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Example research essay topic: Rank And File Afl Cio - 2,564 words

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... "arrest" groups arrived earlier than the "non-arrest" groups which were supposed to protect them from removal by the police. The news photographs of these initial "lock-down" groups have a surrealistic air to them. In the empty streets after dawn, groups of protesters lock themselves together with bicycle locks or tubes covering their linked arms to prevent police from removing them individually. King County Sheriff Dave Reichert says he got a telephone call at 8 AM from a county detective. "He said, 'Sheriff, we " re trapped...

We have no backup, ' " Reichert claimed. "I had officers barricaded in the hotel with a mob literally pounding on the glass, and there was nobody to help them. Nobody. " Reichert wasn't on the scene, but already he was seeing "mobs. " KIRO- 7 television crews were at the same location and show lines of grinning demonstrators holding hands and blocking the street -- no "mob literally pounding on the glass. " Sheriff Reichert was the first self-inflicted casualty of the intelligence failure. In the blame storm of controversy which erupted after the protests, Reichert was the head cheerleader among the hardliners who condemned the Seattle Police's "lack of preparedness. " The Seattle Police were prepared for non-violent demonstrations and their only failure of strategic intelligence was misjudging the size of the crowds. Nobody could be prepared for the fantasies of the FBI and the Sheriff.

There were no "terrorists" behind the demonstrations, no "mobs, " no "violent protesters. " The police need to fantasize violence on the part of the protesters was a projection of their own desire for violence. This fundamental disconnect between reality and fantasy continually crippled the police strategy and rendered it ineffective. Theory of the three waves The Direct Action Network planned more effectively, and in the end more realistically, with a "Peoples Convergence" consisting of three waves of blockaders enclosing the WTO conference site: The first wave consisted of "affinity groups" who had opted for non-violent civil disobedience and arrest. Their job was to penetrate the area close to the conference site, seize the dozen strategic intersections which controlled movement in the protest target and hang on until reinforcements arrived. In the second wave were protesters who had opted for non-violent demonstration and not being arrested.

Their task was to protect the first wave from police violence and plug up the streets by sheer numbers and passive resistance. The third wave was a march by the People's Assembly, composed mostly of environmental and human rights groups who elected to participated in the street protests instead of the labor parade. This group entered downtown from the south at about 1 PM and marched to the Paramount Theatre inside the protest zone. The three-layered intersection blockade. Seated in the center are the "lock-down" protesters who form the "arrest" faction of their Direct Action Network affinity group (Tinted red in photo inset). They are cuffed together with heavy tubes covering their arms.

Standing around them are the "non-arrest" members of the affinity group -- whose task is to protect the "lock-down" group from police violence (tinted green) In the background, the third layer of "spectator / participant " protesters can be seen. The first and second waves were loosely organized into a dozen simultaneously converging affinity groups, swarming the protest target from all directions. Each affinity group blockaded a specific intersection. The blockade would be maintained as long as possible until police had arrested sufficient demonstrators to regain control of the streets. The direct point of contact between the Direct Action Network and the WTO was the Seattle Police Department (SPD).

Under the leadership of Chief Norm Stamper, the SPD has become a national laboratory for a progressive philosophy of law enforcement known as "community policing. " Recently, the relations between the police and Mayor Schell's administration have not been good. One of the outcomes of Chief Stamper's community policing initiative has been the formation of a police accountability organization which reports separately to the Chief and the City Council through two separate boards. The road to community policing has been rocky, particularly in light of the resistance from rank and file cops. Add to that the heightened tensions because of contract negotiations between the City and the police union. The total size of the Seattle Police Department is roughly 1, 800 officers, of whom about 850 are available for street duty throughout the city. Of these, 400 were assigned to the WTO demonstrations.

Seattle has about the same ratio of police to population as Chicago, but Seattle's smaller size limited in the number of officers it could field against the protesters -- unless, of course, the SPD entered into some sort of joint WTO operation with other police agencies in the region. By Wednesday, the second day of the protests, more than 500 state and regional police, plus some 200 National Guard would be deployed. The largest two outside police forces available to Seattle are the King County Sheriff's department and the Washington State Patrol. Sheriff Dave Reichert is a conservative Republican and political foe of Mayor Schell. This reflects the long-standing division between Seattle and the King County government. The suburban fringe surrounding Seattle is the traditional political battleground in which statewide elections are fought, with the outlying areas going to the Republicans, the heavily urbanized areas going to the Democrats and the suburbs swinging back and forth between the two.

