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Spaniards To Continue Mass Action for at Least a Week
Al Jazeera
Hundreds of demonstrators in Spain are planning to extend their protests against the Spanish government’s austerity measures and the political parties that they blame for soaring unemployment.
A show-of-hands vote at a meeting in Madrid’s central Puerta del Sol square, where demonstrators have erected a makeshift camp, saw protesters indicate that they planned to stay at least until May 29.
“We have decided to stay at least until Sunday at 12pm [10:00 GMT],” a protest organizer declared after the vote.
Tens of thousands of Spaniards have demonstrated in the past week in city squares across the country ahead of local and regional elections that are now under way.
(22 May 2011)
Tens of thousands defy Spain’s pre-election protest ban
Charlotte Chelsom-Pill, Deutsche Welle
A pre-election protest ban in Spain has proved unsuccessful as tens of thousands attend nationwide rallies. Defiant protesters have taken to the streets on the eve of local elections to demand social and economic reform.
Furious Spanish youths were undeterred by a government imposed protest ban on Saturday, vowing that they were “here to stay.”
With local elections due to take place on Sunday, tens of thousands of people gathered in city centers across the county for the seventh day of nationwide protests against soaring unemployment.
Hundreds of protesters, known as “los indignados,” (the indignant) camped out in a ramshackle protest village in Madrid’s central Puerta del Sol Square.
Protests also continued in other Spanish cities including Barcelona, Valencia, Sevilla and Bilbao.
… Saturday was declared “a day of reflection,” meaning political activity was forbidden. Yet fearing violent clashes, the socialist government has not strictly enforced the ban and the protests have remained peaceful.
Following the announcement of the ban, the number of protesters across Spain soared. Spain’s leading daily newspaper, El Pais, estimated that around 60,000 people took part in demonstrations on Friday night.
… Spain is currently experiencing the biggest protest movement since the country was first plunged into a recession in 2008.
(21 May 2011)
Spain eyewitness: The people demand to be heard
Mattea Cussel, Green Left
“There are many Joses here, I’m not sure if its my turn or another Jose,” says Jose, a middle-aged man standing on the outer rim of a grupo de trabajo(work group) called at midnight on an adjacent street to Sol, the plaza known as point zero, in the heart of Madrid.
The plaza has been occupied, as have dozens around Spain, since the huge protests on May 15 that brought hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets to demand “real democracy now!” and an end to austerity measures.
It is Jose’s turn in a conversation among 30 people about the general organisation of five work groups focusing on politics, economy, education, culture and the environment, as well as communication with the press.
Jose insists the spontaneous protesters, who number more than 5000 each day, must take their time before drawing conclusions about their specific demands in the lead-up to the May 22 municipal council and regional elections.
He says the Spanish press is not asking the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers Party) nor the PP (Popular Party), the two major political parties, their demands as is normally the case in unfolding public debates during election season.
Rather the daily question in the national newspaper El Pais is what these young people wish to achieve through their capturing of the plaza in the wake of the Arab revolutions?
Young people do abound in the plaza, but key voices in the work groups are older people who come armed with professional expertise and some even with memories of the 1930s civil war.
That El Pais should expect a definitive answer from a movement that grew organically out of the May 15 protests denies the right to a desperately needed period of political reflection in a country in the midst of severe economic crisis.
That the protesters are mostly young is no surprise in a country where youth unemployment is about 40% and a university graduate considers themselves lucky to secure a job at a fast food outlet.
The overwhelming sentiment is that corrupt politicians must be banned from re-election and the electoral laws must be reformed so that they are more representative. ….
Manifesto of the Assembly of the Sol Plaza Camp
WHO ARE WE?
We are individuals who have come together freely and voluntarily. Each of us has decided, after the concentrations on Sunday, May 15, that we are determined to continue fighting for dignity and political and social awareness.
We do not represent any political party or association.
We are joined by the singular cause of change.
We are brought together by integrity and solidarity with those who are unable to
join us.
WHY ARE WE HERE?
We are here because we desire a new society that puts lives above political and economical interests. We demand a change in society and an increase in social awareness. We are here to make it known that the people have not fallen asleep, and we will continue fighting…peacefully.
We send our support to the friends that have been detained for participation in these concentrations, and we demand their immediate release with no criminal charges.
We want all of this, and we want it now. If you are with us, come join us.
“Better to risk and lose than to lose without having risked at all.”
(21 May 2011)
Nick Griffin and the fall of the BNP
Matthew Goodwin, Guardian/UK
On 5 May, the electoral challenge from the BNP died after another string of dismal results. While it could at one time mobilise over 700 local election candidates and a quarter of a million votes, this month the party awoke to find its vote had collapsed and the number of its councillors had plummeted. The following message came from its leader: “There is no shame in electoral defeat.”
… Its limited appeal was not helped by the way in which, somewhere along the way, Griffin took leave of political reality. At various points he concluded Britons could be won over by focusing on the “peak oil” crisis, allowing ex-servicemen to retain their guns and ammunition and then (in front of over 8 million viewers) defending the Ku Klux Klan on Question Time. In contrast to the likes of Marine Le Pen and Geert Wilders, Griffin never grasped the simple point that large numbers of Britons wanted their anxiety over immigration and political dissatisfaction met by a seemingly modem, legitimate and credible radical right party. Or perhaps he just couldn’t deliver.
… The BNP will linger on, most likely by investing in activities outside elections, but its attempt to mobilise Britons through the ballot box is dead. The party is survived by a growing array of splinter groups. Most, however, similarly lack the resources and sophistication required to take full advantage of the favourable conditions that remain in Britain for a radical right alternative. There exists considerable potential for an anti-immigrant populist party, but these voters are unlikely to resuscitate the BNP.
