 of this event. On behalf of Transform Europe I would like to welcome you in Vienna. You and our guests going through a very difficult phase right now. You know the presidential elections are coming. Yet we don't meet today to discuss about that and everyone involved in this event hopes that each one of you that has a voting act in Austria knows what is to be done in three weeks. Tonight we gather up to talk about Europe's duties to the refugees. The duty of the Europeans towards people are fleeing war, poverty, violence, oppression around the world. In this evening I have a co-host, Stretsko Horvath. He is representing DM, this new transnational movement emerging right now in Europe. Together with Stretsko we will try to moderate tonight's discussion. So I would give the floor now to Stretsko and he will tell us why Vienna, why now, and why DM. First of all, good evening and sorry that we speak English tonight. Why Vienna? My spontaneous reaction would be why not? But as someone who comes from a former Austro-Hungarian colony which is Croatia, I have to remind you on a very curious historical fact, which you probably know but if you don't know it, be with me for one or two minutes. Imagine that we are in the year 1913 in Vienna and that five people who will become historical figures of the 20th century are living in Vienna several meters away. So you have one unsuccessful painter living in Vienna? You have a worker who is working in Vienna, Neustadt, for Daimler, who is also living in Vienna. You have two Russians who are living in Vienna and you have the father of psychoanalysis living in Vienna. So it is just one year before the outbreak of the First World War. Hitler is living in Vienna, Tito is living in Vienna, Tito was the worker of course, Trotsky and Stalin are living in Vienna and Freud. So what I'm trying to say is imagine this situation in Vienna one year before the outbreak of the First World War and these people are living in Vienna. We can only post questions, did they ever meet? Did they sit in a café? For instance, Stalin and Freud did the same café. Would history look like completely differently if for instance Freud had a psycho analysis with young Stalin who was probably still a poet? Would history look differently if the unsuccessful painter met for instance Tito? These are only questions we can post, we don't know the answers. But we are today in Vienna 2016 and we are in such a situation. This situation was best explained by Antonio Gramsci in his prison notebooks when he said that the old world is dying and the new world cannot be born yet and this is the time of morbid symptoms. One of such morbid symptoms is the refugee crisis or what they call the refugee crisis and tonight during our program we will discuss precisely this whether it is a refugee crisis and it brings me actually to the answer of your question why Vienna? Vienna because at the West Balkan conference the Balkan route was closed as you know. Vienna because from Vienna came the plan that the Brenner Pass will also be closed that the border will be reintroduced. Vienna because from Vienna the Austrian government sent troops the army to the Macedonian-Greek border. Vienna because as I already told you it's a historical city and I think we are today precisely in such historical moment where directions can go anyway either in the Hitler direction, Stalin direction or Tito direction. I will not give you my preferences I think you know them as I come from Croatia but why DM? I won't answer this question but I will invite one of the founders of DM Yanis Varoufakis to give the answer. Good evening Vienna. The title if you looked at the banner outside is a question what is Europe's duty to the refugees? What is Europe's duty to itself? Now the beautiful thing about being European is that we have a long cultural tradition from which to draw answers to such questions. Allow me to read a little dialogue from a very old text between a refugee and a European. The refugee says yesterday the 20th day I escaped the wine dark sea and all the time the turbulent wind and waves carried me here now fate drives me on shore so that I may suffer harm here too no doubt and the woman who is greeting him responds stranger you seem neither unknowing nor ill-intentioned but now you have come to our land and city and you shall not go short of clothes or anything else a hard-pressed refugee deserves from those he meets have you recognized the text it is the odyssey and the refugee is of course Odysseus or Ulysses turning to her friends Navsika says to them you must care for him since all strangers and beggars come from Zeus so bring him food and drink girls and bathe him in the river where there is shelter from the wind now the way we treat the stranger the way we treat the Xenos the foreigner is a litmus test about our society it is a reflection of how confident we are about ourselves and about our communities it is a litmus test for whether we are leading a successful life as persons as communities as states and by god europe is failing that test and this is why we are setting up dm the democracy in europe movement because the reason we are failing that the litmus test is because our democratic states have come together in a very odd strange confederacy it is good that we have come together for decades we were integrating with different languages different cultures but recently in the last few decades we've been disintegrating under a common currency which was never designed to sustain the challenges of the modern capitalist world and the result is that we have shifted all important decision making from our democratically elected parliaments and governments into a democracy free zone in brussels and in frankfurt where terrible decisions are being reproduced recapitulated the result being a feedback mechanism of mutual reinforcement between authoritarianism and bad economic policies the combination of which is making the foundations of our society our europe so brittle that we cannot pass the litmus test regarding odysseus regarding children from syria regarding afghani pakistani ghanian libian refugees now for a brief moment last autumn chancellor ankela merkel had an epiphany she sounded like nafsika she said let them in we will take them but it didn't last long because her own political party turned against her her own conservative forces that were being unleashed by this economic crisis which is a result of a terrible architecture in brussels in frankfurt in berlin in vienna in athens in rome in lisbon turned against that very simple policy that goes all the way to homer and very soon after that the paris atrocities gave an opening to the return of misanthropy suddenly the refugee became not a person to be looked after in order for us to pass the litmus test but the threat the other the terrorist the person that was to be kept fenced in or fenced out this is no more than a sign that there is something deeply rotten in our europe ladies and gentlemen there is no refugee crisis in europe there is a refugee crisis in lebanon there is a refugee crisis in turkey there is a refugee crisis in iraq in syria there is a refugee crisis in jordan in lebanon 40 of the population refugees that is a refugee crisis we don't have a refugee crisis we have a crisis of the european economy european politics of european democracy and the scapegoating that always happens as it did in the 1930s is happening today when the economy the capitalist model that we have selected is crumbling because it's not fit to purpose then we tend to seek scapegoats we fail the litmus tests that history puts on our path now at the same time we should not turn