• 1 An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague. (...)

Introduction1

• 2 Bové cited in Jürg Schoch, "Seattle - das war wie Mai 1968," in Tages-Anzeiger, 26.1.2000, p. 5.

"It was just like May 1968," said José Bové, sheep-farmer and French anti-globalisation hero, about the events in Seattle of December 1999 :2 four days of massive street protests against the World Trade Organisation (WTO) turned the city into a battle ground - literally and metaphorically. Bové joined some 700 nongovernmental organisations and an estimated 40,000 demonstrators, including steelworkers, environmentalists, AIDS-activists, farmers, anti-capitalists, anarchists, students and concerned local citizens. What began as a peaceful protest march ended in a violent confrontation with the Seattle police. The authorities called in the National Guard and declared a state of emergency. Global television networks were delivering hourly updates on the situation, turning the protests into a major media event.

• 3 Margaret Levi and David Olson, "The Battles for Seattle," in Politics and Society, Vol. 28, No. 3, (...)
• 4 See Vandana Shiva, "This Round to the Citizens," in The Guardian, 8.12.1999, http://www.guardian (...)
• 5 Mary Kaldor, "'Civilising' Globalisation : The Implications of the 'Battle' for Seattle," in (...)

For some, the Battle for Seattle was a "turning point,"3 an event that symbolised the world's discontent with the spread of globalisation, with policies that promoted free trade and corporate greed over the interests of average people and the environment.4 Others stress that Seattle "was the first time that the political presence of a range of new actors was taken seriously."5 Similar interventions and protests, some nonviolent, others less so, followed in the subsequent months : thousands of demonstrators interfered with gatherings of the World Economic Forum in Melbourne and Davos, or with meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in Washington and Prague. Indeed, major popular protests against international political and economic meetings soon became a common feature of key political meetings, from Quebec Summit Discussions on Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (April 2001) to the European Union gathering in Gothenburg (June 2001) and the G8 summit in Genoa (July 2001). All this is taking place in the wake of several years of less visible but nevertheless sustained protests in many parts of the developing world, from Argentina to Zambia, against the severe social consequences of IMF-imposed structural adjustment programs.

• 6 Joan V. Bondurant, Conquest of Violence : The Gandhian Philosophy of Conflict (...)

This world-wide wave of popular dissent expresses more than mere discontent with the effects of globalisation. The fact that countless people around the globe see street protests as the only means to voice their opinions symbolises a much more systemic and alarming crisis of legitimacy, one that has to do with the lack of democratic accountability of the major multilateral institutions that shape the world economy. In some sense the events of Seattle highlight what Joan Bondurant already identified decades ago as a key weakness of liberal thought, namely « the failure to provide techniques of action for those critical occasions when the machinery of democratic government no longer functions to resolve large-scale, overt conflict. »6

• 7 For instance, James H. Mittelman, The Globalisation Syndrome : Transformation and Resistance (...)

Popular dissent has clearly become a key feature of global politics. But while the nature of these transformations has been discussed in some detail,7 the ensuing dilemmas for activists remain much less explored. Clearly, an increase in political visibility and political influence also calls for additional moral responsibility, or so at least it should. Among the many political challenges that the new breed of diverse global activists face, and that this essay discusses, are the choice between violent and nonviolent means of protest and the struggle over voice and representation, the question of who can speak for whom. An extensive and broadly conceived engagement with these challenges is crucial if the global dissident movement is to contribute to the construction of a better world, rather than merely oppose existing policies.

• 8 See, for instance, David Held et al, Global Transformations : Politics, Economics, Culture (...)
• 9 Paul Virilio, Vitesse et Politique (Paris : Éditions Galilée, 1977), p. 131.

Before probing the political dilemmas of global activism, a brief inquiry into the nature of globalisation is necessary. Given the existence of a vast literature on the subject,8 such an endeavour can only illuminate a few select aspects. A more limited focus on issues of dissent and agency is thus in order for this essay. Of particular relevance here is Paul Virilio, who a quarter of a century ago already noted that the contraction of distances had become a strategic reality.9 Virilio, like man other commentators, believes that the world is undergoing significant change. This change, he argues, revolves around the use and regulation of speed.

• 10 Paul Virilio, La Vitesse de Libération (Paris : Galilée, 1995), pp. 21-34.
• 11 Jean-Baptiste Marongiu, « Excès de Vitesse, » in Libération, 21.9.1995, p. xi.

