Resistence against G20 in Argentina by pausatta

RESISTANCE AGAINST G20 IN ARGENTINA MEMORIA DEL CAMINO DE LA CUMBRE DE LOS PUEBLOS Y DE LA MOVIIZACIÓN

This report was made possible thanks to the support of Action Aid. Texts: Paula Satta English version: Gabriela Adelstein Design: Aldana Fiandrino Editing: Activistas de ATTAC Argentina Buenos Aires, May 2019 This material has been published under Creative Commons Attribution license - Share Alike 4.0. More information in: https://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.es

Introduction: the legacy of Hamburg

P. 4

Background: the global resistance networks

P. 11

Why a G20 in Argentina? Political scenario and militarization

P. 24

The path towards the Peoples Summit “WTO Out, Building Sovereignty”: the bid for training and communication

P. 31

Global Action Week “Out G20-IMF”

P. 39

The plurality of resistances: the thematic Forums a) Feminist Forum against the G20 b) Forum on Food Sovereignty c) Forum on Common Goods and Sovereignty

P. 46

Conclusion: what was the contribution of NoG20 to global resistance?

P. 62

Introduction: the legacy of Hamburg

The G20 is defined in its official website as “the main international forum for economic, financial and political cooperation”. It was founded in the late 1990s as an informal forum of ministers of finance from the G7 and certain so-called “emerging” countries. But following the 2008 crisis it was restructured into a space for presidential summits amidst the serious global financial crisis, in order to “increase international economic cooperation” and preserve the capitalist system as a whole. Current G20 members are Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, South Africa, Russia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, China, Japan, India, Indonesia, South Korea, Australia, Canada, United States, Germany, United Kingdom, France, Italy, and the European Union which represents 28 European countries. . It is, in essence, the group of countries that bear greatest responsibility for greenhouse effect gases emission and climate change, and for the energy crisis, the food crisis, the entrenchment of gender

inequalities, real estate speculation and indebtedness. In other words, these are the countries that have been prescribing neoliberal policies as the only way to drive the ship of global economy, caught up in the capitalist storm. Since the beginnings of the G20, there have been many demonstrations against the presidential summits: Washington, London, Pittsburgh, Toronto, Seoul, Cannes, Hamburg, Buenos Aires... In each city where the summit of G20 leaders takes place, global resistance is organized. On July 7 and 8, 2017, the G20 met in Hamburg, Germany, where an Action Week was prepared against the G20 under the motto “The G20 does not represent us”, with a precise plan of social mobilization that included a counter-summit, civil disobedience actions (direct blockades interfering with the transportation of authorities, both from the airport to the hotels and from the hotels to the meetings), and a huge public demonstration during the last day of the summit. This plan had a strong impact on the media, as did the bloody repression suffered by the protesters at the hands of the riot police. “The G20 and other global meetings are an attempt to legitimize the existing conditions and those who represent them, even though they do so under the pretense of looking seriously at the problems of planet Earth and its inhabitants. However, in this world of destruction and chaos, where predatory capitalism is becoming more and more ruinous, this claim is less and less plausible,

and there is little sincere talk of real, positive “progress.” In fact, the G20 is exclusively concerned with coordinating their common interests along with a demonstration of their power. Both attempts thoroughly failed in Hamburg—due to both the increasingly evident disunity and fragmentation of the respective political elites and also to our common resistance.” The above paragraph is a fragment from the book To our compas in Buenos Aires, a photoreportage by French and German activists who participated in the resistance against the G20 in Hamburg in 2017. It is an invitation to continue to collectively create around the genealogy of global resistance, to contribute as per our shared factors but also our specificities, to highlight the continuities of a process that exceeds the G20 itself towards the framework of a struggle against the different contemporary forms of

1. To our compas in Buenos Aires- about the G20 in Hamburg, 2018

oppression posed by free trade and the supremacy of the private over the public as indisputable bulwarks. This is a global economic and political model that moves further and further away from the needs of the communities and their territories, depredating whatever it finds in its path. “Our goal is to noticeably disturb the proceedings of the G20 Summit, and to disrupt the staging of power that the summit represents. We will commit a publicly announced mass breach of rule. Our actions are those of a justified means of resistant mass disobedience. Our blockades are human blockades and creative material blockades, consisting of everyday objects”, outlined the German activists in the aforementioned book, which was painstakingly studied by the Argentine government as an alleged handbook for the protest. Following the Hamburg Action Plan, at the beginning of De-

cember2017, Argentina assumed the pro tempore presidency of the G20. During 2018, it hosted itinerant meetings throughout the country, under the motto “Building Consensus for a Fair and Sustainable Development”. As from June, ministerial meetings were held in ten different cities (Buenos Aires, Mar del Plata, Salta, Jujuy, Rosario, Puerto Iguazú, Ushuaia, Bariloche, Córdoba and Mendoza), together with the convenings of the seven affinity groups acting as representatives of civil society in the G20: Business 20, Science 20, Women 20, Think Tanks 20, Civil 20, Labor 20 and You-

th 20. This process would culminate in the 13th Summit of G20 State Leaders on Friday, November 30 and Saturday, December 1, 2018, in Buenos Aires. It was the first time the G20 met in an South American country.

With the arrival of the G20 in Argentina, the representatives of various social and political organizations which had been coming together in the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin Tratados de Libre Comercio [Assembly Argentina better without Free Trade Agreements, hereinafter Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC] decided to expand their call so as to carry on the Hamburg legacy of resistance against the G20. It was also as a way of pursuing the recent, successful organization of the Peoples Summit “WTO Out, Building Sovereignty” at the XI Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization that was held in Buenos Aires in December, 2017. Thus, the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC resolved to convene a Global Action Week against the G20 in Argentina.

