Cooperation
Times
Volume 15, No. 2 ~
March-April 2001
Increase the Kansas Minimum Wage
You are
invited to
Kansas Action
Network's
Legislative
Briefing and Lobbying Day to
Increase
the Kansas Minimum Wage
Thursday,
February 22
The Briefing starts at 11:00 a.m. at Assumption Church, 204 SW 8th, Topeka
Join Kansans from across the state in the struggle for a decent wage. This year's goal is to tie the meager Kansas Minimum Wage ($2.65) to the not-quite-so-bad Federal Minimum Wage ($5.15) - a big step for Kansas! This growing coalition for workers rights, social justice and economic fairness, that includes the CENTER, wants your help! For more information call 785-232-4388.
This term, describing our economic and political systems, has been thrown around by students, activists, and CEOs. With no one reaching a solid interpretation, confusion between groups has led to chaos. Globalization can be broken down into five, interconnected parts: economical, cultural, technological, political, and ecological. Learning about the positive and negative aspects of these five parts helps us understand globalization as a whole. (See Laura's article on the Youth Summit she attended in Washington, D.C., following this article)
As the corporate world gains global power, the divides between rich and poor expand. Corporations have started to control the economy with net worths of some like Wal-Mart becoming larger than that of Ireland. The spread of Western ideologies, specifically "consumerism," feeds the control of these corporations. Oil companies have violated human rights in many instances. The Exxon-Mobile pipeline in Chad-Cameroon is a clear example of corporations valuing profits over people. The revenue of this project does not flow back into the region, instead, as it has been documented, the profits are used to purchase arms to forcefully relocate and repress the people of the region. The Chad Cameroon pipeline has received substantial World Bank financing, but not all of that funding goes to the pipeline. The first $4 billion sent to the region was used to purchase ammunition. Exxon has no clean–up plan to address pollution of major water sources in the fragile ecosystem. Civilians who stand up against relocation or the oil company are threatened and imprisoned by the government. This 1000+ kilometer pipeline is threatening the environment and encouraging repression. As corporations take over, people
in Chad and Cameroon are not the only ones suffering. That control is also seen by driving down our former Topeka main street, Kansas Avenue, and then heading over to the mall on Wanamaker. Smaller businesses cannot compete and no one is held accountable.
However, sharing ideologies on a cultural level can be good. Sharing culture globally allows each of us in Kansas to learn and experience customs in countries like China or France without leaving the state, dissolving our ignorance of other people and creating a more accepting society.
The globalization of technology has benefited our society in a similar way. The increasing availability of communication all around the world has created a way for companies in the United States to work with companies in Japan—an exchange of ideas that is unprecedented.
Political globalization is seen with both U.S. foreign policy and United Nations programs. The UN works to create political infrastructures of democratic governments. The globalization of democracy, a political theory sustained in Western governments, is seen as an expansion of peace because it is empirically shown that two democratic governments will not resolve to war. At the same time, democracy is not always complemented by a capitalistic economy. The international investments to build economic infrastructures in developing democratic nations are creating larger gaps between the rich and poor.
Globalization has adversely effected our ecological systems as well. Certain trade agreements have limited our ability to take control of the environment into our own hands. Some scientists theorize that these environmental impacts include an increase in global warming, a decrease in biodiversity, and a depletion of the ozone layer.
Globalization is an inevitable process. It is, in the sense that we are becoming interconnected as a world—a fact. But the status quo is encouraging or ignoring a random, chaotic pattern of globalization that negatively impacts economies, the environment, and human rights. The citizens movement in this area is not against economic development, it is against economic development that excludes cognizance of the degradation of human rights and the environment. All of us are responsible, from consumers in Topeka, Kansas, to Representatives in Washington, D.C.
Globalization: The Youth Summit
I can’t keep myself from smiling as we descend from an altitude of 33,000 feet over Washington D.C. We circle around, angling in the sky, and I see an ocean tanker leaving a wake in its trail. Landing at the Baltimore airport, I attempt to appear confident and find my way through the MARC train, the Metro, and a city bus to the National 4-H Center. (See Laura's article, What's Globalization?)
The Globalization Youth Summit, hosted by Amnesty International and the Sierra Club, was the first ever. With people from Maine to Alaska and California to Florida, it combined an amazing group of students, wanting to learn and ready to act. The mission of the conference was to educate a younger generation to strategically plan and organize campaigns. After exploring the entire public transportation system, I joined a group to "build" an environmentally friendly, human rights conscious community. Sitting around flip charts, we planned a community using parts of society: power plants, business offices, trash transfer systems, and socioeconomic class divisions. After planning our ideal, yet realistic communities, we listened to Carl Pope, the Executive Director of the Sierra Club, and Curt Goering, the Deputy Executive Director of Amnesty International. We also heard Owens Wiwa, the brother of Ken Saro Wiwa, speak about being an environmentalist and human rights defender. We attended workshops given by professors of economics and environmental policy and learned about strategically planning campaigns, defining goals, and bringing about solutions in society. I went to three workshops specifically focusing on corporations, trade, and the environment.
