The 1999 Seattle WTO protests, sometimes referred to as the Battle of Seattle, were a series of protests surrounding the
WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999
The WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999 was a meeting of the World Trade Organization, convened at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center in Seattle, Washington, USA, over the course of three days, beginning Tuesday, 30 November 1999. A ...
, when members of the
World Trade Organization
The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization that regulates and facilitates international trade. With effective cooperation
in the United Nations System, governments use the organization to establish, revise, and ...
(WTO) convened at the
Washington State Convention and Trade Center
The Seattle Convention Center (SCC), formerly the Washington State Convention Center (WSCC), is a convention center in Seattle, Washington, United States. It consists of several exhibition halls and meeting rooms in buildings along Pike Stre ...
in
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
,
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
on November 30, 1999. The Conference was to be the launch of a new millennial round of trade negotiations.
The negotiations were quickly overshadowed by massive street protests outside the hotels and the Washington State Convention and Trade Center. The protests were nicknamed "N30", akin to
J18 and similar mobilizations, and were deemed controversial by the media. The large scale of the demonstrations, estimated at no fewer than 40,000 protesters, dwarfed any previous demonstration in the United States against a world meeting of any of the organizations generally associated with
economic globalization
Economic globalization is one of the three main dimensions of globalization commonly found in academic literature, with the two others being political globalization and cultural globalization, as well as the general term of globalization.
Econom ...
, such as the WTO, the
International Monetary Fund
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is a major financial agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution, headquartered in Washington, D.C., consisting of 190 countries. Its stated mission is "working to foster glo ...
, and the
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Inte ...
.
Organizations and planning
Planning for the actions began months in advance and included local, national, and international organizations. Among the most notable participants were national and international
nongovernmental organization
A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in h ...
s (NGOs) such as
Global Exchange
Global Exchange was founded in 1988 and is an advocacy group, human rights organization, and a 501(c)(3) organization, based in San Francisco, California, United States. The group defines its mission as, "to promote human rights and social, econo ...
[Bogardus, Keven (September 22, 2004)]
Venezuela Head Polishes Image With Oil Dollars: President Hugo Chavez takes his case to America's streets.
Center for Public Integrity
The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) is an American nonprofit investigative journalism organization whose stated mission is "to reveal abuses of power, corruption and dereliction of duty by powerful public and private institutions in order to ...
. Retrieved February 22, 2010. (especially those concerned with labor issues, the environment, and consumer protection), labor unions (including the
AFL–CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) is the largest federation of unions in the United States. It is made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 12 million ac ...
), student groups, religion-based groups (
Jubilee 2000
Jubilee 2000 was an international coalition movement in over 40 countries that called for cancellation of third world debt by the year 2000. This movement coincided with the Great Jubilee, the celebration of the year 2000 in the Catholic Churc ...
), and
anarchists
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessari ...
(some of whom formed a
black bloc). The protests also drew support from some political conservatives, such as American presidential candidate and commentator
Pat Buchanan.
The coalition was loose, with some opponent groups focused on opposition to WTO policies (especially those related to
free trade
Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. It can also be understood as the free market idea applied to international trade. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold econ ...
), with others motivated by prolabor,
anticapitalist
Anti-capitalism is a political ideology and movement encompassing a variety of attitudes and ideas that oppose capitalism. In this sense, anti-capitalists are those who wish to replace capitalism with another type of economic system, such as ...
, or environmental agendas. Many of the NGOs represented at the protests came with credentials to participate in the official meetings, while also planning various educational and press events. The AFL–CIO, with cooperation from its member unions, organized a large permitted rally and march from
Seattle Center
Seattle Center is an arts, educational, tourism and entertainment center in Seattle, Washington, United States. Spanning an area of 74 acres (30 ha), it was originally built for the 1962 World's Fair. Its landmark feature is the tall Space Needle ...
to
downtown.
