Why Do We Oppose the G20? What Do We Want Instead?

Some organizations are protesting at the G20 summit in Hamburg to express opposition to specific G20 policies: the ongoing colonial exploitation of Africa, government pandering to profiteering financial institutions, rampant environmental destruction hastening climate change. As anarchists, we are concerned about all of these problems, but we believe it is naïve to expect that the class of people that is chiefly responsible for them in the first place will fix them for us. Even if the G20 politicians could fix all these issues by fiat and carrying signs could compel them to do so, it would just reinforce the logic of the protection racket in which they inflict crises on us, then hold us hostage and extort us in return for solving them.

It is a distraction to focus only on the bad politics of specific G20 rulers like Donald Trump, egregious as they are. For anyone who truly believes in freedom and equality, the problem is the structure itself, not which people occupy it.

Any system that empowers bureaucrats and heads of state to decide the fate of billions is fundamentally exclusive and coercive. We oppose the G20 summits because we believe that only horizontal grassroots initiatives can solve the problems facing humanity. Financial crisis, climate chaos, ethnic violence, and state repression are the inevitable consequences of markets and governments that concentrate power in the hands of the most ruthless few. When everyone is forced to compete for resources and power rather than being free to develop ways of life based on self-determination, voluntary association, and peaceful coexistence, no one wins, not even the 20 most powerful people on earth.

Not just New Policies, but Entirely New Relations

This is why anarchists take a position against the G20 governments themselves, rather than this or that policy. The free meals, housing, medical treatment, and street parties organized by participants in the resistance to the G20 offer a glimpse of a world in which all the necessities of life are shared—and are sweeter for being so. Likewise, our resistance to the summit is a model for the kind of organizing it will take to throw off the yoke of state repression and open up spaces of freedom in which we can solve our problems together.

Taking action against the G20 and against globalized capitalism secures a space for inclusive grassroots initiatives in the popular imagination as the alternative to world domination by a financial and political elite. If we fail to establish ourselves in the popular imagination, fascists and other nationalists will seize the opportunity to present themselves as opponents of the status quo, accruing support from rebels who have not yet developed an analysis of the institutions of power. We are already seeing a political polarization as people give up on traditional party politics. If we do not offer an alternative that breaks with the state and capitalism, we cede the field to racists and other partisans of state violence.

In place of the hierarchical power of the G20 leaders and their lackeys, we are creating worldwide horizontal networks based on autonomy, solidarity, and mutual aid. We hope to use these to defend ourselves against all would-be rulers as we work to create the foundations for another way of living. Fighting against the G20 and the police who are attempting to impose their summit on Hamburg is just one small part of a much larger project that includes the creation of common resources for the benefit of all. We are here as part of a joyous exploration of what it means to be human outside the imperatives of cutthroat capitalism.