[P2P-F] Portugal is awakening to the P2P ethos

Mon Mar 14 10:37:40 CET 2011

That is great news from Portugal, and your bookmarks on revelution is  
quite a help Michel, thnkas a lot.

greetings

Quoting Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>:

> similarly in egypt and tunisia, it's the youth that has been leading the
> movements for transformation,  but of course, the sociological dynamics are
> different since the middle east has a youth bulge and europe has an elder
> bulge ...
>
> See Samir Amin on this aspect, http://www.newsclick.in/node/2012
>
> I have a new tag to keep track:
> http://www.delicious.com/mbauwens/P2P-Revolution
>
> On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 4:10 PM, George Papanikolaou <georgepapani at gmail.com
>> wrote:
>
>>  The situation of Portuguese youth and economy are strikingly similar with
>> the situation in Greece. Riots in Athens in December 2008 were the first
>> mass mobilization of precarious educated young people. Although the recent
>> decisions of the EU summit postponed the bankruptcy of the country, the
>> economic receipt is not leading anywhere except from partly rescuing the
>> establishment. As in Portugal precarious youth and unemployed are expected
>> to lead any true reaction.
>>
>> George
>>
>> ???? 14/03/2011 04:05 ??, ?/? Michel Bauwens ??????:
>>
>> Dear Miguel,
>>
>> this is a heartening message, and I have seen your name around in
>> forwarding material on p2p quite a few times,
>>
>> is it possible to republish your letter here on the p2p blog?
>>
>> Michel
>>
>> On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 12:20 AM, Miguel Afonso Caetano <
>> miguel.a.caetano at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Greeting, dear all from Portugal. I know haven't participated in any
>>> way in this list yet but the fact is that generally there is not much
>>> happening in a true P2P-sense around here for me to contribute
>>> anything of relevance to the list. Until yesterday. I thought that my
>>> fellow citizens were generally extremely apathetic, individualistic
>>> and subservient. But yesterday this changed with the occurence of a
>>> mass demonstration against precariousness and unemployment that
>>> gathered almost 300,000 people in Lisbon's biggest avenue. Read the
>>> Washington Post and Reuters' reports here:
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/12/AR2011031202958.html
>>>
>>> http://www.hindustantimes.com/Massive-rallies-in-Portugal-as-more-austerity-planned/Article1-672787.aspx
>>>
>>> Spanish newspapers El País and El Mundo also mentioned the rally:
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.elpais.com/articulo/internacional/Decenas/miles/portugueses/manifiestan/precariedad/mayor/concentracion/margen/partidos/elpepuint/20110312elpepuint_18/Tes
>>> http://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2011/03/12/internacional/1299954717.html
>>>
>>> Some photos and videos:
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.flickr.com/photos/bloco_de_esquerda/sets/72157626125803349/show/
>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7PpsTOqYLA
>>>
>>> It was fabulous, it was huge! Never in my 35-years of existence in
>>> this country ever had I seen something so spontaneous,
>>> non-hierarchical, bottom-up and leaderless as this demonstration.
>>> Traditionally, all major "civic" events in Portugal have been
>>> organized by political parties, unions or the Church with promotional
>>> aid by the mainstream media.
>>>
>>> Not this one. It all emerged from Facebook, in an almost bottom-up
>>> fashion. Some left-wing parties have naturally tried to co-opt the
>>> movement, associating themselves with the protesters, providing
>>> propaganda, etc. But all-in-all it was a unique moment. I sincerely
>>> hope this can be the start of something really big, inclusive and
>>> participative :) Civil society around here is still very incipient.
>>> Since April 25 of 1974, The State has gorged all the economy's
>>> resources and now that it is buried in debts, the biggest opposition
>>> party wants to privatize everything and sell all the assets that
>>> weren't already sold to the huge corporations who have profited from
>>> privileged ties with the current ruling government by way of
>>> public-private partnerships to fund the construction of numerous
>>> highways, bridges or high-speed trains. With the enormous
>>> consolidation of the economy that has been going on, no wonder people
>>> have no jobs or have to live in perpetual precariousness! And still,
>>> there are some critics who dismiss the complains of the protesters,
>>> accusing them of lack of self-esteem, spirit of entrepreneurship or
>>> even of having chosen a wrong educational path.
>>>
>>> Sure, there was some recycling of the icons and ideologies of the
>>> April Revolution, specifically its communist and marxist roots:
>>> "comrades" here and there, lots of complains and no consistent
>>> alternatives to present for the future of the society. People still
>>> have a very naïve perspective of the State's role. But to sum up: I
>>> think this is the right moment to spread the P2P ethos here in
>>> Portugal. Leaderless movements like this one are inherently open and
>>> syncretic. Thus, they can be partially appropriated by organized
>>> institutional agents; however they cannot be totally co-opted by them.
>>> Otherwise, they become closed. I estimate that there will be even more
>>> massive demonstrations before people realize they will need to
>>> organize between themselves in practical terms in their daily lives
>>> and not to expect everything from the government.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>
>>> --
>>> Miguel Caetano
>>>
>>> http://remixtures.com
>>> http://twitter.com/remixtures
>>> http://friendfeed.com/remixtures
>>> https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000686403651
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> P2P Foundation - Mailing list
>>> http://www.p2pfoundation.net
>>> https://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
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>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
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>
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