2. More information available at the Peoples Summit website https://fueraomc.org/

Background: the global resistance networks

In order to understand the background of global resistance against G20, we must go back in history. The Argentine resistance process is framed in what is known as the movement of the global resistance networks, erroneously referred to in the media outlets as “anti-globalization” movements. The paradigmatic event, for these networks, took place in November 1999 with the so-called “Seattle Battle” that developed in opposition to the III WTO Ministerial Conference. Protestors belonged to diverse political organizations and movements (ecologists, trade unions, feminists and LGBTs, migrants, students, indigenous peoples) whose relationship with traditional political parties was tense, and which upheld a shared criticism of the capitalist system expressed by global institutions such as the WTO. This street resistance action was hugely successful, as it managed to block the Ministerial Conference and to generate a relevant linkage between the newer social mo-

vements and the traditional trade unions of the United States. In fact, it showed that organization and preparedness, as well as dissemination through the recently created digital media, could win major victories for global resistance. These networks pose not only an opposition to the capitalist domination and oppression system: they also maintain the need to build alternatives and experiences that address the needs of the communities and the environment, under the conviction that we can inhabit other possible worlds. Among these proposals was the idea to pursue the taxation of international financial transactions (the Tobin tax), which became one of the rallying cries of the global movement Association for the Taxation of Financial Transactions and Citizen’s Action, ATTAC). This activist organization emerged in December 1998; its motto “think global, act local” was first used in 1972 by ecologist René Dubos at the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (the “Stockholm Conference”) and then reclaimed by ATTAC in order to understand and act systemically on local conflicts and issues. Another landmark event impacting on the global resistance movement, and in particular in Latin America, was the meeting of the World Social Forum (WSF), especially its 2001, 2002 and 2003 instances (in 2003, 100,000 people from all over the world gathered in the city of Porto Alegre, Brazil). The WSF was the major meeting space for global organizations. Thus, the possibility arose for diffe-

rent kinds of organizations to come together in a pluralist and diverse forum, with self-managed activities but also common events, especially the assembly of social movements which gave closure to each Forum. Criticism was central; but the debates showed the need to coordinate alternatives for the peoples’ economic, social and political organization, and for their links with nature, vis à vis a predatory system. The WSF experience imprinted the way resistance was subsequently organized, in particular at continental level. In the last few years, different kinds of meetings were held (Pan-Amazonic Forum, Migrants Forum, regional or national Peoples Summit, in different cities) using a format similar to the WSF, which became a political consensus throughout the movement. 2.1 National and regional context of NoG20 Within the framework of this global resistance movement, we should reflect on the implications of carrying out, in Argentina, the political decision of convening a social mobilization against the WTO in 2017 and against the G20 in 2018. The Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC faced the enormous challenge of rallying the Argentine social and political organizations, whose last major resistance move had been the Peoples Summit against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in November 2005 at the 4th Summit of the Americas held in Mar del Plata. This was a historic event for the regional political scene which materialized the rejection of the

proposed FTAA agreement. At the time, anti-imperialist discourses circulated extensively through the generalized refusal of free trade in Latin America. It must be noted that in Argentina, during the Kirchner administrations (2003-2015), an impasse was reached regarding the negotiation of treaties and trade liberalization policies. Therefore, local political movements were primarily focused on national issues and regional integration, with scarce debate around the country’s insertion in the global value chains. The issues in the agenda of global resistance, in consequence, were neither elaborated on nor prioritized since the No al ALCA [No FTAA] movement in 2005 until the arrival of the WTO in 2017. “The struggle against the WTO and the G20 made it possible, for social movements and their brave campaigners, to meet again: those who had united against the FTAA in Mar del Plata in 2005, together with new youth organizations, with the strengthened Argentine feminist movement, and with those in the new territorial struggles, in a renovation of the activist field. There was an intergenerational dialogue between the icons of the struggles against free trade and those participating in the struggle against the G20.” (Florencia Partenio, member of Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), Feminist Forum against the G20 and Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC).

Even considering that the No al ALCA was a paradigmatic event in our country, the FTAA represented a negotiation of all countries in the Americas, excluding Cuba. This means the mobilization against the FTAA, centered on the Continental Social Alliance (CSA), was still a regional rather than a global process. The scenario that arose in the face of the convening of the WTO’s Ministerial Conference in Argentina was quite different: with the involvement of social organizations and NGOs from all over the world, the rejection of the WTO was undoubtedly the first major global resistance event to take place in the country, 2.2 From No al ALCA to WTO Out! The organization of the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” was the first global event after the failure of the FTAA in 2005. This time gap had significant consequences, as the Argentine grassroots movements did not easily embrace the issue as pertaining to their own struggles and resistance. The reasons were varied. On the one hand, few organizations were aware of the WTO, as it is associated with technical knowledge of political economy, international cooperation and geopolitics. Also, the WTO has been in crisis since 2003, and thus social movements gave little importance to its arrival; in fact, it was deemed that the Ministerial Conference would not be very relevant. And lastly, many Argentine organizations find it difficult to articulate local struggles with global struggles on a day-to-day basis, as was evidenced later during the

organization against the G20. The specificity of this local political scenario notwithstanding, some organizations such as ATTAC, Jubileo Sur, DAWN, Amigos de la Tierra and members of La Vía Campesina participated both in the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” and in the NoG20-IMF. These organizations have ample experience in global resistance and were strongly committed, as they were aware of the need of coordinating a wide, pluralistic and massive mobilization against both events, and of continuing the process of Peoples Summits through the discussion of alternatives. Nevertheless, from the experience of the struggle against the FTAA a central element emerged in most Argentine movements: the a priori rejection of free trade agreements and trade liberalization policies. “This is something learnt from the struggle of No al ALCA, though the context was different now. Prior to the arrival of the WTO and the G20,we had to undertake popular education efforts, both at grassroots level and for national social leaders, because both events involved the discussion of current global policy and economy and not those of the times of the FTAA. The analysis of the G20 and global policy today as per old diagnoses is preventing us from building new alternatives”, says Luciana Ghiotto (ATTAC Argentina). Thus, these organizations (which are not very extended in Argentina but are linked to global resistance) played a central role in the “translation” of technical notions of global com-

merce, seemingly pertaining only to “experts”, into political terms to be incorporated by the whole spectrum of social, trade union and territorial organizing. This was one of the most important political-educational tasks undertaken by the Asamblea No al G20 [Assembly NoG20], as a continuation of the process launched by the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC during 2018. 2.3 From WTO Out! to NoG20-IMF, a continuous process The first meeting of the Asamblea No al G20 was held at the end of February 2018 with large at-

tendance of various organizations, as many had participated both in the organization and the activities of the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” in Buenos Aires in December 2017. Bettina Müller, a member of the Asamblea and leader of ATTAC Argentina, tells it thus: “On the one hand, many of the actors came from

the struggle against the WTO, but we also grew in number and representativeness. Then, as in 2017, we tried to integrate comrades from the provinces, and in 2018 we were more successful thanks to many organizations in all the country. We were able to use those links we had forged during 2017 and against the WTO. A peoples’ summit, street activities, a media campaign, were all effected both in 2017 and in 2018, but against the WTO we had more professionalism and a greater outreach, because we profited from the links and experiences from 2017. On the other hand, groups such as the Feminist Forum against the G20 had a strong presence in 2017 and were even stronger during the struggle against the G20.”

