Instructors must have:

• An extensive knowledge on either organizing and activism or extensive knowledge of a particular topic or theme related to militarization or other forms of oppression.
• A creative idea for a course and substantial knowledge of that subject area through work or educational experience. (See list of potential course ideas.)
• Strong computer skills and the ability to quickly learn new platforms. (Previous knowledge of Moodle is preferred, but not necessary.)
• The ability to meet deadlines for turning in an application, syllabus and biography. They must also be able to build and teach the course within the required time frame and offer at least one live-time interaction.
• The ability to produce a five-week syllabus that will increase the skills and topical understanding of activists in their course.
• The ability to facilitate online courses on a semi-regular basis and provide thoughtful feedback and punctual interaction with students.
• A willingness and ability to market their course to listserves and potential students outside of our existing marketing scope.

If you are interested in applying to teach a course for the five week session that begins April 13, please visit our website to read more and download an application. Send the application (this can be in the form of an email if you cannot edit the PDF) to Jamie Way at info@afgj.org with the subject line: AFGJ COURSE APPLICATION

All applications to be reviewed for the April 13-May 18 session must be received by March 2.

Occupy activists are coming from around the country to attend the first national gathering of the Occupy movement and many will do so by train. The “Occupy Express” quickly sold out of its first round of tickets and plans are in the works to get more activists on board.

The Occupy Express will make a number of stops in various California, Oregon and Washington cities as it travels up the West Coast. In addition to the first L.A. Occupy Express passengers, groups of activists plan to board the train as it passes through Northern California and Oregon. The train will depart from Los Angeles on February 16 and reach Olympia, WA on the evening the of the 17, just in time for occupants to take part in the Occupy Solidarity Social Forum from February 18-19.

This self-organizing, networking event is being held in recognition that the movement will gain strength if we help open space for sharing, discussion and development. Occupy Olympia’s General Assembly and the Alliance for Global Justice (a non-profit that acts as Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Freedom Plaza‘s fiscal sponsor) will create the space for occupy movement members to share their knowledge and skills with each other with the goal of strengthening the Occupy movement.

Due to the excitement the Occupy Express is generating, the Alliance for Global Justice and Occupy Olympia plan to fundraise and purchase more tickets to help occupants travel to the event.

“The first group of 20 seats on the Occupy Express sold out fast to people from Tucson and Phoenix AZ, San Diego and the greater L.A. area,” said Chuck Kaufman, National Co-Coordinator of the Alliance for Global Justice. “Now we’re seeing about buying more seats which we’re subsidizing so we can charge $99 for the 99%,” Kaufman added.

Tell the President Obama not to deploy the U.S. military against American workers!
Sign this open letter to the President and Congress.

• Demand that the president order the Coast Guard to stand down and prevent its deployment to Longview or any other labor dispute.
• Tell him to keep the military out of our workplaces, union halls and labor disputes.

Four decades ago, President Nixon mobilized the military in reaction to a national postal workers strike. Ten years later in 1981, President Reagan ordered military air traffic controllers to replace striking members of PATCO. Both presidents were Republicans.

Both were card carrying members of the “1%”, devoted to protecting and advancing the interests of the wealthy and multinational corporations. Both were hostile to organized labor.

Thirty years later a Democratic president, one elected with solid labor support, one who inspired hope and raised expectations, has authorized the Coast Guard to provide armed escort to a ship headed to the Port of Longview on the Columbia River in Washington. The ship is destined for a new $200 million grain terminal owned by EGT, a multinational grain conglomerate. That terminal was constructed with tax payer funded public financing.

It had been picketed by members of ILWU Local 21, whose members have performed all of the longshore work in that port for more than 70 years. EGT – violating its contractual obligations – refused to hire ILWU members to work at its terminal. It wants to eliminate a militant democratic union that has negotiated strong contract protections and good wages for its members over the course of decades of struggle. Once achieved in Longview, it is only a matter of time before the same scheme will be introduced in other ports.

Unless stopped, we are about to witness the militarization of labor relations. The use of U.S. military forces in support of EGT is a dangerous step toward militarization of our society. Step-by-step, our rights of speech and assembly, the protection of habeas corpus, due process and a speedy trial by a jury of one’s peers are being stripped away.

We must not be silent in the face of this steady erosion of our basic rights and liberties. Tell the president not to send the U.S. military against workers in the U.S.

The New Year in Washington D.C.’s halls of power has so far been anything but new. President Obama extols the virtues of militarizing the border, plays with the threat of war with Iran and boasts of continued US military presence around the world. War and military interference continue to be a bi-partisan policy.

