UN RENOUVEAU DE LA PARTICIPATION ASSOCIATIVE ? L'engagement et le militantisme au sein du comité Attac Isère

2.2.2.2 The search for a legitimate mode of protest

« All the efforts of violence cannot weaken the truth and are only used for raising it more. All the lights of the truth cannot anything to stop violence, and do nothing but irritate it still more »

Pascal, the provincial ones, 12th letter 

2.2.2.2.1 To answer violence

The international social conflicts such as Seattle or Genoa have constrained the militants of Attac to seek a mode of specific action. Indeed, they were confronted during these mobilizations with groups which include violence in their repertories of actions. The violent action is a data which was often occulted, wrongly, of the analysis of the mobilizations^495(*). Charles Tilly is one of the first authors has to have integrated violence in his reflection, not in fact specific but as a method of the collective protest^496(*). The taking into account of violence appears essential, within Attac, in the comprehension of the forms of the militant action.

At the time of against tops, a great diversity of political actors is represented. In addition to the traditional actors (associations, ONG, political parties, trade unions), anarchistic groups took part in these mobilizations. While the first fall under a prospect legalist, the seconds are, often, in favor of a more violent mode of action. For example, the autonomous movements which claim black block are recognized as being more the violent ones at the time of the against-tops^497(*). Other groups, which are claimed like nonviolent one, develop strategies of action plus protesters (blocking of the access roads, direct interposition vis-a-vis the police officers) such as Reclaim the streets, Tutte bianche or Teststemyà basta. With the wire of the against-tops, violence was increasingly present on both sides. Important safety devices were installed in the cities being used as places of meeting with the international authorities. For example, at the time of the top of the G8 of July 2001, the town of Genoa was transformed into a quasi-blockhouse^498(*). However, violences multiplied.

After these events, the persons in charge for association adopted a position vis-a-vis violence. In response to the Summit of Gothenburg, the Office of Attac published a press release by which they was disunited « completely groups of agitators who ransacked the downtown area of Gothenburg during the against-top » and the will of Attac affirmed « to act in a nonviolent way »^499(*). However the positions of the leaders of association are more ambiguous than could not let it think this speech « set language ». One can distinguish, with respect to violence two tendencies contrary within Attac. First of all, Susan George taken position in a very clear way against violence and the groups who practice it^500(*). Contrary, some, such as Christophe Aguiton, tend to grant a place to violence within the mobilizations without to legitimate it in a clear way^501(*). This refusal to condemn violence caused sharp polemical within association, more especially as Christophe Aguiton lays out, according to some, of a militant past «paramilitary »^502(*). Its political organization (the LCR) was also shown to encourage the militants with violence^503(*). Following the against-top of Genoa, certain representatives of Attac, such as Ricardo Petrella, president d' Attac Italy and journalist of the Diplomatic World, regarded these violences as an answer « inevitable » with the police provocations^504(*), which amounts legitimating them.

The committee isérois was already confronted with the problem of violence. For example, the mobilization of Nice in December 2000 was very badly lived by certain militants. Usually, the organization of the against-tops is done by the national direction of association, while the local committees constitute the troops of the mobilizations. However, at the time of against Summit of Nice the national direction did not invite to take part in the surrounding of the palate of the congresses. Attac committees, of which that of Isere, had been mobilized but no organization framed their action. The committees dispersed among the demonstrators and of the militants of found mingled with groups with anarchists. Cecile explains that the demonstration was very violent and that many militants of Attac come to express peacefully were very surprised course of the events.

Within the committee isérois, Luc specifies us, that it is possible to find this divergence of opinions among the militants. Following violences of Nice, certain militants had refused that the Board of directors of the committee invites to express for the against-top of Genoa. Contrary, other militants were in favor of a more violent action intended to force the zone of demarcation. The position of surveyed concerns the same ambiguity as the remarks of Christophe Aguiton. They refuse to support violence and disunite breakers but they do not condemn them therefore. They position in a strategy of demarcation with respect to violence^505(*). The militants of the committee refuse to be amalgamated with the groups considered to be more radical. The expression of Lionel («Not for me !«) this catch of distance summarizes. One can perhaps explain this reaction, just as that of Susan George, by the taking into account of the image of the movement which could suffer from confusion.

