From Quebec to Spain, anti-protest laws are threatening true democracy | Richard Seymour | Comment is free | theguardian.com

From Quebec to Spain, anti-protest laws are threatening true democracy | Richard Seymour | Comment is free | theguardian.com:

The Spanish government's punitive anti-protest draft laws are, critics say, an attack on democracy. That is precisely what they are.

In a number of recent front lines of popular protest, state capacities have been reconfigured to meet the challenge. In some instances, as in Greece, this has meant periods of emergency government. In Chicago, in Quebec and now in Spain, it has meant the expansion of anti-protest laws.

In 2011, the Chicago mayor, Rahm Emanuel, requested that the city council pass "temporary" anti-protest measures in response to the planned protests around the Nato and G8 summits. The laws included a $1m insurance mandate for public protests, heavy policing and greater obstacles to obtaining a protest permit. By early 2012, the legislation had been made permanent.

The Quebec government
sought to stifle student protest with emergency legistlation that
included measures banning demonstrations within 50 metres of a college,
and changing the route of a protest at short notice. Photograph: Steeve
Duguay/AFP/Getty Images

 

Several policemen charged during a demonstration in defense of public health.SPAIN