Against neo-liberalism
By Russell Pickering
MADRID — More than 1500 people from across Europe and around the world, including eight Zapatista members and members of the Basque liberation movement, attended the Second International Meeting for Humanity and Against Neo-liberalism from July 26 to August 3.
The First International Meeting was held in the Chiapas region of Mexico last year.
The overall theme of the nine-day conference — held in Madrid, Catalunya, Ruesta, Almunecar and concluding in El Indiano — was "New forms of politics and new forms of doing politics". It aimed to create "spaces for the interchange of ideas, practices and desires, more important than conclusions and resolutions", and to be "self-organised".
Major discussion themes included Neo-liberal economy against humanity; Struggles for culture, education and information; Our world and their world; Struggles for land, ecology and the earth; Against patriarchy; and Against all forms of marginalisation.
The conference ended with a series of summary sessions and reports from the various centres. It was concluded that the gathering was an important step in the creation of an "international network of resistances ... made up of all of us who resist".