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\title{Where is the Festival?}
\date{}
\author{}
\subtitle{Notes on Summits \& Counter-Summits}
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\chapter{Genoa is Everywhere}
By now, it is a matter of fact. The world is on the verge of being
transformed into a single enormous supermarket. From San Francisco
to Calcutta, from Rio de Janeiro to Moscow, we will all get in line to
consume the same identical products of unnatural, gaudy appearance.
That which forms an authentic wealth to safeguard for many–autonomy
and difference–could be swept away forever by the imposition of an
economic policy and the consequent social system. When we are presented
with a single possibility while every alternative is kept from us
by force, we cannot speak of freedom of choice in the face of an offer,
but only of coerced obedience. The continuing production of our days
on earth (with all their pleasures, tastes and hues), when a single model
of life to which we are to conform is imposed on it, is the totalitarian
abyss that many see opening before them.
\begin{center}
* * *
\end{center}
Briefly, \emph{neoliberalism} is the name given to the particular economic
policy that the Masters of the earth are applying. \emph{Globalization} is
the name given to the process of homogenizing unification that it
entails. Over the past several months, hundreds of thousands of people
have taken to the streets against neoliberalism and globalization. On
the occasion of meetings between the political and economic leaders of
the most powerful states (in Seattle, Davos, Washington D.C.,
Melbourne, Prague, Gothenburg,\dots{}), protest demonstrations have been
organized that have claimed the attention of the entire mass media.
The next occasion is to be in Genoa at the end of July, corresponding
to the G8 summit. But if, two years ago, this protest movement could
close its eyes to certain contradictions within it so as to avoid
putting a brake on the initial momentum, it seems to us that
reflection on its significance is becoming increasingly urgent and
admits no delay.
Neoliberalism supports a kind of \emph{capitalism without frontiers.}
The most powerful multinationals (mostly US capital) thus succeed in
imposing their interests even when these go against the “national good”
of the little states. Intolerable, right? But what are the opponents of
neoliberalism fighting against? Logically, the most extreme would have
to answer “against capitalism”, while the less extreme would have to
say, “against capitalism \emph{without frontiers”.} The former, as enemies of a
world based on profit — no matter who benefits from it or within what
border the exploitation occurs — the latter as enemies of a world based
on the profit (of the ruling class) of the richest countries at the expense
of the profit (of the ruling class) of the power countries. But whoever
merely protests against the limitless global expansion of capitalism,
against its lack of respect for borders, in substance shows themselves to
be in favour of a form of local capitalism, even if ideal controlled from
the bottom. Therefore, within the movement \emph{against neoliberalism and
globalization} two spirits live together, which for linguistic convenience
we have differentiated as the “more extreme” — who want the elimination
of capitalism and declare themselves against all governments and their
representatives from whom they have nothing to demand — and the “less
extreme” — who support or at least end up accepting the necessity of
capitalism with a human face, limited and regulated by a democratic
government, and whose intention is to explain their reasons to the
current rulers. Not a small difference. But then, how and why did
they come to find a point of agreement? For convenience, above all.
Alliances draw together to gain strength. But it would be foolish to
believe that in an alliance the sides in play are all situated on the same
level. There is always a stronger side and a weaker side. And naturally,
it is the stronger side that dictates the conditions of an alliance, decrees
its slogans, determines its movements, derives the greatest advantage
from it and — if it is sufficiently able — causes the potential disadvantages
to fall on the weaker side. The only thing left to the weaker side, if it
wants to do anything, is to conform itself. So then, the alliance of the
two spirits present in the movement is determined by the choice of a
common enemy: neoliberalism. In the face of the great power of the
opposing side, it is said, differences must be set aside for now: “First we
stop globalization, then we will see what to do.” The condition posed
would even be understandable if it were mutually respected. But how
do things really stand? Do both the components of this Sacred Alliance
stand to benefit from it equally? Are the existing differences expressed
in the same manner and do they hold the same possibilities?
What then is the declared enemy of the anti-globalization
movement, capitalism as such or neoliberalism? And when we are
present there at the summits of the superpowers convinced that we are
“putting pressure” on the Masters of the Earth to which side’s needs
is it responding? At the various anti-globalization demonstrations,
violent clashes with the forces of order have occurred. This is what has
forced the mass media to pay more attention to the disputes. Here is
the usefulness of the alliance — some of the more extreme will say. In the
final analysis, if it hadn’t been for the thousands of other, less extreme,
demonstrators whose mere presence served to hinder the manoeuvres
of the police, these clashes wouldn’t had such a favourable outcome for
the demonstrators. But the less extreme are also satisfied that there have
been clashes. In the final analysis, if the “extremist menace” that needed
to be averted had not been there on display, the Masters of the Earth
would have had no reason to listen to them. As for those demonstrators
who use clashes with the police in order to gain recognition from the
earth’s Masters as go-betweens, it is clear that though they speak out of
both sides of their mouth (“we are not violent, but we clash with the
police”, “we give advice to government officials and sit on municipal
councils but we are antagonists”), they belong by right an by deed to
the less extreme objectors to neoliberalism since their objectives are the
same and they only distinguish themselves from the latter through the
means they use to pursue these objectives. Now battling the police is
not the primary objective of the more extreme, while being heard by the
earth’s Masters is the primary objective of the less extreme. Paradoxically,
who has the most reason to exult in the disorders that have happened
up to now? In other words, to whom is this strange anti-neoliberalist
coalition benefiting the most, the more extreme like the Black Bloc or
the less extreme like the \emph{Monde Diplomatique?}
Let’s digress for a moment. It is not at all strange that the
mass media has rebaptised the movement with the name “the people
of Seattle”. It is as difficult to find a gram of intelligence in the head
of a journalist as to find water in the desert. But we don’t understand
why this idiotic description is repeated by a large part of the movement
itself. It is useless, the American dream even enchants its would-be opponents,
those who on the one hand announce their refusal to live “like
Americans” and on the other hand accept protesting “like Americans”.
So if the friends of neoliberalism look to Washington, D.C., its enemies
look to Seattle. It matters little, after all it’s only a matter of miles, as
long as all eyes are turned to the USA. In spite of the much praised
Autonomy.
Autonomy would like every one to be more or less free to
choose what, when, how, where and with whom to act. The “people of
Seattle”, on the other hand, like all People, is afflicted with a political
defect. Within it are aspiring mayors, aldermen, councillors, even up
to parliamentary whip. Of course, we are referring to those who intend
to be elected as legitimate representatives of the “people of Seattle” in
order to be invited by the earth’s Masters to sit with them at the next
negotiating table, after having sat at the police chief ’s table. But this
is all more than understandable. Less understandable is that the others
adapt themselves to this ignoble game and allow themselves to be
treated as citizens who are requested not to disturb the public peace.