Join us in Washington, DC for the Days of Action to Close the SOA and End Militarization!

Plan to come to DC from April 14-17 for four days of lobbying, conferences, strategy sessions, concerts and street theater, as we continue to make our demands heard for a just world. Prior to the Days of Action, we will hold a Direct Action Training camp from April 11-13 to train movement activists in the skills needed to carry out effective actions to put the SOA and militarization on the national agenda. Click to see images from last April in DC.

Preliminary schedule of events:
Wednesday, April 11- Friday, April 13: Direct Action Training Camp. (Register here)
Saturday, April 14: Conference. From the SOA to the War on Drugs, come, listen and learn!
Sunday, April 15: Strategy Sessions. Help us build the movement strategically for the electoral year.
Monday, April16 – Tuesday, April 17: Lobbying and Street Theater. Lobby your Representative to get them to sign on to HR 3368, and engage in direct action!

Join us from April 14-17 as we continue the struggle forward!

Occupy Olympia and the Alliance for Global Justice (fiscal sponsor of a number of Occupies, including Wall Street and Washington, DC) are hosting this self-organized networking meeting for the Occupy Movement.

The “Occupy Express” will leave Los Angeles on February 16 and arrive in Olympia for on the evening of Feb. 17. It will depart Olympia on February 20 and arrive in Los Angeles on the 21st. The “Occupy Express” will be aboard Amtrak’s historic and scenic Coast Starlight route up the entire Pacific Coast. We will pick up Occupiers all along the route. In the spirit of Occupy, participants will be occupying even while traveling!

The self-organized, social forum-style gathering is open to all occupiers and allies. Occupy Olympia agreed by consensus at General Assembly to host a self-organized gathering of the Occupy Wall Street Movement to network, build unity, share tactics, workshop strategies, discuss diversity and discuss how to develop action plans. Occupiers from Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Oakland, Occupy Washington, DC, Occupy Tucson, and Occupy Terra Haute (IN) were among the first registrants for the event.

The networking meeting is being called in recognition that the movement will gain strength if we help open space for sharing, discussion and development. It is also agreed that the sooner we create that space the better for the movement and that a quick first effort will champion strong gains and garner authentic self organization. Together, Occupy Olympia and the Alliance for Global Justice will create the space for a wide diversity of occupy movement members to bring their knowledge and skills to the table to share in authentic ways with each other for the goal of growing the strength of the movement. Register for the social forum and propose workshops here.

For information about joining the Occupy Express send an email to Chuck@AFGJ.org.

We hope to see you aboard the Occupy Express!

Thursday 1/26/12 – 7PM EST / 6PM CST / 5PM MST /4PM PST

WHO SHOULD JOIN: Those interested in attending and learning how to support the Occupy Solidarity Social Forum in Olympia on February 18-19. Those that want to put on workshops or organize panels and discussions at the conference.

PURPOSE: To welcome more people and share information about the national conference in Olympia. We would also like to discuss the logistics of getting to the events and the workshops that will be held. (See agenda below.)

Occupy Solidarity Social Forum

Occupy Olympia (WA) and the Alliance for Global Justice are hosting an Occupy Solidarity Social Forum Feb. 18-19 in the Washington state capital city. The self-organized, social forum-type gathering is open to all occupiers and allies.

The networking meeting is being called in recognition that the movement will gain strength if we help open space for sharing, discussion and development. It is also agreed that the sooner we create that space the better for the movement and that a quick first effort will champion strong gains and garner authentic self organization. Together, Occupy Olympia and the Alliance for Global Justice will create the space for a wide diversity of occupy movement members to bring their knowledge and skills to the table to share in authentic ways with each other for the goal of growing the strength of the movement. We hope to see you there!

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR THIS CALL

Agenda:
1. Description of and update on the national Occupy Solidarity Social Forum
2. Update on the “Occupy Express” Amtrak train to Olympia
3. Discussion of what workshops, forums, GAs, etc. participants would like
4. Discussion of committees and other tasks

The Chiapas Support Committee of Oakland, California announces a Human Rights Fact-Finding Delegation to Chiapas Mexico for an in-depth exploration of how corporate globalization is affecting indigenous communities constructing autonomy (self-governance).

