Filed under: G8 Germany
For three days in early June the leaders from the U.S.A., the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Italy, Russia, Japan and Germany gathered for the 33rd G8 Summit in Heiligendamm, a small German resort town on the Baltic Sea. The G8 was created in 1974 to protect the interests of the world’s most wealthy and powerful countries in the face of the oil crises and recession of that time. In the last decade, the annual G8 Summit has become the site of an increasing number of demonstrations. These protests are a rejection of both the highly undemocratic methods by means of which the leaders of the eight wealthiest countries, (containing only 13% of the world’s population) make decisions for all, but also of the capitalist policies these leaders espouse, which continue to spread inequality and injustice worldwide. In response to the growing protest at each new Summit, the G8 has attempted to put on a friendlier face, claiming that its primary goal today is “how to shape globalization so that everyone stands a chance” and adding issues like aid to Africa and global warming to the G8 meeting agenda. However, one does not have to look far to see through this well rehearsed rhetoric as the agreements the G8 leaders reach do little more than treat the symptoms of the world’s problems while working hard to maintain western dominance. The growing resistance to the G8 and the current world order is serving to bring important attention to these realities.
The Alternative
The G8 demonstrations have provided the global justice movement with the opportunity to bring attention to the desperate need for relief from the exploitation of neoliberal globalization and an opportunity to network and encourage others in the movement to try to live the alternative. The theme of this year’s demonstrations, which brought an estimated 80,000 people together, was “Make Capitalism History.” The organizers laid the groundwork for three camps equipped to house 15,000 demonstrators. Cooperatively run and volunteer driven, the camps provided meals, electricity, internet, and a large tent for spokescouncil meetings, trainings, and event coordination. Volunteer security, called “rabbits” maintained a 24 hour lookout for police raids and other activity. The infrastructure was well organized not only in the camps but also in preparation for the week’s events, which included concerts, marches, an alternative summit and action days leading up to the Summit on themes of global agriculture, migration, and anti-militarism. The Block g8 campaign arranged for the first day of the summit was organized a year and a half in advance.
16 Million Dollar Fence
Fearing the strengthening global justice movement and its power to disrupt the status quo, immense security steps were taken by the German police and military officials in anticipation of the protests. Keeping with the trend among recent G8 host countries of more walls, militarization and civil rights erosion, an eight-mile long steel fence was constructed by the Germans around the Summit site. The fence included underground iron bars and was topped with barbed wire, video surveillance and sensory detectors. The fence cost 16 million dollars, an exorbitant amount and yet only a small percentage of the total of 124 million dollars spent only on security for the Summit. A “no demonstration zone” was set by the police and upheld by the courts. It prohibited demonstrations within 2.5 miles of the fence. 16,000 police officers were deployed with armored personnel carriers, helicopters, and water cannons as well as an unknown number of German soldiers, naval ships and spy jets. A few weeks before the Summit police searched 40 homes and offices of various protest organizers and seized computers, discs and written documents throughout Germany. The raids were arranged by using Germany’s anti-terror laws. Body odor samples of global justice organizers were also obtained in order to enable the police to identify them later through the use of police dogs.
Achievements of the Resistance
On the morning of the first day of the Summit, the camp we were in began stirring at 6:30 a.m. as people prepared to head for one of the three permitted rally points just outside the no demonstration zone. The strategy for the blockades was made even more effective by the fact that the fence had only three entrances. The area involved is so rural that few roads reach these entrances. In order to get to the roads and avoid as many police as possible, the plan was to walk for miles through fields and forests in a decentralized manner so it would be impossible to prevent everyone from reaching the four blockade destinations. The five finger system, developed by the anti-nuclear movement, was used for this purpose. As the police stood in a line blocking the only road that lead to Heiligendamm, the first of five lines of demonstrators headed directly into the field. The surprised cops, in full riot gear, began running into the fields, and as they did, a second line of activists headed off through another part of the field, and then the third, fourth and fifth. The police did not know how to proceed as we walked right into the no demonstration zone.
During the four-hour walk, we had to cross two additional roads to get to our blockading destination. Using batons, water cannons and pepper spray, the police attempted to prevent us from crossing the streets. Helicopters buzzed quite low overhead and delivered police reinforcements, but it did not matter. In both instances, as we approached the police each of the five lines of demonstrators split up into 10 more. With hands held above our heads the 4,000 demonstrators willingly faced the police violence and made it across successfully. Once we arrived at our blockading destination it was announced over the bullhorn that 8,000 other demonstrators had also crossed the fields and forests and by the late afternoon all four entrances into Heiligendamm blockaded, including the train track that was to bring in the mainstream press to cover the opening evening event. That evening, journalists and delegates were advised to stay in their hotel rooms. The police managed to disperse by nightfall, with violence, one of the blockades in preparation for the morning, yet, even on the second day, many delegates were delayed for hours and had to be shuttled to the Summit site by boat. Only the eight leaders who had been flown in by helicopter were able to easily reach the Summit location.