In line with this statement, Florencia Partenio considers that the presence of the feminist movement in both Summits is one of the continuities which allowed for the process against the WTO in 2018: “Feminist presence was relevant for the formation of the

Asamblea No al G20, not only due to its volume and its level of participation, but also because it permeated each meeting and each training workshop with what is commonly called the mainstreaming of feminist perspective. And also due to the insistence on dialogue, meeting and agreement methodologies pertaining to feminist practice that were upheld from one Summit to the other and boosted them. Continuity also implies a strong emphasis on the genealogy of the struggle: the incorporation of feminists from global and regional networks who had been battling since Seattle. We all came together in the Asamblea No al G20.” We should also highlight the fact that the organization of the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” laid the foundations for the Asamblea No al G20, as a horizontal working structure was the meeting point for local, regional and international organizations around a global issue, in a pluralist framework both as

regards policy and work areas. This was evidenced in the diversity of thematic forums held at the Summit: “Against capitalism: solidary internationalism in our America”, “Feminist forum against free trade”, “Forum for educational sovereignty”, “Workers forum”, “Food sovereignty forum”, “Forum on common goods, climate justice and energy sovereignty”, “Migration without WTO”, “Imperialism and militarism”. The Final Declaration of the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” showcased the first global resistance event in Argentina, which thus entered the genealogy of struggles initiated in Seattle in 1999, and accounted also for the diverse struggles articulated not only in the counter-summit organizing but also in the discussion of real alternatives to the current system. For Vanessa Dourado, member of the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC and leader of the Forum on Common Goods at the Asamblea No al G20, the 2017 WTO Out! experience left, in this sense, a major learning insight: “We learnt a lot, above all regarding territorial work, which means precisely to leave the centered space of Buenos Aires and discuss something as complex as free trade agreements and economy: these issues are quite difficult to bring down to people’s day-to-day concrete reality. To ask ourselves, why are we against the G20? We made this effort of going to the territories to

talk with the environmental organizations, to people, and tell them that everything is related to everything else, that the problem of high-scale mining in Argentina has to do with FTAs and corporations. So the identification and understanding of the enemy was one of the legacies of the WTO experience that allowed for the continuity of our work towards the G20.”

3. Available in Spanish at https://fueraomc.org/declaracion-de-la-cumbre-de-los-pueblos

Why a G20 in Argentina? Political scenario and militarization

The international context of the arrival of the G20 in Argentina was branded by the continuing global crisis of capitalism. Ten years after de 2008 world crisis, it has become evident that the world powers find no alternatives to face the capitalist crisis, and therefore protectionist policies (as expressed by Donald Trump) have reemerged, as well as far-right nationalisms such as Brexit and in several European countries. Julio Gambina, founder of ATTAC Argentina and President of the Fundación de Investigaciones Sociales y Políticas (FISYP), explains that the Trump administration is redesigning all the free trade agreements negotiated during the globalization period, i.e. since the 1990s until the Obama administration. For Gambina, it must be taken into account that “the crisis is not only a commercial war: there are serious problems affecting production and monetary issues. We are currently witnessing the growth rate in China impac-

ting on every country in the world, as large trade surpluses are difficult to sustain.” Within a global scenario of deep crisis and uncertainty, the G20 arrived in Argentina. The G20 process was marked by this global crisis, as well as by the domestic scenario. Even though the hosting of the G20 Summit rotates among its members (which means that Argentina’s turn would eventually arrive), the organization of the G20 in our country was due to the Macri administration’s intention of showing complacency toward the global powers grouped around the financial institutions and the United States. Since Macri’s inauguration in December 2015, neoliberal policies were furthered with a clear, favorable orientation towards transnational capital, through “trade and business openness” hand in hand with free trade, the lack of financing of public works and services, and the encouragement of private investment through public-private alliances. Structural adjustment and austerity programs and pension, tax and labor reforms were also put in place, and were reinforced by the arrangement of debt from IMF. Government’s aim was to show an “Argentina inserted in the world”, starting at the beginning of the administration when the Foro de Inversión y Negocios [Investment and Business Forum] (the so-called “Mini Davos”) was held in September 2016 in Buenos Aires. This event brought together the top 600 CEOs in the world. For Mauricio Macri, the organization of the “Mini Davos” in 2016, of the WTO Summit in 2017 and of the G20 in 2018 were needed to show

a reliable country for foreign investments. Such investments, however, did not arrive. Within this framework, in July 2018

Argentina

signed a standby

agreement

for USD 50 billion with the IMF, which

implied

the enforcement of tax, labor and pension reforms. This in turn led to an escalation of social protest and intensified political tension. The Asamblea No al G20 publicly declared its opposition to the signature of this agreement. In a press conference, it denounced the central role of the IMF within the G20, as coordination, execution and monitoring of G20 policies revolve around international organizations such as the IMF itself,

the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). As stated by Luciana Ghiotto: “In Argentina, following the impact of indebtedness to IMF during the 90s, social organizations strongly rejected the IMF and were extremely wary of it. Thus, linking IMF and G20 was useful to explain, within Argentine organizing, what was at stake.” Vanessa Dourado also believes that the arrival of the G20 must be considered in Latin American terms: “To return to the world is, in truth, to return to ‘the Fund’, to return to the IMF with the WTO and the G20. Argentina is a strategic country to press forward on Latin America territory, with Mauricio Macri attempting regional leadership. So much so that we witness his support of Bolsonaro and of the intervention in Venezuela. It is a very different context from the No al ALCA. Rightwing forces are on the offensive, and social activists are persecuted, as in the case of Marielle Franco which was not only an attack on Marielle herself but on resistance as a whole. Indigenous peoples, peasants and environmental and land defenders are also under siege.” At this point we can make a direct connection between “openness to the world” policies, commercial liberalization, and the militarization of territories. Nevertheless, neither the “Mini Davos” nor the WTO Ministerial Conference involved the logistics and organizational efforts undertaken for the G20. In order to “guarantee the security of the Summit”, an unprecedented security operation

was put in place. While public expenditure in health and education was curtailed, a national budget of over ARS 1 billion , was allotted to these security measures which included at least 22 thousand agents from every federal law enforcement agency: Gendarmería, Prefectura, Policía Federal, Policía de Seguridad Aeroportuaria, Policía de la Ciudad, Policía Bonaerense, and even from the Army and the Air Force. For the days when the Summit was to take place, urban land transportation was restricted, and all underground and railway lines were shut down. Also shut down were the short- and medium-distance bus terminals, the port of Buenos Aires, and the “Jorge Newbery” city airport for domestic flights. These were all very extreme measures, as compared to the organization of the G20 in other countries. A scenario arose of what may be called “preventive repression”, topped by the statements from Minister of Security Patricia Bullrich, who advised the inhabitants of the city of Buenos Aires “to use the long weekend to go away, to leave on Thursday because the city will be quite complicated”. Thus, the overall feeling of fear and paranoia was enhanced, on the basis of the idea that those who were organizing resistance were somehow linked to organi-

4. https://www.lanacion.com.ar/politica/patricia-bullrich-le-recomendo-portenos-usenfin-nid2192387

zed crime, or even that terrorist actions were being planned. The internationally renowned organization ATTAC was openly targeted in the days just before the Summit, due to alleged “fraudulent banking transfers to finance violent protests against the G20”, thus establishing a direct link between those who manifested against the G20 and alleged illegal activities. Certain media outlets also associated a presumed anarchist attack with the idea of a possible “terrorist” attack during the Summit, thus contributing plausible scapegoats to justify repression.