Cost
Cost of the delegation is US $500.00. This does NOT include airfare or bus transportation to and from San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas. It DOES include most food (2 meals per day), lodging (double room) and ground transportation to the communities. Private rooms with Wi-Fi are available for an additional $50.00. Your tuition ALSO includes a donation for each community we visit, an honorarium for each NGO briefing we receive, delegation expenses and educational materials. We provide each delegation with experienced group leaders and a translator. Delegation dates are March 25 to April 1, 2012. We are working on arranging visits now. When we have arrangements confirmed, we will prepare a day-to-day itinerary and will send it to those who express interest in the delegation. 

How to apply
Please email cezmat@igc.org, requesting an application. Act now! There are only 10 spaces on the delegation, so the sooner you send in your application the better. We must receive all applications by February 18, 2012.   A deposit of $100 is required with your application in order to reserve a space.  Balance is due March 5, 2012.  For those who want more information, just email your questions to: cezmat@igc.org  or call  (510) 654-9587.

Bolivia

Food Sovereignty, Indigenous Resistance, and Climate Justice (May 29-June 9, 2012)
We will be celebrating indigenous resistance and exploring food sovereignty issues in Bolivia, the first country in the hemisphere to be governed by an indigenous president.  Learn about indigenous struggles for food sovereignty and the rights of Mother Earth in the face of climate change.  Meet with farmers, community leaders, government leaders, and others.  Experience the rich culture of the Andes and soak in the sights, sounds, people, and politics in this historic moment in Bolivia. 

Cost
$1100. This will cover all lodging, all ground transportation, 2 meals per day, qualified trip leaders, and Spanish-English interpretation.  Additional expenses during the trip will be minimal.
 Airfare not included. 

How to Apply
To Learn more and hold a spot for the trip, email cbalbertolovera@gmail.com.

Venezuela

Food Sovereignty, Human Rights, and Community Power (July 16 to 26, 2012)
We will examine issues of land reform, urban agriculture, rural development, fishing rights, and food sovereignty within a dynamic political context. Venezuela is an outstanding example of a country that strives to ensure its citizens’ right to food while bolstering its domestic agriculture sector, with an emphasis on sustainable agriculture. We will also explore other areas of social transformation, including education, healthcare, and direct citizen participation in the political process. Plus trips to beaches, parks, and other sites of interest.

Cost
$1100. This will cover all lodging, all ground transportation, 2 meals per day, qualified trip leaders, and Spanish-English interpretation.  Additional expenses during the trip will be minimal.
 Airfare not included. 

How to Apply
To Learn more and hold a spot for the trip, email cbalbertolovera@gmail.com.

On Jan. 9, 2012 an Alliance for Global Justice (AfGJ) delegation of US and Canadians visited the farming
community of Rigores, Honduras in the fertile Aguan Valley near the country’s Caribbean Coast.

It was a far different visit than was experienced by a previous AfGJ delegation just six months earlier. On that July 1st morning our delegation stood in a line at the top of a wash, standing between 40 police armed with military grade weaponry, and peasant farmers determined to hold their land against an illegal eviction. For 3-1/2 hours our delegation faced down the police, who had pistols drawn and snipers targeting us from the tree line.

Unable to produce an eviction order and unaccompanied by a lawyer as required by Honduran law, the police did not know what to do when faced with nearly 20 North Americans wearing blue t-shirts reading “Observador Internacional de Derechos Humanos” (International Human Rights Observer). After hours of tense discussion, negotiation, and demands, the police decided that they could leave the community. We accompanied them to their vehicles and then stayed with the community for another couple of hours during which the police drove through several times to see if we were still there.

But July 1, 2011 was neither the beginning nor the end of the story for the peasant farmers of Rigores. Rigores is a long-established community of farm cooperatives. The cooperative which we helped shield from eviction was 10 years old, a tenancy under Honduras’ Law of Agrarian Reform which should have insured them title to the land. But one of Honduras’ rich landowners wants their corn fields, bean fields, grazing land and orchards so he can expand his African Palm plantation with this tree that produces an oil that is used in the majority of food products in First World supermarkets and supplies an increasing share of the European and US biofuel market.

Exactly one week before our stressful experience, police entered Rigores and at gunpoint burned the homes of 135 families, killed their animals, bulldozed their orchards, the school, and two churches. When we arrived on July 1, the community was living in the town’s community center and a large tent provided by a Catholic charity. The police had arrived that day to drive off or kill the people, breaking
their tenancy and weakening their legal case of ownership.

