Shortly after they were soundly defeated by the Swiss electorate who rejected their last referendum aimed against the country's immigrant population, the far-right Swiss People's Party is at it again, using Switzerland's direct democracy in an attempt to push their discriminatory agenda against immigrant residents. This editor has little doubt that this referendum will be squashed by the Swiss people as well, again proving that Swiss direct democracy is functioning as it should, providing checks and balances based on the will of the majority, not the whims of politicians with their own radical agendas. - Editor
Swiss far right forces vote on minaret ban
Matthew Weaver and agencies guardian.co.uk,
Tuesday July 8, 2008 Article history
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/08/islam.race
Far right groups in Switzerland have collected enough signatures to force a nationwide referendum on banning minarets, the distinctive towers of Islamic architecture.
In what is being seen as a sign of growing Islamophobia in Europe, more than 100,000 Swiss citizens signed a petition to halt the construction of minarets.
Under Switzerland's direct democracy rules, that level of support is enough to trigger a referendum. The Swiss interior ministry today confirmed a vote would take place, without setting a date.
The petition was launched by Ulrich Schlüer an MP from the controversial Swiss People's party, which was accused of racist campaigning last year.
In a bid to get immigrants' families deported if their children had been convicted of violent crime, the party ran an advertising campaign showing three white sheep on a Swiss flag kicking out a black sheep with the caption: "For more security."
The president of Switzerland, Pascal Couchepin, said the government would recommend that voters rejected the proposed minaret ban.
The organisers of the petition argue that the minarets, which are used on mosques, are a symbol of political and religious claims to power, not just a religious sign.
Schlüer said last year: "We've got nothing against prayer rooms or mosques for the Muslims. But a minaret is different. It's got nothing to do with religion; it's a symbol of political power."
If Schlüer's camp wins the referendum, the Swiss parliament must pass a law enshrining a minaret construction ban in the constitution.
Opponents say such a ban would violate religious freedom.
More than 310,000 of Switzerland's 7.5 million population are Muslims, according to the federal statistical office.
The UN expert on racism, Doudou Diene, has said the campaign is evidence of an "ever-increasing trend" toward anti-Islamic actions in Europe.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Swiss Far-Right Forces Vote on Minaret Ban
The Media Campaign Against Venezuela's Participatory Democracy
The following two articles both attempt to dispel the disinformation in the mainstream media regarding Venezuela, but from differing perspectives. The first comes from a professional journalist and attacks the mainstream media demanding that the truth about Venezuela's thriving democracy and economic redistribution be reported upon accurately. The second is a report from the Venezuela Solidarity Network of Australia, and is based upon the personal experiences of Sydney residents recently returned from a delegation to Venezuela. This article helps to back up the first with some more first hand evidence from the grassroots. Revealing the truth through public and diverse media as well as connecting people through face-to-face delegations will help to promote participatory democracy by exposing the benefits it brings to society in Venezuela and all around the globe. -Editor
Johann Hari: Lies, kidnapping and a mysterious laptop
You have been told that the Venezuelan President supports the Farc thugs
Monday, 7 July 2008
Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-lies-kidnapping-and-a-mysterious-laptop-861286.html
Sometimes you hear a stray sentence on the news that makes you realise you have been lied to. Deliberately lied to; systematically lied to; lied to for a purpose. If you listened closely over the past few days, you could have heard one such sentence passing in the night-time of news.
As Ingrid Betancourt emerged after six-and-a-half years – sunken and shrivelled but radiant with courage – one of the first people she thanked was Hugo Chavez. What? If you follow the news coverage, you have been told that the Venezuelan President supports the Farc thugs who have been holding her hostage. He paid them $300m to keep killing and to buy uranium for a dirty bomb, in a rare break from dismantling democracy at home and dealing drugs. So how can this moment of dissonance be explained?
Yes: you have been lied to – about one of the most exciting and original experiments in economic redistribution and direct democracy anywhere on earth. And the reason is crude: crude oil. The ability of democracy and freedom to spread to poor countries may depend on whether we can unscramble these propaganda fictions.
Venezuela sits on one of the biggest pools of oil left anywhere. If you find yourself in this position, the rich governments of the world – the US and EU – ask one thing of you: pump the petrol and the profits our way, using our corporations. If you do that, we will whisk you up the Mall in a golden carriage, no matter what. The "King" of Saudi Arabia oversees a torturing tyranny where half the population – women – are placed under house arrest, and jihadis are pumped out by the dozen to attack us. It doesn't matter. He gives us the oil, so we hold his hand and whisper sweet crude-nothings in his ear.
It has always been the same with Venezuela – until now. Back in 1908, the US government set up its ideal Venezuelan regime: a dictator who handed the oil over fast and so freely that he didn't even bother to keep receipts, never mind ask for a cut. But in 1998 the Venezuelan people finally said "enough". They elected Hugo Chavez. The President followed their democratic demands: he increased the share of oil profits taken by the state from a pitiful one per cent to 33 per cent. He used the money to build hospitals and schools and subsidised supermarkets in the tin-and-mud shanty towns where he grew up, and where most of his countrymen still live.
I can take you to any random barrio in the high hills that ring Caracas and show you the results. You will meet women like Francisca Moreno, a gap-toothed 76-year-old granny I found sitting in a tin shack, at the end of a long path across the mud made out of broken wooden planks. From her doorway she looked down on the shining white marble of Caracas's rich district. "I went blind 15 years ago because of cataracts," she explained, and in the old Venezuela people like her didn't see doctors. "I am poor," she said, "so that was that." But she voted for Chavez. A free clinic appeared two years later in her barrio, and she was taken soon after for an operation that restored her sight. "Once I was blind, but now I see!" she said, laughing.
In 2003, two distinguished Wall Street consulting firms conducted the most detailed study so far of economic change under Chavez. They found that the poorest half of the country have seen their incomes soar by 130 per cent after inflation. Today, there are 19,571 primary care doctors – an increase by a factor of 10. When Chavez came to power, just 35 per cent of Venezuelans told Latinobarometro, the Gallup of Latin America, they were happy with how their democracy worked. Today it is 59 per cent, the second-highest in the hemisphere.
For the rich world's governments – and especially for the oil companies, who pay for their political campaigns – this throws up a serious problem. We are addicted to oil. We need it. We crave it. And we want it on our terms. The last time I saw Chavez, he told me he would like to sell oil differently in the future: while poor countries should get it for $10 a barrel, rich countries should pay much more – perhaps towards $200. And he has said that if the rich countries keep intimidating the rest he will shift to selling to China instead. Start the sweating. But Western governments cannot simply say: "We want the oil, our corporations need the profits, so let's smash the elected leaders standing in our way." They know ordinary Americans and Europeans would gag.
So they had to invent lies. They come in waves, each one swelling as the last crashes into incredulity. First they announced Chavez was a dictator. This ignored that he came to power in a totally free and open election, the Venezuelan press remains uncensored and in total opposition to him, and he has just accepted losing a referendum to extend his term and will stand down in 2013.
When that tactic failed, the oil industry and the politicians they lubricate shifted strategy. They announced that Chavez was a supporter of Terrorism (it definitely has a capital T). The Farc is a Colombian guerrilla group that started in the 1960s as a peasant defence network, but soon the pigs began to look like farmers and they became a foul, kidnapping mafia. Where is the evidence Chavez funded them?
On 1 March, the Colombian government invaded Ecuador and blew up a Farc training camp. A few hours later, it announced it had found a pristine laptop in the rubble, and had already rummaged through the 39.5 million pages of Microsoft Word documents it contained to find cast-iron "proof" that Chavez was backing the Farc. Ingrid's sister, Astrid Betancourt, says it is plainly fake. The camp had been totally burned to pieces and the computers had clearly, she says, been "in the hands of the Colombian government for a very long time". Far from fuelling the guerrillas, Chavez has repeatedly pleaded with the Farc to disarm. He managed to negotiate the release of two high-profile hostages – hence Betancourt's swift thanks. He said: "The time of guns has passed. Guerilla warfare is history."
So what now? Now they claim he is a drug dealer, he funds Hezbollah, he is insane. Sometimes they even stumble on some of the real non-fiction reasons to criticise Chavez and use them as propaganda tools. (See our Open House blog later today for a discussion of this). As the world's oil supplies dry up, the desire to control Venezuela's pools will only increase. The US government is already funding separatist movements in Zulia province, along the border with Colombia, where Venezuela's largest oilfields lie. They hope they can break away this whiter-skinned, anti-Chavez province and then drink deep of the petrol there.