a blind eye to genuine concerns that people have which throw them into the arms of misanthropy it is hugely important to acknowledge the sidelining of our domestic local discarded laborers of blue-collar workers that have been sidelined for decades it is important to recognize that many of them feel left out of the enterprise culture which is being shown to them on their television screens and through marketing mechanisms every day wherever they look at it is important to acknowledge that even our children because some of us are privileged enough to have children that studied in london or study in london in berlin in paris that they do not even care about who is removing the garbage at night and this unholy alliance between those of us who have adopted a capitalist cosmopolitanism that neglects the concerns of people who concern themselves to be treated as white trash as the americans say these concerns must be looked after by progressives in europe we must not allow those people to drift into the arms of misanthropy xenophobia alternationalism and racism this is why we need dm and we need it everywhere have you noticed the fallacy of building walls around our nations again of building walls around europe in order to prevent the other from stepping in every time we build a wall we declare our lack of confidence in ourselves every time we build a war in the wall in the name of security we spread division in our society in our hearts in our communities and by spreading division we spend a feeling and a sense of insecurity so let them in so let them in it is a very simple policy the nazi cap policy you let the refugees in but instead of building walls to keep them out we should build bridges between their anxieties the anxieties of the refugees and the anxieties of the locals who feel sound by the elites by the ruling classes by a system that considers them to be too expensive as laborers and too indebted as consumers to matter to their elites allow me just for one moment to speak personally i lived out of my country for 27 years the only way i feel i can be a true patriot is when i am in my country another i live in my country to look at my country as a foreigner as a refugee always look at your own as if you're not one of your own it is the only way that the dialectic of recognition can work in order to tell you who you are and to allow you to pass the litmus test so let me end with Homer again in Homeric Greece the correct way to welcome a stranger who has been washed ashore was with food and drink with fresh clothing and fragrant oil to clean the salt of the skin and only then to ask them what their name is not by means of conducting a cost-benefit analysis to find out what's in it for you if you let them in thank you thank you yeah you want to come back i'm not going to speak but i have a message for you from somebody who wishes he could be here his name is nom chomsky and he sent us this message so nom has this to say in some countries there is a real refugee crisis in lebanon for example where perhaps one quarter of the population consists of refugees from syria over and above a flood of refugees from palestine and iraq other poor and strife-ridden countries of the region have also absorbed huge numbers of refugees among them jordan and syria before syria's descent into collective suicide the countries that are enduring a refugee crisis had no responsibility for creating it generating refugees is largely a responsibility of the rich and powerful who now grown under the burden of a trickle of miserable visits whom they could easily accommodate the anglo-american invasion of iraq alone displaced some four million people of whom almost half fled to neighboring countries and iraq is continued to flee from a country that is one of the most miserable on earth after a decade of murderous sanctions followed by the sledgehammer blows of the rich and the powerful that devastated the ruined country and also ignited a sectarian conflict that is now tearing the country and the region to shreds there is no need to review the european role in africa the source of more refugees now passing through the funnel created by the french british american bombing of libya which virtually destroyed the country and left it in the hands of warring militias or to review the united states record in central america leaving horror chambers from which people are fleeing in terror and in misery joined now by mexican victims of the trade pact which predictably destroyed mexican agriculture unable to compete with the highly subsidized american agribusiness conglomerates the reaction of the rich and powerful united states is to pressure mexico to keep american victims far from its own borders and to drive them back mercilessly if they manage to evade the controls the reaction of the rich and powerful european union is to bribe and pressure turkey to keep pathetic survivors from its borders and to hurt those who escape into brutal camps among citizens there are honorable exceptions but the reaction of the states is a moral disgrace even putting aside their considerable responsibility for the circumstances that have compelled people to flee for their lives the shame is not new let us keep just to the united states the more privileged and powerful country the world with incomparable advantages throughout most of its history the united states welcomed european refugees to settle the lands taken by violence from the assassinated nations that dwelt in them that changed with the immigration act of 1924 aimed at excluding particularly italians and jews there is no need to dwell on their fate even after the war survivors still confined to concentration camps where barred entry in america today in europe roma are being expelled from france to horrible conditions in eastern europe descendants of holocaust victims if anyone cares the shame is deep and it is persistent the time has surely come to put an end and to try to attain some decent level of civilization thank you norm hello again anybody else wants to add something as i told you in the beginning uh well i was welcoming you um this evening we will try to explore how solidarity can bridge borders how transnationalization of our struggles can help us gain a new momentum in the nearest future and what we're trying to do with this event today is basically give you impulses the whole events today will start would last about three hours you know probably from the program we're going to have four short tables around tables with different guests from around europe and the world and we will try to explore exactly these questions of course um we have breaks breaks that are going to be enriched with art art and a lot of labor struggles which we like a lot and we hope you enjoy it a lot so i would like to thank um the choir you just heard before whore 29 november uh they're going to be here around the evening and you're gonna get the chance to talk them a little bit longer so now i'll take the time and introduce the first uh table the first uh panel the first round table today carries the title solidarity beyond borders you know yourselves uh we experienced something magnificent in europe uh over the summer and the spring of the previous year it was a time where the Balkan route was open where refugees and migrants were marching in thousands border after border but also the time where a newer narrative emerged writes out of the roots of the society it was a narrative of transnational solidarity we could actually see solidarity breaching borders not only physical borders but also linguistic borders national borders ethnical borders political borders you had people from different