On the same morning, the route from the airport was also successfully blockaded. Throughout the entire week surrounding the Summit, spontaneous and creative actions could be spotted throughout the area. 11 Greenpeace boats, chased by police, attempted to land on the shore of Heiligendamm to hand over a petition on global climate change. Street theater included representatives of Doctors Without Borders leaping into the water in an effort to reach for a large bottle of medicine that was out of reach, representing all those who could have access to necessary medicine at an affordable price if it wasn’t for patents and the drug companies unrelenting quest for larger profits. Over 100 rebel clowns were seen everywhere, mimicking the police and de-escalating tense situations.
“Achievements” of the G8
“German Chancellor Angela Merkel has booked another success for her style of quiet but persistent diplomacy at the Group of Eight (G8) summit in the northern resort of Heiligendamm,” states the mainstream media, playing its usual role of ignoring the overwhelming demonstrations and mindlessly applauding the empty agreements achieved at the Summit that will do nothing to effect the causes of the social and economic problems facing the world. An international media center was constructed to welcome the 4,000 journalists who came to Heiligendamm to cover the story. At the opening of this center (sponsored by corporations including Nike), journalists were wined, dined and entertained with roasted pig, 20 varieties of mousse, a putting green, as well as a German News service link complete with the angle to cover the Summit and demonstrations. Except for the few selected to travel through the fence to clearly staged photo opportunities, the majority of the members of the press corps never had to leave the comfort of their hotel and the International Media Center, where a large video screen aired all that most journalists evidently felt they needed to see.
The “newly agreed upon aid to Africa” was nothing more than the same aid that had been agreed during the last summit, an empty promise of meager charity yet to be fulfilled, even in the tragic face of unbelievable poverty and the devastating effect of Aids. The desperately needed cancellation of African debt and the allowance of generic drugs was not considered. These remedies will not serve to maintain the well-established structures of global capitalism and therefore are not “appropriate” solutions. The well-publicized agreement on fighting climate change contains no firm commitment, rather several of the countries are “seriously considering” reducing worldwide emissions by half by 2050. The other agreements were little more than a continued celebration of the free market and attempts to applaud the very economic strategies that have led to today’s global reality, where in the last ten years the number of people fighting starvation has risen from 840 million to 854 million (while the tiny minority of millionaires and the super-rich were able to double their wealth from 16 trillion to 33 trillion dollars). The G8 participants discussed a collective strategy against copyright piracy in developing nations, one of the few means of income for people to make money in depressed economies. They expressed concern over the North Korean and Iranian atomic programs, an ironic concern coming from nations who together currently have a total of over 26,000 nuclear weapons, 98% of the world’s supply.
Make Capitalism History
Very little news about the demonstrations was heard throughout the world. Independent media attempted to provide another perspective of the Summit, with a half-hour daily news program and podcasts, but much room remains for expansion of these efforts.
Compared to the WTO demonstrations in Seattle in 1999, these demonstrations had a much stronger sense of unity, and a clearer vision and statement of what is demanded. There was no hesitation in claiming that the movement is first and foremost an anti-capitalist movement. North African immigrants were at the forefront of the demonstrations in Germany, making clear the demands for an end to deportation and the “fortressing of the West.” The demands for democratic globalization, for fair relations and trade between all countries, for an economy based on solidarity, for the sustainable treatment of the environment, for peaceful and political solutions to conflicts, were heard over and over again. The strength of the movement provided inspiration and the determination to remain firm, to not shy away from standing for the radical change required, and to return home to continue to support and create alternative structures in our own communities, while strengthening the connections between the various struggles.
As the week of demonstrations came to an end, the police control was at its most extreme, turning the city into an occupied zone with checkpoints and constant intimidation. Over 700 people were detained, many “preemptively” as allowed by German law for reasons as ridiculous as wearing black and having a bandana. Yet the spirit of the people who participated in the actions was one of victory and of a growing sense that, no matter how much money and force can be mustered to maintain the world order, the people together can overcome it armed with a unified vision of equality and of a just life for all. The G8 summit in Heiligendamm gave the global justice movement a brief glimpse into its own strength which will have powerful implications for the future.
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