![WTO protestors, 1999 (20680767813)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b5/WTO_protestors%2C_1999_%2820680767813%29.jpg)
However, others were more interested in taking
direct action, including both
civil disobedience and acts of vandalism and property destruction to disrupt the meeting. Several groups were loosely organized together under the
Direct Action Network (DAN), with a plan to disrupt the meetings by blocking streets and intersections downtown to prevent delegates from reaching the convention center, where the meeting was to be held. The black bloc was not affiliated with DAN, but was responding to the original call for autonomous resistance actions on November 30 issued by
People's Global Action
People's, branded as ''People's Viennaline'' until May 2018, and legally ''Altenrhein Luftfahrt GmbH'', is an Austrian airline headquartered in Vienna. It operates scheduled and charter passenger flights mainly from its base at St. Gallen-Alten ...
.
Of the different coalitions that aligned in protest were the "teamsters and turtles" – a blue–green alliance consisting of the
teamsters
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), also known as the Teamsters Union, is a labor union in the United States and Canada. Formed in 1903 by the merger of The Team Drivers International Union and The Teamsters National Union, the ...
(trade unions) and environmentalists.
Corporations targeted
Certain activists, including locals and an additional group of anarchists from
Eugene, Oregon (where they had gathered that summer for a music festival),
advocated more confrontational tactics, and conducted
vandalism
Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property.
The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner. The term ...
of corporate
properties
Property is the ownership of land, resources, improvements or other tangible objects, or intellectual property.
Property may also refer to:
Mathematics
* Property (mathematics)
Philosophy and science
* Property (philosophy), in philosophy an ...
in downtown Seattle. In a subsequent communique, they listed the particular corporations targeted, which they considered to have committed corporate crime.
Lead-up months
On July 12, the ''
Financial Times
The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Ni ...
'' reported that the latest United Nations Human Development report advocated "principles of performance for multinationals on labour standards, fair trade and environmental protection ... needed to counter the negative effects of globalisation on the poorest nations". The report itself argued, "An essential aspect of global governance is responsibility to people—to equity, to justice, to enlarging the choices of all".
On July 16, Helene Cooper of ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' warned of an impending "massive mobilization against globalization" being planned for the end-of-year Seattle WTO conference. Next day, the London ''
Independent
Independent or Independents may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups
* Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s
* Independ ...
'' newspaper savaged the WTO and appeared to side with the organizers of the rapidly developing storm of protest:
The way it has used tspowers is leading to a growing suspicion that its initials should really stand for World Take Over. In a series of rulings it has struck down measures to help the world's poor, protect the environment, and safeguard health in the interests of private—usually American—companies.
"The WTO seems to be on a crusade to increase private profit at the expense of all other considerations, including the well-being and quality of life of the mass of the world's people," says Ronnie Hall, trade campaigner at Friends of the Earth International. "It seems to have a relentless drive to extend its power."
On November 16, two weeks before the conference, President
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...
issued Executive Order 13141—Environmental Review of Trade Agreements, which committed the United States to a policy of "assessment and consideration of the environmental impacts of trade agreements" and stated, "Trade agreements should contribute to the broader goal of sustainable development."
![Anarchists at WTO protest (14988709689)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Anarchists_at_WTO_protest_%2814988709689%29.jpg)
Activists staged a spoof of Seattle daily newspaper the ''
Post-Intelligencer'' on Wednesday November 24, inserting thousands of hoax editions of a four-page front-page wrap-around into piles of newspapers awaiting distribution to hundreds of street boxes and retail outlets. The spoof front-page stories were "Boeing to move overseas" (to Indonesia) and "Clinton pledges help for poorest nations". The byline on the Boeing story attributed it to
Joe Hill (a union organizer who had been executed by firing squad in Utah in 1915). On the same day, the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development reported:
developing countries have remained steadfast in their demand that developed countries honour Uruguay Round commitments before moving forward full force with new trade negotiations.
Specifically, developing countries are concerned over developed countries' compliance with agreements on market access for textiles, their use of antidumping measures against developing countries' exports, and over-implementation of the WTO Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs).
N30
![WTO protests](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/WTO_protests.jpg)
On the morning of Tuesday, November 30, 1999, the DAN's plan was put into effect. Several hundred activists arrived in the deserted streets near the convention center and began to take control of key intersections. Over the next few hours, a number of marchers began to converge on the area from different directions. These included a student march from the north, a march of citizens of the developing world who marched in from the south and, beginning around 09:00, militant anarchists (in a formation known as a
black bloc) marching down Pike Street from 6th Avenue, blockading the streets with newspaper boxes and smashing windows.