For months we have witnessed a painful spectacle. The Masters of the
earth meet in the most varied corners of the world to formalize decisions
made elsewhere. Their opponents follow them like puppies in
search of attention: they stand on two paws, bark, growl, at times even
nip at the edge of the pants of those who rule them.
Now it is quite clear. Though there is nothing to say to the
true citizens of “the people of Seattle, we would like to address some
observations to the others — to those without fatherland, to the deserter
from all citizenship. At Gothenburg, the police fired, wounding a
demonstrator who was throwing a rock. The Italian government has
already made it known that it is interested in listening to the less violent
opponents, provided that the more stubborn are left out of the dialogue.
This can only mean one thing: having achieved their first goal — the much
sought after institutional recognition — the less extreme opponents will
quickly cease to be interested in continuing to march along side the
more extreme who were useful up to now, having at first contributed
to keeping the tension that created such excellent publicity high, but
who will only be an encumbrance to them from now on. As soon as
they are admitted into the presence of the earth’s Masters, what use will
it be to them to continue using certain means? And at that point, what
will happen? Those who have participated in this movement stirred by
a hatred for capitalism have fought against its guard dogs, smashing
shop windows and destroying machines, determined to destroy this
world from top to bottom. But who chose the place and time from
which to launch this attack? The earth’s Masters chose it. They chose
the battlefield; they chose the method of conflict. Up to now, most of
the opposition has behaved as the police expected. Now this game is
coming to an end. The police are quick and even given permission to
shoot in the back. As petty politicians, the leaders in overalls, whether
white or red, have every interest in centralizing the movement of opposition
to neoliberalism. As subversives, we have interest in expanding
rather than “globalizing” the movement of struggle against capitalism.
The police are waiting for us in Genoa at the end of July in order to beat
us, photograph us, film us, arrest us and maybe shoot us. And instead
we could be anywhere at any time. The shop-shutters of McDonald’s
and the banks of Genoa will be armoured during the days of the summit.
The multinationals, the supermarkets and the banks of the rest
of the world will be at our disposal at any time. And this would only
be the beginning since as soon as we leave off following the due dates
that others set for us, we will finally be able to choose when, where,
how and who to strike.
If we decide for ourselves, we will be unpredictable. We will
lose allies, but we will find comrades along the way.
\begin{flushright}
— \emph{a few nobodies neither
want to represent or be
represented by anyone}
\end{flushright}
\chapter{Vultures}
In the end, we still fall, a bit stupidly every time.
And yet we know them well, these annoying vultures. By
now, we should no longer nurture even the least bit of hope in finding
courage, dignity, coherence, the capacity to put themselves on the
line in their words or actions. In short, they are not comrades; our
dreams are much too distant from their aims. But even less are they
worthy adversaries, people who have clearly chosen which side to take,
without dreary games with which to try to win over anyone who is
still capable of feeling emotion, of getting angry, of looking without so
many ideological filters at the horrendous and omnivorous reality that
surrounds us all. When such an individual finds the force of the desire
to do something in her\Slash{}himself, in the search for comrades, perhaps
s\Slash{}he runs into them, into the Tute Bianche, into the social centres of
the Northeast [of Italy — translator], into the Ya Basta association, into
Leoncavallo, into any other of the myriads of protean monograms with
which these people try to disguise themselves and to ensnare agreement.
But not us, we, who no matter what, still love to describe ourselves
as anarchists — and tremble when journalists take the liberty of
making distinctions in this as well, debating over who really is who
is not one — we don’t consider ourselves so naïve, and we look with
detachment at the “people of Seattle”, which gets so much exposure
that it seems to us to be the mechanism of a struggle and a method
(that still has interested and even roused enthusiasm in us) that
offers the flank so widely to instrumental manipulation, to repressive
attack, but especially to media banalisation and the most dreary
spectacularisation, and therefore to its substantial surrender to the
inoffensive game of parties. We have chosen not to be part of that
“people”, the journalistic christening of which merely nauseates us;
we refuse to make ourselves fit into the mould of any group or
sub-group, even running the risk — and not just because of this
choice, for goodness sake — of enclosing ourselves in a fortress, the
ideologically pure connotations of which might be capable of
preserving us not only from sullying our hands and consciences too
much, but also from our own frustrations . We declared ourselves to be
outside under the pretext of being inside of something else, much more
meaningful and important, something of our own. Unfortunately, this is
not always so. However, we declared ourselves outside of that context
on the assumption, which we continue to hold well grounded, that it
was much too narrow there. This assumption is strengthened by some
experiences that have involved us directly, that disappointed us.
And yet here we are, surprised once again. For two very different
reasons, which have aroused very different reactions in us, though
both still surprise us.
First of all, the comrades in Genoa, their vitality, their capacities,
even their numbers. To be clear, and in consideration of the fact
that we also know of these events primarily through the journalistic
filter, we are referring to the so-called black bloc. We are amazed, at
bottom, that comrades could find such ample space for action in a
context that we knew was dominated by the double control exercised
on the territory, by the police on the one hand and by the forces of
organized opposition on the other, both our enemies (and in the case
of the “anti-globalizers”, we refer to those “responsible”, to the promoters,
the various “general headquarters”, the functions of order, certainly
not to the individual demonstrators, among whom we believe there
were many, dressed in their preferred colour whatever that may have
been, who did not necessarily consider themselves to be represented
by those who were the self-proclaimed leaders of the good spirit of the
protest and therefore in the right — having to cleanse the procession of
any unwelcome presence.)
But fortunately, anarchists are often bad prophets.
We are amazed and immediately loved these comrades, even
if perplexity still persists within us, the distance not so much from the
method, but rather from the various interests, the perspectives that
diverge, but don’t keep us from considering them our comrades. The
thing that no one says is that in Genoa class conflict manifested itself,
that it expressed itself in this form as well: the attack of the exploited
against the structures of capital and against the cops who defend it. All
the embodiments of exploitation disgust us in earnest, not symbolically,
not democratically. The social war is not our invention.
