Orion > Discourse and Dissent> Rebecca Solnit

What We Hope For

On=20 January 18, 1915, eighteen months into the first world war, the = first=20 terrible war in the modern sense -- slaughter by the hundreds of=20 thousands, poison gas, men living and dying in the open graves of = trench=20 warfare, tanks, barbed wire, machine guns, airplanes -- Virginia = Woolf=20 wrote in her journal, "The future is dark, which is on the whole, = the best=20 thing the future can be, I think." Dark, she seems to say, as in=20 inscrutable, not as in terrible. We often mistake the one for the = other.=20 People imagine the end of the world is nigh because the future is=20 unimaginable. Who twenty years ago would have pictured a world = without the=20 USSR and with the Internet? We talk about "what we hope for" in = terms of=20 what we hope will come to pass but we could think of it another = way, as=20 why we hope. We hope on principle, we hope tactically and = strategically,=20 we hope because the future is dark, we hope because it's a more = powerful=20 and more joyful way to live. Despair presumes it knows what will = happen=20 next. But who, two decades ago, would have imagined that the = Canadian=20 government would give a huge swathe of the north back to its = indigenous=20 people, or that the imprisoned Nelson Mandela would become = president of a=20 free South Africa?

Twenty-one years ago this June, a million people gathered = in=20 Central Park to demand a nuclear freeze. They didn't get it. The = movement=20 was full of people who believed they'd realize their goal in a few = years=20 and then go home. Many went home disappointed or burned out. But = in less=20 than a decade, major nuclear arms reductions were negotiated, = helped along=20 by European antinuclear movements and the impetus they gave = Gorbachev.=20 Since then, the issue has fallen off the map and we have lost much = of what=20 was gained. The US never ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban = Treaty, and=20 the Bush administration is planning to resume the full-fledged = nuclear=20 testing halted in 1991, to resume manufacture, to expand the = arsenal, and=20 perhaps even to use it in once-proscribed ways.

It's=20 always too soon to go home. And it's always too soon to calculate = effect.=20 I once read an anecdote by someone in Women Strike for Peace, the = first=20 great antinuclear movement in the United States in 1963, the one = that did=20 contribute to a major victory: the end of aboveground nuclear = testing with=20 its radioactive fallout that was showing up in mother's milk and = baby=20 teeth. She told of how foolish and futile she felt standing in the = rain=20 one morning protesting at the Kennedy White House. Years later she = heard=20 Dr. Benjamin Spock -- one of the most high-profile activists on = the issue=20 then -- say that the turning point for him was seeing a small = group of=20 women standing in the rain, protesting at the White House. If they = were so=20 passionately committed, he thought, he should give the issue more=20 consideration himself.

Unending Change

A lot of=20 activists expect that for every action there is an equal and = opposite and=20 punctual reaction, and regard the lack of one as failure. = After=20 all, activism is often a reaction: Bush decides to invade Iraq, we = create=20 a global peace movement in which 10 to 30 million people march on = seven=20 continents on the same weekend. But history is shaped by the = groundswells=20 and common dreams that single acts and moments only represent. = It's a=20 landscape more complicated than commensurate cause and effect. = Politics is=20 a surface in which transformation comes about as much because of = pervasive=20 changes in the depths of the collective imagination as because of = visible=20 acts, though both are necessary. And though huge causes sometimes = have=20 little effect, tiny ones occasionally have huge=20 consequences.

Some=20 years ago, scientists attempted to create a long-range weather = forecasting=20 program, assuming that the same initial conditions would generate = the same=20 weather down the road. It turned out that the minutest variations, = even=20 the undetectable things, things they could perhaps not yet even = imagine as=20 data, could cause entirely different weather to emerge from almost = identical initial conditions. This was famously summed up as the = saying=20 about the flap of a butterfly's wings on one continent that can = change the=20 weather on another.

History is like=20 weather, not like checkers. A game of checkers ends. The weather = never=20 does. That's why you can't save anything. Saving is the wrong = word. Jesus=20 saves and so do banks: they set things aside from the flux of = earthly=20 change. We never did save the whales, though we might've prevented = them=20 from becoming extinct. We will have to continue to prevent that as = long as=20 they continue not to be extinct. Saving suggests a laying = up where=20 neither moth nor dust doth corrupt, and this model of salvation is = perhaps=20 why Americans are so good at crisis response and then going home = to let=20 another crisis brew. Problems seldom go home. Most nations agree = to a ban=20 on hunting endangered species of whale, but their oceans are = compromised=20 in other ways. DDT is banned in the US, but exported to the third = world,=20 and Monsanto moves on to the next atrocity.