Some demonstrators held rallies, others held teach-ins and at least one group staged an early-morning street party. Meanwhile, a number of protesters still controlled the intersections using lockdown formations.
![Anti-WTO-Protest-Earth-flag](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Anti-WTO-Protest-Earth-flag.svg)
That morning, the
King County Sheriff's Office
The King County Sheriff's Office (KCSO) is a local police agency in King County, Washington, United States. It is the primary law enforcement agency for all unincorporated areas of King County, as well as 12 cities and two transit agencies which ...
and
Seattle Police Department
The Seattle Police Department (SPD) is the principal law enforcement agency of the city of Seattle, Washington, United States, except for the campus of the University of Washington, which is under the responsibility of its own police department ...
fired
pepper spray
Pepper spray, oleoresin capsicum spray, OC spray, capsaicin spray, or capsicum spray is a lachrymatory agent (a compound that irritates the eyes to cause a burning sensation, pain, and temporary blindness) used in policing, riot control, ...
,
tear gas
Tear gas, also known as a lachrymator agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the early commercial aerosol, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the eye to produce tears. In ...
canisters, and
stun grenade
A stun grenade, also known as a flash grenade, flashbang, thunderflash, or sound bomb, is a less-lethal explosive device used to temporarily disorient an enemy's senses. Upon detonation, they produce a blinding flash of light and an extremely lo ...
s
at protesters at several intersections in an attempt to reopen the blocked streets and allow as many WTO delegates as possible through the blockade. At 6th Avenue and Union Street, the crowd threw objects back at the police.
By late morning, the black bloc had swelled to 200 people and smashed dozens of shops and police cars. This seems to have set off a chain reaction of sorts, with previously nonviolent protesters throwing bottles at police and joining in the vandalism shortly before noon.
The police were eventually overwhelmed by the mass of protesters downtown, including many who had chained themselves together and were blocking intersections. Meanwhile, the late-morning labor-organized rally and march drew tens of thousands; though the intended march route had them turning back before they reached the convention center, some ignored the marshals and joined what had become a chaotic scene downtown.
![National Guard, Downtown Seattle, WTO 1999](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/41/National_Guard%2C_Downtown_Seattle%2C_WTO_1999.jpg)
At noon, the opening ceremony at the convention center was officially canceled.
It took police much of the afternoon and evening to clear the streets. Seattle mayor
Paul Schell
Paul E. S. Schell (born Paul Ervin Schlachtenhaufen; October 8, 1937 – July 27, 2014) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 50th mayor of Seattle, Washington from 1998 to 2002.
Early life and education
The oldest of six chi ...
declared a state of emergency, imposed a
curfew
A curfew is a government order specifying a time during which certain regulations apply. Typically, curfews order all people affected by them to ''not'' be in public places or on roads within a certain time frame, typically in the evening and ...
, and a 50-block "no-protest zone."
December 1
Overnight, the
governor
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
of
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
,
Gary Locke, called in two
battalion
A battalion is a military unit, typically consisting of 300 to 1,200 soldiers commanded by a lieutenant colonel, and subdivided into a number of companies (usually each commanded by a major or a captain). In some countries, battalions a ...
s of
Army National Guardsmen, other law enforcement agencies sent support, and before daylight on Wednesday, troops and officers lined the perimeter of the no-protest zone. Police surrounded and arrested several groups of would-be protesters (and more than one bystander). Beginning at 21:00, a major clash took place on Broadway in the vicinity of Denny Way, involving rocks, bottles, and police concussion grenades. It did not involve a black bloc, but appears to have included local residents, although it is known that many local residents were treated as protesters, even being teargassed, despite having no part in the protests. Police called in from other cities mistook the typically crowded streets of Capitol Hill as groups of protesters. More than 500 people were jailed on Wednesday. Throughout the day, police used tear gas to disperse crowds downtown, although a permitted demonstration organized by the Steelworkers Union was held along the waterfront.