Speed is an important aspect of globalisation, albeit, of course, not the only one. Speed signifies the relationship between various phenomena, notably space and time. Space has become annihilated, Virilio claims, and time has taken over as the criterion around which global dynamics revolve. The instantaneous character of communication and mass media has annihilated duration and locality. The « now » of the emission is privileged to the detriment of the « here, » the space where things take place. What matters are no longer the three spatial dimensions of height, depth, and width, but above all a fourth one, time.10 Virilio predicts that the globe will no longer primarily be divided spatially into North and South, but temporally into two forms of speed, absolute and relative. The « haves » and « have-nots » are then sorted out between those who live in the hyperreal shrunken world of instant communication, cyberdynamics, and electronic money transactions - and those, more disadvantaged than ever, who live in the real space of local villages, cut off from the temporal forces that drive politics and economics.11 Expressed in other words, inequality will increasingly defy the spatial dimensions of political life. One can frolic in the virtual world of speed and enjoy its privileges from virtually anywhere on the planet. A person with access to a computer, modem and phone line in, say, rural Lesotho or Tibet, can be as much part of global dynamics than a corporate executive in New York's World Trade Centre. On the other hand, one can be situated in the middle of the world's metropolitan cores, say, in Los Angeles, Paris or Tokyo, and miss out entirely on the revolution of speed.

• 12 See Jerry Everard, Virtual States : Globalization, Inequality and the Internet (London : (...)

The consequences of unequal access to the world of speed goes beyond the creation of material and social inequalities. The most fatal disparities may well emerge from the creation of two different mindsets and the types of privileges they engender. Those who operate in the cyberworld of speed will gradually acquire different thinking patterns. The dictates of linear thought, imposed by the representational limits of books and other printed materials, are gradually giving way to a more interconnected system of communication. New informational sources, such as CD-Rom and the World Wide Web, have already created logics of representation that defy linearity and, instead, provide the reader with a multitude of access points and connections between them. Fluency in the ensuing types of thinking patterns will increasingly dominate access to privilege and basic necessities, from job opportunities to information sources. People trained in and accustomed to linear thinking are likely to become more and more marginal, being cut of from the new informational dynamics that are bound to drive societies in the new millennium.12

• 13 Human Development Report 1999, United Nations Development Program, http://www.undp.org (accessed (...)

It is not surprising, then, that voices of concern have become more vocal. We hear of a nation state that is no longer able to uphold its sovereignty and the spheres of justice and civility that the corresponding boundaries were supposed to protect. We witness a decline in state responsibility for social affairs, which has either been relegated to the nongovernmental sector or simply left to market dynamics. But the latter, of course, operate along principles other than those necessary for the establishment of social justice. Decades after decolonisation was introduced in most parts of the world the gap between rich and poor has widened substantially. A recent report by the United Nations Development Program, for instance, informs us that the assets of the world's three richest people amount to more than the combined GNP of all least developed countries on the planet.13 Disempowerment and disentitlement have become key features of globalisation. We hear of neo-liberal world order that is

• 14 Cited in Andy Rowell, "Faceless in Seattle," in The Guardian, 6.10.1999, http://www.guardian (...)
• 15 Shiva, "This Round to the Citizens," p. 2.
• 16 Don Knapp, "Activists to WTO : Put People Over Profits," CNN.com, 29.9.1999.
• 17 See Robert O'Brien, Anne Marie Goetz, Jan Aart Scholte and Marc Williams, Contesting Global (...)
• 18 Oscar Ygarteche, The False Dilemma : Globalization : Opportunity or Threat ? tr. (...)

The main common target of the diversely motivated protest actions in Seattle, Prague and other cities are the three key institutions of the liberal world economy : the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO. Some protesters lament the lack of democratic accountability that characterises these influential organisations. Kelly Quirk, head of the Rainforest Action Network, worries that "the WTO has the right to completely rescind any law passed by the citizenry to protect the environment, health and labour rights."14 Other critics focus more generally on the neo-liberal agenda that is promoted by the respective economic institutions. They stress that the ensuing global free-trade regime is sacrificing the poor and the environment in favour of the short-term dictates of profit-seeking capital. Vandana Shiva, for instance, is convinced that the WTO is enforcing "anti-people, anti-nature decision to enable corporations to steal the world's harvests through secretive, undemocratic structures and processes."15 Many agree, even the less radical critics, pointing towards a variety of WTO decisions that favoured commercial interests over, for instance, the protection of dolphins and turtles. Or they emphasise that the so-called non-tariff trade barriers, which the WTO seeks to eliminate, are actually "hard-won environmental and food safety protections."16 Others draw attention to the many gendered effects of IMF interventions in the developing world. Women often bear the ensuing costs, as in the case of reduced expenditures on social services, which is a common element of privatisation and fiscal austerity policies that accompany structural adjustment programs.17 Others again stress that structural adjustment programs not only leave little policy options for nation-states, but also fail to address the root of the problem - seen as the enduring crisis of productivity of capital in industrialised countries.18

• 19 Cited in Vittorio de Filippis and Christian Losson, "Prague, QG des anti de tous les pays," in (...)
• 20 Bello, "From Melbourne to Prague," p. 3. Latter sections of this paper will problematize the issue (...)
• 21 Shiva, "This round to the citizens," p. 1 ; Woodley, "The Battle for Seattle," p. 28.

