Trump. Putin. Merkel. Erdogan. Juncker. The list of invitees to the G20 summit is akin to a gallery of movie villains. Add to the main cast the supporting roles of the coup-maker Temer from Brazil, Xi Jinpeng from China, the murderer Duterte from the Phillipines and the disgraced Park from South Korea and the G20 reveals that it is a grotesque carnival of reaction rather than the dignified gathering of world leaders that it wants to portray itself as.
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Indeed the tarnished and almost comical state of the global elite mirrors the state of capitalism itself.
This is no coincidence. These powerhungry jackals are not the architects of capitalism but its spawn. They merely execute the bloods
hed, misery and death demanded by the capitalist system itself, a system in deep crisis. Andalthough this current batch of madmen, thieves and liars might seem particularly vile they are but players in a game who follow a set of rules given by the rulebook of capitalism. Today we see that the suspension, limitation and abolition of the few democratic rights won by people in struggle are increasingly attacked on a global scale by all of the G20 countries, this in order to limit the capacity for people to struggle back. We resist these measures while at the same time working to create a society from below.
The G20 is no true fight between different ideologies but a squabble between different groups of capitalist countries and interests who all put profit and capitalist order over the lives of people. Workers in different countries are put against each other with the threats of outsourcing and wagedumping which opens up for racist politics which in turn continue business as usual. The G20 is one of the main instigators of capitalist policies which the working class in every country has to fight against, our cause is common because capitalism exists globally.
In these times of austerity, the “luxury” of climate change reforms are passed over due to capitalism’s short-sighted nature. This desire is evident in political choices of ripping up the few pitiful voluntary agreements onfighting climate change and instead expanding heavy industry, expropriating land for fracking and extraction of oil, gas and minerals. The system is not merely heading for a social disaster, it’s also ravaging the very planet it subsists on due to its brutal desire to make profit, thereby destroying the very existance of it’s future inhibitants. This is untenable; every reform has so far been too little and too late and the G20 threatens to further set back any work against climate change.
The wars started by or supported by the great powers at the G20 has created refugee movements which they are now cutting off, effectively murdering thousands along the borders of Fortress Europe and Turkey. The G20 appears as a competition between differing state interests but this only hides that the interests of migrants and non-migrants alike are never considered. On the agenda of the G20 is the proposed “Compact for Africa”, a push to trap migrants inside of Africa and to keep their misery and death far away from the eyes of Europeans.
The G20 is not an end for us but a start. It is a time when we can take back the momentum as the main force of opposition in society. It is a place where we can learn, mobilize, gain confidence and energize our movements together. We will go to Hamburg along with social movements from far and wide to protest their world and envision another.
Everyone to the G20 in Hamburg 6-9 July!
WHAT IS THE G20 SUMMIT?
The 20 most advanced economies in the world have formed the Group of 20 in order to discuss policies of "financial stability" in annual summits. These summits consists of the world elite, the representatives of austerity, war, inequality and climate disaster; the heads of states, finance ministers and central bank governors from the EU and 19 states, and also specially invited individuals and groups such as the IMF and the World Bank as well as groups like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations led by Duterte of the Phillipines. The G20 is totally self-appointed and lacks any democratic control mechanisms are today the premier meeting point for the G20 to discuss and further their neoliberal policies and capitalist interests.
This years G20 summit is held in the left-wing area Schanzen in the huge conference hall of Hamburg. There are a wide array of protests planned from all spectra of social movements, ecologists, feminists, NGO:s, diverse currents of the radical left, the parliamentary left and the greens, asylum activists, Christians and many, many others. There are many different spaces and possibilities for different forms of actions.