peace isn't sexy?

The blog has been quiet because I've been recovering from doing two academic conferences back to back.  Bad idea.  I'm still trying to find my groove with the International Studies (ISA) folks, but despite exhaustion at that point, I really enjoyed the Association of American Geographer's meeting (the AAG is considering a name change by the way).  As always, in every slot there were several sessions I wanted to go to and I had trouble choosing! Really sorry to have missed so many great papers I wanted to see - but it's a sign that there's a lot of exciting work happening in geography.

I spent a long time in the sessions on Violence and Space organized by Simon Springer and Philippe LeBillon.  Too long probably. I think there were 8 sessions and I sat through 6.  Listening to so much work on violence (often with gruesome pictures and descriptions) left me feeling flattened.  I wish we had coordinated better with the four sessions that I helped to organize on Geographies of Peace.  Maybe if we had gone back and forth it would have been easier to hear.  But I was struck by how different the vibe was in the two series.  The violence sessions were in a large central room and were generally packed.  The peace sessions were in the furthest away of the conference hotels, and in a tiny room.  I guess the study of peace is still marginal in geography - unlike the ISA, which has a whole large track of peace and conflict studies sessions.

The paper that made the most impact on me in the AAG was one by Guntram Herb.  He used to teach a course called geography of war, that got a large number of mostly male students for many years.  When he changed the course name to geography of peace, he got a much smaller number of mostly female students.  Now he teaches it as geography of war and peace and gets both more students and better gender balance.  An example I will likely follow!

The final geography of peace session was one that I organized, where LA based activists from the Caravan for Peace with Justice and Dignity spoke.  I was worried about making it a comfortable space for them in an academic setting, particularly for survivors telling harrowing stories of losing family members in the violence in Mexico.  I was unsure about the wisdom of having geographers follow that up with comments. I am pleased to report that it went really well, thanks in large part to Josh Inwood and Byron Miller, who took on the difficult task and got the tone of their thoughtful commentary just right. 

on using your privilege against the system that gives it to you

Chomsky, from the Chomsky Foucault debate:

 

Now as to how I tolerate MIT, that raises another question. There are people who argue, and I have never understood the logic of this, that a radical ought to dissociate himself from oppressive institutions. The logic of that argument is that Karl Marx shouldn’t have studied in the British Museum which, if anything, was the symbol of the most vicious imperialism in the world, the place where all the treasures of Empire were gathered, the rape of the colonies was all poured in there. But I think Karl Marx was quite right in studying in the British Museum. He was right in using the resources and in fact the liberal values of the civilization that he was trying to overcome, against it. And I think the same applies in this case.

- many thanks to Wes Attewel for this one!

solidarity qualms

I have been getting lots of photos like these in my facebook feed.  The boys here are in occupied Palestinian territory and I assume that the photo was set up by the Michigan Peace Team, an international accompaniment organization.  It seems likely some English speaking internationals also set up the photo from Kabul. 

These photos make me uncomfortable.  It seems so unfair that the bombing in Boston gets this much attention and solidarity from the places that are, at least figuratively, getting bombed BY Boston.  Of course I'm sure that's part of the point the folks in, and setting up, these photos are trying to make.  That all lives count, including theirs. 

It's also true that when I was El Salvador during the war I went on a trip through an area full of huge craters from bombs paid for by US military aid, and the Salvadorans with me went to great lengths to reassure me that they understood that the US people were not the same thing as the US government and that they did not blame me, but rather appreciated my work to try and change my government's policies.  I have gotten that message again from people in war zones in Colombia. 

So perhaps these photos could be read as a way of saying, even as your government engages in, or funds, a war against us - we distinguish you from your government.  We see you as human, and we connect with you, with love and grief.  We know this pain.  See us too.  Mourn with us too. 

I dream of a world with a flicker feed of people from Boston with signs saying thank you, we too mourn with Kabul, and Rammalah. 

great geography discussions

I was just at the International Studies conference, and honestly, it left me grateful that I'm in geography and not in IR! I'm looking forward to 'playing geographer' at the AAG geography conference next week, and am proud to be part of a group of folks that organized four sessions on geographies of peace.   Last year I was deeply involved in organizing for the Caravan for Peace and Justice with Dignity, which crossed the US for a month with 160 people, 50 of them family members of the dead and disappeared from the drug war in Mexico.   There have been various caravans across the US on different issues, but as I track it this was the first with international activists.

