Friday, 20 Apr 2001

QUEBEC CITY, Quebec

At around midnight last night, I found myself standing in a suburban hotel parking lot in 25-degree weather, talking on a BBC radio microphone to an anchor in London via satellite. Before I began speaking into the ether, the technicians played a clip of Canadian Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew saying that trade leads to development, which leads to environmental protection and democracy — an absolutely inexorable chain of logic. I was ready to tackle that story head on by talking about the toxic wasteland at the U.S.-Mexico border, the impact of trading natural resources like trees, and the ways in which trade rules undermine environmental laws.

For some reason, though, the anchor decided to ask mostly about the relationship of trade to democracy (a subject that has climbed higher on the agenda for the Summit of the Americas talks this weekend), but not about the environmental impacts of free trade. I tried to steer the questions my way — and give some insight on Latin American politics when I could. Still, though, it all added up to quite a strange experience.

But perhaps not quite so strange as watching the McDonalds in the old city of Quebec completely disappear, bit by bit. The final touch, after the lettering and arch had been taken down, was the plywood covering the windows, which had been painted with brightly colored flowers and trees (a rather unconvincing echo of the real thing). One could not recognize what had been there just 24 hours earlier.

Yesterday afternoon, I saw the final pieces of the fence protecting the Summit area being put in place. The street protesters for whom these measures are intended have indeed been arriving in greater and greater numbers. But all those I talked to are intent on nonviolent protest; one Canadian student even told me that window-smashing was “passe.”

As I watched a group of young activists climbing one of the steep streets of the old city of Quebec, beating drums as they went, I had a flashback to Seattle. I was reminded of my journey near the end of the WTO talks to a center where many of the protesters were staying. Excellent free food was in abundance, the center provided a bicycle library — a set of bikes that were free for the taking (and returning) — and the soft beating of drums kept the atmosphere calm. After the strife in the streets and the political conflict within the negotiations, it was a wonderful oasis from the craziness outside.

The chief lesson I learned then, and that I remembered again while watching the drummers in Quebec, was that there is a purpose to our work on trade that goes far beyond the immediate politics. I still have much work to do here, of course. I’ve just finished working with the FoE office in Washington to develop a press release for tomorrow calling President Bush an “Earth Day hypocrite” for his support of the anti-environmental FTAA. (He’s expected to make some nods in the direction of the environment tomorrow as part of his pitch for the trade deal.) We’re going to have email it to reporters who are sitting six blocks away, but are nonetheless unreachable in person, so I need
to make a round of calls to get their addresses.

But, after all that, I’ll try to take that lesson from Seattle home with me.