15 February 2003 anti-war protests

On 15 February 2003, a coordinated day of protests was held across the world in which people in more than 600 cities expressed opposition to the imminent Iraq War. It was part of a series of protests and political events that had begun in 2002 and continued as the invasion, war, and occupation took place. The day was described by social movement researchers as "the largest protest event in human history".

According to BBC News, between six and ten million people took part in protests in up to sixty countries over the weekend of 15 and16 February.

The largest protests took place in Europe. The one in Rome involved around three million people, and is listed in the 2004 ''Guinness Book of World Records'' as the largest anti-war rally in history. Madrid hosted the second largest rally with more than 1.5million people protesting the invasion of Iraq; Mainland China was the only major region not to see any protests on that day, but small demonstrations, attended mainly by foreign students, were seen later.

Background

In 2002, the United States government began to argue for the necessity of invading Iraq. This formally began with a speech by US President George W. Bush to the United Nations General Assembly on 12 September 2002 which argued that the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein was violating United Nations (UN) resolutions, primarily on weapons of mass destruction, and that this necessitated action.

The proposed war was controversial with many people questioning the motives of the US government and its rationale. One poll which covered 41countries claimed that less than 10% would support an invasion of Iraq without UN sanction and that half would not support an invasion under any circumstances.

Anti-war groups worldwide organised public protests. According to the French academic Dominique Reynié, between 3 January and 12 April 2003, 36million people across the globe took part in almost 3,000anti‑war protests, the demonstrations on 15 February 2003 being the largest and most prolific.

The invasion of Iraq began on 20 March 2003.

International coordination

The 15 February international protests were unprecedented not only in terms of the size of the demonstrations but also in terms of the international coordination involved. Researchers from the University of Antwerp claim that the day was possible only because it "was carefully planned by an international network of national social movement organisations."Stefaan Walgrave and Joris Verhulst
The February 15 Worldwide Protests against a War in Iraq: An Empirical Test of Transnational Opportunities. Outline of a Research Programme.
(PDF). Draft paper online. p.5. Retrieved 24 January 2006. (see Wikipedia:WikiProject Anti-war/An Empirical Test of Transnational Opportunities for permission to quote paper)

Immanuel Wallerstein has spoken of the international protests as being organised by the forces of "the Porto Alegre camp in reference to the emergence of global social movements who had been organising around international events such as the 2001 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre." Some commentators claim this is an example of "grassroots globalisation", for example one book claims that "The worldwide protests were made possible by globalisation... But make no mistake—this was not your CEO's globalisation. The peace demonstrations represented, not a globalisation of commerce, but a globalisation of conscience".

The idea for an international day of demonstrations was first raised by the British anti-capitalist group Globalise Resistance (GR) in the wake of an anti-war demonstration in Britain of 400,000 on 28 September. At the time GR was involved in planning for the Florence European Social Forum (ESF) and brought up the suggestion at an ESF planning meeting. According to GR's Chris Nineham, "There was considerable controversy. Some delegates were worried it would alienate the mainstream of the movement. We, alongside the Italian delegates, had to put up a strong fight to get it accepted."

The proposal was accepted and at the final rally of the ESF, in November 2002, the call officially went out for Europe-wide demonstrations on 15 February 2003. This call was firmed up in December at a planning meeting for the following ESF which took place in Copenhagen in 2003. This meeting was attended by delegates from many European anti-war organisations, the US group United for Peace and Justice

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