Anti-poverty protests: tell us your experiences of campaigns for change
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Version 0 of 1. In 2005, more than 200,000 anti-poverty campaigners, clad in white, took to the streets of Edinburgh to protest for debt cancellation, increased aid and global trade reform. The Make Poverty History movement attracted the attention of world leaders who were in Scotland for the G8 summit held at Gleneagles. The summit achieved significant progress, including a consensus to drop $55bn worth of multilateral debt for 18 of the most highly indebted countries. Leaders also committed to double aid to Africa by 2010, a pledge that fell short of its target but helped the public hold governments to account for their aid promises. The Edinburgh march built on campaigning efforts in 1998, when the UK hosted the G8 summit in Birmingham. That year, an estimated 70,000 campaigners formed a human chain around the city centre to protest for debt cancellation, their chants audible to negotiators inside the summit meetings. Campaigners say the protest was a seminal moment for the anti-poverty movement around the world. As the G7 in Germany approaches, anti-poverty campaigners will once more be protesting for a fairer deal for the world’s poor. Activists estimate a crowd of 20,000 people, a figure dwarfed by the number of attendees at previous G7/8 summits. If you attended the debt-cancellation protests in Birmingham, Edinburgh, or elsewhere in the world, we’d like to hear from you. How significant were these events at the time, and what did they achieve? And how has campaigning changed over the past decade? You can share your thoughts in the comment thread below, or submit your stories, photos or videos via GuardianWitness. We’ll include the best responses in our coverage. |