I've organized a session where several 'caravanistas' will share their reflections about how it went, including a survivor who will talk about what it was like for her to share her testimony along the way, and a caravanista from LEAP, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition .  We have two great geographers who have done work on different forms of peace activism who will comment afterwards, Josh Inwood and Byron Miller, who edited the forthcoming book Spaces of Contention: Spatialities and Social Movements.

4657 Geographies of Peace IV: Reflections on the Caravan for Peace and Peace Activisms
Friday, 4/12/2013, from 4:40 PM - 6:20 PM in Hollywood, The LA Hotel, Level 2

I will be presenting my own research on international protective accompaniment (this year I'm talking about where and when it's been done around the world and what that says about how it works) at:

4457 Geographies of Peace II
Friday, 4/12/2013, from 12:40 PM - 2:20 PM in Hollywood, The LA Hotel, Level 2

I'm also looking forward to the 'warscapes' sessions on Wednesday - and to comparing the papers and the crowds to the peace sessions on Friday!

call me hope?

I will admit to having enjoyed this video.  The music is great, as is the production, and I like the way it reminds us of all the things we have in common, across differences.   I was disturbed that Africa gets conflated and is not really an equivalent to the US category (like, say, Tanzania would have been) - but what really got me was following the link to the organization that produced it as a promo, Mama Hope.  Though it tries to present itself as a different sort of development organization, it comes across as a lot more like traditional charity than the vision of solidarity the video led me to think they might embody.  Though they may, as they say, respond to the needs and proposals of local communities - none of those seem to have involved any sort of organizing component to change the structures of power that make it necessary to go to the US to get help in, say, building a clinic.   Maybe local committees didn't ask for organizing support - but that is probably reflective both of who the people in the US talked to, and what the Tanzanians thought they could ask of them. 

Can shopping build solidarity?

well, the actual title of this fabulous video by Ananya Roy and gang is "Can we shop to end poverty?" - but she ends by arguing for a shift from responsibility to accountability, even mutuality and solidarity.  ok, I gave away the punch line, but please, watch it, you'll be challenged and moved!

(thanks to Paul Jackson, whose blog pointed me to this video.  The video is part of the #Global POV Project, which has other videos, and is an ongoing twitter conversation)

Rachel Corrie presente!

Today is the anniversary of Rachel Corrie's death.

Rachel was serving as an accompanier with the ISM in the Gaza strip, accompanying a Palestinian family that was resisting the demolition of their home by staying in it as the Israeli bulldozer came towards it.  Rachel stood in front of the bulldozer with her bright accompanier vest and was run over and killed on March 16, 2003.  She was 23 years old. 

International protective accompaniment is being done in 10 countries around the world.  Only in Palestine have accompaniers been killed and injured.  Tom Hurndall was also killed in 2004 and several others have been very seriously injured. 

The quote on this poster, from Rachel's letters, reads: "The international media and our government are not going to tell us that we are effective, important, justified in our work, courageous, intelligent, valuable. We have to do that for each other, and one way we can do that is by continuing our work, visibly. People without privilege will be doing this work no matter what, because they are working for their lives. We can work with them, and they know that we work with them, or we can leave them to do this work themselves and curse us for our complicity in killing them."

Freire on solidarity

"solidarity requires that one enter into the situation of those with whom one is in solidarity; it is a radical posture"  - Paulo Frerie in Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1995:31)

What exactly does 'entering into the situation' mean here? In Freire's case he was working with the very poor, but he did not live a life of poverty.  He would have been far less able to do his work and make his impact if he had.  It seems to me there is more power in using one's privilege tactically, carefully, when working in solidarity with those that don't have that privilege, rather than in simply trying to give it up.  I would hope Freire didn't mean just trying on 'the situation' for a week or a month, a common tactic I've written about here before.  I don't actually think 'entering into the situation' is necessarily the best way to understand and respect what life is like for those you work and struggle alongside.

As a side note, one of the highlights of my life was to get to see Freire speak to popular educators in Morazán, one of the FMLN controlled zones of El Salvador, just after the peace accords were signed, in '92.   The energy that weekend was electric and, as I remember it, the conversations were interrupted several times a day with chants of !Viva Paulo Freire!

I am Juan vs. We are Juan vs. We are all Juan

Which do you feel more comfortable saying? I am Juan,  We are Juan, or We are all Juan?

