Next First Friday

Creating Alternatives to Empire

Marco Mejia, who has represented the American Friends Service Committee at World Social Forums, and Tom Hastings, Director of PSU’s Peace and Conflict Resolution program, will join our First Friday discussion after dinner on April 2, on the crucial work of creating new international relationships and institutions for peace.

American economic policies, corporations, and financial institutions exercise dramatic power over the economies, cultures, and social conditions of sovereign nations around the world. Military bases, naval fleets, and troop deployments all over the globe reinforce the United States’ dominance as an unrivaled global superpower in this era of American Empire.

But another element of international connection is happening beneath the radar of the evening news and the power structures that define the national agenda. Indigenous groups, grassroots activists, community organizers, and representatives of civil society around the world are connecting to support each other’s work and challenge the mindset that says, “There is no alternative.”