One Week to Change the World: An Oral History of the 1999 WTO Protests

by D.W. Gibson

The bestselling author of Dispatches from Pluto and The Deepest South of All turns his sharp wit and observational powers on the epicenter of America’s most divisive Arizona.

One week in late 1999, more than 50,000 people converged on Seattle. Their to shut down the World Trade Organization conference and send a message that working-class people would not quietly accept the runaway economic globalization that threatened their livelihoods. Though their mission succeeded, it was not without blowback. Violent confrontations between police and protestors resulted in hundreds of arrests and millions of dollars in property damage. But the images of tear gas and smashed windows that flashed across TVs and newspapers were not an accurate representation of what actually happened that week.

In the oral history One Week to Change the World , award-winning journalist DW Gibson pieces together a complex and compelling account of what really went down in Seattle, immersing you in the angst that defined the end of a millennium, complete with fight clubs and Y2K doomsday scenarios. In more than 100 original interviews with protestors, police, politicians, anarchists, artists, activists, union members, and many others, Gibson reconstructs the events in gripping detail; documents its antecedents and aftermath; and shows how so many of its themes remain just as pressing today, including the vitalness and difficulty of grassroots activism, the aspirations and limitations of globalization, the militarization of policing, the sensationalism of the media, and the undeniable power of the people.

Timed to the 25th anniversary of the protests, this book is a page-turning drama, an essential history, and a practical handbook for how to make one’s voice heard.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, Audiobook

368 pages, Paperback

Published June 18, 2024

About the author

DW Gibson is the author of Not Working and The Edge Becomes the Center: An Oral History of Gentrification in the Twenty-First Century. He has written for The New York Times, The New York Observer, The Daily Beast, BOMB, and Tin House, and worked on documentaries for MSNBC and A&E®. The executive director of the international writers residency Writers Omi at Ledig House, he lives in New York City with his wife and their daughter.

Reviews

[Jacob Wren · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Each affinity group varied in size, maybe ten to twenty people on average. Each group was made up of people who were committed to staying together, looking out for each other – it’s a group of people who establish high relational trust before they go protest together. It has a couple of functions. One, you do your best to always stick with those people; you’re not alone in a crowd, which can be really scary and, in some cases, dangerous. Usually, affinity groups will negotiate before they protest and find alignment about what kind of experience they are hoping to have. An affinity group might be like, “We are all planning to bring our children, snacks, water bottles and if it gets crazy, we’re all out right away.” Another affinity group might say, “We’re open to getting arrested today. If that happens, we’ve got someone at home, we all have that phone number on our arms and we have a plan so that if we end up in jail, we can communicate that to people we care about. We have time off from our jobs figured out in advance.” Another affinity group might say, “We are planning to lock out necks to this bridge with a bike lock and we are not leaving until they saw it off.” Within the affinity group, depending on what you’re planning to do, there are really specific roles. There will be one person responsible for keeping an eye on health and safety for the group. Someone will talk to the media.”
– Nina Narelle (as quoted in One Week to Change the World: An Oral History of the 1999 WTO Protests by DW Gibson)

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is inspiring to see what groups of committed individuals (even without any formal leadership and with very limited finances) can accomplish in the face of the world’s most powerful corporations and governments. It is also heartbreaking to see the abuse and loss suffered by good people, the ruination caused by the few who refused to abide by non-violent principles and ruined it for everyone else, and the ground lost in recent years as life moved out of the streets and into social networks.

I was surprised and delighted to find the writer (more of an editor?) comprised this entire book of quotes from the people involved in the “Battle for Seattle.” No editorial comments, no explanations, simply quotes with names. It really works! (If you’ve ever watched “Gates of Heaven” by Errol Morris, you know how riveting a series of unvarnished quotes by laypersons can be, in weaving a tale). The narrative is masterfully complete and it flows like a novel. The mix of voices (and voice actors, if you do the audiobook) keeps it fresh and lively from start to finish.

And the characters truly are a revelation. True bravery (getting tear gassed and dragged out of trees etc), commitment (at the cost of jail, pain, shame, loss), humility (refusing to accept credit, consistently pointing to others), they remain both interested and interesting (aware of global forces at work, learning how they work, and studying to learn techniques and strategies to respond).

[Charles F Lowther · Rating 5 out of 5]

amazing narrative using interviews to tell the story. changing voices every paragraph.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather well-done oral history. One might wonder what else we have to learn about the WTO protests in 1999 after endless books and articles have been written about it. The answer is: quite a bit. Gibson does a good job of interviewing a wide array of actors from protesters to cops to council people, providing a mosaic view regarding this specific moment in time. Unlike many oral histories that often are muddled in a series of repetitions among a rather loose narrative structure, Gibson provides slivers of interviews to build off each other and develop the momentum of the book. By organizing each chapter to a day of the protest, Gibson provides a rather clear progression that led up to the protests and their unfolding almost as if witnessing it live once again.

Perhaps most fascinating is the attention to detail the book provides in regards to preparation for the protests and the unique combination of groups that made it possible. The book excels when recalling the processes that made these protests successful in shutting down the WTO. It was not only a wide array of groups like Direct Action Network, Ruckus Society, and many others that well-coordinated their efforts, but also a massive systemic failure of the city to take the enormity of the protests as a serious threat. Norm Stamper, Seattle chief-of-police, paints himself as a reluctant cop who more identified with the protesters than the cops. Perhaps. But we learn all the efforts it took to pull such a momentous achievement off (and get it under control from the cop's side).

