Support grows for student anti-war coalition

BY EMMA
CLANCY

Students from hundreds of high schools around Australia are set to
participate in the March 5 student strike against the impending US war
against Iraq. They will be joined by large numbers of college and university
students, in the first nationally coordinated youth-initiated action against
the war on Iraq.

The process of building the strike has facilitated the closer collaboration
of different student groups united in their opposition to war, but more
significantly, has given high school students a project around which to
form anti-war collectives on their schools. There are more and more of
these springing up every day, in regional areas as well as the major cities.

Coming out of March 5, student anti-war activists are hoping to launch
a national anti-war coalition of students and young people, that will be
able to attract and involve all the different student groups and individuals
that are opposed to the war, and allow activists to organise and communicate
more efficiently on a national level.

High school students organising the March 5 strike on Riverside Girls
School in Sydney have told Green Left Weekly that being part of
such a national coalition would make it easier for them to organise against
the war on their school.

“Everyone's really enthusiastic about the strike on our school and they're
all helping to put up posters and hand out leaflets for March 5”, said
Amanda Lloyd-Tait. “I think that being part of a national group would get
these people more involved and would mean we've got something to do after
March 5. It would give us more resources too, for building the next protests,
like posters and other things to get information out to other people.”

Elizabeth Highton-Williamson agrees: “It would mean we're better able
to build the next demonstrations, have more contact with people on other
schools, communicate better about what to do next. It'd also be good because
students on our school would realise that it's not just us who are against
the war, we're part of something much bigger.”

Both students believe it would not only benefit them in organising locally,
but be a step forward for the anti-war movement as a whole. “It would send
a message to the prime minister that just cause we're too young to vote
doesn't mean we don't have an opinion”, said Lloyd-Tait. “Getting more
organised like this will mean we've got a better chance of being listened
to, when people realise that we're not just going to show up to a rally
every now and then, that we're deadly serious about stopping this war,
and we're going to take responsibility for the movement ourselves, and
organise other people.”

Simon Cunich from the Illawarra Grammar School believes that a national
coalition of students is the obvious next step for young people in the
anti-war campaign. The anti-war group on his school is already networking
with students from other schools, and is part of the Social Action Network
— a coalition of social justice student groups all around the Illawarra
region.

Cunich told GLW: “We can see the benefits that networking and
collaborating with other people have by being part of the Social Action
Network. It means there are more resources and ideas to pool, and that
whatever action you take, it will be more effective because there are more
people involved. And this is only collaboration on a relatively small scale.
Imagine the impact we could have if every young person in Australia who
is opposed to the war — and that's the majority of young people — could
get together and organise on a national scale. It would be massive; think
of what we could do!”

The idea of a student strike on March 5 was first raised by student
anti-war activists in the United States. They have already formed a broad
alliance of student groups, called the National Youth and Student Peace
Coalition, and it involves organisations such as the US Muslim Students
Association, the Student Environment Action Collective and the Black Radical
Congress, as well as many local high school and campus anti-war collectives.

The basis for a student coalition against war in Australia exists already,
in the form of student associations on campus and anti-war collectives
on schools, TAFEs and campuses. Further collaboration by these anti-war
groups to build another national student anti-war protest after March 5
could help consolidate the links already established between these groups.

National Union of Students (NUS) education officer Liz Thompson supports
the idea of a national anti-war coalition of students as the next step
in organising young people against the war. “The basis for such a coalition
is obviously there”, Thompson said. “It's been built from the ground up,
all the high school and campus peace groups that are emerging all over
the place, and launching this organisation will mean we have the means
to put forward our own agenda, to maintain the pressure on the government
and to build a sustained mass movement against the war.

“It means we don't have to wait around for rallies to be called — we'll
be enough of a force to initiate them ourselves.

“NUS would, of course, back this coalition and engage with it, and see
it as a really useful and positive way to build the anti-war movement among
young people.”

Sydney University student Simon Butler says he has been amazed over
the last few weeks by the explosion of student activism he has seen among
high school students. “It's been nothing short of inspiring. The outrage
that people are feeling in response to Howard's war drive is no longer
something passive; people all around the country feel confident after the
huge mid-February demonstrations that people power can stop this war, and
high school students are leading the way in terms of grassroots organising.”

Butler, who is also the organiser of the Sydney branch of the socialist
youth organisation Resistance, argues that the campus student anti-war
groups in each city need to link up with the high school anti-war collectives
as a first step toward forming a national student anti-war coalition.

“The March 5 strike and rallies will be the perfect opportunity to do
this”, Butler said. “Such a body — an open, politically non-exclusionary,
national activists' coalition — will provide the means to transform the
campuses and schools into anti-war organising centres, reaching out to,
and drawing into political action, the broader community. That's the way
we can stop this war.”

From Green Left Weekly, March 5, 2003.

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From GLW issue 528