The State Patrol chief is responsible to Gov. Gary Locke, a nominal Democrat who rose to the governorship through the King County Council. The governor also controls the National Guard, although these forces can't be committed to street action without the declaration of a state of emergency by the governor and the request of the mayor. Neither the King County police nor the State Patrol are supporters of community policing policies, which meant that outside assistance would entail Chief Stamper presiding over a joint command divided by fundamental policy differences. Mayor Schell decided that he and Chief Stamper would deal with the demonstrations without the direct support of other law enforcement agencies. Most critics have claimed that this decision was the reason the protests succeeded.

There are strong reasons to believe that this is not so, and that the Tuesday protests would have succeeded in attaining their goals (though in a less spectacular fashion) even if the police presence had included the outside agencies. One of the considerations which weighed against the employment of outside police was the strong possibility that they would attack city residents, as indeed happened on Wednesday night. First Skirmishes Though the police didn't realize it, the Direct Action Network had already swarmed them By 8 AM, most of the key intersections had been seized by the protesters, now reinforced by their second wave. Meanwhile, at the Memorial Stadium at the Seattle Center, the gates are opening for the AFL-CIO rally, which is scheduled to begin at 10 AM.

Chartered busses from around the region have been on the road for some time, carrying a mixture of union members and protesters to Seattle. The AFL-CIO had done a mass mailing throughout Washington State, sending tasteful green postcards to non-union supporters of a variety of liberal and progressive organizations. "Join the March of the Century, " the cards read. The AFL-CIO strategy of parading without protesting dovetailed neatly with the city plans for a minuscule protest and a media genic parade. As the number of protesters increased, the 400 police remained in their lines around the Convention Center or at their positions at the Memorial Stadium. The slow infiltration of demonstrators made it difficult for the police to gauge the intentions of the crowd.

Though the police didn't realize it, the Direct Action Network had already swarmed them and now shifting to a defensive strategy of holding on to the streets that they now controlled. The flimsy rope and netting barriers, the "tripwire" at the Paramount Theatre, went down as protesters walked towards the line of city busses next to the theater. The busses were a second line of defense, separating the police from the crowd. The Direct Action Network's goal was sufficiently broad to join together two major WTO opponents. The Direct Action Network protesters clustered around the international network of non-governmental organizations devoted to extending the principles of liberal democracy.

The DAN factions can be distinguished by their varying focus on environmental or human rights issues. The second major WTO opponent was American organized labor, the AFL-CIO. In contrast to the Direct Action Network, the AFL-CIO is a hierarchical institution which emphasizes top-down command. There is little participation by rank and file in union decision-making, though ceremonial elections are sometimes held to legitimize leadership decisions. Essentially nationalist in outlook, the AFL-CIO policy goals are directed more at American politics and less at international issues. Simply stated, the AFL-CIO's strategic target was supporting and legitimizing President Clinton's actions at the conference through purely symbolic displays.

As discussed later, Clinton acknowledged that there was considerable coordination between his administration and the AFL-CIO in regards to the parade and protests. Overall, the advantage went to the Direct Action Network, since their informational strategy effectively enclosed the coordinated strategy of the AFL-CIO and the federal government. As will be seen, at the critical moment in the street actions, the balance shifted to the Direct Action Network as non-union protesters and a few union members left the AFL-CIO parade and joined the street protests, effectively sealing the success of the Direct Action Network's day-long blockade. The Police Battle Themselves Though the police didn't realize it, the protester's plan had shut down the WTO.

The competing strategies of the Direct Action Network and the AFL-CIO put the police in the classically disastrous position of dividing their forces and inviting defeat in detail. The AFL-CIO rally and parade was planned in conjunction with the police, and although it would not require much more in the way of security than any other parade, it still demanded adequate coverage both for the rally and along the parade route. The security requirements at the WTO conference site were subject to considerably more uncertainty. The DAN organizers had participated in lengthy negotiations with the police and had made their blockade strategy known, at least in general outline.