5. https://www.perfil.com/noticias/politica/atentados-antes-del-g20-los-desafios-de-ladestruida-inteligencia-argentina.phtml

The path towards the Peoples Summit “WTO Out, Building Sovereignty”: the bid for training and communication

Throughout 2018, the Asamblea No al G20 met every two weeks to discuss the political contents of the Peoples Summit, and to design strategies to amplify the call to the Global Action Week against the G20. Internal communication was conducted through an e-mail listserve where information was shared daily, both regarding the G20 and the Asamblea’s own organizational and logistical issues. Prior to the Action Week, one of the main contributions of the political work undertaken by the Asamblea No al G20 was the huge collective effort of disseminating analyses linking the G20 with its impacts on the general population and its implication in public policy making. Said analyses were shared with territorial, peasant, feminist and migrants organizations, with socio-environmental assemblies, cooperatives and various labor unions, thanks to the alliances already forged by the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC and its leaders’ connections with diverse networks and or-

ganizations. In line with the overall educational goal, forums, workshops, debate talks, seminars and training activities were organized in different spaces, throughout the whole country. There were 80 to 100 talks in the Greater Buenos Aires area, and in several cities in the Provinces of Buenos Aires, Río Negro, Neuquén, Misiones, Catamarca, Córdoba and Santa Fe. This was supported by a communication strategy based mainly on independent community radio stations but also on the written press, to promote de different materials produced by the Assembly on the four primary lines of the G20 agenda in Argentina: infrastructure for development, the future of work, sustainable food future, and gender perspective. Training sessions were held for journalists so that interested media outlets could find out how to communicate about the G20 without reproducing the non-critical slant of hegemonic media. Communications and training were the pillars of the work carried out by the Asamblea No al G20, as told by Bettina Müller: “Training programs throughout the country, launched as from July, were fundamental. They allowed for the inclusion of other groups, and for the federalization of the struggle. Also noteworthy were the previous preparatory assemblies, through which we achieved an inclusive, open and horizontal process. We did a great press work:

6. https://noalg20.org/material/

the three packed press conferences we held since September had a wide repercussion in the media.” To oppose the hegemonic views on the G20, the Asamblea produced a booklet challenging the “myths” around the G20, such as “Within the G20, all continents are equally represented”. The booklet “10 Mitos y verdades sobre el G20” [“10 myths and truths about the G20”] was prepared as collective material, with contributions from different leaders of the Asamblea No al G20 regarding the myths of representation, respect of human rights and the inclusion of civil society, climate change, gender equity, quality employment, infrastructure for development, and sustainable food future. Five thousand copies were printed and distributed, not only among the orga n i za t i o n s participating in the Asamblea but also throughout the provinces where

talks

and workshops were held. This material served as a common basis for the whole Asamblea, with its own logo and identity; subsequently, the Forums that made up the Asamblea No al G20 drew from the booklet to replicate, in each area of interest, the specificities of the G20’s impact. We should also mention the outstanding dissemination and training efforts undertaken by the Feminist Forum against the G20, which met throughout the whole year in organizational assemblies and held a press conference on September 26 at the city’s Legislature inviting organizations to participate, and then carried out a specific activity against the Women20 group on October 1 and 2. As part of its communications strategy, the Feminist Forum against the G20 published its own material, asking “Feminism’s possible worlds: do they fit in the W20?” Building on the myths around the G20, it challenged the axes of the W20 (such as labor, financial and digital inclusion of women) from a feminist perspective, remarking the instrumentalization of feminist demands and knowledge, the farce of “entrepreneurship”, and its alleged “gender perspective” biased by an image of a white, heterosexual businesswoman. The articulation of local networks and its impact on the resistance’s organizing ability was a major achievement of these trai-

7. https://fuerag20.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/cuadernillo-diseno-final-22-8.pdf

ning and communications strategies. It was crucial for the materialization of the Global Action Week against the G20 itself, but also to build new bridges and alliances among comrades from the whole country with those who were active on the same issues, thus linking the local demands with global resistance. Therefore, the political work of the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC carried on by the Asamblea No al G20 went far beyond the mere transmission of “technical” knowledge on the G20: it was an exercise in popular education, as the dialogue of knowledge allowed for new ways of considering the relationship between local and global. It went beyond the Summit of the G20 leaders, linking the issues discussed by the G20 to day-to-day life and the concrete problems in the territories. During September a major alliance was formed: the Confluencia Fuera G20/FMI [Confluence Out G20-IMF], which convened the Global Action Week against the G20 and the manifestation of November 30, through an international call disseminated in six languages and titled “Movilizarnos frente al G20 y el FMI. Por las soberanías política, ambiental, cultural y económica de nuestros pueblos y nuestros cuerpos.” [“Mobilizing against the G20 and the IMF. In demand of political, environmental, cultural and economic sove-

8. Materials and press reporting may be found on the networks of the Feminist Forum Against the G20: https://www.facebook.com/forofeministacontraelg20/ @FeministasNoG20/ https://www.instagram.com/forofeministacontraelg20

reignty of our peoples and our bodies”]. The Confluencia was pluralistic, as it was composed of very dissimilar organizations that do not usually coincide in local (or even continental) political scenarios. This space included not only national organizing, but also continental networks and movements, and national federations and organizations from other countries, with a shared diagnosis: the arrival of the G20 not only impacted on Argentina, but would also affect the political message attempted, at the regional level, by several presidents. Notwithstanding the difficulties inherent to joint organizing, the creation of the Confluencia was a relevant political occurrence, evidencing the common goal of guaranteeing a huge unitary protest against G20 so that resistance against this forum made the headlines all over the world.

