I once protested against the G7. I feel no need now, because it’s collapsing all by itself | Zoe Williams

W hen 200,000 protesters gathered to meet the G8 summit in Genoa , 25 years ago, their point (our point, in fact; I went on a coach, it took two and a half days) was that eight rich nations shouldn’t dictate the rules to the rest of the world. If you accept that power concedes nothing without a demand, this demand probably sounds a bit broad, boiling down to “abnegate your power”. But it was part of a wider anti-globalisation movement, in which many of the precise mechanisms by which the developed world exploited the developing had been nailed down. Many of the protest tactics and networks had been honed at the battle for Seattle in 1999, outside the World Trade Organization summit, along with an agenda that was capacious and versatile. Unfortunately, the authorities had also learned a thing or two, and both the elaborate security of the G8’s red zone and the police brutality outside it were met with some astonishment from the world’s (liberal) media, but not from anyone with a memory exceeding two years. Genoa also became a no-fly zone, citing concerns about terrorism . Since this was before 9/11, it made the world’s establishment look rattled and paranoid. The profile of the demonstrators was pretty well-understood – they (we) looked like anti-capitalists, but did not look like people who could get anything dangerous into the air. An anti-globalisation protester throws a petrol bomb towards Italian police in Genoa, 20 July 2001. …