There it goes with the suggested changes. Yes you were right Monty, and Chris, 'committment' is a much better term.
luis
>Final Declaration of the 2nd Encounter for Humanity and against
>Neoliberalism, in Spain, July 1997.
>
>Translated by Luis.
>
>
>A little over three years ago, in different parts of the world collectives
>in support of the zapatista revolution appeared. Later, the EZLN comrades
>convened the First Encounter for Humanity and against Neoliberalism, where
>it was decided to start the building of a network which would look into
>coordinating groups throughout the planet for the struggle against a system
>that has a planetary base and vocation: neoliberalism and the attendant
>economic globalization, with its brutal economic, social and ecological
>consequences for the different peoples and territories of the Earth.
>
>We have arrived here from the five continents to help build a world of
>dignity and humanity.
>
>The richness of our discussions, the color of our exchanges and the humanity
>of our experiences and struggles have shown that we have dignity. However,
>neoliberal capital tries more and more to rob us of our dignity.
>
>We come from the five continents, but there are millions of brothers and
>sisters that remained behind.
>
>Among us there's an unemployed worker forced to compete against all the
>others because a competitive labor market is good for the economy.
>
>Among us is a woman who walks several kilometers every day to bring water
>home because there isn't any in her village, but there are golf courses in
>the desert.
>
>Among us there is a student reading a book at night in conditions of poverty
>who must memorize dogma to be prepared to better compete.
>
>Among us there is a mother who goes to the market in any southern country
>and buys less every day because her money is being swallowed up by
>international banks.
>
>Among us there are those who work too much because they might be
>unemployed
>tomorrow.
>
>Among us there are those who believe that there's no tomorrow, that there's
>no today and no yesterday.
>
>We are those ripped apart, those classified, those trapped in hierarchies
>and forced to fight among us so that the global factory may continue
>spinning without anybody stopping it in a senseless and endless motion.
>
>We are the isolated, the atomized the divided by race, gender, occupation,
>status, nationality, color, sexual preference, those made to believe that by
>virtue of our differences we must not unite, that crime must continue, that
>hunger must continue, that the silence must continue, that censorship must
>continue.
>
>Now we say enough! and begin to do things our way. It will take time, but
>we've started.
>
>The First Declaration of La Realidad proposed that we build bridges among
>ourselves, many bridges that are also rainbows. The Second Declaration of
>La
>Realidad proposed a network of struggles and communication to begin to
>materialize these bridges among ourselves. We have taken a step forward.
>
>Today faced with the fragmentation and the isolation that social and
>political struggles have historically shown and still continue to show,
>neoliberal capitalism offers a cohesive and global, though not centralized,
>model, whose versatility and ability to adapt and absorb everything that
>questions or opposes it, forces us to search for new ways to articulate that
>seek maximum efficiency in the struggles and resistances towards its
>definitive transformation and replacement.
>
>The concept of a network, because of its flexibility, versatility, low
>maintenance cost and capacity for the continuous opening of multiple
>concrete fronts, is the paradigm of this new way of confronting the
>overwhelming reality of the system.
>
>By network we understand a movement under permanent construction of
>people
>and organizations interconnected among themselves that will link,
>communicate and coordinate the different struggles of prevention, resistance
>and action for Humanity and against Neoliberalism.
>
>Made up of organized entities, individual or collective, interrelated among
>themselves, without a specific center, with a horizontal structure, that
>send and receive information and are capable of orgainizing themselves for
>the undertaking of common acts, using all technological means available and
>all forms of social relations. As the Second Declaration of La Realidad
>says: "The net is all of us who talk and listen ... all of us who resist.
>With local, supralocal, national and international levels until we build the
>Planetary Net for Humanity and against Neoliberalism." One in which the
>objectives, the information, the groups and the actions enrich themselves as
>they travel through the net, proposing without imposing, one in which all
>the parts are the whole and the whole is in each of the parts.