9. https://fuerag20.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/llamamiento-internacional-final3.pdf

Global Action Week “Out G20-IM

The Global Action Week “Out G20-IMF” was organized in Buenos Aires from November 26 through November 30. On Monday, November 26 and Tuesday, November 27, several seminars and activities took place, among which the seminars of the Red de Género y Comercio and of the Transnational Institute (TNI), the Escuela de Economía Feminista organized by DAWN, and the continental meeting of the Encuentro Sindical Nuestra América (ESNA). Also the Plataforma “América Latina Mejor sin Tratados de Libre Comercio” [Platform “Latin America better without FTAs”] was publicly launched; this Plataforma was the result of the articulation of the Asamblea Argentina Mejor sin TLC with other national plat-

forms against FTAs from other countries in the continent. On Wednesday, November 28 and Thursday, November 29, the Peoples Summit took place. This was the strong bid of the Asamblea No al G20 together with other organizations of the Confluencia Fuera G20/FMI. This Summit had two main goals: on the one hand, to highlight the contents discussed in the Forums and the different lines of debate; on the other, to render visible the social and political actions against the G20. Thus, on November 28 the thematic Forums, workshops, debate talks and book and documentary presentations took place at the Facultad de Ciencias Sociales [School of Social Sciences] of the Universidad de Buenos Aires, and on November 29 there was a day-long meeting at Plaza de los Dos Congresos, which faces the National Congress. Tents were installed on Avenida Rivadavia at daybreak on Thursday, November 29: a central tent shared by the organizations belonging to the Confluencia Fuera G20/FMI, and two large tents for the Forum on Food Sovereignty and the Feminist Forum. Other tents hosted the Migrants Forum (focused on the work of the Asociación de Mujeres Migrantes de la República Argentina, AMUMRA) and the group Soberanía Popular (GPS). Other participants were political parties and social movements such as Libres del Sur/ Barrios de Pie, MST, Anticapitalistas en Red, ALBA Movimientos, PSTU and CSP Conlutas, and CTA-Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Cultural actions of resistance were staged by art collectives (Alaacionista, Proyecto Squatters, La Criatura, SOS, “MirkoRupto” and Fin

de un mundo), a popular economy food fair was jointly organized by UTT, CTEP, MNCI, Barrios de Pie/Libres de Sur and the Feminist Forum, and the great closure was a crowded youth music festival that lasted until midnight. The central tent held debates on the G20 facilitated by different leaders of the organizations in the Confluencia. The purpose of this tent was to show how the struggle against the G20 is linked to various aspects of the Argentine political struggle. The debates referred to the main outcomes from the forums held at the Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, so there was a nexus with the collective findings of the previous day. Discussions in this tent were divided along three lines: 1) a panel on the progression of right-wing parties and movements throughout the region, with a wide attendance of activists from Brazil and other countries in the area; 2) a panel on resistances and alternatives to the G20; and 3) a closing activity that brought together the national political context of ad-

justment programs, the agreement with the IMF and the presence of the G20. Domestic and international media outlets reported on this day’s actions, highlighting the presence of the “Baby Trump”. This strategic action made the Peoples Summit even more visible. The local ATTAC group (as part of the Asamblea No al G20) made the arrangements so as to bring to Buenos Aires the famous inflatable doll, which had already been used in several protests against Donald Trump throughout the world. It was placed facing the National Congress, to highlight the symbol of a president represented as a baby who makes decisions based on whims rather than political consensus, and the Argentine Congress, the collective decision-making organism within representative democracy. (PICTURE) On Friday, November 30 there was a Street march under the slogans “Fuera G20; Abajo el acuerdo con el FMI; Fuera Trump y demás líderes imperialistas; Fuera Bolsonaro; Por el No pago de la deuda externa y No al ajuste, la entrega y la represión” [“G20 Out. No IMF deal! Trump and the other imperialist leaders, Out! Bolsonaro Out! No payment of the external debt; Adjustment, dependence and repression, no!”]. Despite the formidable militarization of the city, and the restrictions on urban transportation plus the shutdown of access roads which prevented several organizations from attending, the march was massive: 50 thousand people took to the streets towards the National Congress, without incidents

and on the first day of the G20 Summit. The smooth functioning of the Summit was self-attributed by the Argentine government, satisfied with the strengthening of its political and diplomatic ties to the main leaders of world capitalism. That is to say, it achieved one of its main goals: the negotiations with the IMF during the second semester of 2018. In the words of Julio Gambina, “Argentina needed to show that it is capable of complying with the Fund, so that the Macri administration can fulfill its term with no financial turmoil. The association United States-IMF attending the G20 was a key factor to understand the huge expenditure in security, and the lack of conflict.” The media remarked upon the peaceful tone of the march, whe-

re there were “no masked faces”, and this was positive for the government. But this peacefulness should be considered in the light of the huge security operation that sieged the city, including small armored cars donated by the Chinese government. Therefore we were rather in a “preventive repression” situation, deliberately organized by the Argentine administration during the previous months and, above all, during the week of the Summit, as protest was increasingly criminalized and social organizations were delegitimized through false accusations.

The plurality of resistances: the thematic Forums a)Feminist Forum against the G20 b) Forum on Food Sovereignty c) Forum on Common Goods and Sovereignty

The continuity of the Feminist Forum against Free Trade and the Feminist Forum against the G20 was unique, as this Forum met throughout 2018 holding two international preliminary meetings during the first semester and then weekly meetings in Buenos Aires, bringing together a wide political spectrum of local and international feminist organizations (Marabunta, NUM, Espacio de economía feminista de la SEC, Colectivo Ni Una Menos, Las Casildas, Cátedra Libre Virginia Bolten, Espacio de géneros CCC Floreal Gorini, Espacio de Géneros del FPDS-CN, Campaña Nacional contra las Violencias hacia las mujeres, Red PAR, Instituto Equit, REBRIP, Feministas del Abya Yala, SOS Corpo, Articulación Feminista Marcosur, DAWN, Red de Género y Comercio, AWID), labor unions (ATE desde abajo, CTA Autónoma), cooperatives, migrants’ organizations (AMUMRA and Movimiento 2 de marzo Bloque de trabaja-

dorxs migrantes), territorial and social organizations (Movimiento de los pueblos por un socialismo feminista desde abajo, Mujeres en Red Villa Langostura, MP La Dignidad, Jóvenes al Frente Parque Esperanza, No tan distintas, CISCSA, Pañuelos en Rebeldía), Afro-Argentine groups (Programa de Radio Indeleble Afroargentinidad, the gender area Comisión de género del 8 noviembre: Día de lo/as Afroargentino/as), artistic and cultural groups (Mujeres Públicas, Serigrafistas Queer, Muralistas Seamos Libres, A turma da bahiana, Red Ma(g)dalena Internacional), human rights organizations (Asamblea Permanente por los Derechos Humanos, ANDHES), political parties (MST, La Cámpora, Democracia Socialista, Mujeres peronistas por la unidad JP CABA), dissident and LGBT groups (Movimiento Trans Nadia Echazú, Afros LGBT), and the Programa Crees (UNQ) and Radio Humedales. With experts on labor issues, gender and science and feminist economy, this Forum discussed forms and contents for actions. These were not only expressed in November at the G20 Summit, but were also reflected in territorial formations in different cities throughout the country, and in virtual gatherings such as the three webinars (two in Spanish and one in English) that addressed first the G20 agenda and then the W20 agenda. As noted, this Forum functioned in Argentina but also maintained, as from the WTO Out!, its strong regional character and its international networks throughout the whole decision-making process. Two e-mail listserves (one in Spanish and another in