Until we break our addiction to oil, our governments will always try to snatch petro-profits away from women like Francisca Moreno. And we – oil addicts all – will be tempted to ignore the strange, dissonant sentences we sometimes hear on the news and lie, blissed-out, in the lies.
j.hari@independent.co.uk
Inspiration from Venezuela 'brigadistas'
Source: http://www.greenleft.org.au/2008/757/39115
Lisa Macdonald, Sydney
5 July 2008
Three of the five Sydney residents who joined a May Day solidarity brigade to Venezuela reported back on their observations and experiences of the Bolivarian revolution to a meeting of 35 people on June 24.
Margaret Allum explained that the brigade of 12 Australians, organised by the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network (AVSN), was very warmly received by the many organisations and people they met in Venezuela. She described the massive “sea of red” at the May Day rally in Caracas, which the brigadistas joined with a large Australian solidarity banner.
She also reported on the inspiring discussions with the workers at SIDOR, Venezuela’s largest steelmaking company, which was nationalised on April 9 after a long struggle by workers.
A major focus of the brigade — which included members of the Electrical Trades Union, NSW Teachers Federation (NSWTF), Community and Public Sector Union, Maritime Union of Australia and the National Tertiary Education Union — was to learn about workers’ rights and workers’ control in Venezuela.
NSWTF member Phil Bradley described the revolution’s remarkable achievements in the area of education, contrasting this with the massive de-funding of public education in NSW and nationally, and the erosion of Australian teachers’ working conditions.
Will Silk discussed the Venezuelan revolution’s commitment to participatory democracy, fostered through the social missions, the communal councils and experiments in endogenous development. He stressed the global significance of the Venezuelans’ attempts to create a new form of socialism — a socialism of the 21st century — and the many challenges still to be overcome if the revolution is to succeed.
The brigadistas welcome invitations to speak about their experiences to any organisation interested in hearing more. They can be contacted at . The AVSN’s next brigade to Venezuela will be held on November 20-30. For more information, visit http://www.venezuelasolidarity.org.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Direct Democracy in Germany: When Voters Have Their Say
This is a classic debate regarding direct democracy. Who will show up to vote? Will referenda remedy the indifference of the youth and the apathy of the general populace? Germany brings an interesting example to the table with a state reluctant to relinquish power, and a population on the edge of demanding it. -Editor
Direct democracy in Germany
When voters want a say
May 1st 2008 BERLIN
From The Economist print edition
Source: http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11293654
If you thought Germany did not do referendums, think again
CAMPAIGNERS for Tempelhof airport lacked neither enthusiasm nor cash. Sky-blue posters urged Berliners to vote yes in a referendum to keep open the airport, a symbol of the Berlin airlift of 1948-49. In vain: too few voters turned out on April 27th to make it valid. Though 60% of those who voted said yes, at least a quarter of eligible voters had to give their approval. So Tempelhof will probably close in October. On the same day the citizens of Schwerin voted to oust their mayor for mishandling an investigation into the starvation of a five-year-old girl. And the Bavarian branch of the trade union confederation plans to start collecting signatures on May 1st for a referendum on a minimum wage. Direct democracy, it seems, is becoming part of Germany's political scene.
Germans lag behind the Swiss, who routinely take law-making into their own hands. Referendums and plebiscites still carry a whiff of Weimar and of Hitler's exploitation of public emotion. The constitution permits them at national level, but the Bundestag has never enacted further laws to make them possible. Yet in states and municipalities, direct democracy has taken off. Since unification in 1990, referendums in these two tiers have become possible in all 16 states. The number of local initiatives has jumped from a handful in the early 1990s to 300 a year.
To German business, this looks like a threat. Around 14% of initiatives seek to block private-sector investments, often mobile-phone towers or shopping centres. Power projects are also targets, increasing fears of a possible energy crunch. In November voters in Ensdorf, in the Saarland, blocked the construction of a €2 billion ($2.9 billion) coal-fired plant. In Brandenburg voters threaten to phase out lignite mining. “Almost every power project faces opposition from citizens' initiatives,” complains Michael Feist, president of BDEW, a club of energy and water companies.
Enthusiasts think direct democracy is spreading because the traditional type is ailing. Membership of political parties has slumped, as has trust in politicians. Nearly half of Germans think elections give them no say over government policies, according to one 2006 survey. Some 80% want referendums at national level. The young are indifferent to party politics but mobilise over single issues, says Gerald Häfner of Mehr Demokratie, a lobby group. In municipalities that may mean swimming pools and pedestrian zones. State-level initiatives deal mainly with education and culture (a referendum in Schleswig-Holstein rejected German spelling reform) or the mechanics of democracy (Bavaria voted to abolish its Senate in 1998).
Loth to share power, politicians argue that ordinary citizens cannot be trusted with too much. Most states do not allow votes on such issues as spending and taxation. The type of quorum that doomed Tempelhof exists only in Germany, says Mr Häfner. The minimum number of signatures required to launch a referendum has been cut, but it is still a tenth of the electorate, on average. Even victory is no guarantee of success. Legislatures can sometimes overturn referendum results, as Schleswig-Holstein's did for the spelling reform, and courts have modified them.
Defenders of direct democracy insist that it improves decision-making. Switzerland's taxes and spending are lower than otherwise, and its labour productivity higher, because the Swiss can vote on fiscal issues, says Lars Feld of the University of Heidelberg. Resistance may be ebbing. The Christian Democratic Union, the most sceptical big party, was an enthusiastic backer of the Tempelhof referendum, notes Volker Mittendorf of the University of Wuppertal. Hamburg, where the party is forming its first state-level coalition with the Greens, will seek to make referendums binding on the legislature. Bavaria's ruling party, the Christian Social Union, credits direct democracy with giving citizens a way to disagree with the government on single issues without voting for the opposition. Tempelhof may close, but direct democracy will soldier on.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
South Korea: Candlelight Vigils Spark Participation
The following interview gives great insight to the scenes on the street in South Korea where people are protesting a trade deal that would allow US beef to be imported. But that is not the only issue being addressed. Candlelight vigils have brought millions into the streets and continue to connect activists and common citizens. Using the internet and cell phones to communicate, the protests have brought thousands and at times a million protestors into the streets. As they demand the a voice in government policy, we stand in solidarity with them and all those struggling for popular power all over the world. -Editor
"We’ve Got the Power” — Candlelight Vigils to Street Rebellion: A conversation with a South Korean Organizer at the G8 Protests
Source: http://www.newsocialist.org/index.php?id=1648
An interview with South Korean activist Dopehead Zo, by Sarah Lazare, Marina Sitrin, David Solnit and Asha Colazione.
The anti-G8 mobilizations have been bringing together inspiring organizers and activists from all over the world. Japanese precarious temp workers, calling themselves “Freeters”, South Korean anti-military base organizers, Spanish media activists, Farm workers from Via Campesina, Australian human rights activists, German direct action organizers, and many others from North America, Asia, and Europe, have all come together to share stories, struggles, ideas, and to network and plan actions. At The Counter G8 International Forum in Tokyo, we met one organizer whose story is so compelling we needed to share it as soon as possible. The following is a selected transcription of our conversation.
Dopehead Zo is an activist who has been heavily involved in the South Korean demonstrations against the US beef import deals. Beginning in late May 2008, mass protests have rocked Seoul and other cities in South Korea, bringing hundreds of thousands, and at times over a million protesters together into the streets. These are some of the biggest mobilizations South Korea has seen for over two decades. These are both mass demonstrations and places for the creation of new social relationships between people. As one flyer put out by activists there reads: “Candlelight Vigils Evolving to a Street Rebellion Calling for Direct Democracy – We’ve Got the Power”
At issue is the decision taken by the new South Korean president – Lee Seok-haeng – to ease restrictions against US beef imports, most of which had been banned in 2003 after mad cow disease was discovered in the United States. The ban was a blow to the US beef industry, as South Korea was its third largest importer of US beef. Critics see the lifting of the ban as an effort to appease the United States at the expense of South Korean public health, and the trade deal has awakened broader feelings of discontent with the government’s pursuit of neoliberal reforms and close relations with the United States. The overwhelming public response has virtually paralyzed Lee Seok-haeng’s government and has caused him to start backpedaling on the agreement. Meanwhile, protests, rallies, and candlelight vigils continue to fill the streets of Seoul. Perhaps other forms of democracy are on the people’s agenda.