The=20 world gets better. It also gets worse. The time it will take you = to=20 address this is exactly equal to your lifetime, and if you're = lucky you=20 don't know how long that is. The future is dark. Like night. There = are=20 probabilities and likelihoods, but there are no = guarantees.

As Adam=20 Hochschild points out, from the time the English Quakers first = took on the=20 issue of slavery, three quarters of a century passed before it was = abolished it in Europe and America. Few if any working on the = issue at the=20 beginning lived to see its conclusion, when what had once seemed=20 impossible suddenly began to look, in retrospect, inevitable. And = as the=20 law of unintended consequences might lead you to expect, the = abolition=20 movement also sparked the first widespread women's rights = movement, which=20 took about the same amount of time to secure the right to vote for = American women, has achieved far more in the subsequent 83 years, = and is=20 by no means done. Activism is not a journey to the corner store; = it is a=20 plunge into the dark.

Writers=20 understand that action is seldom direct. You write your books. You = scatter=20 your seeds. Rats might eat them, or they might just rot. In = California,=20 some seeds lie dormant for decades because they only germinate = after fire.=20 Sharon Salzberg, in her book Faith, recounts how she put = together a=20 book of teachings by the Buddhist monk U Pandita and consigned the = project=20 to the "minor-good-deed category." Long afterward, she found out = that when=20 Burmese democracy movement's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, was kept = isolated=20 under house arrest by that country's dictators, the book and its=20 instructions in meditation "became her main source of spiritual = support=20 during those intensely difficult years." Emily Dickinson, Walt = Whitman,=20 Walter Benjamin and Arthur Rimbaud, like Henry David Thoreau, = achieved=20 their greatest impact long after their deaths, long after weeds = had grown=20 over the graves of the bestsellers of their times. Gandhi's=20 Thoreau-influenced nonviolence was as important in the American = South as=20 it was in India, and what transpired with Martin Luther King's=20 sophisticated version of it has influenced civil disobedience = movements=20 around the world. Decades after their assassinations they are = still with=20 us.

At the port of Oakland, California, on April 7, several = hundred=20 peace activists came out at dawn at dawn to picket the gates of a = company=20 shipping arms to Iraq. The longshoreman's union had vowed not to = cross our=20 picket. The police arrived in riot gear and, unprovoked and = unthreatened,=20 began shooting wooden bullets and beanbags of shot at the = activists. Three=20 members of the media, nine longshoremen, and fifty activists were = injured.=20 I saw the bloody welts the size of half grapefruits on the backs = of some=20 of the young men--they had been shot in the back -- and a swelling = the=20 size of an egg on the jaw of a delicate yoga instructor. Told that = way,=20 violence won. But the violence inspired the union dock workers to = form=20 closer alliances with antiwar activists and underscored the = connections=20 between local and global issues. On May 12 we picketed again, with = no=20 violence. This time, the longshoremen acted in solidarity with the = picketers and -- for the first time in anyone's memory -- the = shipping=20 companies cancelled the work shift rather than face the = protesters. Told=20 that way, the story continues to unfold, and we have grown=20 stronger. And there's a third way to tell it. The picket stalled a = lot of=20 semi trucks. Some of the drivers were annoyed. Some sincerely = believed=20 that the war was a humanitarian effort. Some of them -- notably a = group of=20 South Asian drivers standing around in the morning sun looking = radiant --=20 thought we were great. After the picket was broken up, one = immigrant=20 driver honked in support and pulled over to ask for a peace sign = for his=20 rig. I stepped forward to pierce holes into it so he could = bungee-cord it=20 to the chrome grille. We talked briefly, shook hands, and he = stepped up=20 into the cab. He was turned back at the gates --they weren't = accepting=20 deliveries from antiwar truckers. When I saw him next he was = sitting on a=20 curb all alone behind police lines, looking cheerful and fearless. = Who=20 knows what will ultimately come of the spontaneous courage of this = man=20 with a job on the line?

Victories of the New Peace Movement

It was a=20 setup for disappointment to expect that there would be an = acknowledged=20 cause and effect relationship between the antiwar actions and the = Bush=20 administration. On the other hand...