English) periodically disseminated the activities around the G20, the reports of assemblies, and international calls. Work was structured in commissions: logistics, finance, communications, arts, and internationalization. It produced audiovisual materials that are being transmitted through the Forum’s own YouTube channel. Dissemination through social networks and alternative media were part of a robust communications strategy that had wide impact and repercussions in October, when the two days of actions ¡No en nuestro nombre! [Not in our name!] were held at Plaza de los Dos Congresos in response to the W20 meeting. There were art shows and performances during the first day, and discussion groups throughout the whole second day, where alternatives were debated with trans and lesbian activists, social economy workers, cooperativists, teachers, migrant workers and labor union delegates. Also present were peasants, small producers, and popular economy leaders, both in the discussions and in the self-managed food fair. In response to the W20, the Forum’s Statement “What are the ingredients of a feminist casserole?” was read: “Neither our peoples nor are we the ones who requested their loans and credits. They were requested by lackey governments. We are not willing to live in debt and exhausted, always relying on credit, victims of

10. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHzs64NN74FfYaezsGbJxqA

usurious rents, renting alien lands, living in obscure rooms and precarious homes, chasing the unattainable dream of becoming prominent entrepreneurs, someday, ‘through persistence and individual effort’, climbing the corporate ladder, alienating ourselves, stepping over each other, losing our roots and our sisters along the way.. (…) There, at the communal casserole gatherings, roadblocks, assemblies, feminist learning spaces, we search for answers to the daily acts of violence we suffer, we gain strength, we plan collective strategies for survival, we listen, and we feed ourselves and our children as we can.” The Forum also participated, collectively, in the feminist economy workshop of the 21° Encuentro Regional de Mujeres Lesbianas, Travestis y Trans held in La Matanza (in the Province of Buenos

Aires) in September, and in an open-mike radio program at the 33° Encuentro Nacional de Mujeres [Women’s National Caucus] held in Trelew (Province of Chubut) in October. Thus, experiences were shared, and debates were held on alternatives from the perspective of popular, plurinational, dissident and territorial feminisms. At the Peoples Summit, the Forum had different activities. On Wednesday, at the Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, it launched the Campaña “Nuestro cuerpo, nuestro territorio” [Campaign “Our body, our territory”], where Latin American feminist activists met to discuss the processes of capitalist expropriation, criminalization and threats against women’s and LGTBNB human rights defenders. There was also a talk on digital economy: “¿Es posible la revolución feminista en tiempos del 4.0?” [“In times of 4.0, is a feminist revolution possible?”] On Thursday, the Forum’s tent at Plaza de los Dos Congresos was crowded the whole day long. First there was an international debate on the continuities of the process against the WTO in the resistances of the Global South feminisms. Then the Tribunal Ético-Popular, Antirracista y Feminista contra las políticas del G20 [feminist, anti-racist, ethical people’s court against the G20 policies] was held, along three lines: 1) the progress of fascism in Latin America, 2) the defense of territories and the struggle against ex-

11. http://dawnnet.org/2018/10/no-en-nuestro-nombre-manifiesto-del-foro-feminista-frente-al-g20/

tractivism, and 3) migratory movements: women and sexual dissidences in migrations. At this people’s court there were activists from Brazil (Movimiento de Mujeres Campesinas, Red de Mujeres Negras de Río de Janeiro and AMB), Colombia (Proceso de Comunidades Negras), Paraguay (Coordinadora Nacional de Mujeres Rurales e Indígenas) and Mexico (Justicia en Movimiento), as well as activists from the Comité de solidaridad con Kurdistán, Mapuche land defenders, and Afro-Argentine members of the Forum. A massive feminist assembly was held at the end of the day, drawing from the experience of the Feminist Forum against Free Trade of 2017. On the day of the march, the sentence of the feminist, anti-racist, ethical people’s court was read, expressing the

severe breakdown of democratic states that deny the peoples their basic political, social, cultural and religious rights. This sentence was related to the proposals from the Forums on Food Sovereignty and Common Goods, denouncing that “transnational companies have destroyed the territories and the crops. In Brazil, for example, legal abortion is prohibited, but 12 liters of pesticides per inhabitant may be used, provoking fetal malformations, spontaneous abortions, cancer, etc. Agroecology and peasant production for self-sustenance are criminalized.” As shown during the feminist, anti-racist, ethical people’s court, feminist and popular pedagogies are another alternative proposal from the Forum. They create new ways to denounce and resist, challenging capitalist rationalization within an unequal world. The new unstable, delocalized labor conditions increasingly imply indebtedness, especially for women, whose options are limited to entrepreneurship for the very few. One of the axes that structured the Forum’s discussions addressed the crisis of caretaking and the macroeconomic conditions for capital reproduction, centering on “life sustainability” as a fundamental concept and intent of feminist economy. This was also posed as a challenge by different groups organized in self-management and cooperatives. According to Florencia Partenio, “feminist economy is an alternative within the framework of a political feminist project. It was materialized by the Escuela de Economía Feminista [Feminist School of Economics], a training space organi-

zed by DAWN and built in dialogue with other collectives and global and regional networks of the Feminist Forum. Each module involved comrades from Mexico, Ecuador, Spain and France who were participating in the Action Week. This initiative is a real alternative to neoliberal policies.” Throughout its actions, the Forum’s pluralistic voice is noteworthy. Internationalism is an alternative put in practice by feminisms, as the only way of resisting against a global financial capitalism that recolonizes and loots the territories with neocolonialist logics. Global chains of caretaking and the life conditions of women and LGTBQNB people must be considered. Thus, internationalism and the strength of an intersectional feminism that takes into account gender, race, class and ethnic inequalities as part of the heteropatriarchal capitalist system itself, are key points of the work of the Feminist Forum against the G20.