December 2–3
Protests continued the following days. Thousands demonstrated outside the Seattle Police Department protesting their tactics and arrests of peaceful protestors. President Clinton arrived and attended the conference. On December 3 the conference ended as delegations were unable to reach agreements, partly in response to the protests.
Confrontations with the police continued, albeit at a lower intensity. The primary goal of disrupting the trade talks achieved, some sought the horizons of possibility; it was determined quickly that the necessary ambition to achieve the broader goals of various anarchist factions was not sufficient.
Media response
''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' printed an erroneous article that stated that protesters at the 1999 WTO convention in Seattle threw
Molotov cocktail
A Molotov cocktail (among several other names – ''see other names'') is a hand thrown incendiary weapon constructed from a frangible container filled with flammable substances equipped with a fuse (typically a glass bottle filled with fla ...
s at police. Two days later, ''The New York Times'' printed a correction saying that the protest was mostly peaceful and no protesters were accused of throwing objects at delegates or the police, but the original error persisted in later accounts in the mainstream media.
The Seattle City Council also dispelled these rumors with its own investigation findings:
The level of panic among police is evident from radio communication and from their inflated crowd estimates, which exceed the numbers shown on news videotapes. ARC investigators found the rumors of "Molotov cocktails" and sale of flammables from a supermarket had no basis in fact. But, rumors were important in contributing to the police sense of being besieged and in considerable danger.
An article in the magazine ''
The Nation
''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper t ...
'' disputed that Molotov cocktails have ever been thrown at an antiglobalization protest within the US.
Though media coverage of the Battle in Seattle condemned the violence of some of the protesters, the nature of this violence has been justified by some people. Specifically, the violence employed was not person-to-person violence, but "acts directed toward property, not people."
Though many still denounced the violent tactics used by protesters of the 1999 WTO meeting in Seattle, this violence clearly resulted in increased media coverage of the event. The WTO meeting had an increase in evening news airtime from 10 minutes and 40 seconds on the first day of the meeting to 17 minutes on the first day of violence. In addition, WTO coverage was the lead or second story on
CNN
CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
,
ABC
ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet.
ABC or abc may also refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting
* American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster
** Disney–ABC Television ...
,
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
, and
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
after violence was reported. Two days after the start of violence, the meeting remained the top story on three of the four networks. Though these numbers alone are telling, the media coverage of subsequent demonstrations that did not include violence by protesters shows even more the effect of violence on coverage. For example, the World Bank/International Monetary Fund (WB/IMF) meetings in the spring showed a "coverage pattern that was almost the reverse of that in Seattle" and that "suggests the crucial role of violence in garnering time on the public screen." In an even more striking example of the effects of violence on media coverage, the 2001 WTO meeting in Doha, Qatar, included no reports of violence. As a result, "there was absolutely no TV evening news coverage by the four major networks."
This coverage did not center exclusively on the violence. Instead, details of the protesters' message and antiglobalization campaign were included along with the discussions of symbolic violence taking place. DeLuca believes the violence served as a dense surface that opened viewers' and readers' minds to a whole new way of thinking about globalization and corporations' operations. That is, not only was this violence contained within the familiar setting of television, and not only did it meet the criteria of being dramatic and emotional enough to warrant air time, but it also shattered preconceived notions of globalization and the practices of corporations that drive so much of America's economy.
Aftermath
To many in North American anarchist and radical circles, the Seattle WTO riots, protests, and demonstrations were viewed as a success. Prior to the "Battle of Seattle", almost no mention was made of "antiglobalization" in the US media, while the protests were seen as having forced the media to report on 'why' anybody would oppose the WTO.
Previous mass demonstrations had taken place in Australia in December 1997, in which newly formed grass-roots organizations blockaded Melbourne,
Perth
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...
, Sydney, and
Darwin city centers.
Controversy over the city's response to the protests resulted in the resignation of the police chief of Seattle,
Norm Stamper
Norman Harvey Stamper (born 1944) is an American former chief of police, writer, law enforcement consultant, and advocate for criminal justice reform.
Biography
Stamper is known for his role as Chief of the Seattle Police Department (1994-2000) r ...