The second reason for our surprise: the reactions of the tute
bianche. It is useless to widen the discussion, that the Genoa Social
Forum in its totality expressing itself as it did is absolutely a consequence
of its very nature and reason for being. In reality — and this is why we
are surprised at our surprise — even that which these whitewashers of
our house, or more, have said and done is perfectly fitting with what
they are. And we have learned to recognize this quite well over the
years, from times when they didn’t use certain disguises, but others
that fooled even us, when, due to our naivety and superficiality, we
managed to conceive of them as distant comrades in struggle. We were
diverted by a language that we heard, undoubtedly — I repeat — due
to our stupidity, as less offensive than what, to our surprise, it would
become. Its calls for autonomy and class struggle perhaps appeared
ironic to us, even though we had not understood that the direction of
that irony was diametrically opposed to what we would have hoped.
Now the jokes have become clearer, their political capacities have
been refined (still at a level of extreme cultural impoverishment, but
we should not forget that the entire political scenario has suffered a
fierce intellectual abasement, along with all society that plods along in
its magnificent informational ignorance), their names have appeared
unequivocally flanking those of the class enemies. And yet, even in all
this, an oppositional component plays a role, hauled out as an artifice
at the most opportune moments, or instead held back, as a provocation
by a neo-vanguard outside prime time, or a residue of adrenaline
rising again as when — youth, at bottom, when all of us feel a bit like
anarchists\dots{} — they played at conflicts with the police, a practice that
still continues to rouse a certain sympathy. Of course, we recall that
in those days they didn’t use harnesses and the turtle formations (but
did they really do this or was it just a folkloric invention of journalists?
We ask it here again) and amenities of this kind, but the agreements
with the political police were already a recurring and noted practice
in the streets.
Now, why are we surprised when their spokespeople disassociate
themselves from the violence of the black bloc at first, in order to
later recant and express rage for the repression that shot someone to
death?
Why not believe that they would take advantage of this situation?
A comrade is dead, killed by a carabiniere. A comrade put his
life at risk, while the vultures wretchedly begged the repression not to
strike their procession of honest and correct disobedients, but that it
be applied elsewhere, to those who don’t respect the rules. As soon as
this happened, hypocritical and convenient indignation, expressing the
shortest memory in the world, explodes flaming from the eyes of the
corpulent leader of the white-washers when he gets wind of the occasion
that a martyr, who was still an enemy until the moment in which the
murderous bullet struck him (wouldn’t it have been sufficient to arrest
and beat him democratically in the barracks?), was offered to them.
But the only thing truly surprising remains our surprise in the
face of all this. Is it necessary to remind ourselves of the other occasions
in which we have had means for knowing them in their deepest essence?
When they have beaten us, “mistaking” us for fascists; when they have
led us to believe that they possessed the determination to go beyond
the threshold that makes them welcome to vice-mayors — senators —
councillors — civil society? When they have willingly been responsible
for police attacks against their own comrades (it is acknowledged that
they call each other this) in order to gain a hearing from the minister
of the interior? When they have announced or supported extremely reactionary
demonstrations calling for severity on the part of state justice
(against the very wicked fascists, racists, bullies, leaguists, criminals of
the national unity, of course — rabble to put it kindly)? When they are
candidates in elections? When they are allied to the allies of Haider?
What more is necessary to open our eyes?
\chapter{Notes on Summits \& Counter-Summits}
\section{The Illusion of a Centre}
Capitalism is a social relationship and not a citadel of power.
It is starting from this banality that one can deal with the question of
summits and counter-summits. To represent the domination of capital
and the State as a kind of general headquarters (such as the G8, the
WTO or some other organization) is useful to those who would like to
substitute that centre of power with another centre: the political structures
of the so-called movement, or better, their spokespeople. In short,
it is useful to those who propose merely a change in management personnel.
Not only is this tendency reformist in its essence and purpose,
it is also collaborationist and authoritarian in its method, as it leads to
the centralization of opposition. That’s why these leftist opponents,
who want so much to be heard by the “masters of the world”, invest
money and political hype on the summits, the dates of which they are
often set with them. During these summits decisions that were made
elsewhere are merely formalized, but this certainly does not disturb the
various representatives of the social forums; after all, their opposition
is also completely formal, consisting mainly of paid seminars where
it is shown that neoliberalism is wrong and humanity is right, or, for
the more lively, in some combative performance that is agreed upon
with the police. Besides, how could an opposition financed by the
institutions, represented by council and parliamentary members and
protected by the grave-diggers of the workers’ movement (we’re referring
to the security services entrusted to the CGIL\footnote{The Italian General Confederation of Labour, a major trade union organization.} in collaboration
with the cops) be real? The paradox is that people are called into the
streets in the name of another possible world, but with the intention
that\dots{} absolutely nothing happens. Each time that an oceanic crowd
demonstrates peacefully, visibly supervised, they say that a great victory
for the movement has been achieved. And yet these social pacifiers know
quite well that their capacity to pose as negotiators with the institutions
doesn’t depend on the number of people that they lead into the streets
(millions of demonstrators opposing the latest military aggression
against Iraq have not worried the governments involved in the war),
but rather on the power of mediation and repression they manage to
put into practice — or to justify — against all social rebellion. In fact, if
summits and counter-summits are so frequently talked about, if the
representatives of the social forums have come together at the negotiation
table and been flattered by the mass media, it is only because first
in Seattle and then on other occasions, something happened: thousands
of comrades and poor youth attacked the structures of capital and the
state, upset police city planning schemes by opening up spaces for
communication and clashed with the uniformed servants. Without this
subversive threat — which is characteristic of our time together with the
many insurrectional explosions that have shaken up the last few years
— the bosses would have nothing to do with the various Casarinis and
Agnolettos.\footnote{Casarini and Agnoletto are spokespeople of groups behind the social forums.} Hasn’t something of this sort happened with the unions?
In more recent times they have been put in storage after they have
been flattered by capital in times of great social conflict with the aim
of dividing, demoralizing and denouncing revolting proletarians. So
they are now forced to raise a loud voice against the very attacks of the
bosses that they themselves once justified and ratified.
The “disobbedienti”\footnote{The “Disobbediente” are the latest incarnation of the former White Overalls (Tute Bianche), a “radical” organization associated with the Rifondazione Communista party in Italy that represents the practice of the newer theories of Antonio Negri. This involves working with the institutions to the extent not only of associating with a parliamentary party, but also of negotiating with police and municipal governments to organize demonstrations in such a way as to create a good media spectacle without causing real disruptions of the functioning of social institutions. This includes meeting with police to plan staged “direct actions” and “confrontations”.} spokespeople must then distinguish
themselves from the bad ones, the extremists, the violent ones (i.e.,
those who practice direct action) and give political visibility to the others.