>
>We propose an open network knitted with information, connection, integration
>and mutual help in the knots of encounter, one that finds its strength in
>its plasticity. A network with the dynamic organism of a living being, which
>allows for the inmediate activation at the opportune moment, in response to
>concrete needs and conflicts, but at the same time in step with the emergent
>coordination of the plurality of our struggles, consciences and diverse but
>converging conceptions of reality.
>
>The network must allow the incorporation of all the organizations,
>collectives and citizens, based on absolute equality, who answer the call to
ME-Abat neoliberalism and the alienation and suffering of humanity without
>central power nuclei and empowering the autonomy of the experiences thus
>created and the organizational ways each especific reality demands.
>Empowering in turn the human contact, the affection among peoples which
>allows for the social growth of the fabric of struggles and resistances in a
>continuous and alive fashion.
>
>The esential objective of the network is to fight all forms of oppression,
>degradation and destruction of persons, peoples and the Planet incarnated in
>the Hegemonic System, and to simultaneously build a new world in which all
>worlds have their place, those of today as well as future ones.
>
>Functionally the network is:
>
>- A net of information, which sets up in a space of communication a
>continual flow of data, facts and claims generated by the daily practice of
>each and every one of the collectives and individuals who make it up.
>
>- A net of prevention and action, which permits us on the one hand to
>anticipate and resolve problems before they cause irreversible results, and
>on the other to achieve maximum efficiency in the actions to be undertaken
>towards the multiplication and combination of varied forces.
>
>- A net of continuous intercation of experiences, conceptions, methods and
>capabilities and personal relations that allow for the coming together and
>enrichment of peoples, cultures, collectives and individuals, and the
>finding and promotion of social and economical alternatives that allow for
>vital options respectful of people and the planet we inhabit.
>
>
>Network of nets and contact with other networks.
>
>On the one hand, there is the progressive consolidation of this network on
>an international scale, worldwide as well as regionally planetary,
>attempting to incorporate local networks. In this sense, the realization of
>this encounter means an advance, because although there are still important
>holes in the structure of the net, everything indicates that those holes are
>step by step being filled. The Network for Humanity and against
>Neoliberalism is taking concrete form primarily in the European space and in
>the Americas, but we have also seen how this encounter has brought together
>representatives from all parts of the globe: Asia, Africa, eastern countries
>and Oceania.
>
>However, there remains much road to travel. Perhaps a way to consolidate
>this dynamic is to take advantage of and enlarge the regional coordination
>structures that have been set up for this Encounter.
>
>But besides this problem of network consolidation on a regional and
>planetary scale (Europe, America, Africa ...) it can be seen more clearly
>that there is a need to connect this proccess with the progressive
>crystallization of networks of a sectorial character, likewise on planetary,
>regional and local levels. In this way we will gain in efficiency and in
>capability for political influence. Some of these nets are being built
>starting from sector nets already in existance, and others are being pushed
>forward as a result of this Encounter.
>
>What networks are we talking about? Networks which, for example, will
>coalesce groups and collectives that work in the fields of health,
>antinuclear struggle, ecology (particularly oil), information and mass
>media, feminist and lesbian women, free circulation and global citizenship.
>At least these are the ideas and proposals that have surfaced at this time.
>
>However, we must take into account that the practice of resistance and
>transformation, as well as that of elaboration and reflexion are not
>exhausted within the environment of the networks we have launched or
>connected with our dynamic.
>
>There are likewise many nets, groups and dynamics, worldwide, regional and
>local which oppose in one way or another, in greater or lesser degree,
>explicitly or implicitly, the neoliberal logic. And it should be an
>objective to keep in mind to establish relations with them and to promote a
>creative promiscuity for all, each one keeping their respective autonomy,
>which will contribute to the ends we pursue. This is a way to bring into
>practice the plurality and diversity which animates the zapatista comrades,
>with the goal of proving that in this world there's room for many worlds.