, and arguably played a role in Schell's loss to
Greg Nickels
Gregory J. Nickels (born August 7, 1955) is an American politician who served as the 51st mayor of Seattle, Washington. He took office on January 1, 2002 and was reelected to a second term in 2005. In August 2009, Nickels finished third in the p ...
in the 2001 mayoral primary election. The massive size of the protest added $3 million to the city's estimated meeting budget of $6 million, partly due to city cleanup and police overtime bills. In addition, the damage to commercial businesses from
vandalism
Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property.
The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner. The term ...
and lost sales has been estimated at $20 million.
On January 16, 2004, the city of Seattle settled with 157 individuals arrested outside of the no-protest zone during the WTO events, agreeing to pay them a total of $250,000. On January 30, 2007, a federal jury found that the city had violated protesters'
Fourth Amendment constitutional rights
A constitutional right can be a prerogative or a duty, a power or a restraint of power, recognized and established by a sovereign state or union of states. Constitutional rights may be expressly stipulated in a national constitution, or they may ...
by arresting them without
probable cause
In United States criminal law, probable cause is the standard by which police authorities have reason to obtain a warrant for the arrest of a suspected criminal or the issuing of a search warrant. There is no universally accepted definition o ...
or evidence.
See also
*
1988 IMF/World Bank protests
The 1988 annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank were met with an international protest in West Berlin. Whereas the organizations' earlier meetings were met with smaller, national protests, the 1988 meetings attrac ...
, anti-globalization precursor protest a decade earlier in West Berlin
*
27th G8 summit
The 27th G8 summit was held in Genoa, Italy, on 20–22 July 2001 and is remembered as the peak of the worldwide anti-globalization movement as well as for human rights crimes against demonstrators.
Overview
The Group of Seven ( G7) was an unoff ...
, a 2001 summit that resulted in anti-globalization protests and similar controversies about police and government response
* ''
Battle in Seattle
''Battle in Seattle'' is a 2007 political action-thriller film written and directed by Stuart Townsend, in his directorial debut. The story is loosely based on the protest activity at the WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999. The film premiered ...
'', a 2007 film loosely based on the protests.
*
Electrohippies
The Electrohippies Collective (Ehippies) is an international group of internet activists based in Oxfordshire, England, whose purpose is to express disapproval of governmental policies of mass media censorship and control of the Internet "in order ...
, an international group of internet activists involved in action against the WTO
*
List of incidents of civil unrest in the United States
Listed are major episodes of civil unrest in the United States. This list does not include the numerous incidents of destruction and violence associated with various sporting events.
18th century
*1783 – Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, June 20 ...
*
Multilateral Agreement on Investment
The Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) was a draft agreement negotiated in secret between members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) between 1995 and 1998. It sought to establish a new body of universal in ...
, a draft agreement that failed in 1998 due to
* ''
Showdown in Seattle'', a 1999 documentary film about the protests
* ''
30 Frames a Second: The WTO in Seattle 2000'', a 2000 documentary shot during the protests
*
Via Campesina
La Vía Campesina (from es, la vía campesina, ) is an international farmers organization founded in 1993 in Mons, Belgium, formed by 182 organisations in 81 countries, and describing itself as "an international movement which coordinates peasan ...
, an international movement of peasants' organizations
References
Bibliography
*
Further reading
*
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External links
University of Washington WTO History Project interviews and documentation of the protest
Raw video footageof the protests, organized by day and street intersection
by Paul De Armond, an account of the protest in multiple parts
*Th
World Trade Organization 1999 Seattle Ministerial Conference Protest collection, 1993–2011 45.63 cubic feet. At the Labor Archives of Washington, University of Washington Libraries Special Collections. Also se
{{DEFAULTSORT:World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference Of 1999 Protest Activity
1999 protests
1999 riots
1999 in Washington (state)
Anti-globalization protests
Anti-capitalism
1999 in Seattle
Protests in Seattle
World Trade Organization
Anarchism in the United States
Communism in the United States
Socialism in the United States
Riots and civil disorder in Washington (state)
November 1999 events in the United States
December 1999 events in the United States
Political riots in the United States