On the one hand, therefore, the slogans of the social forums are
perfectly suitable for the enlightened bourgeoisie: taxation of finance
capital, democratic and transparent regulation over global trade, more
state and less market, critical consumption, ethical banks, pacifism, etc.
On the other hand, what they sell with their “democratic mobilizations”
is a valuable commodity: the illusion of doing something against
the injustices of the world. In this sense, counter-summits are a juicy
spectacle. The few bad ones are repressed and the fair demands of the
good ones are listened to: end of the story?
Power knows that it isn’t so simple. The disgusting realistic proposals
of the domesticated opposition have nothing to say to the millions
of poor people parked in the reservations of the market paradise and
repressed by the police. This was proved in Genoa: only during the
clashes and the looting of supermarkets the young local proletarians
united with the insurgents. In the meantime the White Overalls with
their gaudy spectacles appeared to them as Martians or buffoons ,
those excluded from any political racket understood the language of
revolt immediately .
\section{A Gust of Unpredictability}
There is no doubt that in Seattle and Genoa, and again more
recently in Thessaloniki, a critique without mediation against domination
and its false enemies was developed. Despite the fact that the dates
were set by the bosses, the presence of the reformists in the streets was
overcome. We say this, even though we were among those comrades
who maintained that Genoa is everywhere because if domination and
dispossession are in every part of society and in daily life, the attack
doesn’t need dates set by the enemy. We found interesting the practice of
those who, deserting the stage of the “red zone” that was to be violated
and the trap of full frontal clashes with the police, moved with agility,
striking and disappearing (in this sense, the attack on the Marassi prison
in Genoa is remarkable). This powerful gust of unpredictability, this
subversive “federalism” of actions and groups, marked an important
rupture with the logic of those who centralize the enemy in order to
centralize the struggle (and render it symbolic). But we still think that
to be in the place where the enemy does not expect you, far from the
appointments, is the best way. Even in their most interesting aspects,
the counter-summits limit this perspective. Moreover, even considering
the importance of the revolts in Seattle and Genoa, it seems to us that
chasing after such dates is becoming a cliché, and more, a devourer of
energy: as soon as one counter-summit ends, preparation for another
begins. The dates are fixed more and more by the mass media, to the
point that, if many revolutionaries have demonstrated, for example,
against the war in Iraq, almost no one has managed to express any practical
solidarity with the insurgents of Argentina or Algeria. The clashes
involving just the “militants” are often considered more important than
authentic social and class uprisings.
We know very well why many comrades go to counter-summits:
wide-spread direct action and the generalised clash with the cops
is only possible in mass situations. As the possibility of attacking is quite
low elsewhere, only in crowded situations can a certain sort of street
guerrilla warfare be tested. Other kinds of actions can be realized at
any moment and they are not in any way incompatible with a certain
practice in the streets during counter-summits. And yet we think that
in the long run such a practice limits the autonomy of analysis and
action (in the face of many social conflicts we have just stood there
looking on) and tends to become in spite of itself , a sort of extremist
model within the “disobedient” caravan. And again, why on earth does
power publicize so many summits in which decisions that have already
been made are ratified? All this seems to us to be a great occasion for
the police to study and experiment with anti-riot techniques. It’s like
homeopathic treatment: tiny doses of the virus of subversion in order
to reinforce its immune system in view of much broader social plagues.
It must know how the bad ones move and organize themselves, and
with which good ones it is possible to dialogue in such a way that
nothing really changes.
\section{An Experiment in the Open Air}
But above all, summits constitute a form of experimentation
to see what level of oppression people are willing to put up with. By
bringing a bit of Palestine, with its checkpoints, its permanent red
zones and its armoured patrol cars around every corner, into the “rich
West”, power is saying to its subjects that, until proven otherwise,
they are criminals; that nothing is secure enough for the police and
technological apparatus; that city planning is the continuation of the
social war with different weapons. More that sixty years ago, Walter
Benjamin wrote in his Theses on the Concept of History that “the state
of exception in which we live has become the rule”. If this is true, we
have to understand what links a concentration camp for immigrants
without documents to the stadiums where war refugees are loaded,
certain poor and working-class neighbourhoods patrolled by the
police, or to the various Guantanamos scattered throughout the world,
or to some operations of evacuation that are clearly disproportionate
to the declared aim (for example, entire neighbourhoods evacuated in
order to defuse some implement from the first World War) or to the
rationing of electrical energy carried out without warning — in the style
of the 1920’s — by the ENEL.\footnote{The national electricity board in Italy} Up to now it is a question of successful
experiments that confirm what a comrade wrote in the 1970’s: the
people of capital are a stoic people. They upset traffic circulation, they
put surveillance cameras everywhere, they install noxious antennas over
the roofs of our houses, they criminalise more and more behaviour:
no one says a word.
Summits are the concentrated representation of all this, the
legal suspension of every right. “What’s going on?” the average citizen
asks, forced to take a detour in order to go shopping. “Nothing, it’s just
the anti-globalization people,” the woman at the supermarket answers.
Meanwhile, they are even privatising drinking water, while the police
are everywhere.
But precisely because it is a concentrated representation of a
daily situation, the practical critique must be widespread and constant,
for example through the destruction of video cameras and other systems
of electronic surveillance. It is important to map out the locations of
the instruments of control, spreading awareness of them and theoretically
supporting the necessity of attacking them.
\section{The New Ugly Face of Domination}
Power is increasingly brazen. On the one hand, the masters know that
the current social conditions, increasingly marked by precariousness
and dependence on commodities, can be imposed only through terror:
such terror is manifested through war outside and in fear of the
future inside (for example, fear of remaining without work) or through
the repression of more and more social groups. On the other hand,
decades of social pacification — in which every despicable act has been
passed simply because nothing has been done to prevent the passing
of the preceding ones, in an incredible acceleration of degradation
— have given power an arrogance without precedence. We have seen
this, for example, in Genoa, in the beatings, the torture, the murder
of Carlo Giuliani. And it continues. The new police chief of Trento is
Colucci, police chief in Genoa during the G8 summit, a certified pig.
He will be managing the summit of foreign ministers of the European
Union that will be held at Riva del Garda next September 4 through
6. Do you understand the message? A Trento committee “for truth
and justice” has found nothing better to do than to invite him to a
public confrontation.
\section{Acid Rain and Fig Leaves}
The foreign ministers who will be meeting in Riva on September
4 through 6 must achieve a common platform to present at
the WTO summit in Cancun, Mexico on September 9 through 13.
