"Dear friends in and visitors to Denver:
Thank you for gathering to lay the groundwork for a response to the
upcoming Democratic National Convention. We share your investment in
this and appreciate your efforts. We discussed at length whether to
send one of us to join you, and finally concluded that it would be
more efficient to focus our energy on this side of the country this
month; we trust that you are at least as competent and informed as we
are.
In place of a spokesperson, we send this letter, which we request that
you circulate and read at the consulta. We also encourage others
around the country who are invested in responding to the DNC but
cannot attend this consulta to send letters of their own, so the
decisions that come out of the consulta can take into account a wide
range of the perspectives and desires of those who will participate
this coming August.
These are the points we consensed upon as important to us:
*We wish for anarchists and anti-authoritarians organizing against the
DNC to maintain autonomous organizing structures, so we can initiate
and coordinate our own actions rather than simply reacting to others’
decisions. We should use our power in a way that complements and
supports others in their struggles, but retain our own infrastructure
and decision making. In previous mass actions, when anarchist and
anti-authoritarian efforts have been subsumed into vertically
structured organizing, it has neither benefited us nor, in our
opinion, the effectiveness of the mass actions in general.
*We are concerned that, on a national level, the organizing against
the Republican National Convention seems to be further along than the
organizing against the DNC. If this continues, we fear that many more
anti-authoritarians will attend the RNC than the DNC, as occurred in
2004. This would be a tremendous missed opportunity, on a number of
levels. First, it would give the impression that anti-authoritarians
are simply the radical fringe of the liberal establishment, opposing
Republicans but leaving Democrats unchallenged. This essentially lets
the Democrats off the hook for their complicity in the occupation of
Iraq, the assault on civil liberties, and the exploitation and
ecological devastation inflicted by industrial capitalism; now that
the Democrats seem poised to take the reins of the executive branch,
it is more important than ever to show that we offer a concrete
opposition to party politics, not just Republican excesses. This
should be easier than usual this election, as the Democrats obtained a
majority in Congress on the promise that they would deal with the Iraq
quagmire, a promise they have failed to keep.
*In view of this, we hope that this consulta will produce a concrete
strategy proposal that can be endorsed by groups nationwide. Busy
radicals are already making plans for this summer, deciding what to
prioritize according to what seems most promising.
*We would like to see a strategy that provides for the desires and
participation of anarchists and anti-authoritarians nationwide as well
as Denver locals. The system supported by the Democrats affects the
lives of millions across the US and the world; the DNC is not just a
local Denver issue, but a national and international one. We hope for
a strategy that is satisfactory for Denver locals, but that
incorporates local initiatives into national initiatives rather than
vice versa. If such a strategy won’t come out of the current
organizing, please make this clear, so others nationwide can create one.
*As many have emphasized, we believe it is critical that our primary
focus be on the first day of the convention itself—Monday, August
25—because this day will set the tone for the entire convention and
the protests against it. Likewise, we think it is important that as
many actions as possible occur simultaneously rather than one after
the other. When actions occur one at a time, as in the past two RNC
protests, they can be isolated and more easily repressed; when they
coincide, as they did at the Seattle WTO protests, the police are
stretched thin, and less able to interfere.
*We would like to see a strategy that makes space for arrestable as
well as legal activity, for all those who desire conflict with state
and capital. This is bound to be controversial; no doubt at every step
there will be people who believe there is a reason to rule out direct
action and decentralized activity. Not providing for these, on the
other hand, creates the possibility that they will occur anyway in
ways that are less effective and less safe for others.
*We have heard some people talking about targeting the delegates
themselves, a strategy that was tested at the 2004 RNC. We strongly
recommend against making harassing individual delegates the main goal
of any counter-DNC strategy. We feel this gives the impression that
the conflict is a private grudge match between protesters and
delegates; on the contrary, we desire a public confrontation with the
institutions of capitalism, in which people collectively join in
impeding its functioning. The SHAC model, on which this idea of
targeting delegates seems to be based, has pushed Huntingdon Life
Sciences—one corporation—to the brink of bankruptcy because all that
is needed in that case is for the targeted individuals to take their
business elsewhere. We doubt a similar campaign against the Democratic
Party—or the electoral system—would produce similar results.
*We would prefer a strategy that brings people together into the same
physical space rather than dispersing them over a broad area without a
common focus. This is important to us both for the sake of momentum
and morale and also in view of the topography of downtown Denver.
*Speaking specifically, we would prefer a DNC strategy that
incorporates some variant of the earlier proposals incorporating
multiple coinciding marches and blockading. Whatever strategy arises,
we hope it will reflect the interests and capabilities of all who are
invested in opposing the DNC.
This year’s DNC protests can be magnificently awesome, but only if we
get moving. See you at Colfax and Broadway!
Again, thank you for the work you are doing. See you in Denver.
Unconventional Action Central NC"
_________________
"Boredom is counter-revolutionary."
-- Situationist International
