Editing Direct Action Network

{{about||the UK disability activists|Disabled People's Direct Action Network}}
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'''Direct Action Network''' ('''DAN''') was a North American [[confederation]] of [[anti-corporate]], [[anti-authoritarian]] and [[anarchist]] affinity groups, collectives, and organizations.  It grew out of the Seattle chapter which had been formed to coordinate the nonviolent civil disobedience portion of the [[WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999 protest activity|anti-WTO mobilization]] in [[Seattle, Washington|Seattle]] in 1999.<ref>David Graeber, ''[[Direct Action: An Ethnography]]'' (AK Press, 2009) p. 290-294</ref>

==History==

Seattle DAN was formed in response to the call for direct action against the WTO conference by [[Peoples Global Action|People's Global Action]].  Members of the Art and Revolution Collective, based in San Francisco, sought funding for their WTO actions from a coalition of [[NGOs]] led by [[Public Citizen]] and [[Global Exchange]].  Simultaneously, local activists in Seattle began meeting to plan disruptive protest.  The Seattle group envisioned a "decentralized network of people who would organize autonomous actions," while the San Francisco group envisioned "a coherent organization...that would come together around a fixed day action."  According to San Francisco organizer David Solnit, the two groups merged "somewhat awkwardly," with differences over property destruction being a particular source of tension.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://depts.washington.edu/wtohist/interviews/Solnit.pdf |title=WTO History Project, University of Washington "David Solnit interview with Jeremy Simer" |access-date=2013-11-25 |archive-date=2014-06-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140613005713/http://depts.washington.edu/wtohist/interviews/Solnit.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>

Soon after the Seattle mobilization, several DAN chapters formed a '''Continental Direct Action Network''' (CDAN), which rapidly expanded into branches in 12 cities in the [[United States]] and [[Canada]]. CDAN, as well as many of the local chapters, adopted principles of unity based on those of [[Peoples' Global Action]].

Regional DANs were formed of autonomous [[affinity group]]s which coordinated actions via [[spokescouncil]]s using [[delegation]] and [[consensus decision-making]].

According to former NYC DAN organizer [[David Graeber]]: 

<blockquote>Chapters operating in different cities soon came to be classified into two broad tendencies: anti-corporate, or anti-capitalist. The former tended to be more reformist in orientation, more oriented towards the [nonviolence] tradition and suspicious of more militant styles of direct action, more interested in appealing to the middle classes around concepts like fair trade and green consumerism. The latter were more explicitly anarchist and revolutionary. The most prominent examples of the former tendency were Seattle DAN and LA DAN, both of which continued to be dominated by NGO activists...The vast majority of groups that were within the DAN network, however, including NYC DAN, the Philadelphia Direct Action Group (PDAG), San Francisco and Humboldt County DAN, Chicago DAN, and many others, were plainly anti-capitalist. They had little NGO participation, but were made up instead mainly of independent activists and members of local anarchist collectives...<ref>David Graeber, [[Direct Action: An Ethnography]] (AK Press, 2009) p. 294</ref> </blockquote>

Other than Seattle, DAN played a key role in organizing the following protests/mobilizations: 

* [[International Monetary Fund]]/[[World Bank]] protests, April 8–17, 2000
* [[Republican National Convention]] protests, Philadelphia, July 29, 2000
* [[Democratic National Convention]] protests, Los Angeles, August 11, 2000
* [[George W. Bush]] Inauguration, Washington, DC,  January 20, 2001
* [[World Economic Forum]] protests, New York City, NY, February 2, 2002

==Decline==

After the [[September 11 attacks]] in 2001, DAN began to fall apart.{{cn|date=November 2024}} DAN's last major mobilization was in [[New York City]] in February 2002, where remnants of the local chapter was responsible for organizing actions against the World Economic Forum attended by between 15,000 and 20,000 individuals. NYCDAN was later eclipsed by the Another World is Possible Coalition (AWIP), a local NYC network which was originally formed by DAN members. 

Since DANs evaporation, many former activists have gone on to play pivotal roles in regional and national mobilizations and groups, including anti-war organizing, NY Peoples' Global Action, [[World social forum|NYC Social Forum]], New York Metro Alliance of Anarchists and other organizational work. The websites for both Continental Direct Action Network and Direct Action Network are no longer maintained. 

==Hand signals in consensus process==
A feature of DAN's consensus process was the use of [[Consensus decision-making#Hand_signals|hand signals]]. These included [[Occupy hand signals|twinkling]] to indicate agreement with a proposal, as well as other signals now widely used in consensus culture.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=snugO8KeC2EC&dq=twinkling&pg=PA190 |title=Francesca Polletta, Freedom Is an Endless Meeting: Democracy in American Social Movements, University of Chicago Press, 2002 |isbn=9780226674490 |access-date=2016-11-02 |archive-date=2020-10-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201006145018/https://books.google.com/books?id=snugO8KeC2EC&pg=PA190&dq=consensus+%22hand+signals%22+twinkles&hl=en&ei=jfa-TvKBKsr20gH2m-TvDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=twinkling&f=false |url-status=live |last1=Polletta |first1=Francesca |date=May 2004 |publisher=University of Chicago Press }}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Indymedia]]
* [[Anti-globalization]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050116180417/http://www.greens.org/colorado/list_archives/discuss-dan/msg00143.html "What is DAN?" Discussion Notes]

==Archives==
*[http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=WTO1999SeattleProtest5177.xml World Trade Organization 1999 Seattle Ministerial Conference Protest Collection] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130927053218/http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=WTO1999SeattleProtest5177.xml |date=2013-09-27 }} 1993-2000. 43.63 cubic feet.  At the [http://www.lib.washington.edu/specialcoll/laws Labor Archives of Washington, University of Washington Libraries Special Collections].

[[Category:Defunct anarchist organizations in North America]]