> How does this compare with something like Seattle,
> where you actually shut something down?
>
> A few people, you included Doug, have praised WWP for
> having gotten so many people out in the street. If
> such demonstrations have little or no effect, other
> than being a sort of empty left-wing ritual, then does
>
> that number really matter? Is there a possibility of
> another "Seattle" so long as we have groups like WWP
> "leading" the anti-war movement into ineffective
> channels of dissent?
>
One of my favorite barometers of "success" after Seattle was a WSJ article about the number of NGO's admitted as observers, I believe to the World Bank meetings. Pre-Seattle, the number hovered in the low teens. After Seattle, the next year the number was 350! This was possible because of the people in the street backing up the NGO's. That indeed was a little reported aspect of the WTO meetings that did manage to take place in Seattle. A couple credentialed NGO reps even got arrested and thrown out of the inside meetings.
Of course another "success" in Seattle was considerable market for riot gear, flash bang grenades, and chemical crowd control (tear gas).
WWP can only "lead" when there is sufficient synergy of people with other interests. The WTO Seattle events were a coming together of LOTS of labor, human rights and environmental sensibilities and people who engage about these issues in a variety of ways distinct from WWP.
As for "ineffective channels of dissent," I have a lot of confidence in people's ability to make progress based on dialogue that only intermittently spill into street demos. To me the street demos are powerless without all the behind the scenes parts too.
DoreneC -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20021030/36181f6d/attachment.htm>