political traditions working together to support the refugees so in most of our struggles uh at least the ones i like to be involved in a big big slogan is always um solidarity is a weapon so together with lorenzo marsili we will try to explore now in the next panel what's the solidarity beyond borders mean just before the panel enters the the stage which hopefully they will do on time a couple of words for lorenzo who is going to be moderating the next table lorenzo marsili is an author and the co-founder of the european alternatives an organization that has been working good evening everybody for what is a very important event in a very delicate moment i don't need to tell you or to tell uh the great speakers we're having here tonight the danger of the situation we're currently going through the rise of the extreme or the xenophobic right across europe and across the western hemisphere from donald trump in the united states to le penne in france to the current government of poland to their teachers the authoritarian government of urban uh just a few hundred kilometers from here and of course to austria not only for the results of the first round of the presidential elections a few a few days ago but also for what the current government is doing and as an italian allow me to say that the fact that only a few kilometers from here the austrian government is building a wall at the brand new pass to preemptively keep migrants out is the representation of the moral bankruptcy that europe has now gotten itself into the brand new pass and the collapse of that border represented if anything the achievement of european unity and of solidarity beyond borders which is the topic of this first round of tonight's discussion i don't think we need to succumb to uh a kind of left-wing melancholia but on the contrary this should incentivize us to act to act as austria has shown us it is possible to act only a few months ago when the refugees welcome movement found in vienna and in austria one of its most inspiring situations the whole of europe was galvanized by the humanity that austrians has showed uh during the first wave of the refugee crisis with the balkan route being in the headlines only a few months ago and this is important to keep in our minds that we are different and we're capable of great europe white mobilizations in favor of solidarity uh end of a humane policy i am um very delighted to be able to speak tonight with uh with some great uh uh participants who have been directly uh involved in all that tonight's discussion is about uh fanny mulier yuri is a researcher at the university of vienna on racism and critical theory and also an activist deeply involved in migration and refugees uh work uh christina shirk uber apologies for the pronunciation uh is also deeply involved in civil society initiatives in support of refugees in uh in austria and a collaborator of uh the folks hillfett whom uh which i'm sure you will you will know of as well as an artist which is very important uh presence for dm dm always makes the case that politics is not about politicians politics is about breaking the imaginary and artists really have a role to play and of course tereza forkadas a benedict in none uh a feminist if i may say so uh i think it's important to underline that aspect especially with such a panel uh a medical doctor and a great activist from katalunya uh and across the spanish state as well funny let me begin immediately from you these two austrias the austria of refugees welcomes welcome a few months ago and the austria of the wall at the brandl pass and of the results of hoffer only a few days ago what's changed in such a few such a few months at a certain time okay thank you very much for we really have to answer in two minutes so i'm gonna use some notes as well but thanks for the question and i can i could tell you story from my view in different ways really but let me just tell you maybe taken approach on it to to tell a story of success and then i will also say some a little something about the far right so the long summer of migration until now until the spring of migration in the Balkans especially is both a really a result and also a driving force of a number of factors which we are going to talk about today or discuss today and tonight and we witnessed what we what can happen when state control and the border regime and border politics of the EU meet migrant mobility strategies and also self organized movements and somehow give rise to something new what we witness not only in the summer but also still today with the refugee and migration movement not only our border regimes challenge or borders challenge as such but core narratives of the EU and still challenge and also so to say that the core answers given by the EU and nation states to the crisis to austerity politics to also questions of housing education and obviously labor and um citizenships these answers have been challenged because they are disappointing still and as we see today they imagine the migration movement reminded society here in austria and everywhere else really about the core questions and politics and the lack of alternatives really given by the EU and the nation states and also as we know today there have been millions of people involved in the solidarity movement as well and actively involved in refugee work support work and also we see a transnational or a translocal strength of these movements and who were still and are part of circumventing national and EU policies and these emerged initiatives really are also they also develop sustainable practices of social compositions right and beyond politics of identity if we talk about the anti-racist movement for example and they did so on a very on a local level on the municipal level on the ground in the cities also and they still play a key role I think and the key political actor of this welcoming uh movements within they have done important work which is also obviously anti-racist and um on a social level they also open the space and for the months and imaginaries of an alternative Europe of solidarity I would say and just to say one little thing about the far right obviously uh today also mainstream media is very much reporting not about those initiatives organizations and the movement what still is there but they don't report about the thousands of people now who are now protesting in France for example or the thousands of people protesting in fear of Macedonia against anti in an anti-corruption protest is also hard for public opinion to connect those fights and those movements with the current migration movement and the solidarity movement so this is obviously playing in the hands of the far right and this is not just happened this didn't just happen today or yesterday and the austerity politics of the EU have also eased the way for the far right since years now absolutely absolutely um to continue that conversation I'm gonna try and build a bit of a dynamic debate a note of service I was promised a clock if I don't have one I cannot be blamed for breaking the time because I have no idea what time it is uh for for continuing on on on this topic there is a beautiful short story by the great Argentinian writer Borges and it is the confession of a Nazi leader the day the day before his due to be executed at the Nuremberg trials and in a nutshell what he says at the end is to a to an american general uh yes you may have won the war but in order to win the war you have had to become like us and so in the end we have won and what he meant is that uh the allies uh civilized europe had to shed away civilization and become a war-like civilization in order to defeat