Following months of speculation over the location of the 2005 G8 Summit in the UK, and reports that all police leave in Edinburgh and Scotland will be cancelled next summer, the Gleneagles hotel [official website] in Perthshire, Scotland has finaly been confirmed as the venue (G8 dates: 6th-8th July 2005).
The last time the G8 met in the UK was in Birmingham in May 1998. Then up to 70,000 people encircled the centre of Birmingham, forming a human chain and demanding an end to third world debt [pics]. On the same day up to 7,000 people took control of the centre of Birmingham for the second Global Reclaim the Streets Party [pics 1 | 2 | 3][video] - with actions and protests happening against the G8 in around 40 cities across the world, with over 400 social movements taking co-ordinated action under the banner of Peoples' Global Action (PGA).
Six years and many huge mobilisations later, people in the UK have been organising around the G8 for several months. A growing new network of local groups has been created called the Dissent! Network, with nodes across the country. Dissent! is planning a series of awareness raising events through the year and has been calling for both local and international participation. Many people and groups are now focussing on planning protests and direct action campaigns against the G8.
Recently many NGO organisations are also co-ordinating on a level unseen since the Jubliee 2000 drop the debt campaigns, and are set to try and take advantage of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown's aim to pitch the UK presidency of the G8 as a positive step towards reducing third world debt and around issues of development and trade [see guardian article] - 2005 is also the 20th anniversary of the Live Aid concert. Several groups are expected to use the European Social Forum in London in October later this year as a platform from which to launch campaigns. Recently several Trade Union leaders, politicians and Globalise Resistance have also issued their first call for protests.
See also:
Recent UK Savannah G8 Solidarity Actions
The People's Golfing Association (PGA) [statement][pics]
"Anarchist Group's Gleneagles Website Exclusive!"*
Corporate Media Coverage of Gleneagles G8
For more on G8 - see the Indymedia G8 Reports Section
Comments
Hide the following 11 comments
date?
11.06.2004 12:21
sean
more info and a bit of background
11.06.2004 13:05
6th-8th July 2005
(but not confirmed on any official websites yet).
More info:
The Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, beat Mr Blair to the Gleneagles announcement by informing the Italian press that the leaders had all been invited to Scotland. Mr Berlusconi said Mr Blair told them: "You will all have to wear kilts!"
Later when Blair was asked by the press if he wanted to apologise to the people of the Gleneagles area for the mayhem that would come with the G8 summit, Mr Blair said simply something like "Yes, I suppose I should, yes, is probably the answer."
Blair also said:
"Hopefully then we will have a series of actions..." but this is shamefully quoted out of context ;)
In 1977, the UK first hosted the G8 Summit in London and have hosted the G8 Summit a total of four times, first London 1977, then came London 1984 which saw the first counter conference coinciding with the, as it was then, G7 summit. Organised by "The Other Economic Summit", better known as TOES, which turned up to insert itself in the doorway of the great and good of the London Summit. Parallel to the summit, researchers, activists, mainly ecologists and alternative economists responded to the hunger strikes and nuclear problems to challenge the G7 member states, especially about their relationships with the countries of the South and the environment.
The English TOES then became the New Economics Foundation in London, but TOES remained the generic term for the summits held parallel to the G7 during the 80s which, between 1984 and 1988, evolved according to the different networks and coalitions of NGOs of the host countries. In time, these coalitions came to declare the G7 a symbol of "globalisation and neo-liberalism", which made little impact on public opinion as the alternative summits had limited publicity.
Then came London again in 1991, and of course Birmingham 1998....
wobbly
Birmingham 1998 - we were f*cking avin' it!
11.06.2004 15:00
we ARE everywhere
we really need to . . .
12.06.2004 09:45
At dsei, locals I spoke to were supportive, but had no idea why we were there until I told them. We need to counter the media propaganda that is already spreading the line "protestors may cause trouble like they did in genoa" - pointing out the police beatings in the school/dormitary etc, talk about the aubonne bridge incident etc and establish that the police are not their to 'protect' the locals but to prevent dissent and guard murderers. Any one up scotland way want to take this on?
If we're serious about change, rather than just feeling revolutionary every time theres a summit, we need to engage with those outside of our movement who will otherwise swallow the state propaganda whole. Simply putting our side will open up the possibility in people's minds that the mainstream is full of propagandist nonsense, something few people are aware of or even consider.
propaganda
more about dissent
12.06.2004 10:43
1. A very clear rejection of capitalism, imperialism and feudalism; all trade agreements, institutions and governments that promote destructive globalisation.
2. We reject all forms and systems of domination and discrimination including, but not limited to, patriarchy, racism and religious fundamentalism of all creeds.
We embrace the full dignity of all human beings.
3. A confrontational attitude, since we do not think that lobbying can have a major impact in such biased and undemocratic organisations, in which transnational capital is the only real policy-maker;
4. A call to direct action and civil disobedience, support for social movements' struggles, advocating forms of resistance which maximize respect for life and oppressed peoples' rights, as well as the construction of local alternatives to global capitalism.
5. An organisational philosophy based on decentralisation and autonomy.
josqiun
Someone tell the dinosaurs at PGA - The G8 is redundant!
15.06.2004 18:16
The Davos meeting and Bilderberg meetings are much more where policy is decided for the G8 anyway! At Bilderberg we have the added bonus of campaigning against the head bankers from the Federal Reserve, European Central Bank and World Bank/IMF and European Royalty. Bilderberg protesters can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Come on Kolya, come on PGA wake up!
This annual gathering of the world's richest nations has become redundant
08 June 2004
When leaders of the Group of Eight industrialised nations assemble at Sea Island in the US state of Georgia today for their 2004 summit, it will be, for most of them, the second time they have been gathered together this week, and it will not be the last............
Rapier of sanity
Armchair activism?
20.06.2004 20:15
Winston Smith
Feel like u have been down this road before
28.06.2004 22:49
bunnyboiler
So lets just sit at home...
20.10.2004 15:19
I know what im doing.
*e*
electropixie
e-mail:
djscreamy@hotmail.com
Homepage:
http://electropixie.blogspot.com
PS
22.10.2004 13:41
*e*
electropixie
e-mail:
djscreamy@hotmail.com
Homepage:
http://electropixie.blogspot.com
clever
26.11.2004 22:07
jpea