Campus Antiwar Network

The Campus Antiwar Network (CAN) describes itself as an "independent, democratic, grassroots network of students opposing the occupation of Iraq and military recruiters in our schools." It was founded prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and claims to be the largest campus-based antiwar organization in the United States.

History

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CAN banner from Berkeley protest. Picture from Traprock Peace Center.

The Campus Antiwar Network was created on January 17 2003 by delegates from over 70 colleges and universities at twin conferences at George Washington University and San Francisco State University. Its purpose was opposition to the planned invasion of Iraq. Immediately after its formation, it elected to hold national days of action on January 27 and 28, corresponding with UN announcements and George W. Bush's State of the Union Address. Soon after that, its first national conference occurred soon after on the weekend of February 22-23, in Chicago.

Due to the decentralized nature of CAN, it is hard to measure its size and impact over time. However, it seemed to members that the organization grew quickly with mass opposition to the war in early 2003, but lost momentum and membership with the twin blows of the failure of mass protests to prevent the invasion, and the exclusively electoral focus of many activists in the period leading up to the 2004 presidential election. Its second national conference, November 1-2, 2003, again in Chicago, had around 200 delegates, and the third national conference in November 2004 in New York City drew an enthusiastic crowd of 100. Then, with the rise to national prominence of Cindy Sheehan, falling approval ratings for President Bush and the war, combined with the rise of the counter-recruitment movement, CAN's growth accelerated again in mid-2005. Its fourth national conference, on October 22- 23 October 2005, at UC Berkeley, drew over 650 participants, with delegates from 37 schools present to vote on the second, organizational, day.

Structure

The Campus Antiwar Network is a network of largely independent affiliates which choose their own day-to-day goals and tactics. CAN brings them together, usually only by email and conference call, to share the lessons of experience, discuss and decide on a view of the present needs of the peace movement, assist each other in defending against threatened disciplinary action or prosecution, and plan coordinated actions on both national and regional levels.

The organization also has a coordinating committee, elected at each national conference. As of the nation conference in 2007, the national committee has been restructured from previous forms to have five regional representatives and four at-large representatives, with decisions made by majority rule. In the past, the committee has one representative from each of five regions, five at-large representatives, and two high school representatives.

Individual CAN affiliates organize as they choose, although each is asked to select two members to give their contact information to the national coordinating committee. The coordinating committee is responsible for coordinating actions voted on at the national conference.

Points of Unity

CAN nationally structures itself around the Points of Unity, or Unity Statement, which must be ratified by a two-thirds majority of all delegates at the national conference. Activists follow current events and propose a new set of points before each national conference.

Working Groups

CAN also has various national working groups:

• A treasury, with an elected treasurer and two assistants responsible for keeping track of income and expenditure.

• A literature working group, staffed by volunteers and responsible for writing and updating political pamphlets as well as a book on the history and actions of the counter-recruitment movement.

• A website working group, staffed by volunteers and responsible for the maintenance of CAN's website.

• A newspaper working group, staffed by volunteers and responsible for writing and publishing a newsletter containing reports on CAN actions as well as strategic arguments, articles on events in Iraq, etc. The first issue was shipped in November, 2005, under the name "College, Not Combat".

• A repression working group, staffed by volunteers and responsible for responding to actions by police and campus security and administrations seen as repressive of antiwar activity or other dissent.

• An action working group, staffed by volunteers and responsible for coordinating national actions, ranging from student days of action and contingents in national marches, to a planned "Boots on the Backs of Brothers" speaking tour in spring 2006.

National Conventions

First National CAN Convention

Chicago, Illinois -- February 22-23, 2003

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Students at CAN's First national convention in Chicago.

The 2003 National CAN Convention adopted a structure with the guidelines that it be student owned and operated. The specific directives were:

1. CAN will remain independent, and is not affiliated with any other organization, though it pledges to work with all forces in the antiwar movement
2. It is democratic, so that each member campus can elect delegates through their local antiwar student coalitions and each affiliated campus group has an equal voice within CAN
   
3. CAN accepts affiliation from every campus or school antiwar organization and respects the right of its member committees to organize independent antiwar actions locally.