DAN had repeatedly and publicly stated that their goal was to "shut down the WTO. " Mayor Schell and Chief Stamper were faced with the difficult decision of allocating forces against two different opponents using markedly different strategies. By 9: 10 AM, "crowd-control efforts were encountering difficulty, " according to Washington State Patrol Chief Sandberg. She placed troopers throughout Western Washington on alert. The day was barely started and the police plan was already beginning to break down. The Secret Service, responsible for the security of federal and visiting government officials, discovered that the streets between the Convention Center, the adjacent hotels and the Paramount Theater -- a distance of up to five blocks along some routes -- were closed by protesters. "It hadn't taken long for things not to be working very well. " said Ronald Legal, the special agent in charge of the Seattle office of the Secret Service. Though the police didn't realize it, the Direct Action Network plan had achieved its goal -- they had blockaded the streets and shut down the WTO.

According to the agreed-upon script, the police would now arrest the protesters. Unfortunately, the protesters had been so successful at blockading the area around the convention center that police couldn't move. It makes no sense to arrest someone if you can't remove them from the area. SPD Capt. Jim Page, who commanded the force in the streets, later said he had too few officers to make mass arrests.

The next phase of the protest plan was to hang on to the streets as long as possible. Since the police remained stationary for the most part, other than slowly moving single vehicles through the crowds, there was little for the protesters to do but enjoy themselves with chants, singing and drumming. The overall mood was festive, rather than hostile. The protesters had won, though it was too early for anyone to know that for sure. Until several hours after dark, the Direct Action Network would control all movement in triangle of streets under blockade. Strategic surprise doesn't occur in the field, so much as in the mind of the opponent.

The longer it's delayed, the more complete its effects. In the case of Mayor Schell, the surprise and disbelief would dominate his actions until late afternoon. By 9: 30 AM, the police command post was being inundated by reports from the streets that control of the situation -- meaning the ability to move police and delegates through the streets -- had been lost. The divisions between the rival commanders began to widen as the morning wore on. "This was not an integrated command structure, " King County Sheriff Dave Reichert said. "While everybody was at the table, it was made clear that the rest of us were relegated to supporting roles.

Seattle was running the show. " The criminal element in the Seattle Police There was a wild card in the police pack: The segment of the Seattle Police Department which actively sought to disrupt the chain of command and force the initial confrontation with demonstrators into chaos. To put it bluntly, these officers comprise the faction within the police department which has been most threatened by Chief Stamper's reforms -- the criminal element. "Organized crime is the continuation of business by criminal means, " says Dr. Phil Williams, international expert on organized crime. And criminal business, just like legitimate business, requires the active support and participation of law enforcement. In the late 1960 's and early 1970 's, Seattle went through a series of scandals involving organized crime and police corruption. The popular view of organized crime as an "underworld" operation, totally divorced from everyday business and politics was seriously challenged by the work of William J.

Chamblis, a sociologist at the University of Washington. Chamblis's tudy of organized crime in Seattle, On the Take: From Petty Crooks to Presidents showed that "crime is not a by-product of an otherwise effectively working political economy, it a main product of that economy. Crime is in fact a cornerstone on which the political and economic relations of societies are constructed. " Rather than a "few bad apples, " corruption is the normal state of affairs. Chamblis' work and other research on shows that "organized crime really consists of a coalition of politicians, law-enforcement people, businessmen, union leaders and (in some ways least important of all) racketeers. " Seattle's police history has been as colorfully sordid as any other American city's. The criminal economy of drugs, prostitution, gambling, and the financial apparatus which such large-scale businesses require is no different in Seattle than elsewhere. From Seattle's beginnings around the "Skid Road" leading at the Denny sawmill to the current flap over police "misconduct, " police morale has been a reliable indicator of the level of corruption.

Recently, morale has been low, which means that the crooked cops have been on the defensive. The focus of the criminal element's displeasure has been Chief Stamper and his Senior Leadership Team -- or as the department's rank and file pronounce it, the "sluts. " The criminal e...


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