Archive for August, 2010
CALL FOR SUPPORT: Donations Needed for N30 Legal Expenses!
August 10th, 2010
Dear Friends, Supporters, Comrades and Community,
As you may recall, a lively protest took place on the streets of Chicago’s financial district last November 30, on the 10th anniversary of the “Battle of Seattle” and a week ahead of the big UN climate summit in Copenhagen. Several groups from across the city had come together to demand just, equitable, and effective solutions to the climate crisis, starting with the shut-down of the Crawford and Fisk coal plants in Chicago’s Little Village and Pilsen neighborhoods. The November 30th (N30) event also targeted “false solutions” to climate change like carbon trading, nukes and agrofuels, and was part of a national day of action for climate justice.
Now, the city has decided to charge these folks $8,340, with a deadline of mid-August to pay the fines.
Please help us raise the funds we need by donating what you can!
What the Zapatistas Can Teach Us About the Climate Crisis
August 10th, 2010
by Jeff Conant
With their 1994 battle cry, “Ya basta!” (“Enough already!”) Mexico’s Zapatista uprising became the spearhead of two convergent movements: Mexico’s movement for indigenous rights and the international movement against corporate globalization.
Skip to 2010: the movements for indigenous rights and against corporate globalization have converged again, this time globally, in the climate justice movement. Following the widely acknowledged failure of the climate negotiations in Copenhagen last December, the greatest manifestation of these converging movements took place this past April at the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
While political forces have conspired to make the Zapatistas largely invisible both inside Mexico and internationally, their challenge has always been to propose a paradigm of development that is both just and self-sustaining. It seems fair, then, to see if Zapatismocan shed any light on the muddle of politics around the climate crisis. Can the poetic riddles of Zapatista spokesperson Subcomandante Marcos serve as signposts on the rough road toward just climate solutions? Read the rest of this entry »