The topic is the General Agreement on the Trade of Services (GATS)
that anticipates precisely the liberalisation of the principle “public
services” on a global level. Among the many decisions in process, the
most scandalous is surely that of the privatisation of water, which may
become a reality for the 144 countries who belong to the World Trade
Organization. It is a process that has been going on for some time, as
for decades seven multinationals have contended over concessions for
the bottling of mineral water, and in the last few years over concessions
for managing the water system as well. The “Trento board for a social
Europe” is also interested in the privatization of water, and on its scarcity
due to pollution, as a mark of the most unbridled neoliberalism.
Apart from the usual complaints about the non-democratic aspects of
these agreements (as if those made by individual governments were
on the contrary subjected to who knows what public debates\dots{}; and,
weren’t the state institutions supposed to save us from the savage market?),
what is equally scandalous as concerns the reformists is the gap
between the size of the disasters that they denounce and the solutions
that they propose.
On the one hand, they indicate the industrialisation of agriculture,
the concentration of populations in increasingly gigantic cities,
the pollution produced by factories, the waste of drinkable water for
industrial machinery and for cultivation intended for the intensive
breeding of animals as the causes of these disasters. In short, they are
the very essence of the techno-industrial system. On the other hand,
they propose\dots{} new laws, transparent rules, even the participation of
citizens through short term treasury bonds in the S.P.A.s\footnote{Action associations similar to PACs in the US.} that privatise
water. Thanks to the marvels of progress, there are whole countries in
which a collapse of the banking system would leave the countryside
without water, and these citizens, so proud of being so, want different
laws. It is like suggesting covering one’s head with an organic fig leaf
against a downpour of acid rain.. The proposals of the various social
forums, reasonable in terms of political and economic rationality, are
simply crazy from a concrete and social point of view. It is not a question
of denouncing a world in ruins, but rather of taking space in which
to resist and time in order to attack. It is not just a question of how
radical one is in the streets. The point is what sort of life one desires,
how much one has submitted her or himself materially and spiritually
to an increasingly inhuman and artificial social order or, on the other
hand, what relationships one is ready to fight for.
There is no need to go to Riva to oppose the water racket.
Those who are directly responsible for this ultimate commodification
(for example the big companies that bottle mineral water) are just a
few steps away from us at all times. If the civilized can’t even defend
the water they drink — or at least understand that others do so in a
clear and direct way — we can all just go to bed. In this case too, it is a
long chain of dependence and oppression that is now presenting us an
exorbitant bill. Only through autonomy in the face of industrial mass
society and open revolt against the State that defends it will anything
different come to exist.
The same is valid, for example for the question of patents,
including those on the genetic code. It is simply idiotic to demand
protective laws in the face of the entry of capital into the human body.
Techno-scientific delirium, which consists of wanting to transform nature
and human beings into a sort of variable of the computer, passed
the point of no return some time ago. Any illusion of reforming a
science that is entirely in the service of power is simply a dismal hoax.
The actions that have happened in most countries against transgenic
cultivation or against private and state laboratories that experiment on
the human genome have shown quite well that the critique of mercantile
reason has no need of spectacular dates.
More generally, what is euphemistically described as globalisation
would be unthinkable without the material basis supplied by the
technological apparatus. Just consider the things that are presented as
principle factors in development and economic and military conflict:
energy and information. What seems like an unassailable Moloch is in
reality a gigantic web formed by cables, antenna, substations, trellises
and transformers that can easily be attacked.
\section{Riva Is Everywhere}
The CGIL will organize the security service during the counter-summit
in Riva. The outgoing police chief of Trento has rightly pointed out
that the more demonstrators turn themselves into agents of police, the
less need there will be of the latter.
After long negotiations between the social forum and the police
force (managed obviously by national leaders), it seems that the Council
will be making a villa outside Riva available to the Disobbediente and
their associates, granting them the right to demonstrate (always out of
town, in deserted streets) through Sunday. Riva will be closed, which
means that the cops will simply block three access roads. The government
commissioners’ office has passed an order which prohibits and
suspends exhibitions and demonstrations (including sports and cultural
exhibitions) in more than twenty councils in the Trentino region. The
police want empty streets, the people must understand that Big Brother
is not just a television program. And we?
Let’s take up a thread from far away again. Günther Anders
wrote in the 1950’s, “Hiroshima is everywhere”, and in the 1980’s,
“ Chernobyl is everywhere”. Some rebels against the technologised
world in the 1990’s said, “Mururoa is everywhere” ( when the French
government subjected that island in the Pacific to murderous nuclear
tests). Two years ago, some comrades claimed, “Genoa is everywhere”.
As revolt explodes without limits and against every spectacle, as the
Apparatus expects an enemy that is not there and reveals its totalitarian
character still more, we say Riva is everywhere. We will not be
in the streets against the summit of the European Union, because in
the struggles of our time and those in the future, we wanted, and still
want, to strike other paths. One does not escape the circle by following
the logic that “This time it is close to my home”, since summits will
always occur close to someone’s home. And because the real conflict
is elsewhere. There are other ways to oppose the arming of the cities
and valleys in which we live, ways that are within everyone’s reach. We
want to free ourselves from the dictatorship of the number and from
its worshipers. We know this is a perspective that may only give few
results in the immediate sense, but it is by deciding for ourselves how,
where and when to strike and tenaciously defending our reasons for it
that we will cause individual and social insubordination to advance.
\begin{flushright}
\emph{Some Roveretan anarchists}
\end{flushright}
\chapter{So That July Turns out to be a Threat\forcelinebreak \emph{On the trial of the rebels of Genoa}}
On March 2, 2004, the trial against twenty-five demonstrators
accused of “devastation and looting” for the rebellion against the G8
in July 2001 opened in Genoa. And it is just the beginning; a testing
ground aimed at perhaps even wider judiciary operations. It is an
exemplary trial in every sense: for the type of charge (which has very
few precedents in Italian history and which anticipates several years in
prison), for the way in which power has prepared the terrain for the
plays and vendettas of the court, for how the whole business illustrates
the obstacles that every collective movement of individual liberation
has to face in the courthouses and in the streets.
Anticipated by twenty arrests ordered by the attorney’s office
of Cosenza in November 2002, and by twenty-three more arranged
a little later by the attorney’s office in Genoa, this trial wants to send
everyone a clear message: the uprising of Genoa will have its scapegoats.