We will likely never know, but it seems that the Bush=20 administration decided against the "Shock and Awe" saturation = bombing of=20 Baghdad because we made it clear that the cost in world opinion = and=20 civil unrest would be too high. We millions may have saved a few = thousand or a few hundred thousand lives.
The global peace movement was grossly underreported on = February=20 15th. A million people marching in Barcelona was nice, but I = also heard=20 about the thousands in Chapel Hill, NC, the hundred and fifty = people=20 holding a peace vigil in the small town of Las Vegas, NM, the = antiwar=20 passion of people in even smaller villages from Bolivia to=20 Thailand.
Activists are often portrayed as an unrepresentative, = marginal=20 rabble, but something shifted in the media last fall. Since = then,=20 antiwar activists have mostly been represented as a diverse, = legitimate,=20 and representative body, a watershed victory for our = representation and=20 our long-term prospects.
Many people who had never spoken out, never marched in = the=20 street, never joined groups, written to politicians, or donated = to=20 campaigns, did so; countless people became political as never = before.=20 That is, if nothing else, a vast aquifer of passion now stored = up to=20 feed the river of change. New networks and communities and = websites and=20 listserves and jail solidarity groups and coalitions=20 arose.
In the name of the so-called war on terror, which seems = to=20 inculcate terror at home and enact it abroad, we have been = encouraged to=20 fear our neighbors, each other, strangers, (particularly = middle-eastern,=20 Arab, and Moslem people), to spy on them, to lock ourselves up, = to=20 privatize ourselves. By living out our hope and resistance in = public=20 together with strangers of all kinds, we overcame this catechism = of=20 fear, we trusted each other; we forged a community that bridged = all=20 differences among the peace loving as we demonstrated our = commitment to=20 the people of Iraq.
We achieved a global movement without leaders. There = were many=20 brilliant spokespeople, theorists and organizers, but when your = fate=20 rests on your leader, you are only as strong, as incorruptible, = and as=20 creative as he -- or, occasionally, she -- is. What could be = more=20 democratic than millions of people who, via the grapevine, the = Internet,=20 and various groups from churches to unions to direct-action = affinity=20 groups, can organize themselves? Of course leaderless actions = and=20 movements have been organized for the past couple of decades, = but never=20 on such a grand scale. The African writer Laurens Van Der Post = once said=20 that no great new leaders were emerging because it was time for = us to=20 cease to be followers. Perhaps we have.
We succeeded in doing what the anti-Vietnam War = movement=20 infamously failed to do: to refuse the dichotomies. We were able = to=20 oppose a war on Iraq without endorsing Saddam Hussein. We were = able to=20 oppose a war with compassion for the troops who fought it. Most = of us=20 did not fall into the traps that our foreign policy so often = does and=20 that earlier generations of radicals did: the ones in which our = enemy's=20 enemy is our friend, in which the opponent of an evil must be = good, in=20 which a nation and its figurehead, a general and his troops, = become=20 indistinguishable. We were not against the US and = for=20 Iraq; we were against the war, and many of us were against all = war, all=20 weapons of mass destruction -- even ours -- and all violence,=20 everywhere. We are not just an antiwar movement. We are a peace=20 movement.
Questions the peace and anti-globalization movements = have raised=20 are now mainstream, though no mainstream source will say why, or = perhaps=20 even knows why. Activists targeted Bechtel, Halliburton, Chevron = and=20 Lockheed Martin, among others, as war profiteers with ties to = the Bush=20 administration. The actions worked not by shutting the places = down in=20 any significant way but by making their operations a public = question.=20 Direct action seldom works directly, but now the media = scrutinizes those=20 corporations as never before. Representative Henry Waxman = publicly=20 questioned Halliburton's ties to terrorist states the other day, = and the=20 media is closely questioning the administration's closed-door = decision=20 to award Halliburton, the company vice-president Cheney headed = until he=20 took office, a $7 billion contract to administer Iraqi oil. = These are=20 breakthroughs.

