[Nettime-bold] .histories Black Block interview re Seattle 99

["Lachlan Brown" <lachlan@london.com>]

Black Block Participant Interview by Active Transformation

The following is an interview with an anarchist participant in the Seattle Shutdown the WTO demonstrations that will be appearing in the upcoming issue of Active Transformation. We believe this interview displays some important observations about the protests and the many participants, as well as the future of revolutionary anarchist struggle. For security reasons the interview subject did not give their name. 

AT: First off what made you decide to go to Seattle? 

BB: I had a feeling it would be important. I remember reading about the WTO in an anarchist newspaper from Minneapolis called the Blast, probably 4 years ago...and it stuck with me as a pretty evil entity. I had not heard much of it since, until about a year before the Seattle demo. The various People's Global Action events, especially the J18 demos against the G8, had been very inspiring. I always felt like protests in the U.S. have always been disappointing - but the preparation for N30 seemed interesting. There was a sense from the beginning that it would be a mass event, even if not extremely militant. On the chance that it might be a massive protest against global capitalism, me and a few others decided to go. 

I had no reason to believe it would be so successful at disrupting the WTO's ability to function or even exist, at this point. 

AT: Why do you think the protests were so successful? 

BB: I think this was probably the most important event for the American left in the last twenty-years. There have been large events, like the Gulf War protests, etc., but not that have been so diverse and interested in disrupting business as usual, and then being successful. 

There were three main reasons the protests were so successful. The first reason was that there were hundreds of different organizations: labor, environmental, anarchist, students, women, anti-sweatshop - the whole spectrum. This alone didn't do it though. What made it powerful was that it was pretty understood this was not going to be a passive, stand in the street and give speeches, appeal to the masters, kinda demo. It was well understood by all that it was going to be about disrupting the conference - and that is a big step for the American movement. 

The second reason it was so successful was that the strategy developed through the Direct Action Network meetings the entire week was anarchism in action. The plan developed was based on affinity groups, which are small clusters of people who know each other who have similar political goals or desires, etc. What we did was devide the downtown area into pie slices, with the convention center as ground zero. Then, different affinity groups would take responsibility for different slices, and plan however they saw fit cause disruption that would hinder the operation of the conference. This made police disruption utterly impossible. The cops could forsee very little since the strategy was so decentralized among closely knit groups. 

The third, and most controversial reason, was that of the black block elevating the protest to a different extreme level. I am not saying that the black block was more radical or more politically advanced, but that the key to the success of the protest was the diversity of tactics, interrelating in a number of ways to cause disruption that was not policable. 

AT: Could you talk a little bit about the anarchist black block? 

BB: Before I do that I would like to mention that anarchists were not isolated in the black block. There were anarchists involved in every possible way. There were anarchist labor activists, puppeteers, non-violent lockdown blockaders, marching musicians, medics, communication people, media people, whatever - as well as a group of about two hundred in black masks who had prepared, also in affinity groups, to do as much symbolic physical damage to multi-national capitalism as possible. 

I have seen black blocks used in protests in the U.S. a lot but never so successfully. It is important to note that the black block was not the result of some conspiracy. It too happened quite spontaneously, with people who came from all over the country - with similar desires. 

The day started with black block people in small groups making impromptu blockades with whatever was handy in the streets - dumpsters, newspaper boxes, warning tape, planters, among other things. In addition to this the black clad anarchists supplemented attempts to make human blockades at the Sheraton hotel, where many delegates, and across the street at the convention center. Where the pacifist lines were weak, the black block would fill in and create a second line, further away from the police. They would also surround delegates in the street and force them, non-violently, to alter course away from the hotels or the convention center. At one point a delegate pulled a handgun on protesters, at which point the protesters hit the deck, and the delegate was escorted through the police line, gun still in hand. 

One false line that is being pushed by the mainstream media, as well as a lot of underground media was that the violent police response was somehow caused by the property destruction. I would like to state that the police violence had begun by 9 am, in response to very successful street and doorway blockades, way before the window breaking began shortly after "Reclaim the Streets" at 11am. They began with tear gas, rubber bullets, etc. The first window broken actually was when a tear gas grenade was shot through a store window. 

There had been minor property "transformation" throughout the morning, and even the day before. It was mostly graffitti - on buses, cop cars, the Sheraton, etc. The day before N30 a protest at McDonalds sponsored by French Farmers, caused minor destruction to windows, etc. It should have been a sign of what was to come. 

When the large scale window breaking began it was quite awe-inspiring. All of a sudden people we were walking with pulled out all sorts of tools: nail pullers, hammers, crow bars. They then proceeded to very quickly knock windows out of every bank, upper class or multi-national clothing store. I even saw a woman smashing an ATM machine with a sledge hammer. I was afraid at any moment a police tactical team would break through the crowd and violently assault the Black Block. 