Attending the Summit provided the opportunity to meet student activists from around the country who are contemplating different economic and political theories and thinking about the problems of the status quo as well as solutions. The diversity of the group allowed me to meet moderate democrats, anarchists, and everyone in between. I learned that to be effective, I must understand the economy and know the arguments from both sides. The globalization theme of the conference was extrapolated into late night conversations on religion, politics, and the economy. We witnessed cultural globalization firsthand when we ventured out of the 4-H campus and rode the Metro to an Ethiopian restaurant on the other side of Washington. It was across the street from French cuisine and a block away from South African dining. Leaving the Summit with more questions than answers, I will remember it as a life-changing experience. I know that I must begin to speak truth to power. Is the world ready?
(Laura Adams is a senior at Topeka High School. She has been an active member of the Amnesty International Club for 3 years where she has helped build coalitions with other student groups. She is a debater and plays oboe with the symphonic band and orchestra as well as the Washburn youth wind ensemble. She will know by April where she will be majoring in Environmental Engineering next year!)
Author and Activist to
Speak on Globalization
by Bill Beachy,
Executive Director
The CENTER is committing its Annual Meeting for 2001 to a presentation and discussion of Globalization and what citizens can do, with nationally known author and activist Kevin Danaher. The public is invited to hear Danaher on March 1 in the Fellowship Hall at First Christian Church, 1880 SW Gage, starting at 7:00 p.m.
Kevin Danaher is the director of Public Education for Global Exchange. He has written for and edited such books as Globalize This!, 50 Years is Enough: The Case against the World Bank and the IMF and the renowned Corporations are Gonna Get Your Mama: Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream. A dynamic speaker and educator, Danaher explains how the World Trade Organization, International Monetary Fund and World Bank have historically been promoting global domination by multinational corporations who are driven to maximize profits by exploiting natural resources and workers. A growing movement of workers, environmentalists, and human rights activists are uniting to combat the forces of elite globalization and to promote grassroots globalization.
His most recent volume, Globalize This! came out after the massive mobilization against the WTO in Seattle last year. His other books include: Fighting for the Soul of Brazil, In Whose Interest: A Guide to U.S.-South Africa Relations, Can the Free Market Solve Africa’s Food Crisis, The Political Economy of U.S. Policy Toward South Africa, South Africa: A New U.S. Policy for the 1990s, and Beyond Safaris: A Guide to Building People-to-People Ties with Africa.
Danaher has special expertise on globalization and its impact on domestic U.S. society, the policies of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, U.S. foreign policy, Southern Africa, Cuba, Northern Ireland, world hunger, agricultural systems, and the global impact of U.S. trade policies. He has also traveled widely in Africa, the Caribbean, Central America, North America and Ireland. He is familiar with the problems and prospects of economic development in many third world countries.
Global
Justice Conference 2001
by Markus Weyel
The March 9, 10 and 11 Global Justice Conference will focus on organizing against Citigroup, the largest financial institution in North America, and the Free Trade Area of the Americas, also known as NAFTA for the Western Hemisphere. The conference will feature workshops on Globalization, the Prison Industrial Complex, Global Forest Destruction, Predatory Lending and Redlining, Race and Class, Intentional Labor Organizing, Gender Issues in Social Movements, Political Theater, Direct Action, Media, and more. The institutions of global oppression will never be the same!
As part of Global Justice Tour 2001, Call to Action, a mobile training collective, is coming to the University of Kansas in Lawrence for the weekend of issue and action oriented workshops. Invited are students, activists and concerned citizens from the environmental, social justice, human rights, anti-globalization and labor movements. Together we can create a society based on social and economic justice and ecological sanity!
This is a great opportunity to build your knowledge and meet other people in the region who are working towards a vision of an environmentally, economically and socially just society. We will provide three days of workshops and trainings, food, housing and entertainment on Saturday night.
As you can imagine, there are some costs involved with all this and therefore we are asking for a contribution of $15 per person (more or less is fine too!). But no one will be turned away for lack of funds.
The Global Justice Conference is organized by Free State Action, a Lawrence-based group of activists working to promote social action and education in the community. Supporters are Amnesty International, Environs, the Green Party and the Latin American Solidarity at the University of Kansas, as well as the Lawrence Coalition for Peace and Justice, the Peace and Social Justice Center of South Central Kansas and the CENTER.
To register and to get more information visit the conference’s website at www.kcactivism.org/calltoaction or call Markus Weyel at the CENTER (785-232-4388).
(Markus Weyel, the CENTER’s administrative assistant, is a member of Free State Action and coordinator of the Global Justice Conference.)
Live Man Walking:
Why I'm Walking from Wichita to Topeka to End the Death Penalty in Kansas
by
Charles Carney
Anthony Porter, NO5372, Menard Prison, Death Row, Chester, IL 62259. He was one of the 3500 or so persons in the U.S. who literally had "Death" in his address. Anthony was one of a few who actually had his date with death marked on a calendar. He was about as close to a "dead man walking" as a person could get.
