War not only accomplishes the necessary destruction, but accomplishes it in a psychologically acceptable way. In principle it would be simple to waste the surplus labour of the world by building temples and pyramids, by digging holes and filling them up again, or even by producing vast quantities of goods and then setting fire to them. But this would provide only the economic and not the emotional basis for a hierarchical society. What is concerned here is not the morale of the masses, whose attitude is unimportant so long as they are kept steadily at work.... In other words it is necessary that he should have the mentality appropriate to a state of war..... It does not matter whether the war is actually happening, and, since no decisive victory is possible, it does not matter whether the war is going well or badly. All that is needed is that a state of war should exist." - George Orwell.
Friday, August 6, 2010
Poetry of the Week
New Reflection Eternal Album. Poetry in Motion. Long Time Coming....
"This is the ballad of the black gold
They call it Texas tea
But it's bigger than a cowboy with a lasso
It's deeper than a black hole
Create monopolies
Except they collect your fee when you pass-go
Crisis' international
The government de facto
We got no control of this fiasco
Darker than the back roads
Bubble hotter than Tabasco
More than what you bargained for or asked for
You never see happy-hungry people that ain't rational,
They blasting through the gates and they attack you at the capital,
Run up in your palace, find the head of the states and crack a few,
Get a taste of power, then they become fascists too,
The fiscal conservatives, don't know what they purpose is,
Money on the war, then they cut your goods and services,
Murderous, corporate monsters is breaking records,
Exxon is at 40 billion a year, they raking in record profits.
Stop it!
How they banking while the auto industry is tanking?
Leadership is sinking; oil pollution in the water stanking,
Loyalty to petroleum; royalty spoiled the economy,
We won't get it poppin' till we're oil-free,
If you're oil-rich then we invading,
They call it occupation but we're losing jobs across the nation,
Drill, baby, drill, while they make our soldiers kill,
Baby still, the desert where the blood and oil spill,
This is the ballad of the black gold
They call it Texas tea
But it's bigger than a cowboy with a lasso
It's deeper than a black hole
Create monopolies
Except they collect your fee when you pass-go
Crisis' international
The government de facto
We got no control of this fiasco
Darker than the back roads
Bubble hotter than Tabasco
More than what you bargained for or asked for
Nigeria is celebrating 50 years of independence,
They still feel the colonial effects of Great Britain's presence,
Dictators quick to imitate the West,
Got in bed with oil companies and now the place a mess,
Take a guess, which ones came and violated,
They oiled up the soil, the Ogoni people was almost annihilated,
But still they never stayed silent,
They was activists and poets using non-violent tactics,
That was catalyst for soldiers to break into they crib,
Take it from the kids and try to break'em like a twig,
And make examples of the leaders; executed Saro-Wiwa,
Threw Fela's mom out the window right after they beat her,
In an effort to defeat hope. Now the people's feet soaked in oil,
So the youth is doing drive-bys in speed boats,
They kidnap the workers,
They blowing up the pipelines,
You see the fires glowing in the nighttime!!!
History, a slippery creature,
Its full of plot twists and surprise endings like a mystery feature,
This oil shit is slicker than preachers,
It make the problems in the region amplify like victory speeches,
Poison the water and lead the boys to the slaughter,
Go in somebody country and rearrange the order and destroy the borders,
You see them dancing through the fields of fire,
World domination--their real desire,
The devil is still a liar.
This is the ballad of the black gold
They call it Texas tea
But it's bigger than a cowboy with a lasso
It's deeper than a black hole
Create monopolies
Except they collect your fee when you pass-go
Crisis' international
The government de facto
We got no control of this fiasco
Darker than the back roads
Bubble hotter than Tabasco
More than what you bargained for or asked for."
- Talib Kweli.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Thoughts and Ideas, July 29th, 2010, from the Toronto People's Assembly on Climate Justice Organizing Circle
Brainstorming some thoughts on Thursday afternoon before the People's Assembly organizing meeting, I jotted down this brief vision and definition: "A permanent popular space powered by consensus and participatory practices, as a channel of ongoing dialogue on solidarity and movement building."
Observations from the first People's Assembly of June 23rd. Observations, comments, positives and negatives, and things we could change or keep the same varied, but in general the group agreed that for our first effort the turnout and product was very positive, and the assembly a success. As a general analysis I observed that since it was our first assembly, it is difficult to say what we need to change and what we need to keep the same. As we come together the process will create itself.