Dopehead Zo spoke with us for hours, sitting on the floor together after the forums of the day had finished. He shared his experience protesting in the streets of Seoul and described a new kind of social movement that is taking form. A movement comprised of, as he calls them, “common people.” He describes forms of mass democracy in the streets, and the joy of being together to create new ways of relating to one another. He also explains what all of this has to do with the G8 protests and places it in the context of an overall struggle for social justice.
Q: Can you describe what it is like right now on the streets of Seoul?
A: People are holding candlelight vigils every night, with a minimum of 10,000 people in Seoul and several thousand in other cities. On weekends, we have 50 thousand or 100 thousand people participating. When it began, it was anti-US beef imports by the Korean government. The newly elected, right-wing neoliberal ex CEO South Korean president, wanted to give some good gifts or presents to the US. The first thing the new South Korean president did was to visit the US and beg for a good relationship, and for all kinds of things. Or go to Sarkozy. I hate to mention the president’s name. The gate to the US beef industry was the imports of US beef, every part of the cow – spinal cord, intestines, heart – the parts that other people usually don’t eat. I am a vegan myself, but many Koreans cook these parts and then they eat it. According to most calculations, the US beef industry would massively profit from beef imports, and once South Korea opens its markets to beef imports, other Asian countries will do the same. Talks between the two presidents took place in April, and before the talks, the two governments made an agreement and then it became known to the public in early May. As people heard more about the details of the agreement, they realized it was really unfair. Everyone could tell it was for the profit of the US beef industry, not the health of the South Korean people. If mad cow disease is in the US, there is no way to stop it with the import of US beef.
The agreement was really messed up. The general public found out about it and started a candlelight vigil. South Korean people started to pressure the government by taking to the streets every night with candlelight vigils. The government didn’t listen to us, of course. At first it was 2000 people then 20,000 then 100,000 … and then more and more people … People got angry and took to the street.
Eventually the government listened to it. The pressure got bigger. The Korean government knows how to control the movement people, because the resistance or the movement has been going on for 20 or 30 years, so there is kind of a pattern as to what we do when we do rallies or demonstration. Riot police know how to respond to these situations. But this new candlelight vigil – police do not know what to do. Because when police try to stop the rally, they don’t stop. They continuously move to another street. Before, back then, we had one clear target. Let’s say it was the US embassy in Seoul or the police headquarters or the presidential residence.
Now, people, common people, who didn’t actually know about the free trade agreement before or hadn’t heard of neoliberalism, like young couples with a babies, they come out into the streets with their baby in a stroller, or old people come out. So, you can see a whole new demonstrator. And there was no set pattern for when they were blocked by the police. The tactic that police used to block a road so that people cannot go in the path that they want to. In May and June, the people just started to flow, and the police realized they couldn’t contain the demonstrators if they used the ways they were used to, so they brought out a new way – water cannons. We haven’t seen water cannon for 5 or 10 years.
Q: Water cannon against the candlelight vigils?
A: Yes. Not only water cannons, but batons, shields and physical violence against people like me, with nothing – no weapons, no helmets. They also use fire extinguishers. Tear gas was kind of banned.
Q: What does the fire extinguisher do?
A: You use it and then demonstrators cannot breath so we have to pull back and disperse. The fire extinguisher fills the whole area instantly. We couldn’t do anything on the police buses. Some of the direct action we do is that we paint a lot of graffiti on police buses or the streets. At first the police started to arrest people, and beat people, and then it got such bad media coverage because like you said, it was a nonviolent protest, and so then the police responded with civil violence and they were criticized very badly. So then the new strategy that the police started to use was to block the whole area where any protesters could go. The streets of central Seoul became neutralized every night. No traffic at all.
Q: Could you describe a little bit of what it is like in the streets when there are hundreds of thousands of people, do they sing together, talk together, are they friends, what does it look like?
A: We try to do everything. I am a singer myself, so I perform three or four nights a week, five or six hours each night. I get exhausted. I sleep all day and then get up again in the morning. People who have never met before talk to each other and start talking about what we should do to make our voices heard. Amazing things have been created, like huge squares or spaces. We cook, we talk, we make a speech, and when we rally, we do that kind of thing too. And we dance.
Q: Can you talk a little more about the dissatisfaction with the relationship to the US and what that might have to do with the G8?
A: The newly elected right wing president had a big wish. They think that the neoliberal way is the only way, and the market is their god. The president is the ex CEO of Hyundai. He thinks that a working economy means that there is construction, buildings being built. Environmental activists think this could be a disaster. It was this new administration that made the general public realize that everything is related in the name of neoliberalism… We are taking this opportunity to spread this ideology – the idea that in order to become a leader we have to receive ideas in the name of neoliberalist policies. In the name of neoliberalism, we have to open our markets. The reason we have to open our Korean markets is that if we don’t do it, we will be a backwards country. That is a term that the ruling class loves to use. At first it was the US beef import issue, but then it was the government trying to impose its neoliberal policies at the same time. The president was rushing to realize his dream. The right wing loves him. These policies could affect peasants lives, or farmers lives, or small businesses.
Q: Does it feel like people are talking about that, like in grocery stores or schools?
A: Yes. It’s very natural for Korean people to talk about the US beef issue, and once you start talking about US beef the subject becomes linked to other related issues, like opening markets through FTAs [Free Trade Agreements], like with Japan, Korea, the EU, Chile, with the US, with China and privatization, because that is the big plan for the government. The government is promising that we are going to go “forward”. That’s the major policy.
Q: How are things organized at night? Are there political parties? Unions? How do people know where to go?
A: The internet is amazing. I am really addicted to it. Internet is the main tool that we have been using. Text messages. Since the beginning, it was middle school and high school students who constituted the demonstrators, like ten thousand high school students and middle school students in their uniforms, and what they do is exchange text messages, like two thousand text messages every day to everyone: “tomorrow, 2:00, city hall square, let’s go, be there with a candle.”
Q: The image that sometimes people have on unions or political parties taking chare is not true?
The candlelight vigil started with normal people and then they realized that no matter what the people did, the government would not listen to them. And then when the crowd began to take more to the streets, that is when the labor unions got involved. KCTU [Korean Confederation of Trade Unions] is a big labor union with about 700,000 union members and university student activists. They wanted to join and then some of them wanted to become the leaders of the movement and wanted to control the flow of the actions or rallies and then the general public started to yell at the wannabe leaders – “who do you think you are to try to control our movement. It is a people’s movement, not the movement of the elitist union members”. It is for the common people. Every time professional activists try to regulate or suffocate the energy, the vibe, they fail. Miraculously, people succeeded in continuing their actions every day and every day. They didn’t get exhausted. Why, because they have never experienced something like this. When we have marches with big unions, it is often really boring, with all of us marching in line and the same old songs being played.
I play new protest songs. Those professional organizers get exhausted. They think it is not fun if you have thirty consecutive days of street demonstrations. But for these hundreds of thousands of people experiencing this, it was fun. Every day they realize something. Some of them even voted for the right wing president, when he said that he would make them all rich. But then they realized it was all lies. Then they got more angry and tried to find ways to make their voices heard.
The presidential residence was protected by a high mountain and armies of police. But then people started to infiltrate those blocs and then later we succeeded in gathering in front of the residential place. We could not do anything three miles near the presidential place. Accidentally on the part of the police bloc, we opened it, then lots of people went through a small hole, and then later, we gathered. It was early in the morning. It was thirty thousand people in early June it was first a large crowd demonstration in front of presidential palace since the people’s uprising in 1960.
I have been long-time activist since early 1990s.
Q: Does this feel different?
A: For me, not really different. I have been active in the movement for a long time. I don’t have any bad feelings regarding my comrades, but the way we do it is different. I am an anarchist myself, and the political movement in Korea has been influenced mostly by Marxism and the way that they organize.
Q: Do you think anarchism makes more sense to people now?
A: Definitely. Union leaders and organizers have been using their conventional ways of organizing and want to use them on the common people. People feel it is authoritative and don’t like it. If you have someone telling you what to do, you say, we don’t want that. In that sense, these are conventional movement people who think this new situation is anarchistic. We don’t use the term anarchist or anarchy. I can tell the way they do it is anarchistic, but it doesn’t matter, the ideology that you give yourself.