Each of these slogans has a slightly different impact.  There really was a 'We are Juan' campaign to stop a deportation, though the link seems to be gone.  I personally like that slogan better than I am Juan, but I like We are all Juan best.  It is the closest translation to the zapatista solidarity 'Todos somos Marcos' slogan that may have started this wave, but it also seems less appropriative.  It does not imply I am exactly like Juan, or totally know his experience, but rather that I stand with him, if you attack him, you attack me.  An injury to one is an injury to all. 

I've written before about the drawbacks of 'I am X person under attack' type campaigns, such as the current ''I am Bradley Manning campaign - though it's very different when Daniel Ellsberg says it, since he really did live through a very similar persecution (please sign Daniel's petition to support Bradley).

an alternative security tactic if you're threatened with rape

warning, this entry may leave you with disturbing mental images!

So the odd alternative security advice I got for a sexual attack, and it would seem this is only useful for women, is to pee on yourself - and TELL your attacker that you just did.  The idea is to gross them out.  

Thankfully I've never had to try this, so I can't say if it works, but these are the sorts of strategies women share with each other, and the sorts of things women accompaniers have to think about. 

civilian peacekeeping in Burma

The Nonviolent Peaceforce just signed an agreement with the government of Burma (Myanmar) to support initiatives of the official Myanmar Peace Center.  In their announcement they make no mention of the long history of military rule in Burma, or their take on the elections that many question.  Presumably they see the elections as legitimate, even though they were run by the military and the military won 80% of the vote.  I certainly support the moves towards democracy in Burma, but working directly for a government so closely tied to the military seems an odd move to me.  But then the Nonviolent Peaceforce has been very interested in working officially with governments (they serve in an official capacity in Mindanao).  The NP  calls what they do 'civilian peacekeeping' rather than protective accompaniment, and accompaniment seems to be only one small piece of what they do for peace. 

an anti-empathy campaign?

The video above is part of the "not in her shoes" campaign by Planned Parenthood.  The video ends by calling for conversations based on "mutual respect and empathy".  But I think many viewers will think that the slogan "not in her shoes" is an argument that you can NOT empathize - that there is no way you can understand what a woman who chooses an abortion is going through.  I think what they are trying to go for instead in the video is that you should not make decisions for her, but because the phrase 'in her shoes' has been so closely tied to empathy, it causes confusion and I was surprised when they then ended with a call for empathy.

I've blogged repeatedly before about how this turn of phrase 'in her shoes' is problematic. To play with the metaphor, if you are in someone else's shoes, there is no room for them  - you put your reality on top of theirs, you step on them.  That is to say, you run the risk of thinking you really know what it's like to be them, of engaging in appropriative empathy.  I agree with planned parenthood, you are not in her shoes.  But rather than emphasize that, I continue to think it's more powerful to imagine walking alongside her, in your own shoes - in this case, working together for safe and legal access to all reproductive health services for all. 

a very different empathy video

Thanks to Craig Jones for pointing me to this video, which is one of those attempts to help you imagine yourself in the shoes of a war victim.  I like it more than most of these because the juxtaposition of the words and the images are such that you are always reminded that you can´t entirely know what it´s like.  The video is also unusual in that after trying to get you identify with the victim, it then turns to listening to the humanity of the victimizer. 

another take on empathy

I love this animated lecture series, but some of the arguments by Roman Krznaric in this talk on empathy bug me.  Yes, I do think that some sort of 'feeling-with' plays an important role in building connections across distance and difference and motivating people to work for social change.  But I don't think the answer is to 'feel as', and much less to try to 'be the other'.   Pretending to be homeless seems disrespectful to me, and I am disturbed that here George Orwell is yet again simplistically held up for doing this.  There is certainly power in living with the poor, living simply, and in other ways 'being with' those who are different than you, in ways that help you understand their reality, feel-with, and motivate you to walk with and struggle with them.  But pretending to be someone you are not is not only disrespectful of those you would walk with, it diminishes the power of your solidarity. 

Ways of feeling-with

In the fantastic article “Sympathy and Solidarity: On a Tightrope with Scheler” (1997) Sandra Bartky draws of Max Scheler’s work on sympathy (from 1913).  He argues that there are four forms of fellow-feeling, or feeling-with.  We tend to call these empathy today, though she argues they are sympathy.  Those four forms are:

1)    true fellow-feeling: shared feeling due to the same cause like the death of a child (though I would argue that even the same cause can lead to different feelings)

2)    emotional infection: shared emotion through contagion, like mass hysteria

3)    emotional identification: ‘psychic contagion’ where you are lost in the other and imagine you can see and feel with them

4)    “genuine fellow-feeling”: where you react to the other’s feeling, but are aware of the distance between hers and yours.  She feels, and you feel with her.