The first interesting discussion of substance of the evening was one on consensus. The circle put a variety of similar definitions on the table, and roughly what emerged in agreement was this. I wrote down "Stress consensus, while telling people not to feel inhibited with using blocks, with blocks as an active and important part of the process, to lead to more dialogue, agreed upon changes, and a collective resolution of the issues. And, a 75% majority vote as a very last resort if the group can really not move forward." Some synonyms of consensus are unity, harmony, and unison. We must always keep this at the core of every consensus process.
Personally, my politics, and my instincts tell me that I would have liked to go straight into our second Assembly next time, but I realize, and also with the discussion from last night, that we need a few more organizing meetings before moving ahead to the next big show.
I talked about either doing one more, or more organizing meetings to iron out the format and functioning of the assembly, or going straight into the second Assembly next time. I also floated the idea of doing an assembly/organizing meeting, which would be a larger organizing meeting much like the one we had last night, only with more people involved to open up the process horizontally, and to make the organizing and planning phase as inclusive as possible. Again, the organizing phase should be only to iron out and decide on the format of the assembly, and on logistics to make the next Assembly happen. Specifics and strategy are for the Assembly to decide, not the organizing team.
I realize the idea of a larger assemblyesque organizing meeting, or an organizing Assembly to formulate the format of the Second official Assembly was confusing to some. I realize that and apologize for that, I know it is an unusual hybrid concept, but that is essentially what last night's July 29th meeting was intended to be, as emails for participation were sent out before the meeting to all 180 people who signed up for the mailing list at the first People's Assembly on June 23rd. And, that is essentially also what was decided at the end of last night's meeting, that we scheduled another organizing meeting for two weeks from now, with invitations to be sent out for more people to participate, to grow the organizing core that has come together. So we've decided on another organizing meeting scheduled for two weeks from now to continue las night's discussion, and I am in complete agreement and harmony with that, I just wanted to try to clarify on this ambiguous issue that emerged last night.
The reason why I raised the question of exactly what our next move should be in the organizing/construction process, is because I worried that more organizing might not be as horizontal and inclusive as we want it to be. But, I realize and acknowledge with everybody that we are not ready to go straight into a second Assembly. I wasn't in favour of either way, I just wanted to put the question out there for the group to create debate, which it did.
In my view, our People's Assembly needs to be a permanent space, and a regular reoccurring bimonthly gathering, and I specify bimonthly as in every two months, because apparently there is some ambiguity around this terminology, so, once every two months. It is essential to hold the Assembly regularly because we want to retain momentum, we want to keep the new faces committed, and the public engaged. And, an important point to outline, something a companera pointed out to me which I had overlooked, is that the Assembly can be set to convene on a regular schedule but not limited to that. We do not want to place any limitations or restrictions on the Assembly, it is an entity of the people for the people, a mechanism or a vehicle for communication and dialogue that can be called upon by anyone, at anytime, whenever needed.
In terms of timing and deadlines for the Second Assembly, many people were floating around October or even November as a possible date, but perhaps a late September target would be more vigilant. There are two reasons why our next Assembly needs to happen as fast as reasonably possible, well organized and promoted of course, but sooner rather than later. First, because it appeals to so many different constituencies, Climate Justice at the moment is a unifying force, and an asset for movement building. In Toronto, the first report back from Cochabamba, on May 7th of this year, featuring several summit participants, attracted a lot of unexpected attention, drawing in over 250 people. Then on june 23rd of course was our first People's Assembly on Climate Justice which was very successful and also produced a turnout of around 250 people. There was very positive energy coming out of the Assembly. So in general, Climate Justice in this city is currently building on momentum. Second, the reaction to the G20 in Toronto has presented us with a golden opportunity. The G20 invasion affected not only activists and protesters, but impacted people from almost all walks of life. The projection of repression was manifest all over the downtown core and certain other areas, and the absurdity produced many self-declared converts to the cause. And, with Stephen Harper and the Consevatives' track record on environmental issues, this was obviously good news for the Climate Justice Movement in Toronto. Throw the Toxic Tour into the mix, which was CJ's very creative and well orchestrated cross-pollination, and it almost seems like G20 week and the Climate Justice Movement were a match made in heaven. At the moment we have momentum and new faces on our side, we should not take that opportunity for granted.
Different Visions, Possibilities, and Possible Formats for the People's Assembly:
Should we operate with working groups, or with some other structure as a format for the Assembly? Or a combination of?
In terms of the working groups, we will have to decide whether a smaller or greater number of groups will be appropriate, effective, and efficient for our process in Toronto. In Cochabamba (The World People's Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth) there were 17 different working groups. That proved to have some pros and some cons. On the one hand, it allowed for a lot of creativity and specifics on particular topics, projects, and issues. On the other hand there was a lot of cross-over of themes amongst the different working groups, and a lot of duplication and repetition in the declarations. I think that probably for our Toronto Assembly, for a smaller group, we will need to stick with somewhere between 5 and 10 working groups, if working groups are the format we choose.