As a member of the Illinois Coalition Against the Death Penalty Visiting Team, I was assigned to visit Anthony just 60 hours before he was scheduled to be executed by the State of Illinois. There are only a few periods in my life more profound than the time I spent talking with Anthony on September 21, 1998. I stood shoulder to shoulder with Anthony. He passed documents through the bars. He could hardly read the documents. A psychiatrist had determined his IQ to be lower than 70. His hands shook. His eyes were red from lack of sleep. His face looked fearful and desperate.
I felt powerless.
After speaking with Anthony for an hour, I knew he was innocent. (Not that Anthony's guilt would change my mind about the death penalty). It was clear from the affidavits he gave me that the real shooter at Washington Park that evening was another man. Anthony was not even at the scene. He had several alibi witnesses ready to testify that he was at home the night of the killing. The courts had ignored the alibi witnesses and the affidavits.
With machine-like coldness and precision, the state was preparing to strap him to a gurney and inject a needle full of poisons in his vein.
The day after I visited Anthony, I spoke at a rally celebrating Anthony's stay. Afterward, I met his mother, Clara. We held hands. I told her what a blessing (and at the same time how awful) it was to have stood with Anthony the previous day.
When I give talks about the death penalty, I often refer to numbers and statistics (i.e. African Americans represent 12 percent of the population but over 40 percent of those on death row!). Or I refer to the reasons why the death penalty should be abolished. For example, it simply does not reduce the murder rate. But when I reflect on my encounter with Anthony, I can honestly say that I've stood shoulder to shoulder with one of the "numbers," I've looked into the eyes of one of the "reasons" and I've held hands with one of the "statistics." However strong the reasons I give for ending the death penalty, they fade when I consider the human connection.
How many more are there like Anthony, languishing on death row in full knowledge that they are not guilty? In Illinois alone, thirteen people have been exonerated for crimes they did not commit. They spent 10, 12, 18 years on death row. How many will actually have their flames squelched by the unforgiving, inflexible state? Who will put their children to bed when they are not there? Who will attend their teenager's graduations? Who will give them back their lost years, indeed their very lives?
That same evening I visited Anthony, he won a last minute stay of execution so that he could have a fitness hearing. Just over four months later, on February 1, 1999, Anthony's story drew national attention when CBS evening news showed a clip of Alstory Simon admitting that he shot the victims late that summer night in Washington Park. Four days later, on February 5th, Anthony Porter was released from Cook County Jail on his own recognizance. In January of 2000, George Ryan, Republican Governor of Illinois, declared a moratorium on the death penalty for the state of Illinois. He said the death penalty system was broken.
In July of 2000, after having lived in Chicago for 11 years my wife Donna and I moved to my home town of Wichita. I was fully aware that Kansas had reinstated the
death penalty. Shortly after my arrival in Kansas, I connected with some people who were doing monthly vigils in front of various churches, mosques and temples to highlight the strong positions that most congregations have taken against the death penalty. This fit well with my beliefs, because I believe that ultimately the existence of the death penalty is a spiritual problem. Usually, these vigils took place on evenings when one or more persons were scheduled to be murdered by the State. After several of these vigils, I got the idea to take our vigil on the road.
From March 15 to 25th I will be a "live man walking" from Wichita to Topeka so that there will be no more dead men and women walking ever again in Kansas. And my dream would be that, with the momentum that Illinois has established, we will begin to see a domino effect—State after State after State, overturning their death penalty statutes.
The spirit of Anthony Porter will walk with me.
For more information about the Journey for Justice walk, call 316-263-5886.
(See the announcement about the Topeka program related to the Walk below. Charles Carney is a staff member at the Peace and Social Justice Center of South Central Kansas and a member of the board of directors for the Kansas Coalition Against the Death Penalty.)
Father of Murrah Federal Building Bombing Victim To Speak
In April 1995, Bud Welch's 23-year old daughter Julie Marie was killed in the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. In the months after her death, he changed from supporting the death penalty for bomber Timothy McVeigh to taking a public stand against it. Welch will speak at a Rice and Beans dinner on March 24 at 6:30 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall at St. John A.M.E. Church, 7th & Topeka Blvd. in Topeka. This program comes at the end of the Journey for Justice walk from Wichita to Topeka. (See related story Live Man Walking.)
Welch's change of heart was inspired in part by Julie Marie herself. Once, while listening to a radio report on an execution in Texas, she had turned to him and said, "Dad, that makes me sick. All those Texans are doing is teaching all the children down there to hate. The murderer did wrong, but now the government has stooped to his level."
Bud eventually arranged to meet Timothy McVeigh's father, Bill. "I saw a deep pain in a father's eye, but also an incredible love for his son," Bud said. "I was able to tell him that I truly understood the pain that he was going through, and that he—as I—was a victim of what happened in Oklahoma City."
For more information about this program call the CENTER at 785-232-4388.