Posted on 5-12-2002

Florence's New Renaissance


Anti-globalisation is not a nine-day wonder that ended on September 11,
John Vidal*, Monday November 11, 2002,
The Guardian Newspaper


In 1425, the powerful wool merchants' guild of Florence commissioned the
artist Lorenzo Ghiberti to construct a door for the baptistry of St John
in the city. He was to "do whatsoever he desired and designed so that it
should be the most perfect and most beautiful imaginable". Ghiberti took
27 years and did not disappoint. His doors were described by Michelangelo
as worthy of being called the "gates of paradise".


Last week in Florence, a similar kind of open-ended brief, to imagine and
construct a European social edifice worthy of being one day called a
21st-century paradise, was entrusted to the institutions, politicians and
people of Europe. It came from 40,000 intellectuals, students, ecological
and social activists, people representing the poorest and most
marginalised, radical economists, concerned individuals, humanitarians,
artists, culturalists, churches, scientists and land workers from a
bewildering array of non-government groups and grassroots social
movements.


With the title, Another Europe is Possible, and under the banner of the
European Social Forum, the many social movements and groups that have
demonstrated in Seattle, Genoa, Prague, London and a dozen other cities
over the past three years - against world leaders and organisations such
as the International Monetary Fund or the World Trade Organisation - set
out to show that they could actually propose change and not simply oppose
what is happening around the world.


This was no ordinary political gathering; indeed many called it "the new
politics". Seemingly without form, issuing no final communique,
inadequately translated, often chaotic, the four-day meeting drew people
from every corner of Europe and 80 other countries.


No conclusions were reached or consensus sought, for this was more a
laboratory of ideas and debate than a rally to conceive a new party or
constitution, but for the first time it is possible to disentangle the
broad threads of a genuine new vision for Europe from the 400
passionately debated overflowing meetings, often attended by 3,000 people
or more.


Top of the list, they sought a demilitarised Europe at peace with itself
and the world, an ethical continent that takes a high moral stance
against US imperialism. High on the list too was a radical rethink, or
complete rejection, of the predatory capitalism the continent now knows.
They imagined a Europe that rejected crude market ideology, made
institutions fully accountable, put people before profit, and where big
business was not allowed to dominate the political or consumer agendas.


There were specifics: Europe, they said, should have open borders, and
all people within it should have the right to work and to have a home; it
should have a Tobin tax on financial markets and regulation of
corporations; there should be no GM foods or pollution; no privatisation
of public services; the media should be in the hands of the many not the
few; and racism should be driven out.


There was almost complete consensus on three issues: that
"neo-liberalism" - the free-market ideas espoused by the IMF and G7 - is
a violent political and economic doctrine; that trade with poor countries
should be fair; and that one vote every four years given to political
parties run by self-serving elites is no way to run modern, complex
democracies in a globalised economy.


The talk over, and with none of the violence that the Italian government
and media had widely predicted, the 40,000 mainly young people at the
meeting were joined by 250,000 trade unionists, socialists, peaceniks and
others from across Europe in a massive peace march through the most
beautiful city in Europe. It was, said Claudio Martini, the president of
Tuscany, who had thrown open the doors of the city, "an historic day for
the state, the city and the social-forum movement". He did not have to
say it was also one in the eye for the right.


Many at the forum detected something exciting and very fresh emerging.
With the left in Europe dominated for so long by inter-factional
fighting, sclerotic parties, narrow visions, and ignorance of others'
concerns, traditions or cultures, hoary old communists, unionists,
ecologists and fringe groups were all saying they were astonished by the
passion for profound change, and the engagement of a new generation. The
Florence meeting is important, they said, but as yet we do not quite
understand why.


Several things are apparent. Clearly, anti-globalisation,
anti-capitalism, pro-democracy - or whatever tag people want to put on
this movement of movements - is not a nine-day wonder that started in
Seattle and ended promptly on September 11 (as so many US and British
commentators have crowed). What was first given expression at the world
trade meeting in Seattle may be said to be maturing in fits and starts
into a very broad social justice movement, and shedding its TV-inspired
image of grungy anarchists smashing symbols they do not like. Clearly,
too, it is based not just on emotionalism but on growing political theory
and analysis, and is becoming popular enough to draw in many on the left
who had given up hope that change was possible.


Second, many believe they are witnessing the globalisation of opposition
to neo- liberalism, in direct parallel to the globalisation of capital
and economic policies around the world. Out of this, the theory goes, an
all-embracing populist agenda based on the experience of the grassroots
is emerging. Moreover, for the first time in recent history, the agenda
for change is being driven by the grassroots. The European social forum
is itself an idea picked up from the World Social Forum, based in Pôrto
Alegre, Brazil, where each year tens of thousands meet in opposition to
the World Economic Forum, the annual talking shop in Davos. The social
forums' loose structures, emphasising debate and information-sharing,
only go as far as to encourage people to return to their communities to
effect change. This participatory system is completely different to the
established organising of political ideas.


But how far might this mushrooming of concern influence real power, as
displayed in governments, at the EU or in global institutions like the
WTO? The answer, of course, is not much yet, but groundswells have a
habit of developing rapidly and, post-Florence, no politician should,
like Tony Blair, be able to suggest that all demonstrations against world
leaders or institutions are "spurious".


In the short term, the belief held by many in Florence is that meetings
like this will draw together unlikely partners and refresh thinking both
on the left and among the millions disenchanted by establishment
politics. That's not going to construct the gates to a beautiful new
European social paradise, but it may be the foundations for a bridge
leading towards it.


John Vidal is the Guardian's environment editor,
john.vidal@guardian.co.uk