The final section of the book, "After," is perhaps its weakest part where people momentarily reflect on the limitations of the protests and their inheritances. Briefly mentioned is the general "whiteness" of the protests in terms of lack of racial diversity and similarly the lack of organizing off of such protest due to an alleged hostility towards hierarchical organizing. Both are very thin analyses, investigated by others elsewhere better. Likewise, some interviewees suggest how Occupy Wall Street owes a debt to the WTO protests, which is true to an extent but fails to account for Occupy's uniqueness as well and its specific historical coordinates. This section, at moments, sounds like a bunch of Generation Xers caught in a moment of time without any real analysis of its deeper meanings or relations to contemporary social protests. One interviewee suggests, "I think there's a lot of ageism today; people don't want to listen to the old folk." This overlooks who exactly doesn't want to listen and who does. It paints all contemporary movements as the same, and it doesn't really offer a sense of inter-generational tensions, for good and bad. I have dealt with this quite a bit in my own work-- the tension between learning from the past but not being dictated by it, and elders sometimes not attempting to keep abreast with what is going on in the present moment as well. However, with this said, there are instances of different generations of protesters relaying of strategies, tactics and guidance occurring with each other from time to time. The problems, sometimes, is we remain unaware of these longer histories. Is it done enough? Maybe not. But blame can be cast on both sides for that.

This book is rather good in its overall presentation of the protests regardless if you were a part of them or know nothing at all. I learned quite a bit of new information from them-- like the complications of the banner hang that initiated the protests-- that I truly appreciate.

[Brenton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought a copy of this book at a panel discussion about it and the WTO Protests.

Overall I enjoyed reading this. Despite living in Seattle for going on ten years, I never learned very much about the 1999 protests. It was really interesting to learn about just how much planning and organizing went into the event, and just how poorly the city planned for it. Hearing from a range of different participants in their words - from the variety of different protesters to members of government and law enforcement to participants in the WTO itself - was really interesting and rich in detail.

Some of the drawbacks of an oral history framework are the difficulty of forming a cohesive narrative and getting a clear understanding of the events that actually occurred. I think Gibson did a decent job at weaving the various quotes together into a narrative, but it's still difficult to follow the full thread, especially when there are so few natural/obvious breaks. And lacking a good understanding of the events as I did, it is difficult to get a good sense objectively of what actually happened during the protests. In many cases people's direct observations and recollections directly conflict, so a reader is left to judge which people they find more trustworthy.

So I would recommend this if you're interested in hearing more about the WTO protests, particularly about the lead-up. You might want to have at least a basic foundation understanding of the events beforehand just to help keep things straight, though.

[Hilary Fiorentino · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed learning about a part of history I've never heard of before and the aspects of organized protesting. It was interesting to see how people of different backgrounds and interests came together against the WTO and worked both the "inside" and "outside" of the meeting. I know this is supposed to be an oral history, but the writing style made it hard for me to follow. The chaos of the writing definitely reflected the chaos of the events taking place that week. Pretty quickly I lost sight of the individual voices and referring to the list of names in the back became cumbersome. I resigned myself to only absorbing as much as I can and letting little details go. Overall an interesting and worthwhile read if you can get past the format.

[Kemp · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think this is an important topic, especially in light of today’s political environment with rejections of free trade. Unfortunately, this book really makes it hard to shed light on the subject.

I was concerned when I started the audiobook and say the introduction was over four hours in length. But I preserved…for a while. The book isn’t really a book. Nor a story. It’s a collection of recollection and interviews of the myriad of participants.

I jumped to the first of four chapters for the actual protests but the interviews continued. This doesn’t work for me. I need a book written with more thought, imagination, and analysis.

[Wonderkid · Rating 5 out of 5]

I initially picked up this book for its cover but bought it because somehow, this huge (and successful) protest wasn't on my radar 25 years ago when it originally occurred. I wish reading about history was always this interesting. It's actually a fascinating story of how numerous activist groups - that might not seem philosophically aligned - coordinated their efforts to temporarily block a meeting of the World trade Organization. In our current, politically divided, landscape we could all take a page from this book and see how far we could get with some cooperation.

[C McC · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't know what to expect and I got so much more out of this than I ever thought. Let me preface that I listened to the audiobook, which I think added to the experience. It goes into so much detail. While it can be hard to keep everyone and everything straight, it gives the chaotic ambiance analogous to the subject matter itself. Hidden gem

[Crista Huff · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a political activist who has worked on trade issues, I loved reading the history of the Battle in Seattle. Very well done!

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting.

[Sofia Cimballa · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Lee Bob Black · Rating 5 out of 5]

Power and protest: voices from the frontlines!

On one side, the “Battle of Seattle” involved labor unions, environmental activists, and farmers. On the other side, there were business and industry leaders, politicians, economists, and law enforcement.

In this dizzyingly stunning book, DW Gibson gets the perspectives of individuals from each of these groups. He talks with everyone from disrupters to protectors, from revolutionaries to conservatives, from anti-globalists to globalists.

What were they fighting for? What were they against?

In their own words, One Week to Change the World: An Oral History of the 1999 WTO Protests captures the raw emotions, diverse views, and intense clashes that unfolded during the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle.