Complexity and Social Movements: Multitudes at the Edge of Chaos ...

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The global ambitions of the current imperium rekindle memories of both nationalist liberation and domestic class struggles both of which were cast as law and order problems. The re-emergence and re-formulation of these discourses within right wing think tanks towards the end of the twentieth century called for a league of forceful civilised nations to police Third World movements described as ‘extremist’, ‘terrorist’, and ‘criminal’ (Fukuyama 1992). 4 This so-called ‘Clash of Civilisations’ requiring ‘Western military vigilance to defend itself against Eastern civilisations’ (1992) consolidated rapidly in the following decade. Under the leadership of a tightly networked neo-liberal intelligentsia, 5 the global institutional nexus continues to advance an agenda underpinned by a notion of freedom to profit and prosper sedimented within American culture since the seventeenth century (Welsh 2005). In the twentyfirst century, this process of ‘terrorist’ extension now includes civil society actors inside the ‘advanced’ economies but simultaneously networked as global civil society actors advancing global interests transcending national systems of interest representation. State responses to delegitimise the messengers as a contemporary ‘folk devil’ (Donson et al. 2004) and subject them to extreme sanctions have broad similarities but are enacted in a variety of ways reflecting both national and regional custom and tradition. These extensions are important and on-going and this chapter concentrates upon the period between 1999 and 2002 where we are able to remain true to the Deleuzian genealogical detail underpinning this work. We thus draw heavily upon material relating to events in Seattle 1999, London 2000, and Genoa 2001 in support of our argument that there has been a conscious attempt to construct a new ‘folk devil’ despite the absence of the ‘moral panic’ traditionally associated with the term (Donson et al. 2004). In this process, prominent politicians and senior police officers identify activists as ‘violent’, ‘mindless thugs’, 6 views widely reproduced in print and broadcast media (Wahl-Jorgensen 2003). Seattle connections States fight back 69 As we noted in Chapter 1, Seattle was identified as a potential site of emergence within movement networks from at least 1996. The modus operandi advanced at this time was substantially realised through nomadic exchanges central to the diasporic spread of repertoires of action through enhanced mobility. Far from being an unexpected event, the Seattle plateau condensed a diverse range of practices, albeit leading to unpredicted and unpredictable emergent outcomes. It is important to offer an account of these precursors to give the reader some sense of the agency lying behind the ‘flows’ of meaning that coalesced to structure this action. The role of European and UK movements is foregrounded here as an exemplar of a process paralleled in multiple global sites and enacted via local customs. However, we would emphasise the situated partiality of our account, as
70 States fight back academically, we are adhering to our sense of Deleuzian detail in working from examples where we have empirical depth. This enables us to illustrate the importance of network immersion in order to access events otherwise invisible within the public sphere. The realignment of politics beyond left right binary divides following the collapse of communism was preceded in the United Kingdom by an apparently hegemonic neo-liberal Thatcherite politics from 1979 onwards. The hot cold war became a major focus for social movement actors within the context of defensive unionism. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the UK movement milieu entered a period of apparent quietude leading to claims about ‘UK exceptionalism’ in the context of widespread mobilisations on mainland Europe (Rootes 1992). This view had barely surfaced when vibrant actions became visible within the public sphere (Welsh and McLeish 1996). Activists targeted road programmes, airport construction, animal rights, and supermarket locations, marking a significant transition to movement engagement with mundane developments associated with modernity. These defensive movement actions were paralleled by vibrant expressions of cultural innovation associated with musical genres articulating more proactive versions of life style politics (McKay 1996, 1998). The establishment of Earth First! UK (Wall 1999) as a distinctive variant of its US progenitor introduced an over-arching theme that resonated positively with the dispersed emphasis on direct action across the United Kingdom. Earth First! and derivatives, particularly London RTS, became central network actors orchestrating some particularly high profile events. Of these J18 – the day in June when trading was brought to a standstill in the City of London – assumed international prominence. In the run up to Seattle key individuals associated with this and other UK events were invited to the United States to act as trainers and resource persons. The Seattle event thus drew upon a wide range of experience but was enacted in a US context within a particular urban environment and an established law and order regime and culture. Seattle The Seattle WTO meeting was scheduled to produce a new trade round including the inclusion of China, a move with significant backing from President Bill Clinton but opposed by international labour organisations on human and union rights grounds. American Labour and Union concerns over the impact of global free market initiatives had been shaped through experience of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which had also contributed to the Zapatista mobilisation. In Seattle American leadership within the WTO’s ‘QUAD’, an agenda setting core including the EU, Japan and Canada, failed to secure the passage of a new round, meeting significant opposition in open meetings from Latin American and African countries. Inclusion of China in the WTO offered to integrate a
