Northeast Anti-G8 Roadshow and Caravan Scheduled,
From Quebec City to New York, Toronto to Ottawa
Between April 2 to April 17, activists from Quebec, Ontario and Alberta will
be taking to the road in a three-week caravan against the G8. The caravan
will be linking with community groups and local activists in the Northeast
region. In addition to information about the G8, and the regional
mobilization in Ottawa on June 26-27 ("Take the Capital!"), the caravan will
be presenting info about a wide range of topics, from the Common Front
Campaign against the Tory government in Ontario, to the Peoples
Global
Action (PGA) international network of resistance, to the planning for
resistance in Alberta in June.
The caravan and roadshow will include evening panels with local activists
and organizers. Workshops on a variety of topics -- such as the G8 and
anti-oppression organizing -- will also be part of the caravan at afternoon
events.
In addition to formal events, the Caravan is also producing a radio
documentary (The Roots of Resistance) and a larger article and zine,
involving interviews with dozens of community organizers throughout the
Northeast. We are aiming to interview those people involved in day-to-day
grassroots community organizing away from the spectacle of large-scale
protests.
A caravan schedule, list of participants, as well as the organizing and
political principles of the roadshow are included below. Specific details
about local events and workshops will be posted in future caravan
announcements.
We are soliciting your help to make this caravan as effective as possible:
---> If you have contacts with local groups and activists for the radio
documentary project -- the Roots of Resistance -- please pass them on.
---> Caravan participants are also interested in meeting with local groups
and individuals on an informal basis.
---> If you have any information -- pamphlets, callouts, urgent actions,
posters, etc -- that you would like distributed thru the caravan info table,
get in touch.
---> If you can help the Caravan meet its expenses (gas, van rental and
food) with a donation, please let us know.
For more information, or to help, please contact us at 514-844-1994 or
clac@tao.ca.
=== CARAVAN SCHEDULE ===
April 2: Quebec City
April 3: Ottawa
April 4: Montreal
April 5: Toronto
April 8: Toronto/Hamilton
April 9: Peterborough
April 10: Kingston
April 11: Kitchener-Waterloo
April 12: Guelph
April 15: New York City
April 16: Boston
April 17: Amherst, Massachusetts
[Note: If you would like a visit by the anti-G8 Caravan and Roadshow to your
area, please get in touch at clac@tao.ca. More visits are possible later in
April or in early May. A second caravan, covering locations all over Quebec,
is currently in the planning stages.]
=== CARAVAN PARTICIPANTS ===
[The participants below will all be involved with panels, workshops,
interviews and other aspects of the caravan. Not all members of the caravan
will be speaking at every event, and local activists and organizations will
be an integral part of the Caravan at each stop.]
Fiona Cavanagh -- Fiona is a student in international education and an
activist based in Edmonton, Alberta. She works with The People's Action
Network (FTAA), Citizens for Peaceful Communities (police-monitoring),
Ecocity, and is involved with local anti-G8 organizing.
Stefan Christoff -- Stefan is an activist, musician and artist living in
Montreal. He is a member of the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC) and also
an audio activist with CKUT community radio. He has also been active in
planning and organizing the Howl Festival of Art & Revolution in Montreal,
Toronto, New York City and Halifax.
Lisa Freeman -- Lisa is an activist and community organizer who has been
involved in supporting people with developmental disabilities in
Kitchener-Waterloo and Ottawa where she now lives and works. She has
recently been very active in local anti-oppression work, as well as
coalition building against the FTAA and G20 in Ottawa.
Andrea Schmidt -- Andrea lives in Montreal, where she is a member of the
Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC) and Action montrealaise contre la guerre,
l'imperialisme et le racisme (AGIR). Andrea is also a facilitator with the
Montreal Direct Action Workshop.
Marika Schwandt-- Marika is an activist and performer based in Edmonton,
Alberta, where she is active on many projects including indymedia, community
radio, police monitoring and health care struggles. Marika is organising on
many levels to mobilise against the G8.
Jaggi Singh -- Jaggi is a writer and activist based in Montreal. He is a
member of the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC), as well as the anti-war
group AGIR (Action Against War, Imperialism and Racism). He is also a member
of the Alternative Bookshop collective in Montreal.
Shannon Willmott -- Shannon is an Ottawa activist. She has been active in
local mobilizing against the FTAA and G8, anti-biotech activism, and
supporting survivors of sexual violence/women living on the street. Shannon
grew up off-reserve on Lake Muskoka with her mixed Ojibwe/Euro-immigrant
family.
=== ORGANIZING AND POLITICAL PRINCIPLES ===
The Caravan is being undertaken on the basis of the organizing and political
principles of the recent Ottawa Consulta against the G8, as well as the
hallmarks of the Peoples
Global Action (PGA) network. Those principles are:
- an analysis that emphasizes a clear anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist
position against globalization and war;
- a clear emphasis on anti-oppression organizing and education;
- a focus on local organizing, as opposed to just going from one big protest
to another;
- trying to make genuine links between "anti-globalization" issues and local
organizing efforts;
- active support and solidarity for initiatives like the Ontario Common
Front's economic disruption campaign, or the recent squat project in
Montreal;
- a respect for a diversity of tactics, and showing solidarity with the full
scope of resistance in our communities;
- distrust and skepticism of lobbying efforts, emphasizing instead
grassroots organizing, popular education and mobilizing;
- organizing in a non-hierarchical, anti-authoritarian fashion, as well as
within the framework of anti-oppression analysis and action.
In addition to the political and organizing principles outlined above, the
Caravan has adopted the hallmarks of the Peoples' Global Action (PGA)
network (as modified and accepted at Cochabamba, Bolivia in September 2001):
1. A very clear rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism; all
trade agreements, institutions and governments that promote destructive
globalisation.
2. We reject all forms and systems of domination and discrimination
including, but not limited to, patriarchy, racism and religious
fundamentalism of all creeds. We embrace the full dignity of all human
beings.
3. A confrontational attitude, since we do not think that lobbying can have
a major impact in such biased and undemocratic organisations, in which
transnational capital is the only real policy-maker;
4. A call to direct action and civil disobedience, support for social
movements' struggles, advocating forms of resistance which maximize respect
for life and oppressed peoples' rights, as well as the construction of local
alternatives to global capitalism.
5. An organisational philosophy based on decentralisation and autonomy.
For more information, please contact us at 514-844-1994 or clac@tao.ca.
