People, dogs and hand-painted posters took over Eugene’s Monroe Park early Saturday afternoon, with activists gathering to speak against what they see as increased globalization efforts by corporations and governments in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.
More than 200 people attended the protest, which was one of many protests across the globe Saturday planned to coincide with the International Monetary Fund and World Bank policy meetings scheduled that day. The meetings were canceled after the events of Sept. 11.
“Originally, this event was scheduled (worldwide) as a day of mobilization because of IMF and World Bank meetings,” explained one of the event’s organizers, David Bersch. “Many of the original sponsors of this event backed out after Sept. 11. The emphasis now is on a peaceful solution to the problem (of economic injustice).”
Event organizers lectured from a makeshift stage at the center of the park, acted out skits about problems with increased globalization and sang songs with refrains such as “No way, FTAA.”
The FTAA, or Free Trade Area of the Americas, is a group of 34 nations seeking international standards on trade issues, according to the site FTAA.org. An April, 1998 BBC article said the group originally formed at a summit of nations meeting in early 1998 in Santiago, Chile. The group hopes to decrease tariffs, help international corporations by legislating patent laws that apply internationally, and use organizations such as the World Bank and the IMF to fund economic expansion in member countries, according to its Web site.
“If we’re going to promote a capitalist system, we need to address the problems caused by it,” said another event organizer, Lara Skinner. “The goal of meeting today is to open up a discussion of why there are people and groups that would be harmed by U.S. policies worldwide.”
Many of the participants in Saturday’s event are members of the Fair Trade Coalition of Lane County. Skinner and others like her have joined the FTC as a way of making their views known. “We want to discover how the global economy is promoting incidents like Sept. 11,” she said.
“The government has been listening to money, not our voices,” said fellow organizer Josh Kellermann. Skinner and Kellermann both belong to the group United Students Against Sweatshops, which was one of many groups that joined together in Monroe Park on Saturday.
“Big corporations usurp the Constitution,” said Russ Goodwin, who described himself as simply a “taxpayer who has a right to be heard” and held a sign saying “End Corporate Treason.”
“They buy our politicians, who then no longer represent the public,” he said.
One globalization issue being protested Saturday was U.S. funding for Colombia’s war on drugs.
“The war on drugs is a fallacy,” Kellermann said. “Eradicating the dependency on drugs would be far more efficient. There need to be programs (supported by the government) that help treat people that have drug problems.”
Posters at the event echoed his thoughts — one in particular said, “In memory of those who have died in the ‘War on Drugs.’” One of the day’s speakers summed up the view of many of the protesters: “It’s going to take all of us to stop the FTAA.”