the nazis and to prevail in the war and hence their spirit had succeeded um I don't want to to push this too far but I see a great risk that even if we win the victor even if we win the battle against extreme and the far right we do it in a way that brings their policies onto the mainstream of mainstream political parties beginning with the christian democrats and the social democrats it is not the far right but it is the grand coalition of austria that's building a war a wall in the bender pass it is not it is not marine le pen but it is franca holland who is passing uh an emergency law in france that kills civil liberties and the capacity to to demonstrate and is imprisoning now the activists of new debu on a daily basis so my my question to to christina would be this to what extent are the mainstream parties to what extent are the civilized progressive parties complicit in buying in the rhetoric of the extreme right and in fact normalizing it well I think they have made a big contribution and did that nowadays uh right ring slogans are actually kind of mainstream and I think one of the biggest failures was actually that they were not able to provide stability and security and I don't mean a stability or security of a fortress Europe but security can provide can be provided by those people who are able to manage change who can who are able to have strategies for change and who are able to deal with the circumstances and I think most of the parties were really not aware about what this refugee movement actually means that it is also actually a big chance and that it is actually also something that either you like it or not it will be there you have to deal with it you cannot only argument from a moral point of view which I of course from my position usually do but also from the view of how are we able to organize change how are we able to deal with circumstances and how can we accept the way it is um definitely from a moral state of view I think it's a disaster that the european union allowed this kind of humanitarian catastrophe for example in idomani where we are also working in collaboration with folksilfe and we see here really a huge a huge lack of management the right wing parties can succeed because they promise things they will not be able to hold the promise social security they will not do it everybody knows we know but people believe them they believe the promises of social security the leftist parties did not show strategies how we can make it and they did not even show strategies in the way of how we can manage the movement of refugees um for me what I personally saw in my experiences as a volunteer in different movements of civil society is that there are really really many heroes in this civil society we have here in austria people from completely different point of views from completely different perspectives organized work together collaborated and they did the job of the government they set up refugee camps it's very good this applause because this applause is really important because I really want to thank at this point all these amazing heroes who really show we can do it it's not impossible we have not sit down and be frightened of but this big big big big problem coming up to us we just act we just do and we will not stop and I would love to have this attitude and a high level of politics I would love to see this okay let's organize let's solve the problem yes and therese if I can bring you in here Spain the Spanish state is an exception in this it is possibly the only country in the european union where we don't see an extreme right wing movement but on the country we see a great progressive movement even in established party politics now what's different or what have you done differently in Spain okay I don't believe that in Spain we are somehow magically protected from that so we might unfortunately hear that that happens in the near future I hope not but what is different in Spain is that Spain is a plurian national country it's a country with four nations and four languages and we had during 40 years in the 20th century a fascist dictatorship that did all it could to crush and to make disappear three of those four nations three of those four languages so that during those fascist years a very strong fascist nationalism was built in Spain but also very strong anti-fascist nationalist movements that's the catalan one the bask as you know with even violence against the fascism and when Franco died in the mid 70s then what happened is that basically the right wing parties that won in poor in Basque country and also in Catalonia they use a kind of rhetoric to speak about nationalism that's plurality it has to do with democracy it has to do with anything that's far away from xenophobia and they see because they have their history and we have our history this way they see how this bringing together the people to go beyond the individual and to be motivated to face a fascist dictatorship this is something that still is alive in a way that the fascist nationalism is not because it was replaced by a democratic movement so here I would like to bring something that might not be very popular but I think debates are good when they open up different perspectives which is of course there is and we know in history a way to face catastrophes with recourse to xenophobia and the scapegoating that Marufakis was talking about but don't we have in history something else haven't we seen the colonized countries to be able to really face up injustice because of a sense of national pride or a sense of collectiveness that goes beyond the individual I have been able to be four times in Venezuela and to follow all that has happened there and I believe many of the movements including Podemos in Spain have been inspired by what happened there and how these common people was able to raise and was able to do exactly what Cristina was talking about to trust that they could act not to wait that the solution comes from above because I don't think in history that has ever happened so what actually no so what what happened there these people were able to not only have a sense of Simone Boliver they call it Bolivarian socialism and that inspires them because of a tradition Evo Morales does get inspired from these also traditions that were crushed or attempted to be crushed and also in Ecuador they raised this issue of summa kausai as a very old notion that actually can bring the people beyond individual I think it's key to fight capitalism and I think that's what we are doing here right so to fight just to be to be sure and especially okay and to do something which is to be able to challenge but really challenge this absolute character of private property because if we are not ready to challenge this in a world that the last report of oxfam international is telling us the 99 versus 1 percent it's not any more a slogan of the indignados or of the occupy movement it's now a reality this cannot be challenged other than challenging this absolute understanding of private property so to do that in the history we have had and I could quote also Gandhi and the movement that happened there we need to go beyond the individual in the sense that what brings me beyond my individual interest what links me to other people in a way that it is of course not partial not tribal this is the fear of trying to bind to other people and I wanted to make Venezuela as an example because they were inspired by Simone Bolivar they started the movement that I think we are reaping some of the benefits even though they are now having very hard times but they were also the first country that was able to send help to Gaza when