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April 29 2003: Anti-globalisation protesters are gearing up for mass action on May 1 against companies that profit from war. Here are the best online reads.
May Day 2002
Special report: May Day
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Battles to come
Opposition to the war in Iraq absorbed many of the anti-globalisation groups and, as few could have failed to notice, it became one of the broadest supported political movements in recent times. But what will the anti-warriors do now the war is over? asks Mother Jones.
Mother Jones
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The right to riot
'Rioting is a Londoner's political birthright, central to the democratic system as a safety valve and as a means to effect change,' writes reviewer Clive Bloom in the city's Evening Standard. His subject, a new book charting 2,000 years of civil unrest in the capital, argues that the 'civilising riot' lets off pent-up steam and allows society to proceed in its old, unequal way. He has little doubt that Thursday's protests will not pass off entirely peacefully but allows himself a little civic pride at their 'indigenous' nature.
Evening Standard
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The next generation
Opposition to the war in Iraq and the reinvigoration of activism through the anti-globalisation movement has spawned a generation of school-age protesters in Australia, reports the New Zealand Herald. But their recruiters, and the nature of some of the demonstrations, are far from supported across the whole protest movement, it adds.
New Zealand Herald
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Celebrate capitalism
What's all the fuss about? asks Edwin Locke in Accuracy in Media, a self-declared citizen's watchdog monitoring 'anti-business, pro-big government, anti-family and anti-religion' bias in news reports. He says the capitalist system is good for all concerned, since if Americans buy T-shirts from Nigeria at $1 a piece, 'Nigerians will have more money to buy food, clothing and housing [while] Americans will spend less on T-shirts and have more money to buy cell phones and SUVs.'
Accuracy in Media
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Fifteen reasons to be angry
Urban 75 offers a different set of criteria to judge the world by - the millions malnourished or starving, imbalances in global wealth and numbers living 'under military dictatorships propped up by multinationals'.
Urban75
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The streets of Paris
French leftwing newspaper Libération celebrates what it calls probably the most significant demonstrations in France in more than 50 years; a 'tidal wave' against Le Pen after the shock of April 21.
Libération
Special report: France
Weblog special: the European right
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Activist's diary
The Independent carries a diary by activist Guy Taylor, a protest organiser with Globalise Resistance. While most protesters were trying to focus on globalisation, he says, all the journalists wanted to know about was the threat of violence.
Independent
Globalise Resistance
Special report: globalisation
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A world of inequality
Umar Ibrahim Sade, writing in Nigeria's Daily Trust newspaper, sees globalisation as the new colonialism. In the new globalised international environment, he points out, 'only goods and capital crosses national frontiers unhindered, while people from the third world find it cumbersome to penetrate into the western developed world.'
Poor sold down the river - allAfrica.com
allAfrica.com
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Anti-globalisers lag behind
Paul Kelly of the Murdoch-owned Australian picks up a study - published by the World Bank - which says globalisation reduces inequality rather than raising it. Those countries that have embraced the 'global economy', it says, have got richer.
Australian
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Hemmed in
But at London's protests last year, most of the coverage focused on a large crowd of demonstrators hemmed in by police in a small area of Oxford Circus for most of the afternoon. Mike Slocombe, editor of Urban 75, says of such crowd control measures: 'As one protester said to me, "If I'm going to be treated like a criminal, I may as well act like one."'
Urban 75
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'Rioting's no fun when you can't have a pee'
This is London takes up the theme. 'The problem with the Met's tactic - mass arrest, in effect - is that very few people in that space wanted a fight.'
This is London
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Tactics at the not OK corral
Squall remembers last year's corralling of 350 Critical Mass cyclists - ultra-fluffies who ride slowly and peacefully through the streets. It argues that police were trying to 'squash peaceful protest with draconian policing', and concludes: 'Keep moving ... Stay unpredictable ... Watch yer backs for pincer movements.'
Squall
Boxed in Holles Street - UK Indymedia (talkthread)
Guide to public order situations - SchNews
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