It is quite obvious that what is at stake goes beyond the July revolt itself
to project its dire shadow over the future. As an example, one can take
the initiative, promoted by the attorney of Genoa, to acquire a space
on the Ligurian newspaper Il Secolo XIX to publish the photographs
— taken by a surveillance camera placed on the street — of two demonstrators
with the aim of identifying them. On that occasion, the crime of
“psychic participation” made its public appearance again: in substance
the state affirms that it is not necessary to directly participate in acts of
revolt in order to incur the favours of repression, rather it is enough to
be present where they happened without preventing others from carrying
them out; in short, without turning into police agents. We add
that those arrested in Cosenza were explicitly made an indecent offer
with some success, which in consequence would become a constant:
the “renunciation of violence” in exchange for release from prison — and
we will have an even more precise picture. What is on trial now is not
this or that action, this or that act of sabotage, but rather the attitude
toward the institutions and, more generally, the refusal itself of the social
order and life as subjects that it imposes. Collaborators or enemies: this
is the ultimatum that the state launches at everyone.
This is also the sense in which the continuous propaganda that
the various Ministries of Fear are orchestrating around the concept
of “terrorism” can be understood. Especially since the attack on the
Twin Towers, the demonstrator who breaks windows is equated with
the revolutionary who shoots down a man of state, and the latter is
equated with the kamikaze who blows up a crowded bus. Thanks to
this self-interested confusion power has tried to hide the meaning of the
days in Genoa: on one side, a social uprising that involved thousands of
individuals willing to bring down the order of money and truncheons;
on the other side, the state that threw off its mask, thus revealing its true
assassin’s face. For anyone who did not want to draw any lessons from
that July, what more could we add that power has not amply shown
by beating and killing in the streets and by humiliating and torturing
in the enclosure of its barracks? What could we add about the inanity
of anyone who asks the courts for Truth and Justice, as if a single truth
and justice could exist on both sides of the barricades? Haven’t the
government, the rulers and the judges been explicit in absolving and
promoting the murderers and torturers in uniforms, like always?
In the same way that the machinery of control cuts up neighbourhoods
and cities with its barriers and check-points, its surveillance
cameras and squadrons, the inquisitors cut up events with their inquiries
and legal codes. Public ministers Canepa and Canciani — two neospecialists
in the hunt for rebels — are merely refining the work started
with the militarisation of Genoa and continued through the attacks,
the murderous bullet of Alimonda plaza, the raid against Diaz, the
tortures in Bolzaneto and other barracks, the arrests and expulsions in
the following days and months. In relation to the investigations, public
minister Silvio Franz, well known for covering up state scandals, has
carried out a leading role thanks to the aid of a collection of experts notoriously
linked to the sphere of the carabinieri and of neo-fascists.
It is up to those who have not forgotten that contagious rebellion
which conquered the streets; to those who don’t want to let the
blood shed by the hand of the state’s cops dry up in their mind, to
furnish all the weapons needed for solidarity toward the demonstrators
on trial. This is the meaning of the modest notes that follow.
In defiance of numberless counter-investigations that have ended up
complicating what was so very evident through the totalitarianism of
the fragment; in defiance of the chattering with which the specialists
have covered up this uprising and the slander with which the political
pack of hounds has besmirched it, we want to retrace a threatening
history in order to put it back in play.
\section{Secret Appointments}
\begin{quote}
\emph{A mysterious appointment exists between the generations
that have been and our own.}
Walter Benjamin
\end{quote}
A few days before the G8, some Genoans went to a carpenter
in the historical centre of the Ligurian capital with the request that he
prepare pieces of wood to be assembled as poles. The old craftsman
immediately grasped the intentions of these unusual clients and told
them what they, those of his generation, used in conflicts with the
police. The memory goes back to the revolt of July 1960, to the young
people in striped t-shirts, in the working class neighbourhoods of Genoa.
The old man explained that, in order to face the charges of the
riot cops, the insurgents made use of the stockfish left to dry outside
of the numerous fish shops of the alleys. The vendors passed them to
the rebels, but not before having immersed them in the water tank
to make them sturdy and effective. The paths of the historical centre
are no longer the same, so our friends left there with their collapsible
poles. But a few days later, these pieces of wood will be a sort of baton
between two generations of uncontrollables and rowdies.
Friday, July 20, 2001, after hundreds on rebels have liberated
some neighbourhoods from the capitalist normality that is the coldest
of icy monsters, a supermarket is transformed into a collective, free
banquet. For a few hours, rebels and residents of the area freely help
themselves, eating and joking and discussing. Even a journalist, paid
to serve with his telescopic lens as others serve with their cudgels, is
photographed by one of his colleagues as he comes out with two packages
of mozzarella.
In order for this mozzarella to meet those stockfish in a “tiger’s
pounce into the past”, a social uprising was need that could replace
historical time with the time of revolt. An uprising that has upset both
the plans of the Earth’s Rulers and their guard dogs and those of the
mediated and media opposition.
\section{The Thread of a History}
\begin{quote}
\emph{What has happened now will be quickly forgotten. In the air,
only an empty, horrible memory. Who was protected? The lazy, the miserable,
the usurers. Those who were young had to fall\dots{} but the unworthy
sit unscathed in the warmth of their living rooms.}
Ernst Bloch
\end{quote}
The G8 summit in Genoa was the occasion for a huge experiment
in control and militarization without precedent in Italy: streets
closed and armoured with gratings over fifteen feet tall, the complete
restructuring of traffic circulation, manhole covers preventatively
welded\dots{} and more comical provisions were not lacking (underpants
and socks removed from the balconies!). Many exasperated citizens
left the city, which assumed the grim appearance of an enormous
concentration camp. Twenty thousand men from all the armed corps
of the state came together in the Ligurian capital in order to patrol it.
Roadblocks were set up, body bags in which to put the possible dead
ordered, selected snipers positioned on the roofs and frogmen stationed
in the water. An authentic torture chamber was prepared for prisoners at
Bolzaneto, the management of which was assigned to the gentlemen of
the special prison anti-riot squad (the GOM). While the task of maintaining
public order was entrusted mainly to the carabinieri\footnote{Italian military police force that acts as national against civilians.}, which
formed the CCIR (carabinieri contingent for decisive intervention) for
the occasion, constituted of soldiers commanded by officers of the elite
Tuscania corps, active earlier in Somalia, Bosnia and Albania.