As you might imagine, Bartky and Scheler argue that it is the fourth that is most useful.  I would call this walking with her, rather than in her shoes.  Bartky argues that this is not a comparison of my feelings to hers, or a projection of my experience onto hers, and not a matter of imagining what if this happened to me. None of these allow us to really appreciate her life, to reach out, to go beyond our own experience.  Bartky does see imagination as important, but without ourselves as the star of the show.  You don’t have to imagine as it would happen to you, you can imagine it as happening to her.  You don’t have to have felt it, or something like it, before yourself to imagine it (though I think it is of course easier to imagine those emotions, a matter she does not address).  She does argue that it is easier to imagine when we get more details, not simply about the scene, but also the feelings of the teller.  I certainly agree.   

Bartky, S. L. “Sympathy and Solidarity: On a Tightrope with Scheler.” In Feminists Rethink the Self, edited by Diana Tietjens Meyers, 177–96. Westview Press, 1997.

How To Talk To Someone About Privilege Who Doesn’t Know What That Is

I'm still settling in to Bogotá, so forgive me for reposting again.  Over on everyday feminism, Jamie Utt, wrote an article on how to do this.  His key points are excerpted below:

1. Start By Appealing To the Ways In Which They Don’t Have Privilege

One of the fastest ways to disarm a person’s defensiveness about their own privilege is to take some time to listen to the ways in which they legitimately do not have privilege and validate those frustrations.

I once attended a workshop with Peggy McIntosh, the original author of “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” The goal of the workshop was to give people tools for leading workshops of their own on privilege and oppression that get past the defensiveness.

One of her suggestions was to have people divide a paper in half. Have every person start on the left side of the paper and write down all of the ways in which they do not have identity privilege. They can include everything from being left handed and having to drag your hand through the ink to being a woman and having to deal with the gender wage gap. Then folks would write on the opposite side all of the ways in which their identity does afford them privilege that they did not earn.

From there, folks pair up and do a listening exercise where they listen intently to the other person talk about both sides of their list. Doing so allows people to air their frustrations at being denied privilege while also acknowledging that they do, indeed, have privilege.

From that place, it is a lot easier to help folks understand the power of privilege in creating a system of oppression and how eliminating that system is liberatory and transformative for everyone.
Now, to do this, you don’t need to turn it into a workshop. Just try asking the other person to talk about the ways in which they don’t have identity privilege and validate those hurts and frustrations.
Simply listening can go a long way! Plus, it’s a starting point for helping them build empathy for those who do not have their same privileges.

2. Stress That Privilege Is Relative

Each person experiences their privilege and lack thereof within the context of their own community and the people they interact with at the time.

As such, privilege is relative, and we need to talk about it that way.

Does that mean that all privileges are equal? No. I’m right handed and in turn, don’t have to drag my palm through the ink when I write. That’s a privilege I have by the nature of my birth.

That is not to say, though, that my right-handed privilege bears the same weight or social responsibility as the privilege that my skin color, gender, wealth, or sexual orientation afford me.
The point is that our identities are complex and intersectional.

Some folks get defensive about discussing privilege because they fear such a conversation will not address the real and powerful ways in which they do not have privilege. So they deflect by only talking about those things.

Just because we benefit from one form of privilege doesn’t mean that we benefit from all forms of privilege.

When we realize that, we can work together with people who share our privileges and those who don’t to build something better!

3. A System of Privilege and Oppression Hurts Us All

What we most need to stress in conversations about privilege is that this system doesn’t just hurt the people who cannot boast one form of identity privilege or another.

It hurts everyone. Until we understand that, we’re not getting anywhere because the only people of privilege who will ever act to end the system are the ones acting strictly from paternalistic guilt.
Take white privilege, for instance. White privilege is, essentially, a social construction whereby wealthy Europeans wanted to make sure that they could consolidate their wealth by pitting poor people from Europe against poor Africans and Indigenous people.

White folks were made to feel better about themselves and were given paltry privileges over people of color in order to divide the white proletariat.

All that meant, though, is that the white folks got to be the lords over people of color while the wealthy whites still had their boots on the necks of poor whites!

These privileges don’t help us as white people nearly as much as they hurt us!

Similarly, male privilege may benefit men tremendously in certain ways. But in others, it restricts us into a tiny box of masculinity. I don’t know about you, but I am sick of trying to fit into my gendered box, the “Act Like a Man” box.