It is not the purpose of this essay to discuss and evaluate these and many other criticism that have been directed against the WTO, the IMF and the World Bank. Rather, the essay scrutinises some of the political dilemmas related to the process through which these grievances are expressed. And here the issue of globalisation is pivotal. Indeed, it is perhaps the only rallying-point that unites all the various and diversely motivated protesters. They all oppose something called globalisation. "I don't like the word globalisation," says one activist. "It signifies something inevitable, ineluctable."19 To be more precise, the problem is not globalisation as such, for it is hardly possible to turn back the clock of technological progress and neutralise the multitude of forces that are currently transforming the world. What many activists oppose is a particular approach to globalisation : the prevalent, neo-liberal version of international economics and the ensuing belief in "the inexorable irreversibility of free-market globalisation."20 This is why they stress that globalisation is not an inevitable phenomena, but a constructed narrative, "a political project which can be responded to politically."21

• 22 O'Brien et al, Contesting Global Governance.
• 23 O'Brien et al, Contesting Global Governance, p. 206

Evaluating the impact of global activism is no easy task, and I do not pretend to present, in the space of an essay-length exposé, evidence that can point conclusively towards success or failure. There are, however, a number of extensive studies that provide relevant insight. Among them is an impressive monograph that examines the relationship between social movements and international economic institutions. The authors, Robert O'Brien and three collaborators, examine the extent to which social movement pressure has resulted in institutional change and policy modification.22 The book's core consists of four detailed case studies. They focus on the influence of the environmental, the labour and the women's movement on the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO. The authors find sufficient evidence to conclude that multilateral institutions have embarked on a process of engagement, mutual learning and exchange of information. All three economic institutions have developed mechanisms to improve their relationships with NGOs. But while showing increased willingness to listen, the institutions have so far been reluctant to grant NGOs formal representational rights and access to the decision making process. As a result, O'Brien and his collaborators believe that in the short run the impact of global social movement "is unlikely to transform institutional functions."23 Since their study was finished just before the protests against the WTO meeting in Seattle of December 1999, a slightly more optimistic evaluation may be in order from today's vantage point.

• 24 Charlotte Denny, "Protesters Open Doors for Moderates," in The Guardian Weekly, 5.11.2000, p. 23. (...)
• 25 John Vidal, "Real battle for Seattle," in The Guardian, 5.12.1999, http://www.guardian Many (...)
• 26 "War die Selbstkritik mehr als Rhetorik ? Breiter Konsensus über die Nachtteile der (...)

Several commentators do, indeed, point towards a limited series of 'successes' reached by the recent wave of global activism. There is the fact that both the WTO negotiation round in Seattle and the annual World Bank / IMF meeting in Prague finished a day earlier, although the respective organisations claim that this change in schedule had nothing to do with the voices of protest that interfered - at times audibly - with the formal deliberation of the decision makers. Some commentators point out that the very presence of radical and violent protesters has provided the moderate, reform-oriented NGOs with unprecedented access to the inner sanctum of the IMF and the World Bank. "There is nothing like being besieged by a group of rioters armed with Molotov cocktails to make your old enemies suddenly look appealing," says one journalist.24 Others stress how the pressure from the street was instrumental in reinforcing some 40 developing countries who, during the Seattle WTO negotiations, argued that they were marginalized and bullied by an organisation that is dominated by rich countries protecting their own trading interests. "An unprecedented rebellion was in the offing," said one commentator. "For the first time in history the poor countries of the world had told the rich they weren't playing the First Worlds' game."25 A similar pattern occurred during the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2001. Representative of Third World Countries continued their criticism and an unprecedented number of NGOs were invited to participate in the program. And while police action outside kept popular protests in the streets of Davos to a minimum, the UN General Secretary, Kofi Annan, declared renewed commitment towards reaching a so-called "Global Compact" - a project designed to monitor the performance of major companies with regard to human rights, working conditions and environmental protection.26

• 27 See O'Brien et al, Contesting Global Governance, p. 7.
• 28 Ronald J. Deibert, "International Plug 'n Play ? Citizen Activism, the Internet and Global (...)
• 29 See, for instance, the "Stop the FTTA Web-site" (http://www.stopftaa the site of the "Centre for (...)
• 30 Mark Riley, "Anti-globalisation groups prepare for online battle," in The Sydney Morning Herald, (...)

