Where the Peace Movement Went Wrong. By Nathan Newman

NathanNewman.org

April 10, 2003

Where the Peace Movement Went Wrong

This is a long one, laying out some of my assessment of what went wrong with the peace movement. It's what I've been saying to friends in the movement-- conservatives can chortle as they listen in since it's a harsh assessment, but the way forward to a better strategy in the future is tough criticism when it's needed to make a change in tactics and strategy.

I am actually glad to see the pictures of Iraqis celebrating freedom from Saddam's dictatorship. Not because it changes my view that this war was the wrong decision, but at least it means that for some Iraqis the death and devastation of their cities is offset by their immediate freedom from Saddam's yoke.

The problem for the peace movement is that they failed to argue persuasively that death and war was not the best option to achieve this goal, instead leaving a lot of the US population with the sense that the choice was between the war and inaction, which ended up tilting many moderates reluctantly to the war camp.

For many Americans, the war involves fighting a brutal regime that abuses its own people and has a history of invading neighbors. Whether the Bush leadership have other nastier intentions is separate from that obvious issue, which many people can separate from even concious misgivings about the Bush administration.

The antiwar argument had to be about whether there was an alternative way to achieve the goal of a freer and more democratic Iraq (and questioning the good faith of war proponents to achieve that result).

The antiwar movement lost the argument on timing and on the efficacy of alternative means of addressing peoples broad concerns on Iraq. And I attribute that partly to their simplistic focus on "no war" unity over developing a more sophisticated positive message that also would have required more outreach to non-rallygoers (and probably less focus on rallies).

And I continue to argue with a range of activist friends that when we allowed groups that defended the Hussein regime in the past to lead some of the rallies, many folks who don't like Hussein rightly could think that such a movement has no real plan for an alternative challenge to Hussein's regime.

For some of the left, they've retreated to almost isolationist pacificism as all the argument they need, without any need to address strategy and why THIS PARTICULAR WAR is the wrong direction.

The left in this country has an honorable history of leading the fight internationally for human rights, from challenges to Belgium's mass murder in the Congo at the end of the 19th century (led by among others Mark Twain) to denunciations of the fascist regimes in Europe in the 1930s to attacks on colonialism in the 1950s to denunciations of death squads in El Salvador and Apartheid in South Africa, the left has always called for challenges to bad regimes.

Progressives have usually supported non-violent means as a way to do so, usually arguing that it was misguided support for such regimes early on that get them to the point of becoming so dangerous that war is the only answer. This point is obvious in the case of US support for both Bin Laden and Hussein in the 1980s.

But to merely point out past US complicity is not enough. If we oppose war, we need a far clearer roadmap for the public on how we would support those who resist oppression. Mouthing lines about national sovereignty in cases like Iraq is as stupid as the Bull Connors or Pat Buchanans who cited states rights rhetoric to justify national abstention from challenging racism in the South.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with humanitarian interventionism in principle-- the left has believed in it for centuries. What is opposed is its use on behalf of corporate interests in a violent form, when non-violent solidarity is both more likely to lead to a just result and imposes less costs on the population.

But in the case of Iraq, the lack of organizing of that global solidarity and plan on how to help those resisting Hussein is exactly what strengthened the warhawks in arguing that their method was the only way to "liberate Iraq." In practice and in message, there was little or no message by the antiwar movement on how they were acting in solidarity with the oppressed folks within Iraq.

And that was the fatal flaw of antiwar organizing.

And the left cannot plead lack of time, since they had all the time necessary between the first and second Gulf Wars to build a cohesive public education message in defense of Kurdish and Shia human rights and pressure for non-violent strategies that would have been seen as an effective alternative to war. It was the first Bush administration that sold out both the Kurds and the Shias when they rose up in the aftermath of that first war, yet the left failed to rally to support their cause strongly against that sellout.

So over the years and even in recent months, the peace movement failed to engage that issue substantially and mostly said nothing.

And that was a substantial reason that large chunks of even liberal opinion moved into supporting the war. You can excuse it by saying they were all misinformed by the media and such, but it's worth understanding and emphasizing that two months ago, only about one-third of the public supported war without significant global support, as signified by UN endorsement, and now an additional 40% of the public now supports this unilateral intervention. It is the failure of the antiwar forces to hold that 40% of the public that needs to be analyzed.

The "Win Without War" folks somewhat took on this challenge but it was by the time it was organized a bit too little too late. The neoconservative warhawks had been doing their intellectual outreach for years, publishing books, holding policy conferences, organizing at their grassroots, to solidify a, yes, moral basis for their position (even if its a disingenuous position), while the left was largely throwing its critique together on the fly.

The Left was flatly outorganized on this issue and not because they had fewer resources but because they just didn't even do the organizing necessary or engage in serious intellectual engagement. Which is why it was claimed that the only "unity" position possible was the simplistic "no war" message and thus anyone, including pro-Hussein propagandists like the WWP, could speak in the name of that antiwar message. It was too thin a message and failed.

I opposed this war for a whole range of reasons, moral, realpolitick and geopolitical. On the moral side, I thought that there was a non-war alternative through continuing to press for change on behalf of the Iraqi people through the United Nations or other methods, such as support for internal resistance (and critique the first Bush and Clinton administration for failing in that). On the realpolitick side, this war is unlikely to lead to a real democratic alternative, both because of Bush's disingenuous motives and precisely because it was unilateral, Iraqi nationalism is more likely to be channelled in response into authoritarian counter-responses over time. And geopolitically, the war in Iraq endangers both us as US residents and others around the world by stoking hatred and strengthening authoritarian movements that will find ideological sustenance denouncing our actions.

Bits and pieces of this response were scattered across antiwar analysis, but it was marginal to the simplistic "no war" legalisms and "unity" rhetoric with forces that excluded such analysis. Speeches at rallies I went to were preaching to the converted, not speaking to those less convinced of Bush's complete perfidy and for whom an actual argument was necessary. A few on February 15th in New York attempted this, but they were such the exception, and so unreinforced by broader public outreach to that unconverted group, that I'm hardly surprised that it was ineffective.

While I am personally convinced of Bush's cynicism and bad motives, merely repeating or worse assuming it will not convince many people who needed to have actual arguments and alternatives presented.

The antiwar movement was a failure. Many of my left friends will point to the "success" of the large rallies organized, but what's the achievement? Tactical successes such as a few big rallies? Rallies are means, not achievements. Why should we praise tactics that coincided with AN INCREASE in support for uniltateral war? The February global rallies seemed to make a small untick in opposition but it was pretty ephemeral.

While I did work supporting the mass rallies, I've written that the energy put into them could have better been put into broader outreach to the unconverted middle, whether door-to-door, going to community meetings, or just talking on street corners to those who would listen. I started my political life going to door-to-door, talking to new people about consumer and enviro issues. Most serious union organizing is based on door-knocking as well at potential members doors.

The deemphasis on door knocking and the attached organizing is the exact problem I see with too much of the antiwar left that preferred to talk to itself at rallies or in its existing media circle rather than reach out to new people.

That needs to change and quickly. And it can start by the peace movement concentrating now on what we can do to guarantee that the Iraqi people get the democracy they have been promised and keep control of the oil resources and escape their country's debt which largely went to the Western governments and companies that armed the military we just fought. I'll write more about that in coming days, but I'll leave on that note as a start.

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Posted by Nathan at April 10, 2003 06:48 PM