I want my gender expression to be free and independent of those aspects of masculinity that hurt men and women – violence is acceptable for solving problems, boys don’t cry, men are the lords of their household, men must know everything even when they don’t, etc.

The privileges are marginal when we look at the system of justice that can be built on the other side of this struggle!

 

4. Privilege Does Not Have To Mean Guilt!

....

5. Offer Concrete Ways That They Can Undermine the System of Privilege and Oppression In Their Own Life

....

6. Make It a Conversation of Actions, Not Character

 ...

 - read his full take on the last three here, and more from Jamie over at his change from within blog

I am in the midst of moving to Bogotá, so I will cheat and repost in its entirety this super relevant article by Harsha, published in briarpatch.

Decolonizing together

Moving beyond a politics of solidarity toward a practice of decolonization

by Harsha Walia • Jan 1, 2012 •

Illustrations by Afuwa

Canada’s state and corporate wealth is largely based on subsidies gained from the theft of Indigenous lands and resources. Conquest in Canada was designed to ensure forced displacement of Indigenous peoples from their territories, the destruction of autonomy and self-determination in Indigenous self-governance and the assimilation of Indigenous peoples’ cultures and traditions. Given the devastating cultural, spiritual, economic, linguistic and political impacts of colonialism on Indigenous people in Canada, any serious attempt by non-natives at allying with Indigenous struggles must entail solidarity in the fight against colonization.
Non-natives must be able to position ourselves as active and integral participants in a decolonization movement for political liberation, social transformation, renewed cultural kinships and the development of an economic system that serves rather than threatens our collective life on this planet. Decolonization is as much a process as a goal. It requires a profound recentring on Indigenous worldviews. Syed Hussan, a Toronto-based activist, states: “Decolonization is a dramatic reimagining of relationships with land, people and the state. Much of this requires study. It requires conversation. It is a practice; it is an unlearning.”

Indigenous solidarity on its own terms

A growing number of social movements are recognizing that Indigenous self-determination must become the foundation for all our broader social justice mobilizing. Indigenous peoples in Canada are the most impacted by the pillage of lands, experience disproportionate poverty and homelessness, are overrepresented in statistics of missing and murdered women and are the primary targets of repressive policing and prosecutions in the criminal injustice system. Rather than being treated as a single issue within a laundry list of demands, Indigenous self-determination is increasingly understood as intertwined with struggles against racism, poverty, police violence, war and occupation, violence against women and environmental justice.
Incorporating Indigenous self-determination into these movements can, however, subordinate and compartmentalize Indigenous struggle within the machinery of existing Leftist narratives. Anarchists point to the antiauthoritarian tendencies within Indigenous communities, environmentalists highlight the connection to land that Indigenous communities have, anti-racists subsume Indigenous people into the broader discourse about systemic oppression in Canada, and women’s organizations point to the relentless violence inflicted on Indigenous women in discussions about patriarchy.
We have to be cautious not to replicate the Canadian state’s assimilationist model of liberal pluralism, forcing Indigenous identities to fit within our existing groups and narratives. The inherent right to traditional lands and to self-determination is expressed collectively and should not be subsumed within the discourse of individual or human rights. Furthermore, it is imperative to understand that being Indigenous is not just an identity but a way of life, which is intricately connected to Indigenous peoples’ relationship to the land and all its inhabitants. Indigenous struggle cannot simply be accommodated within other struggles; it demands solidarity on its own terms.

