De Antwoorden van het Antiglobalisme, van Seattle tot Porte Alegre
Dirk Barrez
262 pages
published in 2001

The 1999 WTO protests in Seattle made it abundantly clear that a new international movement had been born, a movement the press called "the antiglobalisation movement". This is a bit of a misnomer, as it suggests that a) there's one monolithic movement and b) this movement is against globalisation perse, as opposed to being against the way economic globalisation is being implemented. The historical process of globalisation has been going on for at least two centuries and is purely a result of improved communications, improved transportation, the growth of science and the growth of knowledge. The "antiglobalisation movement" does not have a problem with this.

There is however another process of globalisation, a deliberately engineered process of economic globalisation which seeks to create a truly global free market, where any consideration other then economic are swept aside as "trade barriers". This process is nurtured and led by the great economical institutions like the Worldbank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organisation and G8. It's globalisation purely in service of business, which recognises no other concerns but its own.

Its ideology is radical free market, it reasons that only a total free market can bring welfare, that anything that hinders a multinational from doing what it wants is bad, that most if not all rules and regulations regarding trade should be abolished. The state should play no economic role at all in modern society and certainly not in international trade. If this doesn't happen, if your government does not scrap all artifical controls and restrictions on the market, your country will stagnate and s lide into poverty. Only by letting the market be free to do what it wants can you create wealth.

In 1999 in Seattle, a (very) loose coaltion of trade unionists, anticapitalists, environmentalists, socialists, feminists, anarchists, farmers and other came together to protest against this vison of globalisation by protesting against the WTO conference being held there. Together they managed to shutdown the conference and so a new movement was born -- or at least finally became visible. It had been present for longer, but Seattle was when the movement went global itself.

Having protests against globalisation is fine, but you need more then just protests to be effective. You need to be campaigning for something as well as fighting against something. An alternate vision of globalisation is needed. [1] The World Social Forum in Porte Alegre was set up to help deliver just that, as well as provide a place for various organisations and people involved in the struggle to meet up and brainstorm. It was held for the first time in 2001 and Dirk Barrez was there. The various interviews he had with several well-known as well as several less well-known antiglobalists were distilled into this book.

Dirk Barrez is a Belgian tv journalist, writer and activist, who used to be active in the European peace movement in the eighties as well as in the Third World movement. He has his own view on how the antiglobalist movement should develop further and is not afraid to share his views. That's part of why he went to Porte Alegre, to further develop his views and to hear of others what they thought. In his book, he tries to give a broad overview of what he and other antiglobalists think should be done about various issues. The topics in De Antwoorden van het Antiglobalisme range from social justice, to land reform, the environment, farming, natural resources, global democracy and how to achieve it, emancipation, war et cetera. No concrete plans are given, this is more of an attempt at creating a general philosopy for the antiglobalist movement.

I didn't agree with everything he wrote, he seemed e.g. to dismiss socialism as an answer too quickly for my linking, but as a whole he succeded in what he set out to do. He managed to write down a coherent, if broadly sketched, philospophy for the antiglobalist movement which could very well serve as a basis for further debate and action. It's a pity this book is not available in English, though it is in French. More information can be found at Dirk Barrez's website, http://www.dirkbarrez.be/. Part of the book is available there, in English.

[1]
Hence also the name I prefer for the antiglobalisation movement, the alterglobalisation movement. Others also speak of the Global justice movement.