Israel did this last bombarding well not the last before that one and was a country that was able to send solidarity and help and to bind to other people I believe that's what we need I believe that's what partially it's happening in Spain but it's a real challenge maybe a quick second round that I insist with the people from the theater that if you don't send me a clock I will entertain the audience until now you're trying to go very quick a clock or just how much time we've left that would also be useful no but I think one way of convincing people who might not already think like like we do or like I would say all or most of people in this room do is to show them that there are concrete alternatives to managing in a humane and effective way the migration flow and there are perhaps alternative not only more moral but also more effective than bribing for instance the authoritarian leader of Turkey to try and do the dirty job instead of us so I want to get your opinion maybe starting with Utiles and then coming all the way to Fanny of what you see as concrete alternatives for the humane effective management of the situation they were currently facing in terms of refugees what does solidarity beyond borders mean in practice okay that's an easy one I think the world is complicated and of course I don't have and I don't believe in anybody having magic solution already prepared but some things are easy and that one is easy because I heard also your speech at the beginning there is no refugee crisis in reality there is crisis of democracy there is problem with capitalism what it means is that we could perfectly there is nothing that avoids us or that precludes us meaning Europe to give to everybody who wants to enter Europe at this moment to give a visa I'm speaking especially about the people coming from Syria to give a normal visa that they can come into any European country two years visa these people have money most of them that's of course the problem of the migrants that come because of economic poverty is also something I want to take into consideration but the hype now and the problem and the like the the headlines of the newspapers and where all this effort is concentrated and the policies that are xenophobic that come across these for example little parentheses I was in Poland two weeks ago in Poland they don't have immigrants but they have anti-immigration fear and crisis right that's very significant right the problem is not a real one it's a constructed one so just briefly most of these people and you I'm sure you are all aware of to come even to arrive to Lesbos and to be able to then start this pilgrimage through or be stopped on their tracks they have to pay the amount of 50 000 euros per family 70 000 euros per family and they pay that to mafias that are linked to the Turkish army and they we are allowing this to happen because with 50 000 70 000 okay you're not going to be reaching Europe but you can start something you can rent an apartment and if you have friends and you have other relatives you might be able to start or to imagine for yourself and your family a two years hoping that this war won't last longer than that and that depends also on what kind of pressure we put on our governments and I stopped because of the signals I'm raising now another time now I know what time it is now and I want to give you all the last words to speak a little bit about DM in a one-minute final slogan Christina Fanny okay about pragmatic solutions for the refugee crisis I don't have it in my pocket but of course it's solvable Austria had 160 000 refugees during the Bosnia war in 1990 and nobody was really feeling it it was not a big deal actually it must be possible it's a question of management what civil society can do actually is just not stop speaking with people and I mean as well the people that are helping that are working I mean the people that have their opinion that it should work and also actually the refugees for them it's extra hard because they are confronted with so much problem but as you said we see at those points where actually really people live the less migrants you have the more xenophobia you actually have and it's definitely possible to create a hybrid society actually it must be possible and it is possible and here really has to be made a strong investment in empowerment of people we cannot bring refugees in this role of the ever taking the poor wonder the people without dignity they have to have empowerment for their rights they have to be able to speak for themselves they have to be interwolfed in society not assimilated but interwolved and there should be really big investments because at that point when we reached that point of a kind of hybrid society I think many many of these fears that are actually rising up and that are making us building fences for whatever reason would probably decrease so I and what's also very important there is no profound asylum system and asylum is not a mercy act it's a right it's a human right I can I can only repeat a lot of what was already said but maybe to go back also to this trust of the movement and to trust themselves and the new practices people learned I think there are some solutions and alternative policies that everybody somehow learned from the migration movements also in their demands of the freedom of movement which is I think a bit more important also because you don't mean for example it's a humanitarian crisis not so much as a political produced situation which is still there still fights against this and it's not only humanitarian crisis but there are politics implemented and people are still fighting against it and also on the other hand I think we have to check out what we're doing every day life everybody who is active and on the ground if you want to say so and this also in the cities or on the ground or in the in the towns people these are the places where people arrive and where actual politics find the the common I don't know the institutional or the experimentations the common struggles they happen there and people can trust these experiences and there's a lot of sustainable experiences we can go back to and I think also the current moment also with the far right in mind but I think it's it's still promising for redefining for example citizenship from below and not from above obviously. Fania I want to start from you for a very last quick round 45 seconds each tonight it's also about launching and presenting the democracy in Europe movement in Austria what do you think DiEM as a pan-European movement can do or should do to come and be a helpful political subject in the struggle for a greater and more humane response to refugee crisis same question 45 seconds right so I mean we said a lot already and this is also the point of a populist left movement it's not only DiEM who has these discussions also in Austria obviously there is for Aufbruch which is going to happen in the beginning of June we have these discussions and we also can I think also we need a populist left why not we need these movements also on this level but still if there is no connection to the movements on the ground if there's no connection to the experiences people made through coming or fighting borders and and challenging EU policies if there's no direct connection and representation also within a populist left movement of those people who were coming and new arrivals who fought these fights and who we fight the struggles together if this is not there then obviously this is not enough this is not going to be enough so let's learn from history let's learn from also social movements from before and anti-racist struggles from