The practice of solidarity

One of the basic principles of Indigenous solidarity organizing is the notion of taking leadership. According to this principle, non-natives must be accountable and responsive to the experiences, voices, needs and political perspectives of Indigenous people themselves. From an anti-oppression perspective, meaningful support for Indigenous struggles cannot be directed by non-natives. Taking leadership means being humble and honouring front-line voices of resistance as well as offering tangible solidarity as needed and requested. Specifically, this translates to taking initiative for self-education about the specific histories of the lands we reside upon, organizing support with the clear consent and guidance of an Indigenous community or group, building long-term relationships of accountability and never assuming or taking for granted the personal and political trust that non-natives may earn from Indigenous peoples over time.
In offering support to a specific community in the defence of their land, non-natives should organize with a mandate from the community and an understanding of the parameters of the support being sought. Once these guidelines are established, non-natives should be proactive in offering logistical, fundraising and campaign support. Clear lines of communication must always be maintained, and a commitment should be made for long-term support. This means not just being present for blockades or in moments of crisis, but developing an ongoing commitment to the well-being of Indigenous peoples and communities.
Organizing in accordance with these principles is not always straightforward. Respecting Indigenous leadership is not the same as doing nothing while waiting around to be told what to do. “I am waiting to be told exactly what to do” should not be an excuse for inaction, and seeking guidance must be weighed against the possibility of further burdening Indigenous people with questions. A willingness to decentre oneself and to learn and act from a place of responsibility rather than guilt are helpful in determining the line between being too interventionist and being paralyzed.
Cultivating an ethic of responsibility within the Indigenous solidarity movement begins with non-natives understanding ourselves as beneficiaries of the illegal settlement of Indigenous peoples’ land and unjust appropriation of Indigenous peoples’ resources and jurisdiction. When faced with this truth, it is common for activists to get stuck in their feelings of guilt, which I would argue is a state of self-absorption that actually upholds privilege. While guilt is often a sign of a much-needed shift in consciousness, in itself it does nothing to motivate the responsibility necessary to actively dismantle entrenched systems of oppression. In a movement-building round table, long-time Montreal activist Jaggi Singh said: “The only way to escape complicity with settlement is active opposition to it. That only happens in the context of on-the-ground, day-to-day organizing, and creating and cultivating the spaces where we can begin dialogues and discussions as natives and non-natives.”

Sustained alliance building

Sustaining a multiplicity of meaningful and diverse relationships with Indigenous peoples is critical in building a non-native movement for Indigenous self-determination. “Solidarity is not the same as support,” says feminist writer bell hooks. “To experience solidarity, we must have a community of interests, shared beliefs and goals around which to unite, to build Sisterhood. Support can be occasional. It can be given and just as easily withdrawn. Solidarity requires sustained, ongoing commitment.”
Who exactly one takes direction from while building networks of ongoing solidarity can be complicated. As in any community, a diversity of political opinions often exists within Indigenous communities. How do we determine whose leadership to follow and which alliances to build? I take leadership from and offer tangible support to grassroots Indigenous peoples who are exercising traditional governance and customs in the face of state control and bureaucratization, who are seeking redress and reparations for acts of genocide and assimilation, such as residential schools, who are opposing corporate development on their lands. I support those who are pushing back against the oppressions of hetero-patriarchy imposed by settler society, who are struggling against poverty and systemic marginalization in urban areas, who are criticizing unjust land claims and treaty processes and who are affirming their own languages, customs, traditions, creative expression and spiritual practices.
Alliances with Indigenous communities should be based on shared values, principles and analysis. For example, during the anti-Olympics campaign in 2010, activists chose not to align with the Four Host First Nations, a pro-corporate body created in conjunction with the Vancouver Olympics organizing committee. Instead, we took leadership from and strengthened alliances with land defenders in the Secwepemc and St’át’imc nations and Indigenous people being directly impacted by homelessness and poverty in the Downtown Eastside. In general, however, differences surrounding strategy within a community should be for community members to discuss and resolve. We should be cautious of a persistent dynamic where solidarity activists start to fixate on the internal politics of an oppressed community. Allies should avoid trying to intrude and interfere in struggles within and between communities, which perpetuates the civilizing ideology of the white man’s burden and violates the basic principles of self-determination.
Building intentional alliances should also avoid devolution into tokenization. Non-natives often choose which Indigenous voices to privilege by defaulting to Indigenous activists they determine to be better known, easier-to-contact or “less hostile.” This selectivity distorts the diversity present in Indigenous communities and can exacerbate tensions and colonially imposed divisions between Indigenous peoples. In opposing the colonialism of the state and settler society, non-natives must recognize our own role in perpetuating colonialism within our solidarity efforts. We can actively counter this by theorizing about and discussing the nuanced issues of solidarity, leadership, strategy and analysis – not in abstraction, but within our real and informed and sustained relationships with Indigenous peoples.