AT: On 60 Minutes they put most of the emphasis on the anarchists from Eugene, OR. Do you think they are responsible for what happened? 

BB: While I know they were there, the black block had a few hundred people in it. I know there were people there from all over the country. The Eugene people have just been very open about violent demo tactics. The 60 minutes episode really does disfavor to revolutionary anarchism, in that it portrays all anarchists through the eyes and mouths of the primitivists - who in my mind make up a small minority of anarchist activists. The primitivists put anti-technology and environmentalism at the forefront of their politics, and downplay, in my opinion, the real social and class struggle that has to take place. While the primitivist critique is useful, it ignores the liberatory aspects of technology. Without computers Seattle would not have happened the way it did. Also drawing a line between the Unabomber and anarchism has serious marginalizing consequences. 

AT: Could you talk a little bit about the police response to the events in Seattle? 

BB: I would say that they messed up big time, way to our advantage. The first day they thought they would be effective by undermining what they thought to be our strategy of filling up the jails. They planned to make no arrests, and just use plenty of non-lethal force. That non-lethal force just stregnthened people's resolve to disrupt the conference. It also transformed a lot of people to move away from strict pacifism. It is easier to remain a pacifist if you've never felt the force of the state. When their strategy failed all they could do was try and maintain the police lines, which they had a lot of trouble with. 

By the end of the first day a State of Civil Emergency had been declared and there was a lot of criticism of the more destructive activists. The police and the city had an opportunity to turn things around for themselves and they blew it. The cops went on a rampage for 24 hours indiscriminantly attacking people all over the city. While they arrested a lot of activists for civil disobedience, the brunt of the force was directed against non-activist civilians. The police were already under a lot of heat for mishandling the day before. With the ensuing day of police rioting they had turned our struggle into a much more popular struggle, and the cops lost all respect.20 

AT: How do you view the other groups that were out there, like the environmental and labor groups? 

BB: They were all critical to the success of the demonstration. It was the barrage from all sides that led to the all-consuming critique that has spread out across the country. Before N30 next to no one has heard of the WTO. And now almost everyone has heard of it and has a bad taste in their mouth about it. The coalition that shut down the WTO ministerial was extremely diverse and that is what made it powerful.20 

Even within the categories of labor and environmental groups there is a huge diversity. You go from Earth First! to the Sierra Club, and from the AFL-CIO to the Longshoresmen. While the more liberal groups made it a mass event, the more radical groups transformed the day into a celebration of anti-capitalist disruption. The Longshoremen and Sheetmetal workers both broke with the labor marshalls plans to divert the demos away from the action downtown. The Sheetmetal workers came and stood against the police lines and faced tear gas with the rest of us. Other unions did the same the next day. 

AT: What meaning does Seattle have for the larger movement? 

BB: I can only begin to answer this in a brief context. First off it provides evidence of at least two really important things: that there is a movement and that we can win. The graffitti on walls all over the city stated clearly "We Are Winning!". By that evening when the state of civil emergency was declared the downtown had been completely altered - it felt like a revolution was underway - it was really powerful. I know that people came back to their cities totally energised to carry on the struggle. 

We need these boosts. So often it feels like there is no hope for a better future. That has changed drastically for me. Another thing was that in talking with people over the next couple of days I got the impression that a good majority of the people who came out were new, young activists. That for me is really exciting. I am sure they have been totally empowered by the experience and will make our movement entirely more vibrant.20 

I think it is important that we build on the foundation of Seattle. We need to take advantage of this chance to dialogue between different groups. The chance for communication between labor, anarchist, and environmental groups is open to us all to learn and develop stronger ties. We must continue to push for strategies that challenge the power of business and state, not appeal to it.20 

We also need to root our struggles in the communities we live in and around issues of oppression and injustice that are everyday issues to people all around us. There has been a large critique among people of color that the largely white anti-WTO protesters mobilize against injustice around the world - but fail to connect, prioritize, or even attempt to understand with important struggles going on right here. That is one of the critical lessons we need to take to heart. 

AT: So what can we look forward to next? 

BB: Besides the plethora of local issues and projects we can get involved in there are a few potentially interesting things on the near horizon. In April the International Money Fund is having an international conference in D.C. It is questionably the WTO's bigger, eviller brother. People's Global Action has also called for the next big international day of action against global capitalism to be on Mayday, May 1st this year. There are already plans in the works for events in Seattle, Detroit, Phoenix, London, and Shutdown Wallstreet in New York City, as well as a number of other cities around the world. 

One critical thing to remember is that there are a number of people facing charges from the Seattle events, some of which a very serious. It is critical to the growth of a healthy radical movement that we do the necessary legal support to free these folks and get them back out in the streets with us.20 

Active Transformation
PO Box 6746
East Lansing, MI 48826 

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