>
>We have to make these coordinations go further than the purely informational
>or virtual coordination which propiciates the transmission of information
>and theoretical elaborations. To incite them to become a true mechanism for
>unity in the struggles and for the enrichment and extension of their
>experiences.
>
>But it must go further still. It must become an instrument that allows for
>the transmission of humanity and facilitates personal and collective
>acquaintance.
>
>We should congratulate ourselves because in spite of the difficulties we
>face, this proccess, with all its imperfectioons and criticisms, is under
way.
>
>Out of this great reunion there should come a collective and individual
>committment in three spheres:
>
>1. The committment to activate from the moment we end this II Encounter the
>exchange of information among individuals and collectives, taking advantage
>of the contacts made among comrades and organizations worldwide. This
>information must not consist solely in the circulation of data, but also in
>a permanent stimulus for all kinds of political, theoretical and cultural
>debates.
>
>2. The committment of each comrade to propose and promote internal debate
>in
>their organizations, collectives and social environments, about the network
>of struggle and resistance and the conclusions of this Encounter.
>
>3. The committment to foment and spread the concept of the network of
>struggles and resistance and the starting of local networks in the concrete
>space of the daily struggles of our comrades.
>
>
>PROPOSALS FOR CAMPAIGN AND CONCRETE ACTIONS
>
>Among the multiplicity of proposals and concrete actions generated by the
>tables and sub-tables, we have extracted the following, as the most general
>and important, even at the risk of not including some which are considered
>by their originating working groups as interesting from their view point. In
>any case they are all amply considered in the conclusions by the different
>tables and sub-tables.
>
>* Campaign against the World Trade Organization. Alternative Summit in
>March
>in Geneva and coordinated actions throughtout the world in parallel with the
>official summit in May 1988.
>
>* Support of acts and mobilizations denouncing neoliberal policies,
>Maastritch and the unique currency, which will be promoted on a European
>scale the first week of December, in a decentralized fashion in the
>different countries, in accordance with the proposal by The Alternative
>Forum of Amsterdam.
>
>* Mobilization campaigns October 8-12 denouncing Northern imperialism that
>oppresses and exploits different peoples worldwide. Coordinated with the
>human chain shoulder to shoulder with will culminated in New York on October
>12.
>
>* Boicott of especific transnational corporations against their labor
>practices and attacks on indigenous peoples. Campaign against Shell
>(because
>of the situation of the Ogoni people in Nigeria). Campaign against Nestle.
>Campaign against Siemens (nuclear).
>
>* Support of the summit parallel to the Climate Summit in Tokio, on December
>this year.
>
>* Acts to denounce the situation of political prisoners, on February 9, 1988.
>
>* Acts against patriarchy on November 25.
>
>* Acts for the participation of women on January 1 1988, anniversary of the
>Chiapas uprising.
>
>* A Day to demand healthy nourishment on December 14.
>
>* The creation of a technical group on ecological information and education.
>
>* Support of campaigns to denounce the Schengen Treaty promoted by
>inmigrant's associations, as well as denouncing internment centers and
>international segregation zones for inmigrants.
>
>The building of this network on an intercontinental level is part of a
>process of struggle for a better future, of learning to organize political
>debate among ourselves. Thus it is very important that we analize and
>discuss among us the conclusions of this Encounter in our local, national
>and international nets. To guarantee continuity in this process, we propose
>the celebration of regional encounters for evaluation, in principle from now
>until December of this year.
>
>At the same time we recommend to enlarge the periodicity of the encounters
>(perhaps every two years). The greater coincidence generated thanks to the
>net and the communication achieved among ourselves must now feed the
>different local perspectives and from there to backfeed the Intercontinental
>Encounters.
>
>
>
> Luis
>@@@@@@@@@@
>
>Luis J. Prat
>
>University of California
>Chemistry Dept.
>Santa Barbara CA 93106
>(805) 893-3295
>(805) 893-4120 FAX
>
>
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