Whatever way one interpreted it, the G8 in Genoa was a watershed which opened a crisis already present in the movement. After Genoa it was difficult to articulate a common vision, and a phase of dizzying fragmentation began.
Things seemed somehow unreal and people were still unable to clearly comprehend the mur- der of Carlo Giuliani, the brutality in the Diaz School and Bolzaneto Police Barracks,117 and the two days of beatings and street fighting with the police. When the televised debates, the accusations and the insults ended, investigations were opened. In February the TPO social center in Bologna, the Cecco Rivolta squat in Florence, the Gabrio social center in Turin, and the headquarters of the Cobas118 union in Taranto were searched as the supposed head- quarters of Indymedia Italy. In reality Indymedia has no headquarters, and only in the TPO all videos were confiscated, to be used to prepare for the trials related to the street clashes. On the other hand, those who witnessed the raid underlined the investigators’ interest in the objects on display in the Sexyshock space, which culminated in the confiscation of a vibrator. Different proceedings began to take shape, some against the demonstrators, some against the police. Of all the structures created for the G8, only the Legal Team survived, supported in its action by the network of volunteers Supporto Legale,119 who continued to follow the trials amidst a slow but inexorable decline in public interest.
The atmosphere of estrangement was exacerbated after the attack on the twin towers of the 11 September, where the feeling that is well described by the phrase ‘state of fear’, which the movement had already tasted in Genoa, spread over the whole world. The ‘politics of the emergency’ became the default practice. The state was ‘forced’ to act in the face of circum- stances, and the need for quick decision-making replaced or, better, completed the already weary democratic practices. It became a modus operandi applied to everything, from politics to the economy, not that the two are distinguishable anymore.
In November of 2002, the European Social Forum was held. It was the first large meeting of what had been the movement of Genoa 2001. There were a lot of participants, but ultimately
117 Bolzaneto Barracks: Barracks of the Flying Squad (Reparto Mobile), a section of the police for use on demonstrations and in football grounds. During the G8 the barracks was at least partially taken over by the GOM (Gruppo Operativo Mobile), the riot squad used to suppress prison revolts. During those three days, about five hundred people were brought to the barracks for identification, then released or moved to jail. Many were tortured in Bolzaneto, including some who had already been severely beaten in the police raid on the Diaz school.
118 COBAS: One of two large grassroots trade unions (alongside the CUB) active in many sectors. 119 Supporto Legale: Organization set up to co-ordinate the legal work and collect evidence relating to the
it was a leave-taking, even if many may not have realized it. One million people came to march in the streets of Florence and then nothing happened. People started concentrating on daily survival or just dropped out. And so this international protest movement dozed off to sleep. In response to the 11 September, the US and NATO launched the military campaign Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan to search for Osama Bin Laden – first an ally against the Soviets, then an arch-enemy, a Magneto, a Moriarty for the 21st century. In 2003, there was the second Gulf war, the execution of Saddam Hussein and the forced democratization of Iraq.
The movement attempted to regroup through the protests against the war, but the atmosphere had been poisoned; governments went their own way and didn’t listen to anyone except the United States. During 2002-2003, large demonstrations took place all over the world, but their effect was to display the movement’s own powerlessness rather than successfully disrupt decisions which had already been taken.
In Italy, the long decade of Berlusconi governments, with a brief Prodi120 interval, began. The left blew up and exhausted itself in endless criticism against Silvio Berlusconi, personalizing all issues.
In many cities, corporate restructuring in the large factories had left behind a landscape of empty and desolate shells. Many were resuscitated, like defused bombs, through squatting and self-management. But starting in the 90s, building speculators began to count these shells among their own treasures. After 2000, in various cities including Milan, evictions cut the legs out from under many squats and the life of collectives became more and more difficult. The survival of movement-oriented groups was increasingly complex and required a level of reflection on the political climate and an attention to the local situation that consumed all available energy.
Another period of mourning marked and accompanied the fragmentation of this period. In 2003, Dax, a guy from the Orso squat in the Ticinese neighborhood in Milan, was stabbed by two fascists. A black fog descended on the northern capital, which in those years had become a laboratory of right-wing government. The peak of this turn was perhaps in 2006, when during a rally by the extreme right, an unauthorized anti-fascist demonstration supported by various social centers and political groups was called. The march took place but was broken up by police charges and arrests, and resistance in the city collapsed between misunderstand- ings and exhaustion. It was a fate shared by many Italian cities. Movements went dormant, with rare but important exceptions: in 2005, in the Susa Valley, 30,000 people occupied the building site of the high-speed train in Venaus,121 tore down the fences surrounding the site and forced the police to retreat. It felt like re-awakening from a long slumber.
120 Romano Prodi: Twice prime minister of Italy (1996-1998, 2006-2008) with a center-left coalition of parties, and 10th president of the European Commission.
121 Venaus: Very small mountain village close to the Susa Valley, from where the struggle against the high- speed train sprouted.