Is the People's Assembly in Toronto a product of a spontaneous, vacuum situation? Or is it a planned and orchestrated effort? Probably a little bit of both.
At least in small part, the decision to build a People's Assembly in Toronto was probably an organic response to something the CJEJ community felt was needed. At the moment Climate Justice has a broad and pertinent appeal that spans internationally over most spectrums of the left, it is the 'hot' issue, if you will. And, in Canada, we have the TSX where more than 70% of global mining capital is headquartered, we have the Tar Sands, and we have a government which is completely indifferent to Indigenous rights and environmental devastation, and doesn't recognize water as a human right. So in Toronto, as in the rest of the country, we certainly have a strong case, and a need for increased and improved Climate Justice Solidarity. In part, the energy for the People's Assembly is an expression of that.
On the other side of things, Cochabamba is the reason why the idea of putting together a People's Assembly in Toronto came to life, and the call to begin the creation of a worldwide Climate Justice Movement was emanating from Bolivia even before the Cochabamba summit. So the initiative and the inspiration for our People's Assembly definitely stemmed from Cochabamba, but there are plenty of other organic reasons why it is now underway in Toronto.
Our Toronto process is not Cochabamba. With the Cochabamba summit, the working groups were actively debating and developing content months ahead of time, so of course it was very open and inclusive. As for the format, 35,000 people attended the summit so the format had to be pre-planned; this is not at all a criticism of the Cochabamba process, simply an observation and a comparison. The pre-planned format was 17 different working groups. A few people from our organizing meeting were talking about the working groups, referring back to Cochabamba, and it is imperative that we look back at past creations and examples of People's Assemblies from across the world, but we are dealing with a unique situation here in Toronto, and a whole new set of attributes and particularities, and we don't know yet if the working group format will work for us. The final product of our assembly might be very similar to a working group format, or it might look drastically different. Basically, we don't know what our assembly will look like, we are starting from scratch. We have to let the process create, with as many people involved as possible.
Here is an example of what a different format might look like:
Again, should we or should we not have working groups. Take for example the working groups that were formed during the first Assembly; Tar Sands Resistance, Indigenous Rights, and cap and trade to name just a few. It doesn't make sense in terms of efficiency and effectiveness to start these newly formed groups with individuals who may or may not know a lot about the issues pertaining to their working groups, and who are starting from nothing, from scratch, and to charge them with the great task of building up solidarity around the issue in the city of Toronto. There are already dozens of groups and organizations in the city, experts and veterans who have been working and campaigning around specific issues for months and years. It would be more effective to communicate with all these groups, and to have them come be an integral part of the Assembly process, thereby providing all Assembly participants with already-existing resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience, and to allow them to choose where they would best fit in, for them to identify which patch on the community solidarity quilt is best suited for their interests and abilities. Working groups might end up being the appropriate format for the Toronto People's Assembly, only time will tell, but if so, I think those experienced affinity groups and organizations should be incorporated into them not as the lead, but in the middle actively working with the people in a nexus support role. The Assembly needs to be a horizontal space to facilitate the consolidating and organizing of solidarity. It will also be a place for exchange and education.
The following echos, and is very similar to earlier attempted definitions I put down, and there is some repetition, but I'm just throwing everything out there to try and describe as best as possible what the process might look like.
"Groups, organizations, and people from all spectrums of Climate Justice, come together in a city-wide Assembly as a mechanism of solidarity and movement building, to really start to define and to shape the Movement. An open horizontal space fueled by popular power, a participatory process, and consensus, as a vehicle for an ongoing dialogue of solidarity building, sharing, and collective community decision-making."
"An open space of solidarity for the Climate Justice community. A body of different groups and organizations to come together and report, share tactics, strategy, and campaigns. A structure, or format is needed, but no control; a completely open and unleashed process set free. A little bit of chaos is good, it allows some of the originality and creativity to organically come out."
In Closing
I think that if the Movement at large, not just Climate Justice, but all spectrums of social and climate justice all together, if that Movement has a chance to grow and to really become a relevant, and effective, and powerful force here in Toronto and across the country, I think the People's Assembly is the vehicle that can make that happen.
Observations from the first People's Assembly of June 23rd. Observations, comments, positives and negatives, and things we could change or keep the same varied, but in general the group agreed that for our first effort the turnout and product was very positive, and the assembly a success. As a general analysis I observed that since it was our first assembly, it is difficult to say what we need to change and what we need to keep the same. As we come together the process will create itself.