6.2 Forum on Food Sovereignty This Forum met on Thursday, November 29, within the framework of the Peoples Summit at Plaza de los Dos Congresos, to discuss one of the central axes of the G20: “sustainable food future”. In 2017 this Forum had included the very relevant participation of La Vía Campesina Internacional at the Peoples Summit “WTO

Out! Building Sovereignty”, and published a forceful statement, the “Declaración del Foro de Soberanía Alimentaria, Territorios de Paz para la Vida Digna” that denounced the diverse violences “exerted every day through the manoeuvres of agrobusiness and corporate interests in our territories, where we are expelled, persecuted, criminalized and murdered, as they increase their profits disproportionately and defend their own interests.” Even though in 2018 participation in this Forum was quantitatively lower, the Red CALISAS de Cátedras Libres de Soberanía Alimentaria, MNCI, UTT and GRAIN were there, focusing debates

on the fundamentals of life reproduction: seeds, which are at the base of the food chain. The issue is particularly relevant, as the Bayer-Monsanto legislation on seeds already has already obtained

preliminary approval in Argentina. The diagnosis of the food system crisis may be similar to that of the G20. Nevertheless, responses to the crisis are quite different. According to the participants in the Forum on Food Sovereignty, this system has not been able to feed the world population through productivity increase, as was promised by big business. Therefore, proposals for transforming this reality must be carried out by peasants’ movements, not by the large corporations represented at the G20. “The G20’s sustainable food system is a farce: it aggravates land and capital concentration, and it is controlled by a handful of corporations led by banks and investment funds. Large capitals are represented by the affinity groups B20 and C20, and by the Sustainable Food System Taskforce. In our view, these corporations are absolutely unable to solve the crisis”, says Marcos Filardi, member of the Asamblea No al G20 and of the Red CALISAS at the Forum on Food Sovereignty. Currently, seeds are marketed and concentrated by four major corporations: Corqueva (from the Dow-Dupont fusion), ChemChina (which has bought Syngenta), Bayer (which has bought Monsanto) and BASF. Filardi explains that “these four corporations

13. https://viacampesina.org/es/declaracion-del-foro-soberania-alimentaria-territorios-paz-la-vida-digna/

concentrate 100% of transgenic foods, 75% of commercial seeds, and 70% of the agro-consumption world market: they are undoubtedly the big winners in the dominant agro-industrial model. In addition we find the cereal interests (five companies concentrate the total global volume of grain marketing) and the food industry that converts into ultra-processed edible objects the three cereals which, today, represent the largest part of human nourishment.” This means that a few global corporations concentrate the food production worldwide, in the current ecocidal system that is damaging nature beyond repair. The different proposals made at the Forum may be summarized in three main lines: 1) to promote food sovereignty with peasant-based agroecology, 2) to rediscuss production, distribution and consumption chains, and 3) to regard food, seeds and water as common goods and human rights. Adding to networks and meetings derived from the Forum’s process since 2017, the need now arose to establish a Red de Abogadxs por la Soberanía Alimentaria [network of lawyers supporting food sovereignty] as a political move to counter the increasing criminalization of socio-environmental groups in our country.

6.3 Forum on Common Goods and Sovereignty The Forum on Common Goods and Sovereignty met on Wednesday, November 28 at the Facultad de Ciencias Sociales throughout

the whole day, discussing along three axes: 1) extractivist context and militarization: loot, pollution, repression, economic and territorial concentration, climate change; 2) resistance and self-determination of peoples; and 3) systemic alternatives and proposals. Participating organizations include: Amigos de la Tierra, Multisectorial Antiextractivista, socio-environmental assemblies from Puerto Madryn y Andalgalá, Observatorio Petrólero Sur (OPSur), CEMIDA, Jubileo Sur and Diálogo 2000, ATTAC -France and Argentina-, Movimiento de Mujeres Indígenas por El Buen Vivir, Red CALISAS, IEALC/UBA and Economistas de Izquierda (EDI). Climate change was one of the subjects of this Forum, continuing with the Forum of Common Goods held at the Peoples Summit “WTO Out! Building Sovereignty” of the previous year. The issue has not been sufficiently discussed in Argentina, and it was dealt with at the Forum not as “pertaining to scientists”, but rather as an urgent matter affecting the communities and our everyday lives both in the cities and in the countryside. At the G20 in Argentina, climate change was not prioritized due to the tensions arising from Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement. As regards the issue of “buen vivir” [“good living”], Vanessa Dourado says that “it was installed by indigenous comrades who shared, in first person narratives, the debates around alternatives to development, challenging the idea of infinite growth in the face of finite resources”. Peasant agroecology and the rejection of the technological package of the Fourth Industrial Revolution were the

strong options that emerged from this Forum, coinciding with the conclusions of the Forum on Food Sovereignty. The fallacy of the concept of “sustainable development” through industrial agriculture was revealed, as family agriculture accounts for 80% of consumption and is therefore crucial. Industrial agriculture does not produce food for the whole world’s population: it manufactures biofuels or animal feed based on agrochemicals and monoculture which damage the soil and worsen global warming. Both Forums condemned industrial agriculture, whose purpose is not to produce food but rather to generate profits for a few, and the G20 is one of the international entities representing the winners in the dominant agro-industrial system. Moreover, the Forum discussed the relevance of women as regards environmental preservation. Indigenous and peasant women form the majority of those working in agroecology, and are therefore murdered, raped and made to suffer bodily harm for being the defenders of the land. Thus, one of the key issues emerging from this Forum is the relation between feminism and environmental care, which allows for the conclusion that women are in charge of the reproduction of common goods and the alternatives must therefore be ecofeminist. Lastly, one of the Forum’s proposals has to do with enacting the rights of nature. As explained by Vanessa Dourado, “indigenous peoples teach us that ‘we are nature’. How can a river be polluted by companies who take no responsibility for the damage they

have wrought? The extractivist model is part of a colonial logic that, through the international division labor, still positions us as raw material providers, militarizes our territories with ‘antiterrorist’ discourses, and appropriates our lands and destroys nature”. Therefore, for Dourado, talking about the common goods issue implies necessarily a reference to militarization. Experiences were shared of areas where the situation is becoming dire, as for example in the Guarani Aquifer, a strategic region for industries that need water for their business.

Conclusion: what was the contribution of NoG20 to global resistance?