CAN adopted its first four Points of Unity:

1. No war on Iraq, whether backed by the U.S. or the United Nations
2. End the UN sanctions which have killed more than 1 million Iraqis
3. Oppose the attacks on civil liberties and racist scapegoating at home
4. Money for jobs, education, and health care, not war.

CAN also decided to call for an April 5 national mobilization in a few major cities following on the heels of the student-labor week of action already being organized from March 31 to April 4.

Second National CAN Convention

Chicago, Illinois -- November 1-2, 2003 The second convention of the Campus Antiwar Network was attended by over 100 members from 34 different campuses around the country, with a solidarity address given in the evening by Omar Waraich, a British antiwar activist.

The primary goals of the activists were to discuss the past six months of work since CAN's creation in January, and to organize future goals as well as further codifying the Points of Unity. An important national action taken from this conference was the resurrection of the "black armband" as a symbol of antiwar unity; a throwback from the Vietnam War.

The Points of Unity were expanded into the following:

1. We stand opposed to all US wars of aggression.
2. We stand opposed to the occupation of Iraq.
3. We support the right of the Iraqi people to self determination.
4. We demand the immediate withdrawal of all troops from Iraq.
5. We call for the US government to pay reparations to the Iraqi people.
6. We stand opposed to the oppression of the Palestinian people and the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
7. We stand opposed to racist scapegoating and all attacks on civil liberties.
8. We demand money for education, jobs and health care, not war and occupation!

"Stop the War in 2004"

New York City, New York -- November 13-14 2004

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Students at CAN's third national conference in New York.

Over 100 delegates from 30 schools were in attendance at "Stop the War in 2004," which was focused around recovering from the recent presidential election and the re-election of George W. Bush. The main speaker at the event was Mike Hoffman, co-founder of the Iraq Veterans Against the War, who spoke about the Iraqi response to the occupation.

CAN decided to increase positive interaction and support with military groups opposing the occupation of Iraq, as well as to organize demonstrations "against George Bush's inauguration."

Although all other Points were proposed to stand as created, the national conference revised their Point of Unity on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict:

"We stand opposed to the oppression of the Palestinian people and the occupation of Palestinian land, and support the right of Palestinians to self-determination."

"On the Frontlines"'

Berkeley, California -- October 22-23, 2005

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The Campus Antiwar Network's October 2005 national convention attracted over 600 students. This joint -conference, sponsored by Campus Antiwar Network and Military Out of Our Schools-Bay Area, sought to deepen the growing counter-recruitment movement among students.

The conference decided on several nationally-coordinated events for the upcoming year. One occurred on December 6 of that year

• A week of action marking the anniversary of the war in Iraq, with student actions planned on campuses and general, off-campus actions on the weekend of March 18-19, 2006.

CAN's call for the student week of action was endorsed by many individuals and organizations including Cindy Sheehan, Howard Zinn, Progressive Democrats of America, and many others.

• A day of action on May 4 2006, the anniversary of the killing of four students at Kent State by National Guardsmen during a protest against the Vietnam War, as well as a memorial for the lesser-known shooting of two Jackson State students on May 14.

"Students Rising"

Madison, Wisconsin -- October 19-21, 2007

Activists at Camilo Mejía's speech.

After a one-year hiatus, the Campus Antiwar Network reconvened to discuss their points of unity and to solidify membership. The conference's representation allowed 2 delegates with voting rights from each chapter, as well as unlimited "guests" to attend all parts of the conference. Over 30 chapters sent representatives, with an estimated 200 activists (both delegates and guests) attending.

The main event was speaker Camilo Mejía, who talked about his time in Iraq and his gradual realizations of his antiwar feelings. Mejía and Liam Madden, both members of the Iraq Veterans Against the War, were in attendance throughout the conference.

CAN revised its Points of Unity into the following Unity Statement:

The Campus Antiwar Network stands for the immediate withdrawal from Iraq of all occupation troops and private contractors. CAN is committed to building a movement based on grassroots, democratic and independent organizing that actively opposes all forms of racism, Islamophobia, sexism and homophobia.

Politics

The Campus Antiwar Network is primarily a group opposed to the war in Iraq and the continuing occupation of that country by the United States and its allies. Since its last two national conferences, it has focused on counter-recruitment, opposition to US military recruitment, as a strategy to end the war. The most commonly heard CAN slogans, found on buttons and signs at protests, are "Troops Out Now!", "College Not Combat!", and "Relief Not War!" - the last a response to perceived failures of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, connected to the war, for CAN members, by the repressive military nature of the relief efforts as well as by the diversion of resources abroad.

