Who are the anti-globalization protestors, and what do they want from us?
Eloy L. Nuñez, PhD. Saint Leo University
A strange thing happened to me on the airplane back from Cancun, Mexico to Miami, Florida. I noticed
several seats in front of me and a few others several aisles away, some of the very same protestors that
I had seen at the World Trade Organization (WTO) riots in Cancun City just a few days before. The year
was 2003, and my bosses at Miami-Dade Police Department (MDPD) had sent me and three other
lieutenants to Cancun to observe the anticipated civil disturbances associated with the WTO
Conference. We had read the after action reports from the 1999 Seattle WTO riot, and the later ones in
Quebec City, Genoa, Washington D.C., and New York City, but it was important that we come see one of
these up close for ourselves.
At MDPD, we had spent the better part of a year preparing for the Free Trade Area of the Americas
(FTAA) Conference that was to be held in Downtown Miami in November of 2003. As one of the core
planners for the event, I was deeply involved in every aspect of the planning for the event. We had just
witnessed five days of rioting and a South Korean protestor stab himself to death less than thirty feet
from us. I had so many stories to tell, and pictures to show, that I couldn’t wait for the plane to land in
Miami International Airport. But even as I rode on the flight back from Cancun, it was clear to me that
the story was not yet over. It was just about to get started.
From where I was seated on the plane, I couldn’t help but overhear some of the conversations between
the protestors who were also traveling from Cancun to Miami, just like me and the three other
lieutenants. I heard one of the protestors… a male in his mid twenties ask the other, “