For its part, the state did not prepare to control a protest, but
to deal with a war. It’s not a matter of controlling demonstrators, but
rather of clearing the board of enemies. In Genoa for the first time,
the state experimented in such a systematic, explicit and widespread
manner with the military logic that presides over international missions
against its own people. In a demonstration of how the line of
demarcation between external and internal enemies is disappearing in
a world unified by the religion of money. In a demonstration of how
power must test out in small scenarios what might be general in the
future. After all, if war is considered a police operation, a police operation
could well be considered a war.
The outcome showed one of the constants of military and
technological expansion: everything that is prepared merely waits to
be used.
The anticipated battlefield was the one that stretched around
the “red zone”. Here, in front of the gates and fences protecting the summit
centre, is where assaults of the demonstrators were expected. This
is where the petty leaders of the mediated, media protest gathered their
troops. This is also where the guard dogs of power were concentrated
in order to repel the pressure of the discontented subjects who came to
beg for their illusory rights. Everything seemed ready. A multitude of
respectful citizens who cry out their reasons, the forces of order hired
to repel them, the skirmish agreed to in negotiation in order to evoke
and exorcise the spectre of conflict, the journalists who hurried there
from around the world, the final applause since, in the end, everything
had to develop peacefully, summit and counter-summit. None of this
came about. From their side, the institutions had no real intention of
avoiding conflict, due to their clear desire to teach an unforgettable
lesson to the ungrateful consumers of Western well being. From the
side of the movement, or at least one part of it, there were those who
preferred to be protagonists of an explicit rebellion against the so-called
Masters of the Earth rather than become a spectator or play a walk-on
part in an agitated TV series to the profit of the mass media. Thus, the
rebels were not seen around the “red zone”. They preferred to desert
the virtual conflict agreed to by the institutions in order to go and find
the real conflict, the one without mediation. Despite showing up in
the city and on the date set by the institutional agenda, several hundred
enemies of this world, quite different from one another, without
leaders or followers, without head or tail, would go where they weren’t
expected. Instead of launching themselves headlong against a supposed
heart of domination, they preferred to go elsewhere, knowing well that
domination has no heart since it is found everywhere. The physical
spaces where the cult of money is practiced, where the stink of the
commodity lingers in the air, where the lies of commerce are heard
— and not the mere “symbols” of capitalism, as the leftist vulgate of
the adorers of the existent claimed — would come to know the practical
critique of action: banks would be attacked, supermarkets looted,
dealerships set on fire.
A city can be beloved, its houses and streets can be recognized in
our deepest and dearest memories, but only in the hour of revolt is the
city truly experienced as our city: [\dots{}] ours, because it is a circumscribed
space in which historical time is suspended and every act has value in
itself, in its absolutely immediate consequences. The city is taken over
in the escaping and advancing with the back and forth of the charges,
much more than playing in its streets as children or passing there later
with a girlfriend. In the hour of revolt one is no longer alone in the
city.
\section{Furio Jesi}
After the passing of the rebels, who curious people and youth
of the neighbourhoods would frequently join, nothing was any longer
as before. Cars, as mobile boxes that transport workers to their daily
condemnation, became toys with which to amuse oneself and barricades
with which to stop the police. The siren song of advertising that
poisons the spirit and commodifies bodies was silenced. Electronic
eyes were blinded. Journalists were driven away. Looting transformed
commodities to pay for into free goods to share. Through colourful
writing, the walls were freed from their dismal greyness. Streets, docks
and buildings were used as arsenals. The city plan, modelled on the
needs of the economy and refined by the imperatives of social control,
broke down under the fire of the uprising. Quite quickly, the impossible
became possible: the prison of Marassi, mostly emptied in order
to leave space for eventual arrests, was attacked. The same fate struck
a carabinieri barracks. For their part, the men in uniform spread all
the violence that they could. Those who have accused the black-clad
rebels of having provoked the repression would do better to take note
that the police and military operations were already planned and
organized as a preventative form of deterrence in the face of it all. In
fact, it was not the result of an excess of zeal, of too much tension or
of inexperience, but was rather the true face of state terrorism that
raged unfettered, launching its armoured vehicles at breakneck speed
against defenceless demonstrators. This is what really determined the
generalized spread of revolt. The very thing that was supposed to stop
it, the police intervention, ended up feeding it. In the course of a short
time, thousands of demonstrators who were peaceful up to then joined
the rebels and began to fight against the cops, leaping into a desperate
guerrilla battle. Even among the militants of the political rackets whose
leaders called for calm, moderation and non-violence, there was much
insubordination.
The ideology of disobedience\footnote{This is a reference to the Ya Basta!\Slash{}Tute Bianche\Slash{}Disobbedienti\Slash{} Social Forum milieu which negotiates spectacular acts of “disobedience” with the authorities for media consumption.} itself would experience its first
disobedients. A little more than an hour after their demonstration
started, the good intentions of the Tute Bianche were shattered. When
the leaders of the white overalls again exhorted journalists in their
train not to confuse them with the violent after coming across the first
shell of a burnt car, when the smoke that rose in the distance was still
distant enough that it could be ignored, the charge of the carabinieri
in via Tolemaide put an end to the simulation. Despite the negotiations
beforehand, this time there’d be no spectacle: the cops attacked
in earnest! Deaf to the appeals of their petty leaders who called them
to give up, to not react, many Disobbedienti began to fight against the
men in uniform, with the help of other demonstrators who rushed to
confront those who were attacking them. For a few hours, there were
no longer violent or non-violent, men or women, social democrats or
anarchists, militants or common people, building surveyors or unemployed,
but only individuals in revolt against the guard dogs of the
existent and the life that is imposed. It was during these conflicts that
Carlo Giuliani was killed. He was not a “block bloc” person. He was
not an anarchist. He was not a provocateur. He was not an infiltrator.
He was only a young man who had reacted to state violence. Not one
of the few, but one of the many.