The president and the whole government, they are not willing to step down or anything, and the day before I came to Japan, police brutality was really incredible. Now the government and the whole right wing have made up their mind to crush the “violent” uprising. They say it is violent because we take over the streets. The government is using scare tactics – six water cannons at the same time – it is really scary. Fire extinguishers are used and it makes it hard to breath. Participation has been smaller after June 10, the nation wide day of action, when the government started to oppress us really heavily. The ministry of education, for example, sent orders to every school that no students could participate in the candlelight vigils.
Q: What are the demands of the people in the streets?
A: First, renegotiation with the US about beef imports, which the Korean government denied, they said that if we renegotiate, the credit of South Korea will be hurt in the international market. Lots of trade experts pointed out that it was all lies. It would not harm the Korean government if we renegotiate with the US. That is the first demand that we are still asking. The legal process is over, and now Korean importers are inspecting the US beef. The first demand is still in effect.
Second demand: the president publicly apologize or resign. Now it is becoming more and more for the resignation of the government.
The whole cabinet offered to resign to the president, but the president did not accept the resignation.
Q: Is there any formal organization of demonstrations?
A: There is a temporary organization of organizations.
The committee of all the organizations has a broadcasting truck with a big speaker, and when the rally begins, the truck plays protest music or they say something. If the police respond and approach the demonstrators, then the committee truck says something. If the common people don’t like it, like if the truck says ok, we have to pull back, and then it’s just gone, then the people do not leave, they just stay there.
The thing is, nobody knows what’s going to happen. For 30 or 40 days, the police didn’t do anything and just let the people do whatever in the open space, and then people started to talk together about tactics, “do we use violence or nonviolence?” Every day, some people try to pull down police buses so that we can make our way to the presidential place. Some people yell that harming police property is a violent thing, or that repercussions from mass media will be big. Other people say police presence is violence itself so we should remove it.
There are some really exciting tactics that those organizers have never thought of, like making a styrofoam mountain so that we can cross over the police buses. It is decided in open meetings, every night, in small groups and large groups.
The sandbags – that was an amazing thing we witnessed one week ago – There was a huge construction site three miles away from where we were. Of course we were surrounded by police buses. We were talking about how to deal with this situation, and someone said, “ok, three miles away we have a construction site with huge piles of sand”. Someone said, “how are we going to carry huge piles of sand?” We lined people next to each other from the construction site to presidential residence, then they carried sandbags, passing them from each person to each person. After three hours, we piled three huge mountains of sandbags and then we could go over the police buses.
Q: Did you go over?
A: No, because once you get to the roof of the police bus, they hit you with water cannons. Many people got over with their flags. Symbolic resistance.
Q: What about food and water?
A: It’s incredible. People just pitch in money. Water, tea, coffee, sushi, kimpa, free every night. You can eat as much as you want. Street cafés open. Like one person drives a truck near the people and says this is a candlelight tea house and anyone can have cup of hot water or tea, and there is a cash jar and anyone can pitch in. For bathrooms we use nearby buildings or bathroom trucks.
Q: What would be your dream scenario?
A: The president steps down, and then, I don’t know. I don’t have a big dream. If everyone has his or her own small dream and we have our own small dreams and we can think about our way to make our dreams come true … I don’t picture a large model of society. It is created together. It is the kind of thing you can imagine through cooperation. The small group I have been working with is called blood sisters. I sew cotton pads and we sell reusable, washable menstruation pads, with organic cotton.
For the last ten years, I have been working on many issues and things that I think are really important that would affect people’s lives. For example, we try to get the word out about the FTA. We have been trying to spread it, we wished that people would know about it, but we couldn’t – we couldn’t control people’s thinking. But then, after the autonomous voluntary movement, people started to figure out everything by themselves. It was really, really amazing. Somehow it was a kind of miracle. Everything we talked about came true – all of a sudden.
This article is reproduced from ZNet
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Philipinnes: People Must be Educated about Direct Democracy of Barangays
Education campaigns are necessary to every attempt at instituting direct democracy. Without some way of demonstrating people power to the masses, no one will understand the benefits of assembling in communities to the extent that would propel them to join. Lessons and methodology must focus strongly on destroying racial and ethnic tensions between diverse individuals and groups within the community. If a curriculum is set up, it must be geared toward building consensus and breaking down social barriers that have prevented many efforts toward direct democracy from flourishing. -Editor
Manuel Valdehuesa Street talk
Source: http://www.sunstar.com.ph/static/cag/2008/05/26/oped/editorial.html
REPUBLIC Act (RA) 7160 states that in addition to being the primary planning and implementing unit of government, the barangay is also "a forum wherein the collective views of the people may be expressed, crystallized and considered."
This makes governing the barangay similar to the direct democracy practiced in the districts of Switzerland (canton) and Israel (kibbutz), and indeed, ancient Athens.
Arroyo Watch: Sun.Star blog on President Arroyo
By assembling periodically, deliberating on issues affecting the community, taking responsibility for their neighborhoods, adopting resolutions, then taking collective action, people govern themselves.
In other words, they manage their community directly - deciding policy, program, and projects - the essence of autonomy, of self-governance. All these apply to every barangay.
The law makes it possible for the community not to rely solely upon higher-ups, not especially those who mistake public service as self-service, or those whose personal agendas offend public interest.
Good governance lies with the citizens themselves - including the task of guiding their leaders by providing them the direction, content, or standards of public service.
And the citizens may also remove their officials between election periods by direct, collective action if they lose confidence in them.
No one seems to appreciate its role or importance in making our republic strong and democratic.
This may be because when the Code was enacted in 1991, neither its authors in Congress nor its implementers in Malacañang and the Cabinet have bothered to launch a campaign to explain its provisions. They didn't know that introducing a new system requires information, education and communication?
Then again, perhaps they knew too well that to have explained the Code's provisions would have empowered and enfranchised the people.
Then it would have been goodbye to the good times, goodbye to dynastic rule, goodbye to election cheating, and, most horrid of all, goodbye to fabulous allowances, commissions, and graft!
Thus, instead of an IEC campaign, they just made half-hearted gestures to autonomy accompanied by pompous demagoguery.
And that is how and why the trapos remain the center of power in the community instead of the people.
Will barangaynons ever take charge? More on this as this column runs on.
Manny is a former UN executive, diplomat, DAP director, and vice chair of the Local Government Academy. He appears here Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays. Email: valdeman_esq@yahoo.com
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
People's Power in Venezuela: Communal Councils Advance in Libertador
As always we keep a close eye on the building of participatory democracy in Venezuela. The article below gives an account of the progress made in the municipality of Libertador, some of the challenges faced by communal councils, and the national policies regarding participatory democracy. Following the article, find a link to an audio clip of a program that covers the Venezuela Solidarity Symposium that took place in Washington DC in April. Activists and Venezuelan leaders united at the conference and shared important information and analysis of the Bolivarian Revolution, US-Venezuelan relations, and most importantly, participatory democracy on the streets and in the workplace. If time is limited, skip the first 10 minutes of the program. - Editor
by John Riddell
January 10, 2008
Source: http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=45&ItemID=14695
"If we want to talk of socialism," says Argenis Loreto, "we must first resolve the people's most urgent needs: water in their homes, accessible health care, easy access to housing."
In the Venezuelan municipality of Libertador (state of Carabobo), of which Argenis is mayor, "we have 90% poverty. Ending that is our first task. I am convinced that the existing state cannot do this." It's essential that "the majority of the people become part of the decision-making process."
But when Argenis was elected in 2000, the second year of the Bolivarian government headed by president Hugo Chávez, he found that "the people did not possess the tools needed for their participation."
That insight led Chávez and the Bolivarian government to initiate the formation of neighbourhood councils across the country—councils that they view as the embryo of a new people's state.
Suzanne Weiss and I spent two days in Libertador, one of the first municipalities where such councils were formed, talking to Argenis and dozens of others. This report is based on what we saw; it also draws on Marta Harnecker's outstanding study of the Libertador experience.*
"Before we had many problems," recalls Félix Hernández, member of a community government. "The roads were super-awful. The electricity worked one or two days and then shut off. Health service was chaotic. Water service was complete chaos."
Appealing to city hall was a waste of time. "It was horrendous," says another council member, Virginia Diaz. "We'd go with petitions and explain. They'd visit and approve the project." But nothing would happen. "When we went back to the office, they'd never heard of us, didn't know anything…. As useful as tits on a bull."
The result was public apathy, says municipal social activist Fidel Hernández—like Argenis, a published poet. "The people had let itself be convinced that it could not govern. There was a deliberate policy for this … that's why we had 1½ million who were illiterate."
