Opposition to privatization continues in many parts of the world. For example the The Times of India reported in January 2014 a threatened strike by power engineers in the state of Uttar Pradesh opposing state plans to privatize power supplies in four cities. It is impossible to provide solid references for all these struggles, but those cited below give an impression of the breadth of resistance.
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A.7.a. Resistance to Energy and Water Privatization
Chapters by authors from 20 countries on developments in energy sector and struggles.
Examines different (though overlapping) alternatives to privatization developed through North-South and red-green alliances and argues concept of the ‘commons’ most effective basis for a strategy of action.
A case study for the University of KwaZulu-Natal project Globalisation, Marginalisation and new Social Movements in post-Apartheid South Africa.
Useful summary analysis including brief case studies of corporate misuse of water and resistance to them (and further references): Nestle in US, Vivendi and Suez in Mexico, Bechtel in Bolivia and Coca Cola in India.
Examines role of different types of opposition in ‘delaying, cancelling or reversing the privatization of water and energy’, including success in Nkondobe (South Africa), Paraguay where parliament voted in 2002 to suspend indefinitely privatization of state-owned water and Poznan in Poland in 2002, and failure of campaigns in UK, Chile and Philippines.
Outlines 9 principles of ‘water democracy ‘ and highlights activism against corporations claiming water supplies.
Includes information on successful local campaigns:
- against Coca Cola bottling plant, closed in 2004, leading to national campaign “Coca-Cola-Pepsi Quit India Campaign’;
- resistance to water diversion in Uttar Pradesh;
- campaign in Delhi against raised tariffs and proposed privatization.