Time to Strike: Cross-Europe Solidarity Forging a Path Out of Austerity
By: Louis Edgar Esparza

In These Times: http://www.inthesetimes.com/uprising/entry/14204/time_to_strike_historic_cross-
europe_forging_a_path_out_of_austerity/

Wednesday was a turning point for the movements against austerity in Southern Europe. The 
viciousness of the repression faced by protesters illustrates how desperate bankers and their political 
allies have become to force the public sector to pay for the errors of banks and investors. But broad 
sectors of the public have shown increased courage and solidarity to fight for an alternative path.

Although these strikes were organized by labor, their success was attributable to the participation of 
broad sectors of the population – the young protesting education cuts, the old protesting healthcare 
cuts, the unemployed protesting for jobs, the employed protesting to keep their jobs, the middle 
class protesting to keep their homes, the homeless protesting to get one. An entire generation in 
Southern Europe is being radicalized.

After a grandmother threw herself from a balcony in advance of her eviction, Spain awoke to the word 
“assassins” scrawled on banks and ATMs across the country. The general strike in Spain saw clashes 
with police in many cities, with significant events in Madrid, Barcelona and three Basque cities. In 
Madrid, police chased protesters into the winding side streets leading into plazas and crevices. The 
evenings normally fill these parks and plazas with people smoking cigarettes, reading the newspaper, 
and enjoying a pint at café tables. Now storm troopers invade with noxious gas and rubber bullets. 
Screams and explosions terrorized residents, hiding in their residential apartments from the sounds 
echoing from their stone edifices.

In Portugal, the government has bribed police with significant wage increases in order to keep order, 
and protesters were faced with especially harsh repression.  Protesters supporting the general strike 
fled the Parliament building and set dumpsters ablaze in the middle of the main thoroughfares of 
Lisbon in an attempt to slow police down. Portugal’s President Mr. Cavaco Silva said of the protesters 
that they are “people who want to destroy society.” Asked about the level of police brutality 
documented by Amnesty International, Mr. Silva responded, “statements of this kind can only be an 
insult to police.”

Greece, on the verge of bankruptcy and with a dramatic rise in homelessness, keeps promising with 
each round of cuts that it will be the last. Unions and other protesters were not buying it. They went 
on strike and protesters threw Molotov cocktails at police. On Thursday, students at Polytechneio 
dumped various liquids on the Education Minister, to protest education cuts. Workers occupied a 
building in Thessaloniki, where Greek and German officials were meeting to discuss the tensions. 
Protestors attacked one German diplomat with water bottles and fought police in an attempt to reach 
him.

In Italy, the largest union called a work stoppage of several hours and students, motivated by steep 
education cuts, spilled into the streets across the country. Reports of street fights with police in 
Trieste, Turin, and Milan describe the brutality with reports of injuries in several cities. Protesters 
occupied the railroad station in Naples. Cars were torched in Rome. There were arrests in Padua. Eggs 
were thrown at Bankitalia in Ancona.

Rail service was disrupted in Belgium. In France, unions marched in cities throughout the country. 
Unions held support rallies in the U.K. Over 600 flights were cancelled, mostly by Iberia and Vueling.

There is a huge potential energy building in these countries. The pent-up idleness of millions of 
unemployed and young people is a powder keg waiting to explode. Workers, the unemployed, and the 
elderly, understandably, do not want their children and the youth of their countries to grow up in this 
kind of environment. Neither do the youth themselves accept drastic cuts to their own education.

These events are not far off--rising suicide rates, plummeting health and decaying infrastructure 
could portend our own future as politicians prepare to strike a "grand bargain." Will we follow 
Europe's example, and strike back?