Of peasant origins, Argenis Loreto finished only six years of schooling before starting his working life in factories, industrial management, farming, and again in factories. He joined a revolutionary group at age 17, took part in the Bolivarian movement's unsuccessful coup in 1992 and became mayor after two decades of underground activity.
Convinced that only the poor and disenfranchised could reconstruct his municipality—and his nation—he sought to bridge the gulf between them and the instruments of government. Argenis and his colleagues set out to do this by extending governmental structures to the community level and by delegating power to community governments. Such a shift was authorized by a decentralization clause (Article 184) in the Bolivarian constitution adopted in 1999.
Progress was slow at first. The right-wing coup and bosses' strike of 2002-2003 delayed restructuring. The Libertador plan ran into strong opposition from some Bolivarian national legislators, who accused Argenis of "creating illegal associations."
Finally, in 2006, the community structure was in place: 35 "social territories," which united residents that shared similar problems, a common project, and a sense of belonging to a common environment. They ranged in size from 1,000 to 15,000 residents. Each territory elected a government through assemblies of its residents, usually choosing between competing slates of candidates. All community government work is voluntary—no salaries are paid—but relevant expenses are reimbursed.
In one of the social territories, skeptical residents declined to name a council. In another, a centre of Libertador's small middle class, the opposition slate was elected. "Many right-wing oppositionists join in community council activity," says Argenis. "They feel they cannot stand aside from the social programs and local projects that the councils carry out…. The opposition's role in local government has helped ease political tensions here."
The people's power structure has two tiers. Each social territory or commune includes smaller and more homogenous communities, each of which has its own communal council. The size of component communities is determined by social geography: urban councils typically unite 200-400 families; rural councils, 20-50 families. The smallest social territory by population (Mont Vernont), is composed of dispersed mountain hamlets: it therefore includes the largest number of communities. In Libertador, there are 204 such communal councils.
Each communal council and social territory holds assemblies to choose and prioritize its ten most needed projects for the coming year. The municipal planning council then evaluates the top three proposals from each territory—more than three, if finances permit. A value of 1 to 9 is assigned to each of a number of criteria: number of residents, number who will benefit, cost, how long the request has been pending, the number of previous projects in this community, etc.
This ranking creates a proposed project list that is presented to an assembly in each territory, which can change its priorities and request reconsideration—if for example a favored project turned out to be impossibly expensive.
Once the project list is decided, the required funds are allocated to the community bodies, which handle administration, buy materials, and engage workers or contractors, giving preference to cooperatives. Community networking and know-how helps keep costs down, and any savings stay in the community for other purposes. Argenis estimates that $1 million a year is saved simply by eliminating private profits.
"For example, a flood control project was approved with a budget of 184 million bolivars [about $90,000]," says Fidel Hernández. "But in fact the community councils did it for 47 million and had lots left over for fixing roads.
"In another case, the local council got a price of 80 million to bring electricity to a district. But in fact they managed to do three districts for that price.
"Last year the community councils spent 84% of the municipal budget [for projects]," Fidel notes.
Popular control has steered funding toward small, plain, and inexpensive projects densely spread through local neighborhoods. Urgent human needs have taken priority over infrastructure requirements like road upgrades.
Argenis highlights the 74 primary-care health centres built by neighborhood councils, which at first sometimes even manufactured the bricks. "We had only nine centres before," he says. In addition, Libertador boasts four Integral Diagnostic Centres—small hospitals—"the pride of our community," according to Felix Hernández.. Another community government member, Aixa Silvera, calls the Cuban doctors working in these centres "the most spectacular thing we have in the communities.
Indeed, Libertador led the way in Venezuela by arranging for Cuban doctors to work in the communities, before this became a national program.
Argenis says that community governments are building 48 primary schools this year—mostly one-room structures serving a neighborhood. There are also now three university campuses in Libertador—part of a national program to "municipalize higher education."
"As for sports, there are now only two or three communities that do not have a minimal installation" which means a playing field.
The citizens of Libertador are also trying to establish cultural centres in each social territory, usually an "open-air amphitheatre." Eight cultural centres are now under construction In some cases resident assemblies gave building a cultural centre priority over fixing the road or installing street lighting. "You can't have a revolution without beauty," Fidel Hernández says.
The obvious progress is confirmed by two surveys that were taken at the beginning of the community government program and again in May 2007. The first survey showed that the most urgently felt needs were for health care and educational facilities. In the second, no one cited health care as a concern, and almost no one mentioned education. Moreover, "we now have hardly any kids on the streets," says Argenis, "and the problem of homelessness is almost solved."
According to official estimates, Venezuela has a shortage of 2.7 million homes, while another 1.3 million dwellings are inadequate home-made shacks. In 2006, 200,000 homes were built—a positive achievement, but far less than what is needed.
Argenis believes that community councils, who feel this urgent need acutely, are best suited to build houses. Sometimes they "build 10, 12, even 15 houses with the money provided for seven," he says.
"But we desperately need raw materials. Our economy was destroyed, and now we don't have the capacity to make the cement blocks, the paint, the ceramic toilets. We're working with Iran, China, and Brazil to meet these needs."
And Venezuela is building six factories to produce plastic building materials—"we have oil, after all," says Argenis. This project, called Petrocasa, will supply materials for 15,000 new houses a year. One of these factories, is close by, in the state of Carabobo.
In 2006 Hugo Chávez endorsed the establishment of communal councils as a priority across Venezuela. In January 2007, he declared them institutions of "people's power," an embryo of a new people's state. An enabling law was passed in April, and there are now more than 10,000 councils across the country.
While vindicating the innovative program in Libertador, this expansion also caused the municipality many headaches. The national government intended the councils to be free of the deadening hand of the traditional state bureaucracy. Among other things, word went out that mayors should not get involved with these people's organizations. This directive might be appropriate in the nearby industrial city of Valencia, ruled by the opposition, but in Libertador it was totally at odds with reality.
Unfortunately, the Carabobo state government, led by critics of Argenis's initiatives, seized on this opening to create problems for Libertador's government. Utilizing its own statewide network of paid social activists, it promoted the notion that communal councils don't need to work with Libertador's larger social territories or with the city government.
"That caused a terrible process of fragmentation and division between the two levels of popular power," says Argenis.
Much effort has gone into knitting the two levels of people's government back together, Argenis says. "When they work together they're unbeatable."
People's power was an element of the constitution reform narrowly defeated in the December 2, 2007, referendum. The communal councils are still authorized under Article 184 of the constitution and the April 2006 legislation, and there is no legal barrier to expanding the structures beyond this framework. However, the referendum setback may encourage the councils' critics.
The community government bodies in Libertador aren't perfect. Among the occasional abuses noted by Argenis:
· Only one community is represented in a social territory council.
· One slate takes all the leadership positions.
· Elected officers take decisions on their own without convening the residents' assembly.
· The assembly functions poorly because of lack of interest.
More troubling is the conduct of other branches of government, such as the problems with Carabobo State. Among the many stories of this sort that Argenis tells, the pig manure episode is enough to illustrate what people's power is up against.
The city government makes special efforts to help Libertador's many farmers, a number of whom raise pigs. Some time ago the Ministry of the Environment banned hog-raising in the municipality because of concerns for water quality, but did not enforce the regulation. Libertador tried to help farmers solve the water problem on their own, by providing septic tanks for environmentally safe treatment of pig manure. The manure's polluting gas discharge was captured and burned for cooking. "This is a miracle," says Argenis. "It cuts out the smell and uses the gas!"
But the ministry intervened and nixed the project, which they said broke their rule against raising pigs. The bureaucratic method could not be better demonstrated: only the formal regulation counted; the real-life problem of manure pollution was of no interest.
What explanations do the ministry provide? "None whatsoever," says Argenis. "Just as we always say: this bureaucracy is eating us alive… We can't change things with this type of state."
Even among inherited municipal officials, "the apathy is barbaric. We have to establish a new conception of a staffer," Argenis says. "I'd like to dissolve the municipal administration … and create a confederation of community governments."
Reflections
At first glance, Venezuela's people's power can seem to be just a formal structure—municipal government on a street level. This is misleading. The councils have appeared and made gains only as part of an immense popular movement on a national level: the Bolivarian revolution.