Let’s be clear on this point. In the days that followed, all the career
politicians that infest the movement initially took their distance from
what happened, accusing the rebels of being a handful of “provocateurs”
and “infiltrators” who had intentionally sabotaged a great peaceful date
with their actions, causing a historical occasion for being heard to be
lost. The entire pack of social democratic dogs — the same ones who
had raised so much dust and noise up to that time and who therefore
believed themselves to be the vehicle of history — spilled an ocean of
slander on them, reviving the old Stalinist tradition of the “hunt for
the plague-spreaders”. This was a way of venting their rancour against
those who decided to escape their control, revealing their presumed
authoritativeness in all its falseness. It was a way of closing one’s eyes
in the face of the end of their political project, the vainglorious inconsistency
of which came out in all its wretchedness at the end of those
days, pathetically trying to relaunch itself. Those who are so indignant
that hundreds of comrades went to Genoa with the intention of inciting
a rebellion, making a minimum of preparation in this direction and
trying to avoid the trap of direct conflict with the police, should reflect
more on who aroused the spirits for months, promising assaults and
invasions without having any intention of carrying them out, without
giving the least consideration to the possible consequences. They
should reflect more on who raised the white hands of non-violence
to the skies as a sign of surrender and not of dignity, helping to send
thousands of defenceless demonstrators to certain defeat. And perhaps
to pose a few more questions: can one be truly “non-violent” and collaborate
with the state, the greatest expression of violence? Who could
denounce those who smashed shop windows in Genoa? Maybe those
who smashed bones, heads and teeth? Maybe those who were indignant
about trampled gardens and then consider workplace deaths normal?
Or even those who want to invade the “red zone” of privilege from the
“grey zone” of collaborationism? If anyone who attacks a bank is an
infiltrating provocateur, how might one describe those who advise a
government minister, discuss with a member of parliament and make
contracts with a police chief? That Friday furnished some answers.
Saturday, July 21, political calculation and fear took the upper
hand over rage. The various militant political rackets organized themselves
to distance and purge their true enemy: all the uncontrollables
who had made their plans fail so miserably. As is well-known, that
evening the police, unbridled in their absolute certainty of impunity,
carried out the attack on the Diaz school, the temporary office of the
Social Forum. Everyone there was brutally beaten by the enraged officers.
A seemingly incomprehensible action, because along with the
rest, the cops beat some of their best allies who had distinguished
themselves in their work as informers the whole time. In reality, this
episode fits perfectly into the military logic that governed the operation
of the forces of order. The proof of the strength of the Italian government
had to be shown once and for all.
\section{A Deafening Babble}
\begin{quote}
\emph{Everyone who has anything to say, come
forward and shut up.}
Karl Kraus
\end{quote}
The revolt ended, and the commentary on it by journalists,
specialists and experts began. And the more the accounts and interpretations
of what happened grew, the more its crystalline clarity diminished.
The revolt in Genoa in its lived totality has been cut up and dismembered
into so many tiny particles. Everything has been ground up and
reduced to powder so that nothing can be seen anymore. Naturally this
formidable work of mystification has been carried out in the name of
truth. The truth that many expect and demand to be pushed through
in the halls of the courts.
And yet, everyone knows what really happened. It is indelibly
etched in the memories and the flesh of the thousands of demonstrators
who were there. And Genoa has precisely demonstrated the absolute
practical uselessness and the frequent dangerousness of cameras and
video cameras. Apart from the police, who profited from them in
identifying and denouncing many rebels — a task made easier by the
omnipresence of carriers of telephoto lenses — , and the journalists
who collected their wages for the work carried out, of what use was
all this camerawork? What’s the use of showing the entire world that
the vice-chief of the Digos\footnote{Political police.} in Genoa, Alessandro Perugini, kicked a
boy who was stretched out on the ground, immobilized by the cop’s
colleagues, in the face? Has he been put in a position where he can no
longer repeat his endeavour, because he was caught in the act? Has a
court condemned him; has he been kicked out of the police force and
replaced with a well-educated officer, respectful of the constitution?
Not at all, quite the opposite. With rather macabre humour, the state
named Mr. Perugini as the Italian representative for an international
campaign against torture in the world.
The belief that it is sufficient to expose the abuses of power
in order to force it to its knees is an ideological illusion, deserving
to disappear like all ideologies. Goodness knows they felt wretched,
these idealists who believe in the light that vanquishes the shadows,
at the news that the experts of the magistrature observing the video
established nothing less than that it could have been a stone launched
by demonstrator deflecting the bullet that killed Carlo Giuliani. A
whitish puff that appeared suddenly above his head a moment before
his death would show it. It is really true that in an image, everyone
can see what they want. And in a competition of images and chatter
between alternative and institutional media, it is useless to hide that
the latter will always win.
Just as there is no use waiting for any truth from an image,
in the same way we cannot expect any justice from a verdict. Because
the courts are institutions of the same state that ordered the bloodbath
that happened in Genoa. Why should judges ever condemn men who
are habitually at their service? Let’s get rid of the pious and reassuring
commonplace that claims that a difference exists between the state of
law and the state of deed, as if there were two entities that must be
brought together in order to have justice. The state invents its law and
applies and modifies this law as it believes best, knowing that it is just
a question of wastepaper. The torturers who ripped up the ID cards of
the arrested in Bolzaneto, shouting, “here you have no rights, you are
no one”, expressed the undisguised nature of the state, of which they
are the loyal and obedient servants.
\section{The Illusion of an End}
\begin{quote}
\emph{The courage of the impossible is the light that breaks through the fog,
before which death’s terrors fall and the present becomes life.}
Carlo Michelstaedter
\end{quote}
All that is remembered of the days in Genoa is the brutality
of the cops. The joyous aspect of a subversion of daily life has been
almost completely buried. But the uprising of three years ago is still
there, threatening in its incompleteness. So threatening that in the
meantime its meaning has not only been eroded by state reason that
has imposed and endless war, but also by slander, mystification and
dismissal put into action by all those — in uniform or overalls — who
were supposed to guarantee order and security in the streets of Genoa,
with the results we know so well. So threatening that hundreds of direct
actions against power (from sabotaged ATMs to blocked trains, from
attacked police stations to damaged scientific institutes, from burnt
diplomatic cars to wrecked Italian branch offices and dealerships) have
been carried out in the weeks and months after Genoa throughout
the world. So threatening, finally, that after the fog of representation,
power is preparing the cement of imprisonment.
Against state vengeance and in spite of those who make use of
the odious division into good and bad, already realized in the streets,
before the judges (maybe justifying the conflicts with the cops as a
legitimate response to the charges, but condemning actions against
the structures of the state and capital that happened earlier\dots{}), it is the
meaning of that uprising that we must affirm, against pacifiers and
investigators. Because revolt explodes, well beyond the dates set by
power, in the place where the game is really played: in the totality of our
lives. This is where we will encounter, together with the social conflicts
to come, the desires of those who fought with courage in Genoa. The
place of a crime called freedom in which innocent and guilty do not
exist.
So then no court, isolating and attacking the accused, will
place its seal on those days.
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Elephant Archives
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Where is the Festival?
Notes on Summits \& Counter-Summits
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guerrasociale.org 2005. Elephant Editions 2005. Translated by Venemous Butterfly Publications.
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