Mark Carney is holding the largest ever gathering of capitalists in Canadian history. Taking place adjacent to one of the busiest intersections in the country, will the left in Toronto make the Confront Carney’s CEO Summit protest epic?
During the evening of September 14, Carney will be hosting 100 leaders of global capitalism at the Four Seasons near Yonge and Bloor. Alongside the prime minister and multiple cabinet ministers, Ontario premier Doug Ford is expected to be there. The heads of Canada’s six big banks will also be in attendance. So will the head of Barclays and top officials of massive investment funds from two dozen countries.
Probably the most powerful man on Wall Street, Larry Fink, will be there. Head of the $15 trillion investment firm Blackrock, Fink is a noted Zionist and board member of the US empire’s influential Council on Foreign Relations.
Details about the Canada Investment Summit remain opaque. A full guest list has not been publicized, and we only found the location of the event because of activist investigation. There may also be some hiccups in the planning as the Globe and Mail noted on Saturday: “Head of federal agency organizing Carney’s investment summit resigns.”
Beyond organizing, hosting and securing the summit, are we also paying for the capitalists to come to Toronto to finds ways to profit off us? Are taxpayers on the hook for their $5,000 or $10,000 a night hotel rooms? And if we are covering their lodgings is there any ceiling on what individuals can charge the Canadian public?
I have the same question for transport. Does Ottawa have a formula for breaking down how much it pays for the cost of a private plane flying from New York, London or Abu Dhabi?
Carney’s carnival of capitalism will be challenged by a coalition of two dozen activist groups and NGOs, including Greenpeace, Leadnow, Council of Canadians and Capitalism can’t be fixed. OPIRG Guelph is sending a bus and so is an NDP chapter in Peterborough. Dozens of others will be travelling to Toronto from outside the GTA.
The march will include contingents focused on specific issues such as pipelines and Palestine. In what will likely be the largest contingent, a carnival against capitalism will include clowns, artwork and choreographed performances.
Two weeks before the march many pieces are in place to ensure a sizable, dynamic, protest. But will it be “epic”? Many variables go into making a march “historic”, such as its size, protester militancy or police violence, political moment and direct result.
The mass march I attended against the Free Trade Area of the Americas in Quebec City was undoubtedly “historic”. As Hugo Chavez later noted, the scope of the protests at the 2001 Summit of the Americas contributed to unraveling the FTAA.
The 2002 protest (riot) against a planned speech by Benjamin Netanyahu at Concordia University was definitely “epic”. Due to a mix of protester militancy and police violence, the then former Israeli prime minister was unable to speak and there was significant fallout.
A bitterly cold January 2003 demonstration against war on Iraq was “historic” as it demonstrated mass opposition in Quebec to joining the aggression. It played a role in stopping Chretien’s government from formally joining the Bush administration’s “coalition of the willing” (they provided many other forms of support).
A far smaller rally on July 1, 2005, was one the most exciting protests I’ve ever been part of. At a Canada Day barbecue, 40 mostly members of the Haitian community quickly drove foreign affairs minister Pierre Pettigrew out of a park in his riding where he planned to hand out hot dogs for a few hours. The boisterous action laid the groundwork for an activist campaign focused on his role in the coup in Haiti that would defeat Pettigrew in the subsequent election.
There were several “epic” marches during the 2012 Quebec student strike. The night march after the government adopted a special law banning spontaneous demonstrations drew tens of thousands who snaked throughout Montreal for over six hours. I left at 3am and hundreds were still marching.
Montreal’s climate march in 2019 was historic simply due to its immense size. Several hundred thousand marched.
The ‘objective’ conditions are there to make September 14 “epic”. It will be the largest ever gathering of capitalists in Canadian history and it’s taking place while students are back, the weather is nice and in a busy area. In terms of narrow political objective, the summit is a prime opportunity to paint the former banker prime minister as an agent of the global rich.
Let’s make September 14 “epic”.
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