This revolution was born in the mass mobilizations against the U.S.-backed oligarchy's attempts to overthrow the country's elected government—by a military coup in 2002, by an economic shutdown in 2003, and by an anti-Chavez referendum in 2004. All were defeated by the initiatives of masses of working people.
In Libertador, Argenis recalls, the embryonic community governments acted as defense committees, struggling to ensure that food, cooking gas, and gasoline reached the people. "That was just so wonderful," he says. "Quickly we had a network of more than 200 Bolivarian shops," distributing necessities and helping defend the revolution. Such national struggles were the true birth of people's power.
Venezuela's success at forging constructive ties with other non-imperialist states has also played a role, not just through Cuba's contribution to health services, but above all in building alliances to help fend off, for now, a U.S.-led assault.
The sometimes destructive role of national and state authorities is also a reminder that the power of working people will not flourish at the street level unless it is consolidated nationally.
Yet the community councils in Libertador call us to us, Sí se puede! – Yes we can do it! Enlisting the majority, the working people, in government is indeed possible. Venezuela's people's power—while still embryonic—is a living, viable reality.
John Riddell is co-editor of Socialist Voice
* Marta Harnecker, Gobierenos Comunitarios: Transformando el Estado desde abajo. [Community governments: transforming the state from below] Monte Avila Editores, 2007. This book is not readily available outside Venezuela. However, its text is available online. Harnecker is director of the "Popular Participation in Public Management" program of the Central Internacional Miranda, a Bolivarian research institute in Caracas.
Audio program from Venezuela Solidarity Symposium: http://calamadison.org/dasa/
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Trinidad: Organizations Call for More Transparency and Participation
Whether openly acknowledged or not, corruption is a problem that people face all over the world. Corruption by it's very nature erodes democratic processes and usurps power from the people while their representatives engage in criminal acts more often that not without accountability. Transparency is a key first step toward countering this effect and expanding participatory democracy because it allows the people to expose corruption as well as see directly the effects of their votes and their own voice within the government, or lack thereof. Many social movements and NGOs are working toward transparency within central governments, but we have a long way to go before this corruption is revealed to the extent necessary to make the general populace aware of just how rampant it is in most cases. The following article from Trinidad and Tobago demonstrates one example of efforts to promote transparency in favor of democracy. - Editor
Letter: People's right to know
Published on Thursday, June 19, 2008
Source: http://www.caribbeannetnews.com/news-8617--7-7--.html
Dear Sir:
The Trinidad and Tobago Transparency Institute (TTTI) has had cause in the past to voice its concerns over Government’s selective use of transparency in its approach to governance.
In 2001, Government inherited the Freedom of Information Act from the previous administration and, in the ensuing years, reduced its effectiveness by exempting from the Act first the Central Bank and then selected State-funded agencies. This was a major curtailment by government of the people’s right to information and, at that time, very few civil society voices were raised in protest.
Next we saw government’s habitual delays in answering questions raised in Parliament and, in some cases, either refusing to answer or giving very limited information. This trend continues today.
Government also attempted to limit citizens’ right to bring public interest litigation against the state by proposing revisions to the Judicial Review Act.
Public procurement practices are replete with examples of Government’s unwillingness to provide timely information to the public whose money is being spent. One example is the continued refusal by Government, in the face of many calls from TTTI and others, to make public the technical studies (paid for by taxpayers) which the Prime Minister and the Line Minister told Parliament recommended the adoption of the multi-billion dollar Rapid Rail System over other less expensive options.
More recently, government sought to protect UDeCoTT from public scrutiny in the face of serious concerns voiced and allegations made by many respected persons and organisations in the society. Eventually, government bowed to the pressure of those calls but still sought to control the process by opting for a Joint Selective Committee of Parliament and only later agreeing to the Commission of Enquiry called for.
The latest example of the lack of transparency was seen when government refused to disclose in Parliament how much of taxpayers’ money was spent on fees for professional services on the dubious grounds of protecting the recipient’s rights to privacy.
We note that some important independent voices have been raised against this latest curtailment of the people’s right to information on how their money is being spent. More civil society organisations should raise their voices in protest over this latest development. Government’s decision in this matter must be reversed because of its far-reaching implications.
TTTI senses that there is a wind of change blowing through this country and bringing with it more national consciousness. Civil society seems to have awakened from its slumber hence the many voices being heard today in protest over the UDeCOTT matter, escalating crime, high food prices, failures in the education and health systems, infrastructure inadequacies etc
This awakening is good for our democracy but civil society must go further and insist on its right to information and it’s acceptance by Government as a partner in the governance of the country. Civil society must also insist on its voice being heard and listened to and its suggestions acted upon by government. Civil society must demand a culture of consultation and a truly participatory democracy for our country and accept nothing less.
Victor Hart
Chairman
Trinidad and Tobago Transparency Institute
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Bulgaria: New Green Party Advocates Direct Democracy
Bulgaria sees the creation of a new green party which among other things supports expansion of direct democracy within the country. Read the following article to learn more about the party and it's platform. - Editor
Source: http://www.sofiaecho.com/article/bulgarian-greens-established/id_29398/catid_66
Among the party's founders are members of To Sustain the Nature in Bulgaria coalition; Balkani Wildlife Society (BWS); UNECO University Club for Environment; Green Policy Institute (GPI); Centre for Environmental Information and Education; Bulgarian Biodiversity Foundation; Cooperation for Voluntary Service Bulgaria (CVS); Bluelink.net; Borrowed Nature; association Za Zemiata (For the Earth); organisers and volunteers of the national campaigns for salvation of Irakli Black sea beach, Strandja nature park, Rila and Pirin national parks. NGOs are not allowed by law to establish political parties.
Hristo Genev, a psychologist and has political experience in the past in the Bulgarian Agrarian National Union, was elected general secretary of the party. The three co-chairpersons are Andrey Kovachev from BWS, Petko Kovachev from GPI (no relation) and Denitsa Petrova, also from GPI . Zelenite’s treasurer is Julia Yordanova from CVS.
The non-governmental organisations’ members decided to form a political party despite their unwillingness to take part in the political life of Bulgaria, as, according to them, during the years of work in the non-governmental sector they could achieve only small changes in the way the state treats the environmental problems and small amendments to some laws on biodiversity and nature preservation. However, even being members of various working groups on environmental problems within the Ministry of Environment and Water Affairs and other institutions, the non-governmental organisations representatives had no right of vote and decision-making within those bodies.
By establishing Zelenite, they hoped to get into the political life and to achieve substantial changes by stimulating the civil society and opening equal possibilities for citizens' participation in the decision-making processes, working towards expanding the direct democracy, do changes within the legislative system, and working for achieving sustainability in different societies and regions, participants said.
Zelenite is not the first political party to adopt the 'green' rhetoric. One of them is Zelenata Partia (Green Party), which is the oldest and has existed since the communistic regime fell down in 1989. However, according to Zelenite members, this party is not functioning or if it does, it is not doing it on the most environmental way.
The other green party formed recently in Bulgaria is Zelena Bulgaria (Green Bulgaria), which reportedly is established by businesses trying to gain key positions in Bulgarian regions that are attractive for tourism and other investments. This argument is backed by the fact that the party appears to have extensive financing to campaign during elections, a trait that has never been typical for other local environmental movements.
ECUADOR: Poder Popular y la Nueva Constitución
El pueblo Ecuadoreño esta experimentando un alto nivel de participación civil en el proceso democrático desde la elección del Presidente Rafael Correa, pero es la responsibilidad de la asamblea constituyente que está haciendo la nueva constitución asegurar que esa participación sea legalmente y permanentamente parte de la escena politica del pais. Eso significa la creación de una estructura de poder popular que incluye consejos comunales y presupuestos participativos. Acá presentamos un comentario hecho por un miembro de la asamblea costituyente que apoya esta iniciativa. - Editor
Poder para el pueblo organizado y movilizado!!!
Enero 28, 2008 Por: Eduardo Zambrano
Source: http://asambleaconstituyente.gov.ec/blogs/eduardo_zambrano/2008/01/28/poder-para-el-pueblo-organizado-y-movilizado/
La Revolución Ciudadana ha descubierto una serie de potencialidades y capacidades del pueblo ecuatoriano para el ejercicio democrático. Visto desde la oposición o desde el Acuerdo PAIS, el pueblo decidió participar. Son parte de nuestra cotidianidad hechos formidables y excepcionales como marchas de miles de personas.