First, speed provides activists with a range of new tools to organise and co-ordinate their actions. Many of the protesters that went to Seattle, Melbourne and Prague, for instance, were brought together by e-mail correspondences and a variety of web-sites that organised resistance against neo-liberal forms of globalisation. The increased ability to exchange information across large differences has had a tremendous influence on the mobilisation of dissent within civil society. Social movements and NGOs that had hitherto existed in isolation can now easily communicate with each other. They can share data and insights about similar concerns and organise common actions in ways that was not possible before.27 A study on citizen activism against the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), for instance, suggests that the Internet played a vital role in the relative success of the movement - the MAI was at least temporarily pushed off the OECD agenda. The Internet was central to the camping insofar as it facilitated communication among activists, permitted publication of a related information and helped to put pressure on politicians and policy-makers in member states.28 Cyber-based protest organisation has become more extensive and sophisticated as activists have learned from previous experiences. The protests in Quebec City, for instance, have given raise to numerous web-sites that exchange information and coordinate future actions.29 Not surprisingly, this move into cyberspace takes place at both sides of the struggle. The World Bank, for instance, has started plans for a major online conference in order to avoid another round of public protests.30

• 31 Naomi Klein, No Logo (London : Flamingo, 2001), p. 357.
• 32 Jean Baudrillard, « The Precession of Simulacra, » in Simulations, tr. P. Foss, P. (...)
• 33 Jean Baudrillard, « The Ecstasy of Communication, » tr. J. Johnston in Hal Foster (...)

Any protest action that draws sufficient media attention has the potential to engender a political process that transcends its immediate spatial environment. It competes for the attention of global television audiences and thus interferes with the struggle over values that ultimately shapes the world we live in. "A world united by Benetton slogans, Nike sweatshops and McDonald's jobs might not be anyone's utopian global village," says Naomi Klein, "but its fibre-optic cables and shared cultural references are nonetheless laying the foundations for the first truly international people's movement.31 But the recent wave of global protests is hardly the first international movement of its kind. Nor is it as unproblematic as Klein suggests. For some the revolution of speed is too random to allow for critical interference and, indeed, for human agency. Jean Baudrillard, for instance, believes that the distinctions between reality and virtuality, political practice and simulation are blurred to the extent that they are no longer recognisable.32 Our media culture, he says, has annihilated reality in stages, such that in the end its simulating image « bears no relation to any reality whatever : it is its own pure simulacrum. » Television, the unproblematic transmission of the hyperreal, has conditioned our mind such that we have lost the ability to penetrate beneath the manifest levels of surface.33

• 34 O'Brien, Contesting Global Governance, p. 206.
• 35 William E. Connolly, "Speed, Eccentric Culture, and Cosmopolitanism," in The Texture of (...)
• 36 Jacques Derrida, « Hospitality, Justice and Responsibility, » in R. Kearney and (...)

Judged from such a vantage-point, the actions in Seattle and other cities are not quite as ineffective as they appear at first sight. Even without engendering immediate institutional transformations, traces of these protest events continue to influence the struggle over global values - and thus over the direction of politics. The repeated presence of protest actions around the world guarantees that a number of key issues, from environmental protection to minimal labour standards, remain discussed in the public sphere. Indeed, even before Seattle, O'Brien and his collaborators had already concluded that the interaction between social movements and multilateral economic institutions has transformed the nature of global economic governance. The authors label this transformation "complex multilateralism" in order to recognise that actors other than states now can and do express the public interest and shape issues of governance.34 The ensuing dynamics testify for the emergence of a new kind of global politics - one in which key political struggles occur beyond the control of the national state. Consider, for instance, how global networks of communication have enabled indigenous peoples in the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand to engage in forms of activism that ensured them an audience beyond their immediate surroundings. For William Connelly, this tendency confirms that speed has multiple dimensions : not only the encroaching and disabling one that Baudrillard (and to some extent Virilio) argue, but also one that "supports the possibility of democratic pluralization."35 Some even think ahead towards a time in which we can speak of unconditional universal hospitality - a situation in which rights and responsibilities would no longer be circumscribed by the spatial and political logic of national sovereignty.36