The first interesting discussion of substance of the evening was one on consensus. The circle put a variety of similar definitions on the table, and roughly what emerged in agreement was this. I wrote down "Stress consensus, while telling people not to feel inhibited with using blocks, with blocks as an active and important part of the process, to lead to more dialogue, agreed upon changes, and a collective resolution of the issues. And, a 75% majority vote as a very last resort if the group can really not move forward." Some synonyms of consensus are unity, harmony, and unison. We must always keep this at the core of every consensus process.
Personally, my politics, and my instincts tell me that I would have liked to go straight into our second Assembly next time, but I realize, and also with the discussion from last night, that we need a few more organizing meetings before moving ahead to the next big show.
I talked about either doing one more, or more organizing meetings to iron out the format and functioning of the assembly, or going straight into the second Assembly next time. I also floated the idea of doing an assembly/organizing meeting, which would be a larger organizing meeting much like the one we had last night, only with more people involved to open up the process horizontally, and to make the organizing and planning phase as inclusive as possible. Again, the organizing phase should be only to iron out and decide on the format of the assembly, and on logistics to make the next Assembly happen. Specifics and strategy are for the Assembly to decide, not the organizing team.
I realize the idea of a larger assemblyesque organizing meeting, or an organizing Assembly to formulate the format of the Second official Assembly was confusing to some. I realize that and apologize for that, I know it is an unusual hybrid concept, but that is essentially what last night's July 29th meeting was intended to be, as emails for participation were sent out before the meeting to all 180 people who signed up for the mailing list at the first People's Assembly on June 23rd. And, that is essentially also what was decided at the end of last night's meeting, that we scheduled another organizing meeting for two weeks from now, with invitations to be sent out for more people to participate, to grow the organizing core that has come together. So we've decided on another organizing meeting scheduled for two weeks from now to continue las night's discussion, and I am in complete agreement and harmony with that, I just wanted to try to clarify on this ambiguous issue that emerged last night.
The reason why I raised the question of exactly what our next move should be in the organizing/construction process, is because I worried that more organizing might not be as horizontal and inclusive as we want it to be. But, I realize and acknowledge with everybody that we are not ready to go straight into a second Assembly. I wasn't in favour of either way, I just wanted to put the question out there for the group to create debate, which it did.
In my view, our People's Assembly needs to be a permanent space, and a regular reoccurring bimonthly gathering, and I specify bimonthly as in every two months, because apparently there is some ambiguity around this terminology, so, once every two months. It is essential to hold the Assembly regularly because we want to retain momentum, we want to keep the new faces committed, and the public engaged. And, an important point to outline, something a companera pointed out to me which I had overlooked, is that the Assembly can be set to convene on a regular schedule but not limited to that. We do not want to place any limitations or restrictions on the Assembly, it is an entity of the people for the people, a mechanism or a vehicle for communication and dialogue that can be called upon by anyone, at anytime, whenever needed.
In terms of timing and deadlines for the Second Assembly, many people were floating around October or even November as a possible date, but perhaps a late September target would be more vigilant. There are two reasons why our next Assembly needs to happen as fast as reasonably possible, well organized and promoted of course, but sooner rather than later. First, because it appeals to so many different constituencies, Climate Justice at the moment is a unifying force, and an asset for movement building. In Toronto, the first report back from Cochabamba, on May 7th of this year, featuring several summit participants, attracted a lot of unexpected attention, drawing in over 250 people. Then on june 23rd of course was our first People's Assembly on Climate Justice which was very successful and also produced a turnout of around 250 people. There was very positive energy coming out of the Assembly. So in general, Climate Justice in this city is currently building on momentum. Second, the reaction to the G20 in Toronto has presented us with a golden opportunity. The G20 invasion affected not only activists and protesters, but impacted people from almost all walks of life. The projection of repression was manifest all over the downtown core and certain other areas, and the absurdity produced many self-declared converts to the cause. And, with Stephen Harper and the Consevatives' track record on environmental issues, this was obviously good news for the Climate Justice Movement in Toronto. Throw the Toxic Tour into the mix, which was CJ's very creative and well orchestrated cross-pollination, and it almost seems like G20 week and the Climate Justice Movement were a match made in heaven. At the moment we have momentum and new faces on our side, we should not take that opportunity for granted.
Different Visions, Possibilities, and Possible Formats for the People's Assembly:
Should we operate with working groups, or with some other structure as a format for the Assembly? Or a combination of?
