Tuesday, November 12, 2002

Civil Disobedience over War with Iraq? In meetings I have attended lately there has been more talk of civil disobedience campaigns against war with Iraq.  The argument generally goes something like this:  if the government goes ahead with a war against our will, we need to raise the social cost of the war at home by actions –i.e. blocking traffic, getting arrested in demonstrations, etc.   I think this is a big mistake.  There is clearly a role for civil disobedience.  Three heroes—Henry David Thoreau, Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi are powerful examples of civil disobedience.  But, to be effective, civil disobedience has to have a moral vision that everyone can grasp.  This is not where the anti-war movement is today.   I believe that the majority of Americans will not support Bush’s war plans if they knew them in their entirety.  But they are confused about whether Iraq is in fact a threat.  Unless the anti-war movement can address this issue, the reasons to oppose the war remain muddled for all but the staunchest pacifist.   I see several currents in the anti-war movement, so far co-existing well.  There are the moral pacifists, like the Quakers and the American Friends Service committee, who have consistently and wholeheartedly stood for peace and non-violence, and who are totally understandable by the rest of America, regardless of whether they agree or not.    A second group is the anti-imperialists, the American left.  These are those of us who see continuity between American actions in Iraq and other forms of American hegemony—from Vietnam to Nicaragua to Panama—all aimed at furthering American power and inequality in the world for the benefit of America’s ruling class.  This is my own group.   Finally, the great majority of the anti-war movement is people who are appalled by the arrogance and unilateralism of Pres. Bush.  People who care about the environment, about nuclear non-proliferation, about maintaining international law based on consensus rather than raw power, see Bush as a frightening leader who may create a disaster.  Their opposition to war is based largely on Bush’s contempt for the UN and Europe, for his blatant double standards as to who deserves peace and freedom throughout the world, and his manifest scorn for humanitarian problems in Afghanistan or aids in Africa.  Former President Jimmy Carter and his Nobel Peace prize represent this point of view.   For all of these people, the issue of whether Iraq is a threat or not is very important, and still unresolved.  Whether they eventually support or more vigorously oppose the war depends largely on how Iraq plays out as a threat.  If Iraq appears to be conceding, and is then unilaterally attacked by the U.S. to fulfill the right-wing agenda, these people could become desperately and passionately against the war, and fully support those who do civil disobedience.    But if Hussein uses chemical weapons, or appears to defy the U.N. and unites most of the world against him, these people will come to see the war as a necessary response to a true threat.   The future of the anti-war movement as a popular mass movement is very much hanging in the balance, and at this time it is only self-indulgent to think that we will win majority support by blocking traffic, or getting thousands of people arrested.   We will need true majority support if Bush overreaches, and we should not do anything at this point to divide ourselves.   This has also been posted on Stand Down, the No War Blog, which is well worth reading. 7:18:35 PM   comment []

© Copyright 2002 Toby Sackton. Last update: 12/26/2002; 9:30:58 PM.