people who get involved, the more power we have.

It is, in the end, all the people of the world have. We have great numbers of non-rich people who, with a little determination and a. strong gut, can take the pepper spraying and throw their voices. Henry David Thoreau thought civil disobediance could change the entire world,

get far disagreeing with him.

of critical mass. Themore |

and, you know you won't. -

continued from page 7

people Pee it | By Alejandro Bustos

aye 1S | Source: National

worth billions, the federal. - Bureau Chief

government has saved -

billions in the EI fund. The 7. “i

only reason why they have +} SANTIAGO, Chile

paid off the deficitis that | (CUP) - A black-and-

extra money. So that white photo of an army

money is, in effect, being truck spraying protestors

paid by unemployed ' | withawatercannon

people who cannot access adorns the lobby ofthe

it, ifit was not forthisre- | StudentF ederation of the

definition then Paul Martin | University of Chile.

would not have a surplus. Inside the modest

So some people like room - furnished with two

students and the unem- old desks, a table with

ployed have paid down three chairs and a three-.

the deficit at a very high piece sofa set - students

cost and the ones who earnestly debate how to _

have done well in thistime | stop the Neo-liberal right,

are the ones now trying to | from winning the country’s

benefit and grab what they | presidential elections.

can from the system. | On January 16, ee Chileans.will head to the

AK: It is complicated by _ | polls forarunoff vote

the fact that the media between Joaquin Lavin, an

likes to putthingsinsmall | official in the former

sound bites, like “okay our | governmentof past

economy is doing good, dictator Augusto Pinochet,

we haye this much percent | and Ricardo Lagos, a

of economic growth this Socialist.

year’ when it would take But Alvaro

more digging to tell the Cabrera, the recently

whole story. I see Seattle | clected Student

as a big spark. Fromhere | Federation president, is

there will be other confer- unhappy witheither

ences and there will be ahcter:

more people doing things “The government

locally. It is like the point disempowered the

people,” Cabrera, a Communist party member, told Canadian University Press(CUP)inalive _ interview.

The “government” is the centre-Left Concertacion coalition, which Lagos isa part of, who has governed Chile since democracy returned here in 1990 after 17- years of military rule.

Like many Chileans, Cabrera - one of several Communist student leaders recently elected in

_| Fighting capitalism across the Americas

the country - is horrified at what the free market has done to this nation of 14- million people, and is angry ata government he believes is unwilling to

change the economic

system.

But whatis really interesting about his frustration is that it expresses acommon theme reverberating across both North and South American student circles.

Thousands of kilometres to the north of

‘Santiago, Chile’s capital,

Cabrera’s words were echoed ina very different context. ‘er

Several months before the recent Nov. 29-Dec. 3 World Trade Organisation (WTO) summit hit Seattle, officials from the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) were busy making links with labour, environmental and United States-based student groups.

Along withits allies, the CFS, Canada’s largest student lobby group, isa vocal opponent ofthe WTO, a global collective of 135 nations whose goal is to remove economic barriers to international trade.

Critics say the WTO will sacrifice environmental, educational and labour standards within individual nations in the name of freer world trade.

“Market principles applied to education will not provide adequate access and quality for all,” Mark Veerkamp, the British Columbia chair for

the CFS, told CUP in late November.

In other words, to stretch the argument further, anon-regulated free market will not protect workers’ rights, save trees, or createa society that can provide publicly accessible post- secondary education and health-care.

- Itisthis beliefina truly public educational system that has led students in Mexico to shutdown the country’s largestuniversity.

_. The National Autonomous University, located in Mexico City,.. once housed the nation’s future presidents and multiple senior

| bureaucrats.

In the past 20- years, however, it has lost its status as upper- and middle-class Mexicans enrolled in private

universities at home, or flew off to schools in the United States.

Last April, the striking studentsshut down the university, which has amassive enrolment figure of 268,000, and barricaded its main campustoprotesta _ proposal to charge fees at astate institution that has never cost students more than a few token cents.

Some students fear these are the first steps in privatizing Mexico’s public university system.

“We all want to go back to school,” Carlos Montalvo, one of the student leaders, told the New York Times just before Christmas. “The pointis, under what

circumstances?” — These words -

“Under what circumstances?” - have been uttered, in one form or another, by countless students across North and South America.

» Now, itis true -

‘these voices arenotlinked

into acohesive message. Some of the estimated 600 Canadian students demonstrating at the WTO summit in Seattle, for instance, were probably unaware of the struggles of their brethren in Chile and Mexico,

Yet what is curious is that these independent movements, who grew out

oftheir own domestic +...

realities, are asking commonquestions. And the question, “what effect would an unregulated free market have in my society?” is one that tops the list. After the protests in Seattle - where more than 50,000 people, or twice that many according to some estimates, demonstrated against the WTO- many people were left wondering ifactivism had been rejuvenated across North America.

Media outlets like the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation compared the Seattle protesttothe Democratic Convention of 1968, when thousands of anti- Vietnam war demonstrators battled Chicago police. _

But for those inside the student movement Seattle was part ofa long process.

“Tt was an important event,” said Ali Fischer, vice-president of the 3.5-million strong United States Student