CAN does not take official positions on elections of any kind, believing that such choices should be personal and based on an individual's own preferences. However, CAN actively encourages members and chapters to become as informed on elections as possible, and local chapters often incorporate political discussions into their own meetings.

CAN periodically updates its "points of unity," based on the current state of the war and antiwar movement. These points are selected by majority vote at national conferences. These include not only opposition to the war in Iraq and to military recruitment in schools, but also opposition to the war in Afghanistan, opposition to Israel's occupation of Palestine, and other views. Although some opinions are more controversial than others, CAN strives to reflect the viewpoints of its democratic and varying membership. Individual CAN affiliates are involved in actions around these issues to varying degrees, and members may or may not agree with all points; the 2005 conference chose to organize national work around the themes of immediate withdrawal from Iraq and challenging military recruitment in order to build the broadest possible national movement. CAN chapters are welcome to choose their own political positions and affiliations beyond the Points of Unity that all chapters follow.

CAN issued a statement on the Danish cartoons controversy, condemning "racism in any form, as recently displayed in the publication of a series of anti-Islamic cartoons," which it argues "are helping to promulgate state violence against Muslims and Arabs -- including the occupation of Iraq." The statement also attacked the Dubai Ports World controversy, describing widespread bipartisan opposition to allowing a company from the United Arab Emirates to take ownership of some U.S. port operations as "blatantly racist." Anti-racism points of unity were integrated into the Unity Statement in 2007.

Actions

Past

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CAN contingent at September 24 2005 protest in Washington, DC.

Historically, the Campus Antiwar Network has used a variety of tactics:

• Demonstrations: CAN helped to mobilize students for the national February 15, 2003 antiwar protest demonstrations prior to the invasion of Iraq, and more recently marched with a contingent estimated by organizers at two thousand people at the September 24, 2005 anti-war protest in Washington, DC. It has also participated in numerous other local and national demonstrations. For example, CAN called for and organized a day of action on December 6, 2005, the date that the Supreme Court heard FAIR v. Rumsfeld, a case deciding the constitutionality of the Solomon Amendment's provision denying federal funding to colleges that ban military recruiters. The action consisted of protests at recruiting stations across the country.

• Referendums: CAN helped write and campaign for the "College Not Combat" ballot measure passed by residents of San Francisco on November 2, 2005, described by proponents as a statement that voters "want it to be city policy to oppose military recruiters’ access to public schools and to consider funding scholarships for education and training that could provide an alternative to military service."

• Direct aid: CAN sent caravans to New Orleans from places such as New York and Chicago, after Hurricane Katrina. These brought supplies and volunteers to work with local Louisiana activists, such as Malik Rahim, towards hurricane relief. The New York students kept a journal of their activities called "This is solidarity, not charity"

• Speaking Tours: In Fall of 2003, the Campus Antiwar Network (CAN) and Muslim Students' Association (MSA) organized a national speaking tour titled "Speaking Truth to Empire." The tour's purpose was to reorganize the student antiwar movement. Featured speakers included Noam Chomsky, Rania Masri, Howard Zinn, as well as military families and veterans. Following this, CAN and MSA co-sponsored another tour called "Eyewitness to Empire," which featured CAN member, Khury-Petersen Smith, who traveled to Iraq and spent a week in Baghdad during January 2004.

• Petitions, letters, and phone calls to school and government officials.

• Debates, both in person and through the mediums of paper publications and the internet.

• Creative performances of various kinds, involving, for example, spoken word poetry and hip hop artists.

• International collaboration. CAN sent delegates to the London International Peace Conference on December 10, 2005. CAN also put on a panel discussion called "Fighting the Empire From Within," featuring CAN activists involved in military "counter-recruitment," war resister Pablo Paredes, and others, at the 2006 World Social Forum in Caracas, Venezuela. More recently, CAN has nationally decided to get involved with the Iraqi Student Project[1], a humanitarian aid project which seeks to bring Iraqi college students to America for higher education.