Cecile : I had never seen such a violent demonstration. People of Attac which had come to see, expected manif a fun, cool, kind carnival, they were surprised, but remained. But I am not sure, that people of Attac would reinvest in manif of this kind especially that against G. 8, in July, which is also announced forces [...] But especially on this manif, it is that there no had been collective preparation on behalf of Attac Isere. In other cities, there had been a preparation, by saying what it was necessary to do if one were stopped, one could call such lawyer number; what should be made if one is in a police station? [...] I am very critical on Attac Isere! There is evil to organize collective meetings and to give directives so that the things function. For example, for Nice one could not organize of bus; as the meeting proceeded over three days, one gave the possibility to people of coming when he wanted, the morning or the evening. One had organized covoiturages, one gave oneself appointments on the carpark from Town square to Grenoble to one hour morning. It was not even known if one would find cars to transport people. One does not know how much came and people were not even well-informed, to enter Nice and where was the meeting.

Luc : The time of front, compared to Genoa, one did not have any information on the way in which that was going to occur. There was a fear of intervening in Genoa, because there was experience of Götegerg with a death, there was experience of Nice where one relatively badly has all summers at ease because there was no organization and there were no engines. One did not want that that reproduces. Thus in the Board of directors one could find the two tendencies, the tendency Aguiton and the tendency Susan George, there was a tendency which said it is necessary to go to demolish the wall around Genoa, an extreme tendency, there was tendency which said, taking into account the problems violence and risks compared to the press, it especially not Aller to Genoa, and then a third tendency of which I formed part, which said «let us wait to have more information! ». For me was about it to decide when one did not have any more information. One spent eight hours on top. Then one waited to know some more to decide to organize something to go there. Because somebody said one does take the responsability to organize something compared to people who will go there?

Julie : Perhaps what one will have a revolution, perhaps which it is necessary to pass by there, there are risings increasingly important, it is necessary to see what one wants, one wants a rising where one puts bombs everywhere where one seeks to react and mobilize oneself and reflect together? I do not see myself going to pose bombs and thus it is necessary well to make differently.

Lionel : I had not been in Nice because it was especially on Europe and I saw that less important, it is less the role of Attac. It is a little more the role of the trade unions. There had been not badly violence with the Italians and the Spaniards. My position is mitigated enough compared to violence with knowing if it should be used or not. I include/understand it but I say «Not for me ! « That returns me a little to my past.

F.E : Why your past?

Lionel : I had not taken part in May 68 but at the beginning of the Seventies I had taken part in demonstrations which were in the line of May 68. It was a little a revenge over May which 68 one took there.

* ⁴⁹⁵ «  The action forces [...] is usually isolated analyzes of the participation, either that one regards it as another nature, or that the indicators used do not allow its taking into account. However, violence constitutes according to us a recourse, virtual, present at potential state daN S the collective action [...] The measurement of the share held by the violent action in the modes of participation must be in the center of the interrogation on the nature of the behavior protester  ». in «  The demonstration like political indicator of change  », p. 114-139.

* ⁴⁹⁶ Cf, op.cit, Lafargue (Jerome), p. 35.

* ⁴⁹⁷ The black block is not strictly speaking an organization but a mode of confrontation and protest. The autonomous groups indicated by this term appeared in 1992 at the time of violences directed towards the World Bank. Cf, Losson (Christian), «  Anti-universalization in the tactics of the confrontation. Movements anarchists radicalize the dispute  », Release, 18/06/2001, p. 3.

