Product Description

This is a history of the rise of the anti-globalization movement, from Seattle to September 11th, 2001. The text charts the group's most notable successes and its failures and is international in scope, covering everything from the Zapatistas' rebellion in Mexico to the Social Centres in Italy, from the biggest peaceful protest demos since the 1960s to the gassings and shootings at Genoa. The author analyses developments in local democracy, in law enforcement, in privatization laws, in capital migrations, in union behaviour, in marketing, in summitry. She gets close to the suited summits - the WTO, the G8, the IMF, and NAFTA - and looks at issues as diverse as bioterrorism, pollution, hypocrisy, fear and confusion. The book could be considered a portrait, or rather the underlying negative, of the planet's torrid time between the Seattle summit and the world-changing events of 11 September 2001.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #155811 in Books
• Published on: 2002-10-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Fences and Windows is not a follow up to the bestselling No Logo. Rather it is a collection of articles and speeches written on the hoof at the various conventions and summits around the world in the wake of the mass protests against the World Trade Organisation in Seattle. Klein's involvement with the new grass-roots anti-corporate movement gave her--and thousands of others--a fast-track education in neo-liberal economics and the effects of globalised corporate activities upon landless farmers in Brazil, teachers in Argentina, fast-food workers in Italy, coffee-growers in Mexico, shanty-town dwellers in South Africa, migrant tomato pickers in Florida, union organisers in the Philippines, and homeless kids in Toronto.

One of the most important and inspiring aspects of the book is Klein's description of the ways in which the new movement differs from left-wing political organising of the past. Rather than being unified by a political party or a national network with head offices, annual elections and subordinate cells and locals, it is shaped by the ideas of individual organisations and intellectuals but, crucially, does not defer to any of them as leaders. What facilitates the multiplicity of campaigns is the communication technology which in turn shapes the movement in its own image. What emerged on the streets of Seattle, Klein observes, "was an activist model that mirrors the organic decentralised pathways of the Internet--the Internet come to life".

What gives Klein's analysis added weight is her reports of the tactics of police and security forces around the world in the campaign to criminalise dissent. Among the tactics used are pre-emptive strikes where movement organisers are intimidated before major meetings or simply arrested before they get there. More worrying still is the propaganda war that seeks to blur the distinction between violence and civil disobedience. This in turn leads to a situation where police violence against protesters is normalised and where indiscriminate gassing occurs so frequently that protesters appear on the streets with necessary protective gear of swimming goggles and bandanas soaked in vinegar.

Overall Fences and Windows is engaged, informative, troubling and inspiring. It's also worrying because it's difficult to believe that governments and corporations are allowed to operate such hypocritical and destructive economic policies while passing themselves off as the champions of the very people they are destroying. It's inspiring because there is hope of change--not least in the models of political organisation she describes. In this regard her article on Subcomandante Marcos and the Zapatistas is remarkable and truly inspirational. The inevitable weakness of a collection of articles such as this is that there is inevitable repetition. On the other hand, the fact that Klein wrote them on the move, from the inside and as it happened (or very shortly afterwards) gives the whole urgency and immediacy. --Larry Brown

Review
a representative review of No Logo: 'A riveting, conscientious piece of journalism and a strident call to arms. Packed with enlightening statistics and extraordinary anecdotal evidence, No Logo is fluent, undogmatically alive to its contradictions and omissions and positively seethes with intelligent anger.' Observer

Alice Fisher, Big Issue
'Fences and Windows is a great progress report on where the debate’s headed. Read it and worry.’

Customer Reviews

A Review of Fences and Windows by Naomi Klein
Klein returns with a collection of short articles, speeches and columns from newspapers. This book is a handy follow up to No Logo. Rather than being a book of investigation like No Logo, this book instead tracks the post-Seattle developments and tackles issues on the more local scale as well as the big global issues. It is very readable, provocative, motivational and builds some very interesting themes (fences and windows).
This book is well worth a go if you liked Klein's previous works, don't expect another No Logo, this book has it's own merits for other reasons.

Klein's update on the anti-Corporate Globalisation battle
This is a collection of articles published in various journals over the last couple of years which succeeds in giving a sense of history-in-the-making, of a movement (albeit in a very loose sense of the word) finding its voice and occasionally being heard. The depiction of both the "broad brush" international trends- whether political or corporate- are succinctly done, and are very impressively and insightfully linked to the 'grass roots' situations and people 'on the ground' affected by such forces. That the voices of real people affected by the impact of such forces- both good, but more often bad- are so seldom heard or listened to in the mainstream media makes this collection feel important.

Klein's ability to present complex developments and arguments in a succinct way- many chapters are only four pages long- is impressive.

The author's previous book, the excellent No Logo, retains its important place in the canon of writing on anti-corporate globalisation, but Fences and Windows can sit proudly alongside.

Not her best writing
There's a distinctly disjointed feel to 'Fences and Windows', Naomi Klein's update on globalisation after her bestseller 'No Logo' of a few years ago. It's made up of various articles she wrote between 2000 and 2002, many of which seem to have been published before (several in the Canadian newspaper 'The Globe and Mail'). Such journalistic writing is fine for a newspaper that readers will discard the next day, but it lacks the substance required of a book. The particular problem is length - most of the chapters are no more than half a dozen pages long, so of course there isn't enough space in which to develop much of an argument, or even look at the topics in much depth. She's also not saying anything stunningly new (except in the final section), which makes for a frustrating read.

She begins by detailing the major anti-globalisation protests, such as Washington DC (2000), then moves on to how 'free trade' (which she very correctly points out isn't actually 'free' at all) and the global market are 'dismantling democracy'. This is definitely the weakest part of the book; there's a strong argument to be made here, but the disparate articles don't make the necessary links to have any force. Next she deals with 'criminalising dissent' - how protestors are mistreated and misrepresented by the authorities. Again, more structure here would help, but it's still a useful way to learn of specific examples.

The fourth section, 'Capitalising on Terror' does much as the title suggests, reasonably efficiently, but it's the fifth and final one that makes this book worth reading. It's rather a cliché for books of this sort to end with how the protestors want to build a better world, but Klein takes a tangent to this issue with great effect. She examines the methods used by protest groups, and assesses their effectiveness with the sort of insightful critique only someone who's part of the movement could provide. Her article on Subcommandante Marcos and the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico is fantastic and alone justifies buying this book. (That it's the longest in the book, at a whole 16 pages, is significant - it was also originally in 'The Guardian' on 3rd March 2001, if you want to search the archives for it instead!).

I'm studying globalisation, and even allowing for the fact that Klein isn't an academic author, her lack of citation of other authors and other people's ideas is distinctly frustrating. The index is comprehensive and useful, but there are no endnotes and meagre credits. Unfortunately this isn't a book that leads you on to further exploration. If you haven't read 'No Logo', do so now and ignore this. 'Fences and Windows' is only worth buying if you're a bit of a fan of the author, or are some anti-globalisation popular lit. completist... Borrow this from the library if you must; don't buy. Get the 'Rebellion in Chiapas' article elsewhere, and do something better with your time.