Student Walkouts

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SFSU, March 20, 2003

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Columbia University, February 15, 2007

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Rutgers University, March 20, 2007

Campus Antiwar Network chapters have long used walkouts as a tactic to demonstrate against the militarization of campus and collusion with war related activities while galvanizing public opinion on campus, unifying CAN groups with other progressive groups, and recruiting new members. The network is able to utilize the internet and conference calls to rapidly create walk outs, although most of the largest walkouts are on specific anniversaries or important dates.

Several walkouts occurred immediately after the US invasion of Iraq including a large one at San Francisco State University. In 2005, a walkout took place at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Over 100 students left class, demonstrated, and then marched past the Army Recruitment Center at University Square.

In 2007, large walkouts occurred as a result of the efforts of CAN groups. On February 15, the fourth anniversary of the largest antiwar demonstrations in history, walkouts occurred at 17 different schools including Columbia University. The Columbia walkout achieved campus-wide support including a petition signed by forty professors and an endorsement by three campus unions. Three hundred students participated in the antiwar activities that followed.

On March 20, 2007, the fourth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, nearly 80 schools answered calls from Campus Antiwar Network and SDS to walk out of class in protest of the war. Hundreds of students from schools across the country walked out against the war and demonstrated in highly visible locations. At Rutgers University in New Brunswick New Jersey, 400 students walked out of class, blocked a marine recruiting station, and took over an interstate highway.

CAN views walkouts as a good way to get students involved with the antiwar movement for the first time. As many students fight against the apathy that is the generalization of their generation, viewing fellow collegiates in action is important to continue growing the movement.

Repression

A number of people involved with the Campus Antiwar Network have faced legal or disciplinary consequences of various kinds for their antiwar activism. These people have been the centers of nationwide defense campaigns on the part of CAN, which argues that their cases prove the threat counter-recruitment poses to the powers that be.

• In March 2004, at City College of New York, four people were arrested at a counter-recruitment protest (after twice, at earlier protests, forcing recruiters off campus) for allegedly assaulting campus security, though they claim that the reverse was the case. One, Hadas Thier, was banned from campus and suspended. Charges have since been dropped.

• Charles Peterson at Holyoke Community College was pepper sprayed, banned from campus, and threatened with expulsion after allegedly assaulting a campus security officer while protesting military recruiters; he claims that he merely grabbed back a sign the officer took from a fellow protester. Charges have since been dropped.

• Tariq Khan, a student at George Mason University and Air Force veteran, was arrested for standing near recruiters with a sign saying "Recruiters Tell Lies" taped to his shirt on the charge of trespassing and disorderly conduct. Khan is a Pakistani-American; he reported that one arresting officer told him, "You people are the most violent people in the world." Charges have since been dropped.

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Dave Airhart on the recruiting wall.

• Dave Airhart, a student at Kent State and a Marine veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, was fined by city police and threatened with expulsion after hanging a banner with an antiwar message on a climbing wall set up on campus by military recruiters. Charges have since been dropped.

• Seven students at Hampton University were punished for participating in an unauthorized protest and "proselytizing" during a walkout on November 2, 2005. The students were initially summoned for an administrative hearing on November 21 to present a case against their expulsion, with three days notice, but it was then postponed to December 2, and finally the school decided only to impose community service.

• Lauren Giaccone and Brian Kelly, students at Pace University, yelled "war criminal" during a speech by Bill Clinton at their school on March 5, 2006. They were briefly detained by the secret service, and threatened with expulsion for failure to register the protest and their organizations. Charges have since been dropped, though the students have been threatened with punishment should they continue to organize protests.

"Credible Threat" to National Security

On April 5th 2005, Santa Cruz students and members of the Campus Antiwar Network led a major demonstration on the campus of UC Santa Cruz. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, “about a dozen protesters entered a career fair in a campus building and surrounded a table where military recruiters sat, preventing other students from talking with them. [And] more than 300 people demonstrated outside. In the jostling that ensued, a career- center staffer was slightly injured.” The protest had significant results, according to Kristin Anderson, a member of the Campus Antiwar Network. She believes that counter recruitment “has gotten popular because it gives students something concrete they can do” and students are able to make connections if they see their fellow classmates being tempted by recruiters. UC Santa Cruz antiwar group, “Members of Students Against War” rallied outside of the “San Francisco's Civic Center” wearing T-shirts reading, "Credible Threat.” This was done to mock the “Pentagon spymasters' assessment of the group's activities.”