The Angel of Alternate History

American=20 history is dialectical. What is best about it is called forth by = what is=20 worst. The abolitionists and the underground railroad, the = feminist=20 movement and the civil rights movement, the environmental and = human rights=20 movements were all called into being by threats and atrocities. = There's=20 plenty of what's worst afoot nowadays. But we need a progressive = activism=20 that is not one of reaction but of initiation, one in which people = of good=20 will everywhere set the agenda. We need to extend the passion the = war=20 brought forth into preventing the next one, and toward addressing = all the=20 forms of violence besides bombs. We need a movement that doesn't = just=20 respond to the evils of the present but calls forth the = possibilities of=20 the future. We need a revolution of hope. And for that we need to=20 understand how change works and how to count our=20 victories.

While = serving on=20 the board of Citizen Alert, a Nevada nonprofit environmental and=20 antinuclear group, I once wrote a fundraising letter modeled after = "It's a=20 Wonderful Life." Frank Capra's movie is a model for radical = history,=20 because what the angel Clarence shows the suicidal George Bailey = is what=20 the town would look like if he hadn't done his best for his = neighbors.=20 This angel of alternate history shows not what happened but what = didn't,=20 and that's what's hardest to weigh. Citizen Alert's victories were = largely=20 those of what hadn't happened to the air, the water, the = land, and=20 the people of Nevada. And the history of what the larger movements = have achieved is largely one of careers undestroyed, ideas=20 uncensored, violence and intimidation uncommitted, injustices=20 unperpetrated, rivers unpoisoned and undammed, bombs undropped, = radiation=20 unleaked, poisons unsprayed, wildernesses unviolated, countryside=20 undeveloped, resources unextracted, species = unexterminated.

I was=20 born during the summer the Berlin Wall went up, into a country in = which=20 there weren't even words, let alone redress, for many of the = practices=20 that kept women and people of color from free and equal = citizenship, in=20 which homosexuality was diagnosed as a disease and treated as a = crime, in=20 which the ecosystem was hardly even a concept, in which extinction = and=20 pollution were issues only a tiny minority heeded, in which = "better living=20 through chemistry" didn't yet sound like black humor, in which the = US and=20 USSR were on hair-trigger alert for a nuclear Armageddon, in which = most of=20 the big questions about the culture had yet to be asked. It was a = world=20 with more rainforest, more wild habitat, more ozone layer, and = more=20 species; but few were defending those things then. An ecological=20 imagination was born and became part of the common culture only in = the=20 past few decades, as did a broader and deeper understanding of = human=20 diversity and human rights.

The=20 world gets worse. It also gets better. And the future stays=20 dark.

Nobody=20 knows the consequences of their actions, and history is full of = small acts=20 that changed the world in surprising ways. I was one of thousands = of=20 activists at the Nevada Test Site in the late 1980s, an important, = forgotten history still unfolding out there where the US and UK = have=20 exploded more than a thousand nuclear bombs, with disastrous = effects on=20 the environment and human health, (and where the Bush = Administration would=20 like to resume testing, thereby sabotaging the unratified = Comprehensive=20 Test Ban Treaty). We didn't shut down our test site, but our acts = inspired=20 the Kazakh poet Olzhas Suleimenov, on February 27, 1989, to read a = manifesto instead of poetry on live Kazakh TV -- a manifesto = demanding a=20 shutdown of the Soviet nuclear test site in Semipalatinsk, = Kazakhstan, and=20 calling a meeting. Five thousand Kazakhs gathered at the Writer's = Union=20 the next day and formed a movement to shut down the site. They = named=20 themselves the Nevada-Semipalatinsk Antinuclear = Movement.

The=20 Soviet Test Site was indeed shut down. Suleimenov was the = catalyst, and=20 though we in Nevada were his inspiration, what gave him his = platform was=20 his poetry in a country that loved poets. Perhaps Suleimenov wrote = all his=20 poems so that one day he could stand up in front of a TV camera = and=20 deliver not a poem but a manifesto. And perhaps Arundhati Roy = wrote a=20 ravishing novel that catapulted her to stardom so that when she = stood up=20 to oppose dams and destruction of the local for the benefit of the = transnational, people would notice. Or perhaps these writers = opposed the=20 ravaging of the earth so that poetry too -- poetry in the broadest = sense=20 -- would survive in the world.

American=20 poets became an antiwar movement themselves when Sam Hamill = declined an=20 invitation to Laura Bush's "Poetry and the American Voice" = symposium=20 shortly after her husband's administration announced their "Shock = and Awe"=20 plan, and he circulated his letter of outrage. His e-mail box = filled up,=20 he started poetsagainstthewar.org, to which about 11,000 = poets have=20 submitted poems to date. Hamill became a major spokesperson = against the=20 war and his website has become an organizing tool for the peace=20 movement.