Decolonizing relationships

While centring and honouring Indigenous voices and leadership, the obligation for decolonization rests on all of us. In “Building a ‘Canadian’ Decolonization Movement: Fighting the Occupation at ‘Home,’” Nora Burke says: “A decolonisation movement cannot be comprised solely of solidarity and support for Indigenous peoples’ sovereignty and self-determination. If we are in support of self-determination, we too need to be self-determining. It is time to cut the state out of this relationship, and to replace it with a new relationship, one which is mutually negotiated, and premised on a core respect for autonomy and freedom.”
Being responsible for decolonization can require us to locate ourselves within the context of colonization in complicated ways, often as simultaneously oppressed and complicit. This is true, for example, for racialized migrants in Canada. Within the anticolonial migrant justice movement of No One Is Illegal, we go beyond demanding citizenship rights for racialized migrants as that would lend false legitimacy to a settler state. We challenge the official state discourse of multiculturalism that undermines the autonomy of Indigenous communities by granting and mediating rights through the imposed structures of the state and that seeks to assimilate diversities into a singular Canadian identity. Andrea Smith, Indigenous feminist intellectual, says: “All non-Native peoples are promised the ability to join in the colonial project of settling indigenous lands. In all of these cases, we would check our aspirations against the aspirations of other communities to ensure that our model of liberation does not become the model of oppression for others.” In B.C., immigrants and refugees have participated in several delegations to Indigenous blockades, while Indigenous communities have offered protection and refuge for migrants facing deportation.
Decolonization is the process whereby we create the conditions in which we want to live and the social relations we wish to have. We have to commit ourselves to supplanting the colonial logic of the state itself. Almost a hundred years ago, German anarchist Gustav Landauer wrote: “The State is a condition, a certain relationship between human beings, a mode of behaviour; we destroy it by contracting other relationships.” Decolonization requires us to exercise our sovereignties differently and to reconfigure our communities based on shared experiences, ideals and visions. Almost all Indigenous formulations of sovereignty – such as the Two Row Wampum agreement of peace, friendship and respect between the Haudenosaunee nations and settlers – are premised on revolutionary notions of respectful coexistence and stewardship of the land, which goes far beyond any Western liberal democratic ideal.
I have been encouraged to think of human interconnectedness and kinship in building alliances with Indigenous communities. Black-Cherokee writer Zainab Amadahy uses the term “relationship framework” to describe how our activism should be grounded. “Understanding the world through a Relationship Framework … we don’t see ourselves, our communities, or our species as inherently superior to any other, but rather see our roles and responsibilities to each other as inherent to enjoying our life experiences,” says Amadahy. From Turtle Island to Palestine, striving toward decolonization and walking together toward transformation requires us to challenge a dehumanizing social organization that perpetuates our isolation from each other and normalizes a lack of responsibility to one another and the Earth.
This is an altered and condensed version of a chapter from the 2012 forthcoming book Organize! Building From the Local for Global Justice, edited by Aziz Choudry, Jill Hanley and Eric Shragge.

Harsha Walia is a South Asian activist and writer based in Vancouver, Coast Salish Territories. She is active in a variety of social movements, particularly migrant justice, anti-racism, Indigenous solidarity, Palestine solidarity and anti-imperialist struggles. In her organizing over the past decade, she has prioritized support for Indigenous communities. Her writings have appeared in alternative and mainstream magazines, journals and newspapers.

Liza Long is not Adam Lanza's mother

I have posted here several times before about the dangers of 'I am x person' solidarity slogans, most recently in relation to the 'I am Malala' campaign.  It's a bit odd to me to show you are in solidarity with someone by claiming you are that someone.  It's like trying to be the one you're with.  If you stand in their shoes, where are they supposed to stand? Why not walk alongside them instead?  Wouldn't it be more empowering for both of you that way? I do get that saying 'I am with Malala' does not have the same sort of rhetorical impact - but in the long run it is more respectful and can build more powerful and meaningful solidarity.

Well, by now you've probably already seen the "I am Adam Lanza's mother" post by Liza Long that went viral last weekend. It is a gripping description of one woman's experience as the mother of a mentally ill boy in the US.  We can easily imagine that Adam's mother might have experienced something like this.  That other parent's with mentally ill children face similar nightmares.  And, I would hope, it moves us to act for meaningful mental health treatment in the US.  So perhaps it is effective at rallying solidarity with parents of mentally ill children, though it does not ask for any specific action (like health care reform that would force health insurers to cover mental health treatment). 

So is Liza Long appropriating Adam's mother's voice?  Well, yes. The thing is, Adam Lanza's mother is dead.  He killed her.  With her own guns.  There is no sign that she reached out for help with her mentally ill son.  Instead she stocked up, bought five guns, and took her son to the shooting range to practice with them.   It appears she may have had her own mental health issues.  None of this makes it ok to speak in her name.  And now the real mother's life story is even less heard, as so many read Liza Long's post instead.

