Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 303.484
EAN: 9781859845042
ISBN: 1859845045
Label: Verso
Languages: Array
Manufacturer: Verso
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 265
Publication Date: 2004-01
Publisher: Verso
Studio: Verso

The Movement of Movements charts the strategic thinking behind the mosaic of movements currently challenging neoliberal globalization. Leading theorists and activists—the Zapatistas' Subcomandante Marcos, Chittaroopa Palit from the Indian Narmada Valley dam protests, Soweto anti-privatization campaigner Trevor Ngwane, Brazilian Sem Terra leader João Pedro Stedile, and many more—discuss their personal formation as radicals, the history of their movements, their analyses of globalization, and the nuts and bolts of mobilizing against a US-dominated world system.

Explaining how the Global South and the experience of indigenous peoples have provided such a dynamic and practical inspiration, the contributors describe the roles anarchism and direct democracy have played, the contributions and limitations of the World Social Forum at Porto Alegre as a coordinating focus, and the effects of and responses to the economic downturn, September 11, and Washington's war on terror as they affect a "movement of movements".

Contributors include: Cesar Benjamin, Consulta Popular; Walden Bello, Focus on the Global South; José Bové, Confédération Paysanne; Bernard Cassen, ATTAC; David Graeber; Michael Hardt; Naomi Klein; Subcomandante Marcos, interviewed by Gabriel García Márquez; Tom Mertes; Bhumika Muchhala, Students Against Sweatshops; Trevor Ngwane, Soweto Electricity Crisis Committee; Njoki Njehu, Fifty Year Is Enough; Chittaroopa Palit, Narmada Bachao Andolan; Emir Sader; John Sellers, Ruckus Society; João Pedro Stedile, Sem Terra Movement; Immanuel Wallerstein.

Customer Rating:
Summary: A visionary anthology of writings on the global movement(s) for peace and social justice!
Comment: Covering a wide range of interlocking social struggles -- from the Zapatista movement in Chiapas to the Indian Narmada Valley dam protests to the Soweto anti-privatization campaign -- "A Movement of Movements" is a thought-provoking introduction to the radical idealism, critical anaylsis, and political imagination shaping the global justice movement(s). While unabashedly internationalist, this movement of movements nevertheless prioritizes localism over empire, direct democracy over hegemony, diversity over monoculture, and communities over leaders. Read this book to better understand the diverse concerns that are uniting an international coalition of students, workers, and environmentalists in a passionate desire for a better world.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: A Must Read for Activists Everywhere!
Comment: With this work, Tom Mertes has provided the progressive community with a concise and insightful overview of both the challenges facing the myriad rivers of struggle against globalization as they seek to join in any kind of unity against G8 hegemony, and in turn the various approaches to overcoming these obstacles. The title of the book poses the question of the possibility of another, implicitly better, world; the various papers and interviews within, provided by the brightest lights of today's left, offer that hope. The publication and distribution of this book in and of itself stands as a victory over the ideological tyranny of U.S. neoliberalism, especially now, and as such will certainly inspire anyone who cares at all about the fate of our world.

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