Peacefully Protesting the G8 and G20

Protestors of the upcoming summits should not, under any circumstances, resort to violence.

Social change groups are mobilizing around the upcoming G8 and G20 summits in Huntsville and Toronto, June 25-27, 2010, to demand action on a variety of crucially important global issues.

Environmentalists are demanding action on climate change in the lead-up to the United Nations conference in Cancun this December, and calling for the G20 to deliver on its commitment to curtailing subsidies for fossil fuels. The labour movement is demanding green jobs and that workers not be forced to shoulder the cost of the financial crisis caused by irresponsible, greedy financial institutions. Many groups are supporting the Robin Hood Tax that would provide financing for international aid and assist in the struggle for climate justice in the developing world.

Yet as has so often happened at these important international meetings, vital issues receive little public scrutiny, while media coverage has focused on the debate about construction of security fences and the threat of violent protest.

The debate on violent versus nonviolent protests took on new urgency after the May 18 firebombing of a local RBC branch in Ottawa. A group calling itself "FFFC-Ottawa" claimed responsibility for the action, blaming the bank for “exploitation of people and the environment” and threatening further violence.

While the vast majority of organizations and individuals oppose violent actions and support nonviolent direct action (peaceful civil disobedience), the concept of diversity of tactics has been evoked to defend the role of violent actions within the context of a broader social change movement, or at least to encourage silence and discourage criticism of violence. The idea behind diversity of tactics is that nonviolent and "not nonviolent" tactics can work together in a protest environment where each option is allowed its space.

The problem is that violence cannot be morally or tactically justified, and silence is complicity. Violence will discredit and discourage participation in broad-based social change movements, as well as being incompatible with nonviolent direct action, as espoused by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

Diversity of tactics was born on October 23, 2000, when a demonstration was called outside the Sheraton Hotel in Montreal by the Convergence des luttes anticapitalistes (CLAC). Inside the hotel was a closed meeting of the Group of 20 (G20) to discuss financial globalization. A leaflet said the demonstration was going to target the meeting based on "respect for a diversity of tactics.” A peaceful protest by hundreds of demonstrators had barely started when, despite the vocal opposition of many present, a small group of masked protesters, some wielding two-by-fours, set garbage bins on fire and started throwing rocks and bottles at the police lines. The ensuing script has now become familiar.

The protest quickly degenerated into brutal chaos. As masked protesters provoked the police and destroyed property, an all-out violent police response was unleashed. Officers armed with pepper spray, some on horseback, charged the crowd and chased demonstrators down the streets. Dozens of arrests were made, leaving many protesters frightened, hurt, and disempowered.

Ten years after the first “diversity of tactics” demonstration in Montreal, numerous violent protests based on the concept have taken place. These include the 2001 Carnival against the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City and the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, which saw hundreds of protesters injured and one shot dead by police. A string of yearly G8 and G20 summits with violent clashes have extended from 2002 in Ottawa to the 2009 G20 protests in Pittsburgh. The track record of diversity of tactics also includes protests aimed at other targets, such as the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) in Montebello, Quebec, the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia. This tragic pattern of violence needs to be challenged.

Diversity of tactics rests on three main tenets, not always made explicit:

1. No tactic should be ruled out as a policy. Diversity of tactics is freedom to choose any tactic, violent or nonviolent.
2. No organized marshals or peacekeeping team should enforce any code of behaviour. At least one protest area should be free of restrictions and devoid of nonviolent action guidelines, especially regarding property destruction.
3. No public criticism of other tactics should be expressed before, during, or after the events.

The seduction of diversity of tactics lies in its promise to bring under one unified umbrella the many different approaches to social change. The idea that all of us should stick together across petty tactical differences is enticing. The need for unity is common sense.

However, the diversity of tactics concept stretches this logic so that "diversity of" comes to mean “any.” Most people would agree that "a diversity of foods" is good for us, but it’s obviously false to claim that "any food" is good for us. There is clearly a difference between healthy foods and toxic foods, just as there is a difference between tactics that build broad support for a campaign and tactics that lead to loss of credibility, injuries, and death.