Six months later all but four families remain on their land. They have rebuilt their houses, although now
from branches and wattle where before stood larger block or poured cement. Their corn is waist high, a few banana and orange trees survived the depredations, and chickens, pigs, turkeys, and cows which survived the wonton slaughter are breeding quickly.

Today Rigores is poor in material wealth but rich in courage and determination that they will not be driven from their land, land that is their hope for their children. As a person privileged to have visited Rigores both on that fateful day in July 2011 and again today, the current visit was an emotional
experience. To witness growth where previously there was only destruction, to “dance” with an aggressive turkey where previously there were only carcasses, but most of all to hear the stories of courage and defiance of a people who will be pushed no farther, was to renew my faith in solidarity and struggle. This is the real Occupy Movement of which our Occupations in the Global North are symbolic of our solidarity with the people throughout the world who daily put their lives on the line defending their right to land to grow food to feed their families and their communities.

But this is not a fairy tale. There’s no happy ending where the people of Rigores get to live happily ever after and we get to feel satisfied at performing a good deed.

Police, military, and private “security guards” still drive through the community and fire their weapons
On Sept. 16 and again on Sept. 19, the military invaded and terrorized the community. The 15 year old son of the community spokesperson, and another boy, were kidnapped by the military, beaten, doused with gasoline and threatened with being set on fire.

Community members gave testimony to our delegation about the trauma they are suffering, especially the children. One man said, “Whenever my son hears a noise he shouts, “The police are coming. The police are coming.” A woman said her young child crawls under the bed when he hears noises. When their houses were burned in June 2011, children were torn from the arms of their mothers and thrown from their houses. Mothers were shot at inside their houses to force them to leave. They were brutalized in ways that are hard for us in the United States to comprehend, and impossible for those who suffered through the terror to remain unmarked.

And now, as they still struggle to rebuild their lives and livelihoods, they have learned from the media
that an official eviction order has been signed by a judge with an eviction date of later this month. They do not intend to leave their homes and we have an obligation to shine the light of international attention on the repression and injustice suffered by the people of Rigores and the many other communities of the Aguan which are under similar threat.

Our report six months ago of the horror that the people of the Aguan have lived under since the June 2009 coup against democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya, resulted in more press attention to the human rights situation in post-coup Honduras. The US State Department recently cut off Millennium Challenge Fund grants to Honduras. A few months ago 87 Members of Congress signed a letter to the Obama administration calling for a cut-off in military aid. The Defense Authorization Bill signed into law recently holds back a portion of military aid until the Secretary of State certifies that the human rights situation is improving. Even the corporate media, usually the reliable propaganda machine for the 1%, is beginning to worry about the shocking degradation of human rights in Honduras since the coup.

All this shows the value of solidarity actions, even for the people of a country largely absent from the
consciousness of most USers and the foreign policy calculations of our government. We will ask people to take action on the specific case of Rigores as soon as we get solid facts. But the reality is that Rigores is just one small place in a global war by the 1% against to poorest people of the world who sit on the world’s richest resources. However, another reality is that peasants no longer have a place to go. There is no place left for them to be displaced to. The so-called agricultural frontiers are gone. Peasants have no other choice but to defend their land.

At a conference of all the peasant movements of the Aguan that our delegation attended this morning before traveling to Rigores, Wilfredo Paz, Aguan coordinator for the National Front for Popular Resistance, told the 80 leaders present that the Aguan land struggle is the most important land struggle in the world. In a way, his words are true and not just parochial. The peasant movements in the Aguan are among the most highly organized in the world, and among those with the clearest vision that their backs are to the wall and they can retreat no farther. Failure now is a failure of life itself. Neither they nor their children have anyplace left to go.

One of the ways they are fighting back is to insure that the terror they are living under can no longer
operate in the shadows invisible to the world at large. They have opened a Permanent Human Rights Observatory of the Aguan to host international accompaniers and to expose and denounce the repression and the impunity for crimes against humanity enjoyed by the oligarchy and its subservient police and military. The Alliance for Global Justice is a member of the North American Support Group of the Observatory. Along with other groups, we are looking for people with fluent Spanish who will commit to join a team of international human rights accompaniers in the Aguan. During its start-up we are particularly interested in finding people who have previous accompaniment experience in other countries. To learn more or to offer your time and skills, send an email to AFGJ@AFGJ.org.

Most of us have neither the skills nor the time to become long-term accompaniers. But we can support those who do, and we can support the people who are under threat by educating our communities and by insisting that our elected officials implement new priorities that stop funding violence and instead
support policies that address the inequitable distribution of wealth and resources.