Not Left But Forward

The glum=20 traditional left often seems intent upon finding the cloud around = every=20 silver lining. This January, when Governor Ryan of Illinois = overturned a=20 hundred and sixty-seven death sentences, there were left-wing = commentators=20 who found fault with the details, carped when we should have been = pouring=20 champagne over our heads like football champs. And joy is one of = our=20 weapons and one of our victories. Non-activists sometimes chide us = for=20 being joyous at demonstrations, for having fun while taking on the = serious=20 business of the world, but in a time when alienation, isolation, = and=20 powerlessness are among our principal afflictions, just being out = in the=20 streets en masse is not a demand for victory: it is a=20 victory.

But=20 there's an increasing gap between this new movement with its = capacity for=20 joy and the old figureheads. Their grumpiness is often the = grumpiness of=20 perfectionists who hold that anything less than total victory is = failure,=20 a premise that makes it easy to give up at the start or to = disparage the=20 victories that are possible. This is earth. It will never be = heaven. There=20 will always be cruelty, always be violence, always be destruction. = There=20 is tremendous devastation now. In the time it takes you to read = this,=20 acres of rainforest will vanish, a species will go extinct, women = will be=20 raped, men shot, and far too many children will die of easily = preventable=20 causes. We cannot eliminate all devastation for all time, but we = can=20 reduce it, outlaw it, undermine its source and foundation: these = are=20 victories.

Nearly=20 everyone felt, after September 11, 2001, along with grief and = fear, a huge=20 upwelling of idealism, of openness, of a readiness to question and = to=20 learn, a sense of being connected and a desire to live our lives = for=20 something more, even if it wasn't familiar, safe, or easy. Nothing = could=20 have been more threatening to the current administration, and they = have=20 done everything they can to repress it.

But = that desire=20 is still out there. It's the force behind a huge new movement we = don't=20 even have a name for yet, a movement that's not a left opposed to = a right,=20 but perhaps a below against above, little against big, local and=20 decentralized against consolidated. If we could throw out the old=20 definitions, we could recognize where the new alliances lie; and = those=20 alliances -- of small farmers, of factory workers, of = environmentalists,=20 of the poor, of the indigenous, of the just, of the farseeing -- = could be=20 extraordinarily powerful against the forces of corporate profit = and=20 institutional violence. Left and right are terms for where the = radicals=20 and conservatives sat in the French National Assembly after the = French=20 Revolution. We're not in that world anymore, let alone that = seating=20 arrangement. We're in one that for all its ruins and poisons and = legacies=20 is utterly new. Anti-globalization activists say, "Another world = is=20 possible." It is not only possible, it is inevitable; and we need = to=20 participate in shaping it.

I'm=20 hopeful, partly because we don't know what is going to happen in = that dark=20 future and we might as well live according to our principles as = long as=20 we're here. Hope, the opposite of fear, lets us do that. Imagine = the world=20 as a lifeboat: the corporations and the current administration are = smashing holes in it as fast (or faster) than the rest of us can = bail or=20 patch the leaks. But it's important to take account of the bailers = as well=20 as the smashers and to write epics in the present tense rather = than=20 elegies in the past tense. That's part of what floats this boat. = And if it=20 sinks, we all sink, so why not bail? Why not row? The = reckless Bush=20 Administration seems to be generating what US administrations have = so long=20 held back: a world in which the old order is shattered and = anything is=20 possible.

Zapatista spokesman Subcommandante Marcos adds, "History = written by=20 Power taught us that we had lost.... We did not believe what Power = taught=20 us. We skipped class when they taught conformity and idiocy. We = failed=20 modernity. We are united by the imagination, by creativity, by = tomorrow.=20 In the past we not only met defeat but also found a desire for = justice and=20 the dream of being better. We left skepticism hanging from the = hook of big=20 capital and discovered that we could believe, that it was worth = believing,=20 that we should believe -- in ourselves. Health to you, and don't = forget=20 that flowers, like hope, are harvested."

And they=20 grow in the dark. "I believe," adds Thoreau, "in the forest, and = the=20 meadow, and the night in which the corn = grows."

Acts of = HopeChallenging Empire on the World Stageby Rebecca=20 Solnit

Acts of = Hope
Challenging Empire on the World Stage
by Rebecca=20 Solnit