BUKO37. Stop. Future unwritten. transnational solidarity
In our dreams for a just world, let's not surrender to the mantra that there are no alternatives. Stop. Nothing is set: the future is a blank page. Let's counteract the neoliberal claim that no alternative exists to the exploitation of people and planet, with emancipatory ideas of liberation and freedom. History is with us and we can shape it. International or transnational ? in solidarity.
Well-known bogeymen prior to 1989 seem to be history. And so are the national liberation movements that once received our solidarity. Is that good or bad? Which political strategic conclusions do we draw from this? New actors emerge on the world stage. So much remains opaque.
The uprising in Syria plunges into the terror of the IS. A quiet revolution in Rojava saved by US bombs. A rebellion in the Ukraine, aided by fascist forces, resulting in a European war. Conflicts and struggles increase and overlap. It's not easy for a left in North and South whose self-image is that of internationalism and antimilitarism.
# transnational
We're witnessing the disappearance of the persuasive power of state institutions. People are exploited along global value chains in the South - and in the North. Within the EU a few dictate the many how they are supposed to save, live, and suffer, while externally the EU is economically and territorially guarded. So the wall is pushed bit by bit to North Africa and Ukraine. As a consequence thousands die and drown ? in the Mediterranean Sea, in Libya or Bangladesh.
Is the western critique of TTIP and alike resonating more strongly with a form of "national sovereignty" than we admit? But if not the state then what else? And how do we get from an inter-national perspective to a trans-national one? Stop ? again and again. Contrasting the seemingly set-in-stone future of global capitalism with moments of liberation.
What is transnationalism today? How do we organise ourselves within the tension of globalisation, nation state and liberation? Transnational action has to take into account local and global devastations. We can not stay out of it, but have to act: the resistance of indigenous communities in Latin America against the irreversible destruction of their habitats by exploiting their national resources or through energy generation in the form of dams concerns all of us. The same goes for the labour struggles of newly organising textile workers in Bangladesh. Or an average sized bourgeoise city in Germany like Münster that is the center for ordering all NATO military mission for the Rapid Reaction Force.
#solidarity
Transnational networking is important to collectively develop and put into practice emancipatory alternatives. This poses a real challenge to everyone involved as it truly demands overcoming boundaries set by race, class and gender and forcing everyone to give up some of their privileges.
Social contestations worldwide are diverse, disconnected and not simultaneous which makes it hard to forge alliances and support beyond bounded struggles and local projects. The amelioration of social ailments is not enough. At the same time there is a lack of continuity even within these kinds of projects: activists emerge and disappear again.
What could form of concrete practice look like? Who, with whom, what for?
We need a new term for solidarity: what is transnational solidarity? What would solidarity look like that truly aims at overcoming sexism, racism and capitalism? The BUKO is supposed to be a forum to deal with these kinds of questions from the different perspectives: social ecology and queer feminism, the economisation of education, antimilitarism and antiracism, and last but not least with a clear view on global protests against the crisis.
#revolution
We experience a world in uproar, especially since the Arab spring. Uprisings XXX, rebellions emerge, squares are occupied. The good news - we experience struggles for dignity and rights in different areas of society, here and elsewhere: struggles for workers' rights, struggles against the privatisation of education, health and housing, struggles for sexual self-determination, migrants' struggles for the freedom of movement, struggles against corruption and state terrorism, struggles against extractivism and resource exploitation, against free trade movements and Troika in Europe. ?
A central questions remains; the one asking for the binding element in these diverse local struggles and particular contestations: how does the common emerge out of these struggles, one that overcomes the ruling neoliberal capitalism and creates true alternatives, alternatives beyond states and hollowed out democracy? This means asking for possibilities for a common forms of organisation. And precisely why do we occupy squares? What could a common utopia look like? What do we mean when we say Stop. Future unwritten?
Start writing future. 14. - 17.5.2015, BUKO 37 in Münster
