We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Tuesday, April 22, 2014

Pieces of Madrid

Click here if you wish to access the original posting on Global Uprisings. 

The first half of the video portrays typical street battles by the people against the security forces of the ruling class. But what I think is a much more important part of the video starts at 9:00m. Although not as photogenic as the street battles, they show people engaged in self-organizing efforts to not only protect themselves and their communities, but to begin the critically important revolutionary task of constructing bottom-up infrastructures of a genuine democracy. They are busy constructing the foundation of a new society that serves the needs of everyone to replace the capitalist organization of society which delivers so much wealth and power to a few. The Spanish people are starting to realize that there is no alternative: they must construct a genuine democracy or our masters will continue to lead us down the road to a nightmarish fascism and the destruction of the biosphere for human habitation. 
This short documentary explores ongoing resistance and self-organization in the midst of the economic and social crisis in Madrid, Spain.
As social conditions continue to deteriorate across the country, people have been turning to the streets and to each other to find for solutions to the crisis. This film tells a story of the massive mobilization that saw millions of people converge on Madrid on March 22nd 2014, the story of the proliferation of social centers, community gardens, self-organized food banks, and the story of large-scale housing occupations by and for families that have been evicted. The film pieces together many of the creative ways that people have been coping with crisis and asks what the future may hold for Spain.
Filmed and edited in March/April 2014, it is part of the Global Uprisings documentary series.