before I think this we have to think about and also to connect to the fights that struggles or battles of ideas that are already happening on the ground there you can strengthen the movement as a populist left as well when you give resources to those people who are already and perhaps help them connect trans-nationally Christina even if I have only fought for five seconds I'd like to mention that I'm here as a substitute for Erich Fanninger from the Volkshilfe because he's sick we're very happy nobody nobody's stated yet but what DiEM can do actually keeping up the spirit I think the times are over that we leftists are fighting in some backyards about which is the right way of Marxism and what is the real anti-capitalistic structure and we can only have a good life if there's no more anti-capitalism it's time to thank you it's really time to act to solidarize to be tolerant against people who have maybe a little bit different positions but are mainly on the right side made up of bourgeois made up of punks whatever it doesn't matter it's time to network it's time to exchange knowledge it's time to act and it's time to have a good mood because we can never win if we are desperate that melancholy right a left wing somehow at home thank you I see there is a motivated product all right so what I think is that I would like to join this highest spirit with a preparation a preparation for a clash I mean I don't think it's going to happen without non-violence civil disobedience all right that's not to bring spirits down is to keep them up but to keep them up in a way that get prepared because I mentioned about this oxfam intermore nor oxfam international this being aware of the how the power is distributed nowadays across the world of course in Europe being aware of what huge issues I they said I'm a medical doctor and I know what's going on also in the medical industry and I don't have time now of course to go on but it's both I think we have to absolutely recover this political subjectivity who is the actor of history I've said before changes don't come from above has never happened changes for social justice of course other kind of changes yes so this is below this having the power is going breaking through the alienation that makes you think okay we have to wait for savior no saviors are below and it's all of us but also being able to prepare for something that it's not going to be easy I would just think it can happen like if we are not prepared enough that when conflicts happen and they will happen then we just weaken so no prepare for something that can be really an empowering experience something that it's our generation has to be ready to face their claim and their responsibility and prepare for that in the sense of civil disobedience don't think only through the established institutional rails this is going to be a shift and so Therese if in June they do build the wall at the brand new pass I count on you for a great transnational mobilization to say that only over our bodies they're going to seal that border in in in the forcoming future but I need to close thank you so much yes Therese Cristina Fanny for this discussion and understand we have a chorus coming on stage right now thank you as Carmen mentioned on a song by Cem Karaca a famous Turkish rock musician who after the military coup exiled to Germany like many of other leftist intellectuals and cultural workers in this song composed in 1984 he described the political conditions that awaited him as an immigrant in Germany of that time it is a song by the famous urban tour the folk singer Zordica Markovic and it describes all the hardships of the life of guest workers Castaveta which is summed up in the refer Austria Austria you cost me my life I go to the next part of the evening I would like to say a couple of words about whore 29 November the choir we've been listening all the time emerged actually in Austria 2009 in Vienna as an independent collective dedicated to the musical heritage of the anti-fascist movement in ex-Yugoslavia many years later this choir managed to become a real transnational choir they're singing songs of struggles anti-fascist struggles migrant struggles refugee struggles labor struggles in certain different languages and I'm sure you're welcome to join them if you feel jingling and you would be a part of that just because I find this sentence very very good music is one of the means that helps us cross the borders but it's also one of the means that actually would defy borders so consider not only inviting them to play with you not only participating but also organizing things like this for yourselves in your communities I'll give up to Stratko he will introduce the next table yeah so I won't speak too much because time is running out already and there is an internal joke between me and Jan is that no DM event can last less than four hours but that's there is some good news this is the reason why soon in half an hour we will have a break of half an hour outside you can find bars and you can find food as well which is organized by migrating kitchen so the same as the chorus consists of people who come from different countries and there are also some kind of immigrants the same goes for the migrating kitchen and we organize that as well I have to present the next round table I won't speak too much because the next round table will be presented by Luis Martin from Spain he used to be a journalist subject matter which is politics of fear we're joined by alexander strickner alexander is an economist she's also founder and current president of attack austria she among other things she works on the campaign against ctip and ceta and also on matters related to socio-ecological transition welcome we also are joined by christina so there's some she's a franco-italian political scientist and author she has been involved in politics for several years in fact she left the socialist party on the 8th of february and joined dm on the 9th when dm was founded she's currently a research fellow in paris and a very active dm 25 member and also we are joined by sakya salehi sakya was born in afghanistan she came to austria 11 years ago she's a political science student and she's also has just worked as a volunteer for right in refugee camps she currently works with refugee miners and also is a frequent speaker of matters of current affairs in afghanistan and her experience as a former refugee seeker we have been accustomed to politics of fear over the past several decades from the first iraq war to the west policy on war on terror since 9 11 the theme of them versus us their threatening our way of life has been quite effective in forwarding policies which have often led to conflict and the restriction of freedoms this is the case in europe today as well however here we're experiencing how extremist groups are able to efficiently use irrational fear in order to pursue the same evil goals that not many years ago we faced in europe this is largely due to two elements the european establishment in ability to tackle the union's various crises and also the extremist groups ability to connect with a growing vexed public so on this current scenario and as we heard in the previous panel aksandra what is it that is the response we know that there was a change in attitude in astria is there a response from civil society for movements is there an initiative as an alternative to what we are experiencing here yeah thanks louise um funny has already been explaining of what is happening in in austria and i think we can all agree seeing what has happened in the past months um after this moment of hope that we had in summer of so many people