CPTnet
SEATTLE: WTO--A Glimpse of the New World Disorder?
Dec. 13, 1999
by Cole Hull

Every group in the world with an ax to grind is going to Seattle. -- Bill
Clinton

The front page of the Dec. 4 Seattle Post-Intelligencer newspaper proclaims
"Summit ends in failure ." The World Trade Organization's Seattle
Millennium Round grinds to a close without an agenda or a plan for more
talks. Will this be the image left in people's minds? Or will it be the
police violence,
the disruption of self-proclaimed anarchists?

In a week of meetings and marches, sit-ins and standoffs, there is both hope
and failure, both frustrations and victories. And perhaps that is the way
it should be.

The Nov. 30-Dec. 3 trade meetings in Seattle drew twice the number of
delegates and press anticipated, numbering in the hundreds, but it also drew
as many as 50,000 protesters from within as well as outside the city. Most
of them were part of organized groups committed to peaceful marches and
demonstrations. Some were not.

What are the issues that led so many people to the streets of Seattle?
Labor rights, anti-dumping laws; the environment, especially forests,
fisheries; agriculture and genetically modified foods; globalism;
e-commerce; human rights and child-labor laws; and of course the call to
Jubilee, to developing country debt-forgiveness.

And, in the end, much protest about police brutality and anger over their
tactics.

Unfortunately much of the media attention focused on the few hundred people
who were not peaceful. These turned to vandalism -- breaking store windows,
setting trash receptacles on fire and spraying graffiti on downtown hotels
and businesses near the Washington State Convention Center, where WTO
meetings took place.

The police response, initially restrained, became increasingly heavy-handed
as they began firing tear gas, pepper spray, concussion and flash grenades,
and rubber bullets into the crowds. By week's end, the protests became
equally split between focus on the WTO and focus on the Seattle and state
authorities roving the streets in their Robocop gear and in lockdown mode
at the central courts and police stations.

However, glimpses of inspiration and hope could be seen in the tie-died
students marching shoulder to shoulder with longshoremen in hardhats and
Union cards raised high. It could be seen in the increasing activism over
the week by protesters and citizens to clean up the graffiti and the streets
as they went. Even during the worst of the clashes, there were protesters
positioning themselves against windows trying to stop other people from
breaking them.

And there were great acts of hospitality. With most hotels reserved months
in advance by press, delegates and corporations, the city of Seattle asked
people to open their homes to people coming to protest, and thousands did.
Food was delivered to police and protesters alike, quiet circles of prayer
and consensus building by affinity groups could be seen throughout the
streets.

Did the summit end in failure? If the story that comes away from these
events is that people care strongly about their communities, care strongly
about their global community, and that much more care and conversation needs
to be had before we can move ahead in good conscience, I have to feel that
this week, in this twisted morass of conflicting emotions and images, went
well.

Cole Hull, former CPT member and Reservist, lives and works in Seattle with
Mennonite Voluntary Service. He participated last week in the Environment,
Health, and Animal Welfare and Fair Trade /Labor rallies and marches, as
well as a candlelight prayer vigil for peace on the last night of the WTO
meetings, sponsored by area Friends and Mennonites.

CPT Reservist Matt Guynn, a member of the Church of the Brethren in
Richmond, IN for seminary, also came to Seattle as a nonviolent trainer.