The people of Rigores do not intend to abandon their struggle. Our job is to change the change the political paradigm so that their struggle will prevail to the enrichment of all of us.

January 13 – Feb. 17 Course Offerings

The AFGJ Online Activist School is offering three courses, all taught by experienced activist, scholars or community organizers. These courses are held online. You can access the material at your own pace from your own home. You will have regular access to and feed-back from the instructor. At least one session of each course will be live and include interaction among the students and instructor through conference calling, video-conference or webinar platform. Upon completion you will be awarded with a letter of completion from the Alliance for Global Justice. Click here to register now!

Strategic Research on US Militarism for Activist Campaigns

This course will address diverse ways and sources for obtaining information we need on US military plans, activities, costs and impacts to organize demilitarization campaigns. For more information on the class, please click on the title. The course will be taught by John Lindsay-Poland, research and advocacy director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation and author of Emperors in the Jungle: The Hidden History of the US in Panama (Duke University). He has been researching US military policy and activities for peace and human rights projects for 30 years. Click here to register now!

“Empire as a Way of Life”

This course is a critical analysis of the U.S. Empire and the imperialism and militarism that are its lifeblood. Historian William Appleman Williams asserts empire is “a way of life [that] defines the … character of a culture and society.” U.S. citizens believe they have a “manifest destiny” to impose their political and economic policies upon others. For more information on the class, please click on the title. SUNY Professor Emeritus John Marciano has been an activist, scholar and teacher in the antiwar/social justice movement for more than four decades, commencing as a graduate student at SUNY Buffalo where he was a founding member of SDS at that campus. Since 2004, he has taught community courses for adults in Santa Monica on Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States and Empire as a Way of Life, based on the work of William Appleman Williams. Click here to register now!

US Policy Towards Latin America: From Drug Wars to Banana Wars

The face of US policy in Latin America in the last 100 years has included CIA led overthrows of governments, military funding of brutal dictatorships and economic trade pacts that have pushed millions under the poverty line. Yet despite this, Latin America has shown us some of the most powerful and resilient grassroots struggles where people power was proven to be more powerful than guns and greed. For more information on the class, please click on the title. Instructor Tanya Cole is Southwest Regional Coordinator of Witness for Peace. She earned her graduate degrees in Latin American Studies at the University of California Santa Barbara. She has traveled to 13 countries organized 40 delegations while working for Global Exchange and Witness for Peace as well as organized US speaking tours on Colombia, Cuba and Honduras. Click here to register now!

Occupy Olympia agreed by consensus at General Assembly to host a self-organized gathering of the Occupy Wall Street Movement to network, build unity, share tactics, workshop strategies, discuss diversity and discuss how to develop action plans. Olympia is near the Seattle Tacoma airport, a travel hub. Free shuttle service will be available for participants. Olympia has a strong history of organizing and is home of The Evergreen State College offering plenty of meeting space. Occupy Olympia is a natural choice for hosting one of the nationally organized conferences springing forth from this movement because of its temperate weather, strong organizing history, overwhelming local support, proximity to a national airport and it’s local college support.

The networking meeting is being called in recognition that the movement will gain strength if we help open space for sharing, discussion and development. It is also agreed that the sooner we create that space the better for the movement and that a quick first effort will champion strong gains and garner authentic self organization. Together, Occupy Olympia and the Alliance for Global Justice will create the space for a wide diversity of occupy movement members to bring their knowledge and skills to the table to share in authentic ways with each other for the goal of growing the strength of the movement.

Registration will be required, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds. You can register at http://occupyolympia.org/ossf-2012/. Participants should come prepared for tent camping or sleeping on church basement floors. Subject to funding availability, travel subsidies will be offered for participants from existing Occupations. You can contribute to the travel fund go to: http://afgj.org/?page_id=1777.

Chuck Kaufman, national co-coordinator of the Alliance for Global Justice, said, “Our interest is to create a space where the many local Occupations can network and share problems and solutions, begin to know each other and figure out how to support each other. There is no other agenda. It will be up to the Occupiers themselves to seize this opportunity and turn it into a Movement Building experience.”

Bruce Wilkinson, an Occupy Olympia organizer, touted Washington State’s mild winter climate. He said, “Occupy Olympia is excited about this opportunity to host the first of what will probably be many national gatherings of Occupiers as we struggle together to build a democratic movement that will challenge the greed of the 1% and build justice and equality for the 99%.”

For more information contact: Chuck Kaufman, chuck@AFGJ.org