going out and helping that uh it's the conservative and the social democratic parties that are doing the job of the far right and that their approach and their answers have become hegemonic and um what we need to do is and i would say that right now only a few weeks before the presidential the second round of presidential elections i would even say that um at least i could say it for me um that fear has become even more generalized because i think fear we all fear to some extent something and we fear different things i do fear that we will soon have probably a president that comes from the far right of which we have not an idea of what he will do after that so in that sense i think it's really important that we start to to um move ourselves and uh to do something and funny has been already saying in a very short and quick moment of something that is uh about to happen of what people from the left emancipatory people people looking for emancipatory answers have started to work on it's an initiative that is called aufbruch in german in departure perhaps as one attempt to try and say an english word for that and it's a first step it will happen on the third and the fourth of june in vienna i have brought several of these flyers that you can find also outside and otherwise if they are not there anymore when you go out you can find the information under aufbruch.or.at um and it's a first moment where we will meet and the idea is to start to get together and to start to say we don't want to accept that things are going this way we want to start work together and develop an alternative develop an answer to what is happening and i think the first step that we need to do and that's where we can learn from the movements in spain and in greece for instance is that we need to start giving answers to start organizing ourselves at the very local level and to do that also recognizing that people in in many people in austria as it was said also before but because of austerity policies because of globalization because of this capitalist economy that we have um are increasingly confronted with either unemployment with precarious jobs with fears for the future with fears for the future of their children um and we need to create that space to get a bringing in these people giving answers to them as well as bringing in people that come to austria because they are also seeking uh they are seeking a secure place for their lives and i think that's the first moment and i really invite you all uh to to come and join us or to think uh if you cannot come in that moment to join this movement in the future because if we are capable to give a different answer it is us all together that have to start and do that in line with what um alexander has been saying what can you tell us about how refugees are getting organized self-organized and their relation with other movements domestic movements well as we all know um starting a new life in a completely new country is the hardest thing and um people all um a lot um people always feel um lost um because they don't know the language they don't know anything uh there is a huge lake of information uh for example they don't even know how to um send their children to school because um they don't have the information they need and lots of um and there are a lot of volunteers um and also people for example from syria or from um afghanistan who speak the language of the refugees try to help these people try to make things easier for them for example giving them information in their language um uh from the beginning and um providing them for example um language classes and these are things that um help these people um starting their new life life um christina going back directly to fear mongering earlier this year david kameron warned that calais could become a magnet for migrants this is this message that basically opened doors policy is asking for trouble did it strike a court in france and obviously tell us a little bit what's happening today in in calais yes words like that uh are poison are poison for us in in france uh you know in france we have the le pen family we have three generations of le pen and so when we try to imitate extreme right day when we lost so we have the same problem with our government when you use uh the same narrative of uh extreme rights parties or nationalist parties and uh you use fear against your citizen uh it's it's it's a real problem for for us i visited calais uh calais is called the jungle for me it it's something worse than a jungle i visited also the official camp the northern part of the calais camp and i think it's it's something like dante inferno uh it's it's something uh you can imagine uh i was i was really really shocked and uh and scared about it because um i want to share something with you tonight uh we have in calais 400 children who are alone without parents without family and now our british friends are saying that uh a hundred of them have family in uk so it's easy they could join our family in calais but uk said it's impossible they have to wait children have to wait nine ten months just to have an answer not even a good answer just to have an answer so calais is dante inferno now and uh and our politicians don't act for for change the situation well evidently mass media has its role in the spreading of fear mongering and politics of fear the dissemination of of of these messages is very effective but also through social media i mean the hashtag rape fugies was horrible wrong but highly effective so sakya we're not we're not only dealing here with with disinformation but also the optics perception the reinforcement of prejudice what's your experience your personal experience in in fronting those attacks well there are lots of prejudices for example um and politics on the whole or or politics of fear often um helps uh help to um to focus on these prejudices for example refugees don't want to um work they are lazy they don't they don't want to integrate but these are not the facts for example you you shouldn't just focus on the situation at the moment well the new refugees only but you have also to look at refugees who are here for i don't know maybe for six seven or ten years you can see the transformation they do have integrated themselves in the society they do work they are not here just to um because of the social benefits and that that's that's a fact there are lots of people from other countries who live here just like austrians and it's it's really sad seeing how politics um do or media for example only focus on these perceptions in spain christina coverage of the refugee crisis is a little bit different thus far it is benign actually it's very critical of our government and of the european unions institutions handling of the crisis of course we don't have extreme right movements yet or political forces and geography puts a distance how is it so in france however in france it's uh it is a little bit different we have a problem with uh traditional media uh mass media uh we have some exceptions like media parts uh are free media but uh traditional media follow the government communications so they are not really friendly about the problem of refugees they dehumanize they uh they explain that it is a problem they explain that we are in a bad war they explain every day that refugees can be possibly terrorist and when you have this kind of message every day it's it's a real politic of fear so so we have a huge problem with traditional media alexander what cues do we need to take from other countries and other movements that you mentioned before to really in front of the situation yeah i think particularly also against the