60,000 Gather to Create a People’s Europe
The sea of Palestinian scarves - the symbol of resistance for a new and radicalised generation - should have offered powerful hope to those imprisoned in Gaza, as up to 1 million people flooded the streets of Florence to oppose the deadly cycle of violence into which the world is being plunged.
The announcement of the Security Council’s corrupt and cowardly submission to US pressure was delivered on the eve of the Europe-wide demonstration, swelling numbers, anger and determination.The gathering of tens of thousands of Europe’s radicalised youth in Florence in the week leading up to the demonstration was proof of far more than the scale of mass disaffection, which would barely have been news, but was testimony to the competence, creativity and capability of the largest and most diverse movement in history.
Well over 40,000 delegates - registration credentials ran out after that number had entered Florence’s historic Fortressa on the second day - with an average age of no more than 25, gathered to participate in the European movement’s coming of age: moving from destruction, opposition and confrontation to sowing the seeds of a new society.
It is acute political and economic disempowerment, the violent death dance which a tiny global elite, hell bent on turning a majority of the world’s population to the margins in their push towards war, blood,
starvation, unending inequality and impoverishment which has brought these diverse groups and individuals together into what is surely the largest movement in history.
The European Social Forum (ESF) represented a cross-section of European society with a range of ideologies and political practices that would traditionally have been unable to share the same conference centre. From large environmental and development NGOs, reformist economists and mainstream trade unions to the anarchistic “Hub”, assorted far left parties and liberation movements.
It is the very extremity and exclusivity of the “new world order” - in the words of activist and writer Susan George that “the bastards have gone too far” - that has created this diversity. One morning you could sit with formerly conservative and mainstream economics students attending lectures in which they called for the world’s business leaders to be locked up for channelling revenues through tax havens or destroying developing economies in their quest for speculative profit. Later in the day you could attend a workshop looking at alternatives to “late neo-liberal capitalism”, the eradication of sweatshops, the fight against privatisation and an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.
But beyond even the ideological wonder was the scale and competence of the organisation, almost all volunteer, which was enough to put American political conventions to shame and make even a cynic truly believe that another world is possible. Simultaneous translation into 5 languages was provided for 1,000 speakers at 30 conference sessions, 200 workshops, 150 seminars, 25 campaign meetings, and a huge range of cultural events and fringe meetings with subjects ranging from oppression and resistance in Africa and Asia to the creation of alternative economies; from the betrayal of the environment to closing down tax havens.
But the best was still to come. Until you see what 1 million people looks like on the streets, it is impossible to imagine the scale, the colour, the sound. Those who thought the days of genuinely popular mass struggle faded with the ascendancy of neo-liberalism, would have looked in disbelief as demonstrators marched through tower blocks with older men and women hanging off their balconies waving thousands of rainbow peace flags or just white table cloths which came to hand; listened as thousands of bystanders lining the streets trying to watch showed their solidarity by singing the moving anti-fascist anthem “bella ciao”.
After starting the march 2 hours early because of the sheer numbers of people, the first protesters reached the closing concert at sunset as trainloads of people still flooded Florence train station at the other end of town. As night drew in, thousands still poured through the streets chanting, dancing, waving banners of trade unions, political parties, anti-war and anti-capitalist slogans and everywhere the Palestinian kefiyers - more it seemed than the Occupied Territories would have the capacity to produce. Palestine is symbol for millions of young people for who the political and economic system that rules the globe seems not merely unfair, but utterly insane.
Never before have so many enjoyed the pain of a hangover and sleep deprivation than sitting in the closing ‘assembly of social movements’ on Sunday morning, with thunderous voices coming through their translation headphones, and the belief truly engraved in their souls that another world is possible.
Nick Dearden