Existe una voluntad de participación masiva en procesos de consulta y elecciones (Elecciones presidenciales 2006, consulta popular convocatoria Asamblea Constituyente abril 2007, elecciones de asambleístas septiembre 2007), la participación popular avanza. Esta participación masiva instituye necesariamente el germen de más y mejores prácticas democráticas.
Se ha venido afirmando la vocación democrática de la mayoría de ciudadanos y ciudadanas. Desafortunadamente la violencia mediática, la falta de balance de casi todos los medios y la corrupción parecieran ser los males antidemocráticos más difíciles de erradicar.
Se incrementa la participación de los jóvenes, de las mujeres, de las y los discapacitados, de los migrantes, la participación en cooperativas, medios comunitarios, comunidades organizadas autogestionadas, comités de tierras urbanas y rurales, movimientos sociales, entre otras formas organizativas de participación.
En Ecuador el pueblo insurgió para dejar de ser espectador, conciente de que no basta con delegar su poder soberano, se dio a sí mismo una Asamblea Constituyente de Plenos Poderes para hacer una Nueva Constitución que consagre el derecho de los ciudadanos y ciudadanas a participar en los asuntos públicos, no sólo a través de representantes elegidos, sino directamente. Me refiero a la democracia participativa y protagónica en la que las comunidades, conjuntamente con las autoridades locales, tienen el derecho y el deber de formular, ejecutar, controlar y efectuar seguimiento a las políticas públicas.
Ya no se trata solamente de ir a votar, se trata de ejercer una actividad permanente de construcción social que exige formación, proactividad, capacidad de negociación, consulta de la gente, participación y seguimiento por parte de los ciudadanos y ciudadanas. La democracia participativa implica un cambio de cultura en la conciencia del pueblo. Este cambio tiene que representar un salto cualitativo para la vida social y política del país. No se trata de un simple cambio operacional sino de instaurar en la práctica una nueva visión del poder popular en los niveles local, regional, nacional.
Para desarrollar este paradigma revolucionario de la democracia participativa y protagónica, se tiene que generar articulado constitucional y una ley donde se plantea la instauración de una nueva institucionalidad o consejos locales que superen la planificación como actividad de expertos, estableciendo que es el pueblo organizado el que debe decidir y direccionar, conjuntamente con los representantes elegidos y funcionarios públicos, en qué se invertirán los recursos, así como el cómo, el dónde, el cuánto y el cuándo debe hacerse.
El plan de gobierno local debe responder a las necesidades reales de las poblaciones locales; si el pueblo se organiza, si el pueblo se moviliza, los alcaldes ya no pueden decidir invertir unilateralmente los dineros públicos en aceras, brocales y cloacas cuando la comunidad organizada exige salud y escuelas. El presupuesto (participativo) debe ser el plan de gobierno local en números y no un ejercicio de los técnicos y expertos financieros que guarda insuficiente relación con las demandas de las comunidades o lo que se tiene planificado hacer.
Paralelamente, el pueblo organizado no debe olvidar que existe el riesgo de que el ultrademocratismo paralice la acción, que el arte de gobernar implica generar sinergias, aprender a ordenar las prioridades, diagnosticar, consultar, sistematizar proyectos y ejecutar. De manera análoga los representantes elegidos (alcaldes, prefectos o gobernadores) deben desaprender la cultura de la democracia representativa y facilitar este ejercicio de soberanía, promover realmente la corresponsabilidad en el proceso de toma de decisiones.
La participación del pueblo en los asuntos públicos, me refiero a una participación cooperativa, empoderada de herramientas técnicas, conocimiento del presupuesto y ejercicio permanente del control social, donde los alcaldes, prefectos y gobernadores sean líderes-facilitadores del ejercicio soberano del poder popular en la concepción de los planes, en la ejecución con participación de las instituciones del poder organizado (cooperativas, microempresas, etc.) es la única garantía de superación del problema de la corrupción.
Durante los últimos tiempos el pueblo ecuatoriano ha demostrado una gran madurez y visión política ante golpes de estado, destituciones de tres presidentes elegidos en las urnas, la estafa bancaria, crisis política, social y económica, guerra mediática y otras difíciles pruebas. Por ahora el mayor reto del pueblo ecuatoriano radica en la organización. Estos tiempos de revolución no son solo para agotarse en marchas y contramarchas, la plataforma de los Consejos Locales de Planificación Pública nos ofrece la oportunidad de avanzar hacia formas superiores de organización social.
Enfatizamos que hay que avanzar en lo organizativo hacia un verdadero protagonismo del pueblo en la toma de decisiones soberanas. La democracia participativa y protagónica alude a la necesaria vinculación del pueblo organizado y movilizado entorno a lo social, lo político, cultural y lo económico y productivo.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Colombia: Open Letter To Nancy Pelosi and the US Congress
Citizens in several municipalities in Colombia have been employing direct democracy in the form of public consultations in order to voice their opposition to the proposed free trade agreement between Columbia and the United States. The trade agreement would have a devastating effect on Columbia's struggling poor, and opponents to the agreement are calling upon the Columbian government of Alvaro Uribe, a government very much directed by the powers that be in Washington, to put the matter to a the people in a nationwide referendum. While the Colombian government is not likely to heed this request, opposition to the agreement in the U.S. Congress has stalled its implementation. In this letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Columbian opponents of the trade agreement express their gratitude and put forth their aruements against the FTA. - Editor
Colombia: Open Letter To Nancy Pelosi and the US Congress
Thursday, 17 April 2008
"Three years later, like us, you said no to the Colombia-US Free Trade Agreement."
Dear Representative Pelosi and Congress of the United States of America:
First, we would like to express our joy and gratitude for the decision made April 10, 2008, in the United States Congress. With 224 votes in favor and 195 against, the House of Representatives, over which you preside, decided to indefinitely freeze the Free Trade Agreement between Colombia and the US. We know that this is but one step on a long path, but the result is profoundly meaningful for our peoples, and it opens a window through which we can breathe with strength and rejuvenated spirits. With this letter, beyond expressing our recognition and appreciation as peoples, we seek to open a space for communication between us, because we feel that we deserve the right to be heard and respected. It is long overdue that Democratic Party members of Congress under your leadership should become aware of our democratic decision and analyses, all of which are rooted in dignity and respect for life.
Little more than three years ago, on Sunday March 6, 2005, the first Popular Consultation on the US-Colombia FTA was carried out through a referendum held in six municipalities in the Department of Cauca, Colombia. In that free, open and transparent referendum, monitored by national and international observers and bound by strict electoral regulations, there was a level of participation that had been unprecedented in the history of our municipalities. Ninety-eight percent of the people responded NO to the following question: "Are you in favor of the FTA between Colombia and the United States?" The people expressed their sovereign and conscious decision. Since that first consultation, others have been carried out throughout Colombia, all with the same result.
On February 1, 2005, we had made public a proclamation in which we called for a national popular referendum on the FTA. We invite you to examine this document, which we reaffirm, and whose clarity and eloquence remain relevant today, even more so given the most recent decision of the US Congress. In order that you may understand our motives and perspectives, we believe it is our right to respectfully express this to you, as peoples reacting to a trade agreement that would deeply affect our lives. Through you, Rep. Pelosi, we invite the Congress and the people of the United States to read this proclamation and to treat its content with the respect and consideration that it deserves [http://www.en-camino.org/node/34], recognizing the sovereign and democratic decision of our peoples.
It is important for you to know that from the moment of our carrying out the consultation to today, information on the FTA and its consequences made available to the people of Colombia through the government and the mass media has been absurdly distorted and entirely in favor of those interested in winning approval of the agreement. This has effectively closed any spaces for debate and discussion among diverse perspectives, which would be necessary for Colombian citizens to understand the issue and to take a substantive position on it. In the proclamation of our consultation, we asked: "If the FTA is so good, why is the population being misinformed, and why is the government so afraid of a popular consultation and a conscious and democratic decision?"
Today, in light of the decision you have made, we reiterate the relevance of that question. In spite of the barrage of propaganda in favor of the FTA and the manner in which fear was used to assure people that rejecting the FTA would be equivalent to the United States' abandoning Colombia in backwardness, those who participated in the referendum understood that quite to the contrary, approval of the FTA on these terms and under these conditions would be equivalent to pushing Colombia toward an abyss of backwardness, impoverishment, inequality, and war. We understand that the people of the United States also suffer negative consequences from these kinds of trade agreements, but it is ultimately up to you and the people of the United States to analyze and make decisions on these agreements and their consequences. Rep. Pelosi, the Colombian government was opposed and remains opposed to allowing the Colombian people to understand the real impacts of the FTA that has been presented to Congress; it has closed the spaces of democratic debate and ignored the results of the Popular Consultation. We therefore urge you to examine the Consultation of March 2005, our motives and arguments, the democratic decision of the peoples, and the consequences and implications of this decision. We also invite you to support the right of peoples to understand and decide. With respect to the FTA, this is a right that the Colombian government has not respected.