(21 May 2011)
Hmmm. “Peak oil” is listed as a sign of political suicide along with definding the Ku Klux Klan. That’s not encouraging, is it?
For years, there have been reports of people from the far right Brishish Nationalist Party (BNP) at peak oil events. At one time, the BNP probably had the most thought-out political platform based on peak oil of any major political party. It looks as if those days are over.
-BA
Money Troubles Take Personal Toll in Greece
Landon Thomas Jr., New York Times
ATHENS — His face contorted with anguish, Anargyros D. recounted how he had lost everything in the aftermath of the Greek economic collapse — the food-processing factory founded by his father 30 years ago, his house, his car, his Rolex, his pride and now, he said, his will to live.
Many times I have thought of taking my father’s car and driving it into a wall,” he said, declining to give his last name because he was reluctant to draw attention to himself under these circumstances.
Hunched over and shaking, he sat last week in the spartan office of Klimaka, a social services organization here that provides help to the swelling numbers of homeless and depressed Greek professionals who have lost their jobs and their dignity.
“We were the people in Greece who helped others,” he said. “Now we are asking for help.”
It has been one year since Greece avoided bankruptcy when Europe and the International Monetary Fund provided a 110 billion euro ($155 billion) bailout. While no one expected the country to reverse its sagging fortunes quickly, the despair of Greeks like Anargyros D. reflects a level of suffering deeper than anyone here had anticipated.
Economists are predicting a 4 percent contraction in gross domestic product this year, and the data support the pessimism.
(15 May 2011)
Athens Plunges Deeper Into Crisis
Apostolis Fotiadis, IPS
The murder of Manolis Kantaris, 44, last week has initiated a vicious circle of violence in the Greek capital that deepens the existing wounds of the country and makes many wonder what the future holds for Athenians.
Kantaris was stabbed to death late at night while preparing to drive his wife to the hospital to give birth to their second child. The incident took place in the heart of Athens, a place that residents increasingly describe as a lawless area where organised criminal groups rampage.
It is alleged by police – given footage collected from nearby security cameras, and locals – that the three murderers were of northern Africa origin.
The following day members of nationalist-fascist groups – whose presence in Athens’s devalued neighbourhoods during the last year has increased – have staged numerous attacks to ‘avenge’ the Kantaris murder. They ruthlessly attacked migrants and abused people who protested against their violence.
“People in this society wherever they come from need to stay united, criminality does not depend on nationality or ethnic background, and none should hold migrants collectively responsible for this murder,” Naim El Gadour, head of the Muslim Association of Greece told IPS. “Sober people have to take the initiative and seek solutions to the unfolding crisis in downtown Athens. We need this – Greeks and foreigners alike.”
The police are being criticised for tolerating the violent nationalist actions to an extent that led Minister of Security Xristos Papoutsis to publicly admit lack of control over security forces operating in the field.
“It is better to dissolve a security structure, no matter how effective this is, if it operates under a special tolerance status that covers up abuses of power and incidence of extreme violence,” Papoutsis said while warning about a “democratic deficit and arbitrariness inside the security structures of the state.”
(16 May 2011)
Ethnic strife is common when times get tough. -BA
Work-sharing or subsidized leave policies might help ease the pain of U.S. recovery
Alan Barber, Center for Economic and Policy Research
Danish and German Policies Yield Contrasting Experiences with the Great Recession
—
Washington DC- Two years into the official recovery from the Great Recession, millions of Americans are still without work. While the recession hit countries around the world, many weathered the crisis better than the United States. A new report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) looks at 21 countries at a similar level of economic development to the United States and explores why some countries fared better than others.
The report, “Labor Market Policy in the Great Recession,” focuses on Denmark and Germany, countries with very different experiences before and after the recession, and considers some possible lessons for the United States.
Denmark, which was widely seen as one of the world’s most successful labor markets before the downturn, has struggled in recent years. By contrast, Germany, which went through a long, difficult transition after the unification of East and West Germany in the early 1990s, has outperformed the rest of the world’s rich countries since 2007.
The secret to Germany’s successful market performance, the report says, was the country’s ability to spread the pain of the downturn broadly. German companies cut hours rather than workers, while partially compensating the workers for the lost hours.
“Germany’s job-sharing institutions were so successful that unemployment actually fell during the recession there,” said CEPR economist John Schmitt, who wrote the report. “In the United States, the incentives encourage firms to lay workers off, rather than reduce hours.”
Denmark is renowned for its expensive and effective system of training, education, and job placement efforts for unemployed workers. Nevertheless, since the onset of the downturn, the Danish unemployment rate has almost doubled.
“Training, education, and job placement work well when the economy is close to full employment. But, the experience of Denmark shows that these ‘supply-side’ approaches just don’t work if there aren’t jobs to place people in,” said Schmitt.
The report argues that “work-sharing” could help to lower the U.S. unemployment rate, which currently hovers near nine percent. “Work-sharing” programs pay part-time unemployment benefits to workers who have their hours cut. Twenty states currently operate such systems, but lack of publicity and some bureaucratic problems with the available programs have meant few employers have made use of the systems during the current recovery.
The report also suggests that a temporary tax credit to employers who cut hours rather than workers could encourage firms to not only implement “work-sharing,” but also expand paid sick days, paid vacation, paid holidays, paid family leave, and other forms of paid leave for workers.
(19 May 2011)