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Contents List of figures vi Acknowl
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Acknowledgements With thanks to all
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Preface ix activists and engaged ci
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2 Introducing global movements poli
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4 Introducing global movements arou
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6 Introducing global movements esta
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8 Introducing global movements Thes
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10 Introducing global movements exp
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12 Introducing global movements che
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14 Introducing global movements Fra
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16 Introducing global movements ‘
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Page 33 and 34: 2 Prefiguration and emergence Intro
Page 35 and 36: 24 Prefiguration and emergence on T
Page 37 and 38: 26 Prefiguration and emergence 9 If
Page 39 and 40: 28 Prefiguration and emergence Prop
Page 41 and 42: 30 Prefiguration and emergence agai
Page 43 and 44: 32 Prefiguration and emergence C. E
Page 45 and 46: 34 Prefiguration and emergence The
Page 47 and 48: 36 Prefiguration and emergence Glob
Page 49 and 50: 38 Prefiguration and emergence In t
Page 51 and 52: 40 Prefiguration and emergence Neo-
Page 53 and 54: 42 Prefiguration and emergence from
Page 55 and 56: 44 Identities, protest dynamics and
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Page 83 and 84: 72 States fight back streets from d
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Page 91 and 92: 80 States fight back ran out. The p
Page 93 and 94: 82 States fight back The attempt to
Page 95 and 96: 84 States fight back Accounts of th
Page 97 and 98: 86 States fight back hair, infringe
Page 99 and 100: 88 States fight back crisis is in e
Page 101 and 102: 5 Ecologies of action within global
Page 103 and 104: 92 Ecologies of action attractor wi
Page 105 and 106: 94 Ecologies of action embedded in
Page 107 and 108: 96 Ecologies of action The assimila
Page 109 and 110: 98 Ecologies of action compatibilit
Page 111 and 112: 100 Ecologies of action linking up
Page 113 and 114: 102 Ecologies of action occurred wi
Page 115 and 116: 104 Ecologies of action leading to
Page 117 and 118: 106 Ecologies of action siege of in
Page 119 and 120: 108 Beyond resistance to global nex
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120 Beyond resistance to global nex
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7 The death of collective identity?
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130 Global movement as a parallelog
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148 The map is not the territory th
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150 The map is not the territory of
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152 The map is not the territory Ne
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154 The map is not the territory mi
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156 The map is not the territory or
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158 The map is not the territory mo
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160 The map is not the territory of
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162 The map is not the territory ne
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Notes 1 Introducing global movement
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166 Notes 12 Ya Basta’s! subseque
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168 Notes 19 This practice has been
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170 Notes Afro Bloc parading drum b
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172 Bibliography Barker, C., Johnso
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174 Bibliography De Sousa Santos, B
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176 Bibliography Grubacic, A. (2003
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178 Bibliography Lash, S. (2002) Cr
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180 Bibliography O’Neill, J. (200
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182 Bibliography Thompson, E.P. (19
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Index Note: Page numbers in italics
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186 Index class: affinities 93; and
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188 Index G7 23 G8 23, 100; meeting
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190 Index London 52, 63, 69, 116; E
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192 Index Poland 44, 45; ‘Orange
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194 Index Taylor, P. 168 n.2; call
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