Miami Dispatch: 11/12

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Many of us who are here early to organize were also in Cancun, where delegates from the global south walked out of the World Trade Organization ministerial and the meetings collapsed. That victory, which has stopped the WTO in its tracks, has made regional agreements like the FTAA even more important as a way of furthering the global corporate agenda.

Since Cancun, we've been busy planning, writing, and trying to secure all the necessary pieces of this mobilization. We've worked on raising the money to rent this warehouse, to provide food and housing and information and medical supplies to thousands of people in a place where the authorities are less than welcoming. We've held consultas, or organizing meetings, in cities all over the country to help shape actions and form clusters and blocs -- affinity groups that will plan their own unique approaches to the actions. We've held virtual spokescouncils in the form of conference calls -- try facilitating 50 people who cannot see each other! Some people have been on the ground here for weeks: Abby and Rebecca have been scoping out spaces and materials for a community garden project for the Green Bloc. Tim and Meddle have been down here for weeks, helping to find spaces and housing, being followed by police cars as they bicycle downtown. I've been running around the country, talking, training, and encouraging people to come, and in the last week, I've been in four different cities in Florida doing trainings, rituals, and talks.

This mobilization is looking big. After Cancun, we talked about trying to organize at a slightly less frantic pace, trying to find ways for new people to step up to larger responsibilities and spread the work. That's happening. But, like Cancun, Miami does not have a large, radical community to draw from. There are some dedicated, mostly young, activists here from the local area, but much of the experience and drive for the actions is coming from outside.

Still, things seem to be moving along, with people quietly taking up their tasks. We had a meeting earlier in the day, scheduled regular, daily spokescouncils for 8 each night, the kind of order we North Americans love and which we never achieved in steamy Cancun. We already have the full component of working groups, from Medical and Legal to Trainings and Convergence Center. And we've already had our first arrests -- three medics arrested yesterday as they were walking to the convergence center.

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