After the G20 Summit the official document was published: the G20 Leaders’ Declaration “Building consensus for fair and sustainable development”. Its 31 points attempt to summarize (in no more than two paragraphs each) issues such as education, labor, technology, gender equality, food security and financial inclusion, celebrating the “successful Buenos Aires Summit” and closing with the call to the Summit in Japan in June 2019. According to Julio Gambina, “this consensus political document outlines very general issues, and the main problems of the global situation and the trade war were not addressed. One of the outcomes of the G20 Summit is that the focus should no longer be on either the G7 or the G8 but rather on the ‘G2’ (China and the United States), mani-

14. https://www.cancilleria.gob.ar/userfiles/prensa/declaracion_de_lideres_del_g20_en_ buenos_aires-_en_espanol.pdf

fest in the bilateral meeting between Trump and Xi Jinping held within the framework of the Buenos Aires Summit.” From the viewpoint of the social and political organizations in the resistance, this document may be read as a continuation of those emerging from the meetings of affinity groups and ministers held during 2018, where issues such as the future of work, gender inequity and the socio-environmental crisis are superficially dealt with and show (intentional) lack of knowledge on the structural causes of inequality. As an example, we may quote point 17: “Large movements of refugees are a global concern with humanitarian, political, social and economic consequences. We emphasize the importance of shared actions to address the root causes of displacement and to respond to growing humanitarian needs.” This text refers to one of the most urgent global problems, with no mention of, or responsibility awarded to, the countries that plunder territories and aggravate social and armed conflicts with their own neocolonial wars, expelling hundreds of thousands of people from their communities. In Argentina, neoliberal and adjustment measures have generated the deep rejection of the population. And therefore, beyond the weakness of the G20 official declaration, the government to some extent fulfilled the goal of positioning itself in the international scenario as a reliable and strategic country within the region. Notwithstanding the wide criticism it receives, it was crucial for the Macri administration that world leaders have expressed that

the Argentine government is moving forward along the right path. Thus, according to Bettina Müller, “the support that Macri received from the world powers gathered at the G20 in Buenos Aires was extremely important. On the other hand, for the world powers (especially the industrialized countries) the organization of the G20 in Argentina was relevant to show strength and presence in the region, which is undergoing a reflux of progressive governments and a new surge of governments subservient to the interests of imperialist countries, including China”. Nevertheless, Latin America also shows the impact of resistance processes throughout the region, where the streets are flooded daily with demonstrations against neofascisms and their various expressions. So the arrival of the G20 in Argentina may also be interpreted as a disciplinary strategy against Latin American social movements, evidenced by the scenario of preventive repression and criminalization of the organizations before and during the Summit. The power of collective organization was shown at the time of the arrival of the leaders. Notwithstanding the local context of political fragmentation and the impossibility of agreeing on a general strike (as was proposed by some labor unions before the Summit), three major occurrences may be highlighted: the wide Confluencia against the G20 and the IMF, the Peoples Summit in the public space that articulated alternative and programmatic proposals, and the final Action Week which ended in a huge, unitary and pea-

ceful street march. Four months after the Summit, we can make an assessment of

the process, taking into account the various comments of those who participated in this experience. For Vanessa Dourado, the struggle in the south is very different from the one in the north: “We are systematically attacked due to the quantity of natural re-

sources in the region. And these resources are strategic for global capital, especially at a time when it can no longer generate profits. So they come here against democracy, ‘what happens with democracy in Latin America?’ We stand in rejection to the recolonization of our region. Therefore, the specificity of our struggle resides on the interests of capital within our region, and on how we resist against their strategy.” Remarkably, during the last few years the experiences of the Latin American feminist movement, and in particular of Argentine feminism, have been adopted by other social movements in the region, and by feminists in the central countries, as examples of a strong, active movement in constant flow and with increasingly young participation, that can articulate the various intersections of class, race, ethnicity and gender. The power of contemporary internationalist feminism was evident not only in the Feminist Forum against the G20, but also in the organization of the Peoples Summit. Activists from the feminist movement worked in all the spaces (organization, logistics, coordination), and were present in the political discussions and the mainstreaming of gender perspective in the debates. According to Florencia Partenio, “this internationalism is key, within a context of resistances, because in those countries dealing with greater attacks against democracies, against human and labor rights, against the achievements inherited from the labor movement’s struggles, these attacks are being challenged by feminisms. This is a contribution from anti-capita-

list, anti-racist feminisms that engage in dialogue, articulate and even debate with groups of the popular left.” Another key point in the organization of the Peoples Summit was its aim to make visible and intersect the struggles in our territory. This was evidenced by the diversity of participants, activists, workshop attendees and intellectuals that met to discuss articulated responses. One example is the link between the Forum on Food Sovereignty and the Forum on Common Goods, as they shared their analyses on agrobusiness (yet another face of extractivism as implemented by the present-day capitalist model). Bridges and communicating networks were established by those struggling against high-scale mining, fracking, dams, industrial urban pollution and real-estate speculation. Also, bridges between ecofeminism and the Abya Yala feminisms allow for the consideration of alternatives that reclaim ancestral knowledge and experiences from our lands. Lastly, we must highlight one of the alternatives appearing in all the Forums: a new form of social organization, from the bottom up, that takes into consideration the communities and their needs, that is, a popular economy as alternative to the economy imposed by the large corporations concentrating the world’s wealth. A specific contribution from our region is, probably, to understand our resistance in at least two senses, as expressed by Luciana Ghiotto:

“On the one hand, to cultivate the global tradition of resistances: where the G20 goes, resistances organize. And in Argentina we wanted to be part of that global resistance, which means solidarizing with past struggles and leaving our own seed for coming struggles. This is why we needed to systematize our work, framed by the efforts of WTO Out! and the creation of organizations such as ATTAC and resistance against the FTAA. On the other hand, we can also generate a process of linking local struggles with global issues, which is a way of helping insert the Argentine local struggles in the global resistance: to bridge the gap between the Argentine struggle and the global struggle. In November we were able to show, worldwide, that Argentina also struggled against the G20, that we were part of that global collective, while at the same time we debated on the alternatives, on what we wish to build.” If alternatives are aimed at changing reality from a systemic perspective, transforming the structural roots of inequality, they must necessarily be articulated globally. This is one of the outcomes of this process, emerging not only from one or two years of resistance, but rather the result of activism and of the networks of social and political movements, that involve enormous grassroots, territorial and assembly work in our region. Therefore, on the basis of our resistance contributions, we must continue to visibilize and expand resistances, in the face of a world that is becoming increasingly individualistic and for the very few. The great collective and pluralistic effort of the Asamblea No al

G20 to organize a Peoples Summit against the G20 and the IMF is, thus, a path that furthers the legacy of Hamburg, and draws genealogical lines from Latin American history. Moreover, it carries the inheritance of global resistance: the significance of raising our voices, of putting our bodies on the streets, and of thinking together other possible worlds, with hope, from this present time of struggle.

RESISTANCE AGAINST G20 IN ARGENTINA