But what is more disturbing about Liza Long's post is that it is most certainly not going to generate solidarity with the mentally ill - if anything it stigmatizes them even more and puts them at greater risk.  Most notably it stigmatizes her own son, who is given no privacy since she does not even use a pseudonym!  For a great review of how Liza's post does injustice to both her son and others with mental health issues see the post You are NOT Adam Lanza's mother.

PBI's fantastic christmas campaign

Peace Brigades seems to be doing a story a day for their Christmas fundraising campaign, and the first few have been great.  I particularly liked this photo story, that the picture here is the first of.  I've been on some bad roads in Colombia, but I think this wins the prize!
They're also posting great videos, including this one interviewing Iván Madero Vergel of Credhos in Barrancaermeja about what accompaniment means to him.  

all women peacekeeping teams

The only all women team of international accompaniers is the International Women's Peace Service, but the Nonviolent Peaceforce, an international team, has been supporting the development of local women only peacekeeping teams in Sudan.  Their article about this work is below.

Women Taking the Lead in South Sudan

NP is pioneering the formation of Women Peacekeeping Teams (WPTs) in South Sudan. These are teams of local women who monitor incidents of conflict-related Gender-Based Violence (GBV) and help create safe spaces for women to address these in their local communities. There are between 10 and 25 women on each team and the first one was set up by NP in November 2011 in Juba. There are now five WPTs covering two districts in Central Equatoria State and three districts in Western Equatoria State. As we demonstrate the effectiveness of this model, there will hopefully be many more WPTs to come!

Photo: This picture was taken on 23 November 2011, in Ibba Central payam in Ibba county, and displays the members of the WPT as they had just officially formed their team that very day, together with one of NP Nzara's staff named Brenda Floors

The WPTs formed in Central Equatoria State were able to draw from a large pool of women who were willing to volunteer, including educated and skilled women of whom some even hold positions in county or state government. In Western Equatoria State, however, many of the women courageous enough to join a WPT have never had a formal job, and the majority are housewives, working in and around the house, raising the children as well as often working on their land as agriculturalists and/or selling their crops at the market. Some of them work (informally) at local restaurants as cooks or dishwashers. For many of these women, their participation in the WPT is the first time they have had an active, recognized role in a group of this kind.

“There has never been an international organization to come to Ezo before us to talk about women’s issues. (...) It will be our pleasure to receive NP and have them build our capacity and raise our voices.”
- Anna Lakim Nalurgura, Mid-wife and member of the WPT in Ezo Central Payam

The day to day work of the Women Peacekeeping Teams involves helping with the registration of cases of GBV, reporting these to the Ministry of Social Development and finding ways to address these issues through weekly meetings to discuss threats to themselves and other women in the community. At the same time they are being given more and more tools to increase the security of those most vulnerable to GBV and supporting the survivors in connecting them to police, social workers and health service providers. This will greatly improve awareness of GBV at these locations, as well as improve the capacity of local formal and official duty bearers in their increased experience in dealing with such cases. This increased awareness and capacity at the community and respective administrative levels will in turn greatly help reduce Gender-Based Violence in these locations.

NP works with both the WPTs and with the community at large to ensure the space for this work is safe. While it has been important to create an environment for women to participate in, it is equally important to engage the men in finding solutions for violence in the communities. Much encouragement and support is needed to have women realize the contribution they can make to change their own fate, and that of so many others.

Despite the commitment under the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) for women to be represented in all levels of government, there are in fact very few opportunities for women to participate in public life. The WPTs are a unique opportunity to engage local women in the wider peacebuilding process. Women are generally the constants in their communities – they do not travel for work, they do not have multiple spouses in different places, and they often have the best sense of the protection issues in their communities.  Additionally, they are amongst the most affected by violence.

 “Through the existence of WPTs we can penetrate into society. It is the women who are at home all day and see what problems there are in society. It is them who stay with their children and maintain their communities when the men are out fighting.”
– Juba Team Leader Kudzanai Mativirira

The active presence of these local women within the broader peacekeeping effort in South Sudan promotes equal representation and women’s leadership, facilitates the approach of those women who are affected by conflict, and favours the participation of local women and their organizations in post-conflict situations and in the prevention of conflict. The Women Peacekeeping Teams have a unique opportunity to respond to the needs of an especially marginalized population and to showcase the vital role of women as actors in the long and difficult road towards peace, both in the world and in the home.

Photo: This picture was taken on November 25 2011 in Terkeka County, and displays the inauguration ceremony of the WPT formed that very day, together with the NP Juba team's leader Kudzanai Mativirira.