In terms of the working groups, we will have to decide whether a smaller or greater number of groups will be appropriate, effective, and efficient for our process in Toronto. In Cochabamba (The World People's Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth) there were 17 different working groups. That proved to have some pros and some cons. On the one hand, it allowed for a lot of creativity and specifics on particular topics, projects, and issues. On the other hand there was a lot of cross-over of themes amongst the different working groups, and a lot of duplication and repetition in the declarations. I think that probably for our Toronto Assembly, for a smaller group, we will need to stick with somewhere between 5 and 10 working groups, if working groups are the format we choose.
Is the People's Assembly in Toronto a product of a spontaneous, vacuum situation? Or is it a planned and orchestrated effort? Probably a little bit of both.
At least in small part, the decision to build a People's Assembly in Toronto was probably an organic response to something the CJEJ community felt was needed. At the moment Climate Justice has a broad and pertinent appeal that spans internationally over most spectrums of the left, it is the 'hot' issue, if you will. And, in Canada, we have the TSX where more than 70% of global mining capital is headquartered, we have the Tar Sands, and we have a government which is completely indifferent to Indigenous rights and environmental devastation, and doesn't recognize water as a human right. So in Toronto, as in the rest of the country, we certainly have a strong case, and a need for increased and improved Climate Justice Solidarity. In part, the energy for the People's Assembly is an expression of that.
On the other side of things, Cochabamba is the reason why the idea of putting together a People's Assembly in Toronto came to life, and the call to begin the creation of a worldwide Climate Justice Movement was emanating from Bolivia even before the Cochabamba summit. So the initiative and the inspiration for our People's Assembly definitely stemmed from Cochabamba, but there are plenty of other organic reasons why it is now underway in Toronto.
Our Toronto process is not Cochabamba. With the Cochabamba summit, the working groups were actively debating and developing content months ahead of time, so of course it was very open and inclusive. As for the format, 35,000 people attended the summit so the format had to be pre-planned; this is not at all a criticism of the Cochabamba process, simply an observation and a comparison. The pre-planned format was 17 different working groups. A few people from our organizing meeting were talking about the working groups, referring back to Cochabamba, and it is imperative that we look back at past creations and examples of People's Assemblies from across the world, but we are dealing with a unique situation here in Toronto, and a whole new set of attributes and particularities, and we don't know yet if the working group format will work for us. The final product of our assembly might be very similar to a working group format, or it might look drastically different. Basically, we don't know what our assembly will look like, we are starting from scratch. We have to let the process create, with as many people involved as possible.
Here is an example of what a different format might look like:
Again, should we or should we not have working groups. Take for example the working groups that were formed during the first Assembly; Tar Sands Resistance, Indigenous Rights, and cap and trade to name just a few. It doesn't make sense in terms of efficiency and effectiveness to start these newly formed groups with individuals who may or may not know a lot about the issues pertaining to their working groups, and who are starting from nothing, from scratch, and to charge them with the great task of building up solidarity around the issue in the city of Toronto. There are already dozens of groups and organizations in the city, experts and veterans who have been working and campaigning around specific issues for months and years. It would be more effective to communicate with all these groups, and to have them come be an integral part of the Assembly process, thereby providing all Assembly participants with already-existing resources, knowledge, capacity, and experience, and to allow them to choose where they would best fit in, for them to identify which patch on the community solidarity quilt is best suited for their interests and abilities. Working groups might end up being the appropriate format for the Toronto People's Assembly, only time will tell, but if so, I think those experienced affinity groups and organizations should be incorporated into them not as the lead, but in the middle actively working with the people in a nexus support role. The Assembly needs to be a horizontal space to facilitate the consolidating and organizing of solidarity. It will also be a place for exchange and education.
The following echos, and is very similar to earlier attempted definitions I put down, and there is some repetition, but I'm just throwing everything out there to try and describe as best as possible what the process might look like.
"Groups, organizations, and people from all spectrums of Climate Justice, come together in a city-wide Assembly as a mechanism of solidarity and movement building, to really start to define and to shape the Movement. An open horizontal space fueled by popular power, a participatory process, and consensus, as a vehicle for an ongoing dialogue of solidarity building, sharing, and collective community decision-making."
"An open space of solidarity for the Climate Justice community. A body of different groups and organizations to come together and report, share tactics, strategy, and campaigns. A structure, or format is needed, but no control; a completely open and unleashed process set free. A little bit of chaos is good, it allows some of the originality and creativity to organically come out."
In Closing
I think that if the Movement at large, not just Climate Justice, but all spectrums of social and climate justice all together, if that Movement has a chance to grow and to really become a relevant, and effective, and powerful force here in Toronto and across the country, I think the People's Assembly is the vehicle that can make that happen.
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