fact that media is working in that way and we have little control in most cases of that i think what what we can learn or what at least i think from the spanish and the greek experience we can learn is that um we need to create spaces uh where we can meet um in spain for instance you had first uh the plaza the soul movement but then people didn't once they have left the square it was not that people stopped meeting it was moving into into the quarters people continue to meet and i think the question is where can we counter what is said in the media where do we have the possibilities to create a space to to have a different narrative to also um have moments where people can meet face to face and not only read something over media um and i think that's an experience um that we need to draw on how do we create that and i think there we come back to the fact that we need to start organizing we need to start to get organized to to have moments in places where people can meet and start talking about what is happening because yeah when you read every day or every week about refugees or about uh we talked with zackia before uh about uh violence against women then people start to feel uh at some stage this this insecurity and where do they go where can they have a different story and i think that's one of the the big things i think that we we we need to start creating to have um uh as a first step that is in our hands because we will not so quickly have other mass mass media in our hands and i think what is important in my view at least what i learned from the spanish case is creating these spaces means also to have the possibility to to get a different understanding of what is happening to us to to not buy more into the narrative of everything i mean that that the refugees and migrants are the root cause but that it has to do with the capitalist society how how economy is organized and they're also to start build the alternatives so in spain you can see and also in greece that from below there is coming a very vibrant uh dynamic of people thinking in in terms of economic alternatives how to organize things differently how to deal with the housing problem how to relocalize the economy how to strengthen local um local economies and i think that's something that also gives hope that also gives concrete steps that you can move forward and therefore i think that is one one key element that um that we should um pick up and and and uh uh use uh in in our in the case of austria but also in general i think in countries where we have that situation so uh politics of fear fear mongering media connected with freedom of expression essentially as a response as an antidote um christina when we and this question goes to saki as well christina when we when we say charlie abdo we immediately conjure up appreciation for freedom of expression then again we have a response similar to what alexander was commenting on nadibu and how that movement that taking to the streets to discuss to debate to talk has been received both by the media and by the establishment and so for you and and and for you too saki freedom of expression is the oxygen uh for movements for manifestations for fighting uh fear mongering tell us what's happening in that arena is is is a beloved freedom of friendship freedom of expression still the antidote and in in in the context of today and no other being an example yes now in paris we have a new agora we have a place to discuss uh to fight about to fight against uh mass media against uh the the difficulty we have uh to to to have a place to to discuss in uh in france and in paris new debu uh has given a voice back uh to those who decided to remain silent so uh it is now uh a real uh possibility uh to have a discussion with young people with students uh with uh women and uh and it's uh it's important for us we have also uh traditional uh movements and traditional manifestations with trade unions but we have also a problem uh with polis in uh in in france young people uh it's very difficult to understand we have helicopters who are spreading gas in paris we are not in beirut we are in the in the country of the human rights uh we wrote a declaration and now uh we don't remember the context of this this declaration uh but new debu it's it's fresh air for us i need to ask saki the clock is ticking but let's not pay attention for it for a minute oxygen ignore it uh freedom of expression the oxygen for activism uh is it being used is it is it a battleground for you and for you know refugees activists oh well um freedom of speech is a basic human right and um i think we shouldn't allow anyone to tell us what we are supposed to say and what we are not supposed to say sometimes i feel like sometimes i don't dare to say things or my opinion but in but then i think and then there is this this thing that tells me that you can say everything you want and i can tell an example for i i once uh took um took part in a workshop and uh we were talking about the reasons why the why refugees leave their country and we were criticizing the iranian regime for example and we had to uh present our workshop in front of lots of people and there were also um supporters of that regime and in that moment i was torn between should i say my my opinion or not but then i i i decided to say and to criticize um that regime and i think that's very important thank you very much well so is it working yes so we have good news we have only 10 minutes uh till the break so i ask you if you don't have to leave now stay for us for the next 10 minutes uh we will have another song performed by by the horus and then after that we will watch a short art video by danai strattu uh made together with yanis varufakis and he will she will explain it later after the horus uh but first the the the horus will explain the next song uh you don't have a mic yeah it's it's on i think so uh our next song is called a us good look it's a song by soulfully van elli it's he's a famous turkish poet composer and activist imprisoned for his political views during this 1970s he left turkey in 1972 and lived in exile until 1984 the song whose title translates as freedom is based on the famous poem of the same name by paul elwar and is still sung at many protests and demonstrations throughout turkey thank you thanks a lot we just have an hour more than we used to do not so much i know but it's very good yes i think the whole event is better than rome i think prestige yeah yeah yeah this is more relaxed i think yes or not i like this who will present the video which you will see and then afterwards we have a half an hour break you can have drinks cigarettes and food and we ask you to come back because in the next part of the evening we will have two round tables with katia keeping with saski assassin with sandro medzadra with janis barufakis and others and also we have a little surprise for you at the beginning of the next round so i leave the floor to deny to present the video and thanks for being with us thank you stretch i promise you this is the last thing that is happening for this session it will only take about eight minutes if you have the patience to see it what you all don't know i'm sure because we have not said it is that seven dividing walls is what brought janis and me together 10 years ago we traveled together in 10 different dividing walls around the planet the result was two art installations and one took the form of photography and text by janis photography by the other is a video that you will watch now here presented for one screen especially for this meeting usually it's an installation i let you to enjoy it and we talk later thank you thanks