The Role of Solidarity Groups Explored at Conference
Posted on: 10 December 2013
The role of solidarity groups in an increasingly globalised world was explored at a one-day conference in Trinity College Dublin recently.
Hosted by Trinity’s Department of Sociology in association with Trinity’s Institute for International Integration Studies, International Solidarity: Practices, Problems, Possibilities brought together researchers and practitioners from solidarity groups in Ireland and abroad to discuss what we mean by ‘international solidarity’ and what role solidarity groups play domestically and internationally.
Participants in the event included Jack O’Connor, President of SIPTU and also President of Justice for Colombia, and Peter Waterman, author of the recently published book Recovering Internationalism, Creating the New Global Solidarity. The event took place in The Institute for International Integration Studies (IIIS) Seminar Room, Trinity.
In an increasingly globalised world, social movements are becoming more transnational. However while research on the more established NGOs and aid agencies has grown in parallel to the growth of transnational movements, solidarity movements – despite their political significance – remain under-researched. This conference aims to close the gap and further research and discussion in this field.
The conference explored the issues faced by solidarity groups and featured case studies ranging from Palestine solidarity and the anti-apartheid movement to British solidarity with Irish activists in Rossport.
Speaking at the event, Dr David Landy, Assistant Professor in Race, Ethnicity and Conflict at the Department of Sociology, Trinity, commented: “The conference aims to provide a space for practitioners as well as academics to participate and to discuss the wider issues surrounding international solidarity. The conference will move beyond describing individual solidarity movements to discussing the issues that solidarity groups face, and indeed the issues arising from practices of international solidarity. The conference will enable researchers to investigate the commonalities and differences underpinning practices of international solidarity in the contemporary world.”
Keynote speaker Peter Waterman added: “Given its historical significance and the new waves of the 1970s, the 1990s and now 2010+, it is impressive how little systematic reflection there has been on ‘International Solidarity’. In part, I think, this might be due to the way it was discredited by state communist ‘internationalism’ from the East, and turned into ‘Development Cooperation’ by western labour and liberals. And, for that matter, the way the third world solidarity movements saw heroic movements turn into bureaucratic or even repressive parties and governments.”
“There is now beginning to be a new wave of reflection, no doubt stimulated by the newest wave of movements internationally, and hopefully aware of both the difficult history and the novelty of the new ‘global solidarity and justice movement’s. This runs the gamut from solidarity with the Zapatistas to that with Palestine, from the grassroots to cyberspace. And increasingly today the solidarity runs not primarily from north to south, but multi-directionally – as with the models and inspiration provided by factory occupations in Argentina and Greece, Occupy in the US, Via Campesina (the international rural labour network), Tahrir Square in Egypt, Real Democracy in Spain, Pussy Riot in Russia, movements for ”The Good Life’ from the Andes.”