Criticism of CAN

The Campus Antiwar Network's tactics have been criticized by other members of the anti-war movement.^{citation? is this a straw man?}

Moderate antiwar groups^{for example?} argue that CAN is excessively radical, often using slogans and posters focusing unnecessarily on tangential issues like the racism of the Iraq war, the bad faith of its Bush administration advocates, or the right of Iraqis to military resistance. This, they^who? say, alienates many of those who should be part of the anti-war movement's audience but may disagree on a particular issue. On the other hand, other groups^{such as?} have criticized CAN for a reformist focus, and a refusal to engage in illegal, if nonviolent, direct action. This, it is argued,^{by whom?} deprives CAN's politics of any real content by making its advocacy perfectly compatible with the existing system.

CAN activists respond,^citation? in turn, that they are striking an appropriate balance,has CAN put out a statement to this end? which maximizes the number of people involved in the antiwar movement while preserving its core political principles, and makes connections that can involve new groups of people while keeping CAN's founding antiwar goals unchanged.^{note the changing points of unity above}

Relationship with the ISO

Additional criticism focuses on the accusation that CAN is controlled by the International Socialist Organization (ISO) -- an accusation both groups would deny.^citation? Nevertheless, ISO conferences such as the Socialism 2007 conference often see support from CAN groups. Unaffiliated activists claim that CAN's stances have caused non-ISO members to leave CAN, claiming the group's agenda and that of the ISO have become unacceptably intertwined.^{are these CAN members?}

CAN defenders^{who? cite please} reply that CAN's open and democratic decision-making is incompatible with it being a front group. Moreover, they say that the two organizations share the goal of stopping the war but are organizationally and politically independent, and that while many of CAN's prominent members are also ISO members, there are others ranging from Democrats and antiwar Republicans to anarchists. Some also argue that there is a long tradition in the United States of attempting to discredit activist groups by claiming they have an affiliation with communists or socialists (whether or not this affiliation exists), and that such charges are often a cover for political disagreement.

Regardless of viewpoint, the facts are that that the 2007 National Committee of nine representatives contains four ISO members, and that different chapters throughout the nation contain varying ISO membership. Many chapters contain no ISO students, and ISO members make up a majority only at new, small chapters launched at their initiative. Similarly, members of the Democratic Party make up the majority of membership at chapters launched at their initiative. Nationally, CAN encourages all members to become involved in political discussion from their own individual perspectives, and to have meetings focus around the unifying topic of the antiwar movement before all else.cite please

References

Most photos are from the Traprock Peace Center website.

External links

• Campus Antiwar Network: the official webpage.
• Afroamerica: a brief profile of CAN.
• Traprock Peace Center: an extensive photo-history of CAN
• Military Out of Our Schools: a San Francisco Bay Area-based organization with which CAN has cooperated in several campaigns.
• Iraq Veterans Against the War: Giving a voice to the large number of active duty service people and veterans who are against this war, but are under various pressures to remain silent. CAN has worked extensively with them in the past.

Media

• Law Schools, Military Battle Over Recruiting: a Wall Street Journal article on December 6 protests.
• Protest college antiwar hippies!: Free Republic's reaction to the December 6 protests.
• Mavericks, Renegades, and Troublemakers 2005: CAN and Iraq war veteran/Kent State student Dave Airhart in Rolling Stone magazine.
• Protest and Pushback on Campus: The Nation article on counter-recruitment and repression, October 31 2005.
• Counter-Recruitment is Gaining Strength: CounterPunch on repression against CAN students in spring 2005.
• Student Protest Prevents CIA Recruiting Event at NYU: Z Magazine article on protest organized by a CAN-affiliate at NYU that led to a CIA recruiting event's cancellation.
• A New Battleground on Campuses: a CAN member's article on campus polarization that summarizes some of CAN's counter-recruitment organizing in spring 2005.
• What happened to the antiwar movement?: MSNBC article on CAN and other anti-occupation activism a year after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
• Campus Resistence: early report on CAN's counter-recruitment, including the repression at City College New York, from left-wing radio show Democracy Now!