The Colombian government attempted to discredit the decision of the consultation, alleging that we do not understand the benefits of the FTA and that terrorists and other nefarious forces had manipulated the population. Our response to this disturbing and unfounded accusation is found in the text of the proclamation and in the reality of facts that speak for themselves. The position of the government is racist insofar as it still considers us primitive beings incapable of understanding and consciously deciding for ourselves. Moreover, it seriously threatens our lives and integrity by falsely claiming links with terrorists, claims that easily become death sentences in this country.
Read our arguments and see for yourselves if we can be accused of not understanding. In contrast with the Colombian government's reaction, read and respond with ideas, arguments, and substance. As we said in the proclamation calling for the consultation, we are opposed to neither free trade nor an agreement with the United States. We are opposed to this particular agreement, and we have reasons based fundamentally on substance.
Rep. Pelosi, Members of Congress, and people of the United States, three years after our proclamation and call to carry out a public referendum on the FTA, three years after our people said NO, in spite of the closing of spaces for debate and democratic decision-making, more than 60% of arable lands in Colombia remain in the hands of 15,000 families, less than 0.4% of the population of the country. This immense concentration of land is nonproductive in that the food that we consume comes from the poor, small producers; the large property owners do not produce food. Furthermore, the influx of subsidized agricultural products condemns peasants, indigenous peoples, and rural producers to ruin and hunger, as they face the impossibility of competing with less expensive products and artificially reduced prices. Free trade is making the production of crops for illicit use necessary for survival and for the attainment of basic economic resources. You are well aware that we are being displaced and forced off our lands through violence and war, which serves to open the countryside to the megaprojects of transnational corporations. This eviction has displaced 4 million of our compatriots to the cities, where they live in miserable conditions. This promotes only social and political violence and hatred, thereby perpetuating war and misery.
The agreement would place the price of life-saving medications beyond reach for the majority of Colombia's people and would permit the patenting of life-forms and our ancestral knowledge. The FTA, which you have decided to not consider for now, would back a government whose president, during a "community council" held on March 15, 2008, offered bounties on the lives of indigenous peoples who are struggling to recover the lands from which we have been displaced, lands to which we have a right in accordance with agreements with the very state that now criminalizes our struggles to access its own commitments. Agrarian reform has been transformed into a crime in order to protect particular interests that would benefit from the FTA. In the midst of war, misery, displacement, terror, and deception, there can be prosperity for no one. That is why we have rejected this FTA.
Rep. Pelosi and Members of Congress, we want a trade agreement that is actually an agreement, one that is negotiated among sectors that really represent the interests of peoples—not only among a few who act exclusively in the interests of big capital. We want an agreement that is free and not imposed unilaterally through propaganda, without debate or open and democratic consultation. We want an agreement that has real trade as its content, trade that guarantees reciprocal opportunity, so that the well-being of peoples is realized in a manner that is autonomous and sovereign and protects nature and life. The FTA that you have decided not to debate for the moment promotes displacement, legalizes injustice, condemns us to permanent war, and leaves us behind.
We celebrate the decision that you have taken, and we thank you. This means nothing more or less than respecting our lives. Receive our expression of immense gratitude to your people, and accept our invitation to understand the motives of the decision we made democratically three years ago.
Sincerely,
Association of Indigenous Authorities of Northern Cauca, Council
***
For more information on the indigenous movement in Colombia visit: http://www.nasaacin.org/.
Monday, June 16, 2008
Turkish Greens Establish New Party with Direct Democracy Platform
We present two separate articles regarding the new Turkish Green party which has a platform based on environmental principles and direct democracy.- Editor
Turkish Greens to establish a new political party
Source: http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=144502&bolum=103
The Greens of Turkey, who have struggled to establish their movement in Turkey since the 1980s, will seek to become a political party at the end of this month, with a platform based upon environmental principles and direct democracy.
This will be the second effort of the Greens to set up a political party; the first came in 1988 and was successful, but the party was closed down in 1994 by the Constitutional Court due to irregularities in the party budget.
In an interview with Today’s Zaman, Greens spokesman Ümit Tahin said the organizational structure of the party will be different from others. “We will of course fulfill the requirements of the Law on Political Parties, but we will have our own rules, such as a 50 percent quota of women members and rotation of party officials. We will not have a leader, but rather one man and one woman spokesperson,” Tahin noted.
The Greens of Turkey, even before becoming a political party, were accepted as an observer in the European Green Parties Council in 2005.
The Greens of Turkey have the same platform as many other global Greens -- ecological wisdom, social justice, grassroots democracy, nonviolence, decentralization, community-based economics, feminism, respect for diversity, global responsibility and future focus.
In their party program, detailed on their Web site, the Greens of Turkey claim that wars were started in order to control water and oil resources in the Middle East, Caucasus and Central Asia, while Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq were occupied and Turkey is in the middle of all these problems; thus, they say, international politics based on regional cooperation, peace and friendship is necessary. The Greens of Turkey have pledged to cooperate with the Greens of the world to overcome these problems and not to act on the basis of nationalism.
According to the Greens, Turkey is suffering from human rights violations, military coups and social injustice, all stemming from an authoritarian approach to governing.
The Greens note that their movement began based on civil society organizations but that in recent years the concept of civil society organizations has been abused. The Greens say they will derive their power from real civil society organizations that are working for democracy.
The Greens define the existing Constitution as a product of the 1980 military coup and demand that a new, shorter constitution be created that focuses on basic rights. According to the Greens all types of interference in democratic politics should be banned. They note that the new constitution should emphasize that the freedoms of citizens should not be restricted in the interest of the state. They would also like to see restrictions on and civil monitoring of military expenditures along with the abolishment of the National Security Council (MGK). The Greens also want Turkey to withdraw from NATO, the Americans to be prevented from using İncirlik Air Base and the complete demilitarization of Cyprus. When it comes to the EU the Greens are in favor of continuing with the country’s accession negotiations but pledge to work for an EU based on Green principles.
Regarding the Kurdish question the Greens propose that Turkey must confront the mistakes of the past and recognize the Kurdish identity.
The Greens will discuss the details of the party’s bylaws on June 21 during a meeting in İstanbul.
Turkish Greens against current party system
Thursday, June 12, 2008
ŞAFAK TİMUR
ISTANBUL – Turkish Daily News
Source: http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=107072
Believing in direct democracy and prioritizing the local instead of the “center,” a new political party is preparing to enter the Turkish political scene. Aiming to challenge and urge change in the political parties law in Turkey, the Green Party is set to be established at the end of this month.
“Democracy only gives its name to the existing political parties. To overcome this problem, despite the law, we tried to establish new principles,” said Alper Akyüz, one of the founders of the Green Party, emphasizing that the current political parties law prioritizes centralized leadership. Instead, the new party prefers a network type of organization, rather than a centralized one, to minimize the function of the party center, said Savaş Çömlek, another founder. There will be a rotation system for any kind of position in the party, said Akyüz citing an example of the party's principles. Having co-speakers is another choice of the party. “There will not be two male co-speakers at the same time. Two women can be co-speakers but two men cannot,” he said. The party started its organizational work six years ago and finally the work has come to an end. “This took a long time because of our principle of direct democracy,” said Çömlek.
The story of the Greens in Turkey is not new. There was a first Green Party, which operated in 1988-1994 and was closed down by a Constitutional Court decision due to some bureaucratic defects. The founders of the old Green party cooperate with the current Green movement as well.
Kyoto is not an end
The Kyoto Protocol is not a sufficient agreement, said Hüseyin Güngör, another party activist. A new agreement will be made in 2012. However the government could not understand the essence of Kyoto, Akyüz said, although the protocol has come to the parliamentary agenda to be signed by Turkey. The government's approach shows that Turkey will sign the protocol, however it will not be binding, Akyüz said, adding that it is not correct. Çömlek said the politicians are also aware of the importance of the protocol but the question is whether they would bypass the copper and oil lobbies. But the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, government runs the politics of a dealer, Çömlek said.