* ⁴⁹⁸ A perimeter of safety had been delimited within the town of Genoa. A fitted latticework on wall made from there the access impossible to the demonstrators. Dubois (Nathalie), «  During G8, Genoa crossed of the world. Italy envisaged many safety measures to frame the top of July 20  », Release, 18/06/2001, p. 4.

* ⁴⁹⁹ «  This behavior [of violence] is triple to reject. Initially, it constitutes a violation of the practices of democratic dialog of coordinations which are set up at the time of the large gatherings against the néo-liberal policies of the international and European institutions. Then, by the priority attention that the media grant to him, it makes it possible to overlook the stakes and the width of these mobilizations. Lastly, and more serious still, it opportunely provides arguments to all those [...] who, anxious rightly of the popular rejection that their policies cause, believe to find a parade there by trying criminaliser the dispute of a deeply unjust social order  ». Attac France, «  Declaration of the Office of Attac France  : after the incidents of Gothenburg  », 19/06/2001. Document available on the http://www.attac.org/tra/asso/doc/doc.62.htm site.

* ⁵⁰⁰ «  It is the law of the decreasing outputs. If the actions force repeat themselves too much, our work will suffer from it [...] For some idiots ingérables, one passes for primary anticapitalists, anti-Europeans violent one. These violences of anarchists or breakers its more antidemocratic than the institutions than they fight oneself saying  ». Cf, Losson (Christian), op.cit, p. 3.

* ⁵⁰¹Cf, Losson (Christian), «  Christophe Aguiton, one of the persons in charge for Attac  : «  One must include/understand the impatience and frustrations of the militants  », Release, 18/06/2001, p. 4.

* ⁵⁰² «  Christophe Aguiton, secretary-general of Attac and carry AC word  ! , a biography filled well has  : militant LCR for 28 years (during the years 1970, it responsible has been known even service of order (  !) league); expelled of CFDT in 1988, it melts Southern. Impassioned military strategy, it is a hard truth  ». Cf, Lecaussin (Nicolas), «  Tax Tobin  : the tax for the weak spirits  », op.cit, p. 9. 

* ⁵⁰³ A militant of Attac published on an Internet a message in which it showed the LCR of infiltration  : «  In light [...] the LCR would have a service of a clandestine nature, which car-is instituted to frame the members of Attac and to lead them in critical situations, not discussed collectively and beforehand. It better is included/understood «  comprehension  » benevolent of Aguiton [...] for violences in Gothenburg. These violences belong to the official spectacle. They are envisaged inevitable, even premeditated and wished, by the apparatus trotskist, without the knowledge of the militants of Attac  ». Douillard (Luc), «  Attac toy of the LCR  ?  », message diffused on Attac-talk, 24/06/2001.

* ⁵⁰⁴ «  On the other hand, for a few years, the confrontations have become a kind of ritual, apparently inevitable, according to a scenario which one would describe in advance. Each time, the forces about the cities where will be held the great appointment transforms the crossing points and of work of the official participants in a zone of high safety, under the control of thousands of anti-riot police officers, and, practicing a kind of preventive higher bid, take drastic measures of prohibition of access to the perimeters thus protected, even at the cities themselves, as it was the case in Quebec, and in a way even more caricatural, recently in Genoa  ». Petrella (Ricardo), «  Criminaliser the dispute  », The diplomatic World, August 2001, p. 6.

* ⁵⁰⁵ This position is that besides several members of Attac which support violence. For example a militant declared on Internet  : «  I think that violences make to us more visible of general public, and push people more and more to be informed near organizations like Attac. Moreover [...] if there are violences one tend us the microphone to deplore it, and if there is not us are not tightened the microphone [...] Why not do not ask Black Blocs (and others) to assert all their actions force [...] That will allow to make the share of the things clearly, on a side what is ascribable with demonstrators (of which one will continue to deplore the methods) and what is not it [...] And that will avoid unhappy amalgams...  ». Goareguer (Pascal), «  Götebog continuation, and a little policy  », Attac talk, 06/07/2001.