The diversity of tactics concept allows and condones tactics such as those of the Black Bloc, which has historically included the wearing of hoods and masks to conceal identities, physical fights with the police, breaking windows, smashing cars and media vehicles, and firebombing.

An underlying assumption is that peaceful protesters will be “politicized” by provoking police into responding to violence with violence. This arrogant position not only places nonviolent demonstrators at risk, it also leads to alienation and a weakening of the social change movement.

In this society, a group that chooses violence chooses to marginalize itself. Widely rejected tactics such as fire bombings or window-smashing not only lead to mass arrests, but also result in a loss of credibility and public support.

There are basically two different types of tactics: violent and nonviolent. To bring about change, each relies on radically different mechanisms.

Violence relies on intimidation of the opponent, with a clear threat of destruction. It is rooted in the belief that opponents change only when they fear for themselves and their possessions. Pushed to its limit, it is terrorism.

Nonviolent tactics are rooted in the belief that opponents can change willingly or, when that fails, that they can be forced to concede and change through organized mass noncooperation. This includes strikes and boycotts, or nonviolent direct actions such as civil disobedience, blockades, sit-ins and civil resistance raids. Pushed to its limit, this is about “people power” becoming strong enough to challenge and change corporate and governmental power structures.

Like an ecosystem, an effective social change movement rests on a delicate balance that can be disrupted. Fighting police is the tactical equivalent of spraying Agent Orange on a rainforest – the impact is devastating, indiscriminate, and widespread – only the most hardened species survive. When violent tactics are introduced into a mix of creative nonviolent tactics, the environment is quickly reduced to projectile-throwing, masked, mostly male, black-clad monoculture. When the Black Bloc have thrown their last rocks, they run and hide, and only the police remain.

So not all tactics are compatible with each other. Violent and nonviolent tactics rely on different change mechanisms, and operate under radically different and incompatible strategic dynamics.

It seems logical that “peaceful” and violent protests can be segregated and divided into zones at events like the G8/G20 summits. The argument is made that protesters should not let tactical considerations divide them. It is suggested that protesters can simply agree to disagree, and allow all of the possible tactics to be staged together, or at different times.

Aside from issues of principle, the problem is that the designation of "green" or "yellow" zones carries no guarantee that those spaces will not be invaded by the police, or that peaceful demonstrations won’t be used as a cover and hiding place for rock throwers. In fact, this is exactly what has happened elsewhere.

There will inevitably be confusion between peaceful “family-friendly” events and other potentially violent events. And protesters at events like the G8/G20 summits will be lumped together by most media and most of the people who follow those media. The irresponsible violent actions of a few individuals will be the defining image of the protest, instead of the responsible peaceful actions of the vast majority.

One of the greatest casualties of diversity of tactics is the absolute reduction of political space for collective, nonviolent direct action, and civil disobedience.

Nobody wants to do a peaceful, sit-in blockade while taunts and rocks fly over their heads. In Seattle in 1999, and in other instances since, black-clad "protesters" have been seen provoking police while truly courageous protesters were carrying out peaceful civil disobedience actions on the front lines, taking the brunt of the police attacks as they were provoked. Black Bloc communiqués have claimed that their role was to "protect" the nonviolent activists. In fact, they were jeopardizing their safety.

The diversity of tactics concept needs to be openly debated and challenged. Three simple questions should be answered:

1. What tactics are going to be explicitly excluded? For instance, will throwing projectiles or molotov cocktails, setting fires, etc. be rejected?
2. How will we actually prevent the rejected tactics and behaviours from happening?
3. If rejected tactics happen anyway, how should we distance ourselves from them?

Without clear answers to these questions, organizations and individuals should reject coalitions and groupings based on diversity of tactics.

Nonviolent action is the only way to build a successful mass movement for social change. Without nonviolent action, there is no real respect for true diversity of tactics.