Flowers and Bananas

We are exploring many interconnected facets of impunity and strategies of nonviolent resistance. Deeping understanding of the tremendous power and bleakness of the forces that create and maintain impunity is overwhelming, and in this context the spaces of hope, courage, persistence, solidarity, inspiration and community shine all the more brightly. As U.S. citizens we are keeping an eye on the role of the U.S. in the Colombian conflict, and two examples in particular struck me - the flower and banana trades.

Two products that for me have connotations of friendliness, comfort, beauty, innocence, expressions of love — unlike resources like oil and diamonds which the public knows are implicated in horrifying systems of violence. It was devastating to learn about how companies like Chiquita are intimately linked to state violence and paramilitary terror: a paramilitary leader boasted that a major victory was to get arms shipments through the private port of Chiquita, massive violence is used to forcibly displace communities to make way for plantations, and the mechanisms to hold a company like Chiquita accountable and demand justice and reparation are ineffective and offensive at best. The peace community of San Jose has been affected by banana trade violence and are working in collaboration with other organizations to challenge the company.

While I was familiar with the hideousness of the history of fruit trade in Central and South America, it was new to learn about the flower industry. We heard from a spokesperson from CACTUS, an organization that provides legal support to women workers in the flower industry, which is a case study in unjust trade policies and lived practices. (Neo)colonial patterns of undermining native economic security and food sovereignty by forcing the creation of export-only monocrop plantations of commercial luxury items to pay off extrenal debt. Not a new story, but I am seeing it with new eyes in a new context. In this case flowers (shipped to the U.S. and Europe, with the highest demand of course for Valentines Day) are part of the commerical component of the "war on drugs", "replacing" illicit crops. While this succeeds as an economic model it fails as a development model, and women bear the worst brunt — entering the labor market they are discriminated within it, not allowed to organize, denied workers rights, unable to obtain medical aid for work related disbilities from cutting flowers and being exposed to pesticides. They are demanding trade with justice, and dignity and visibility as workers in this industry.

Which products do we think deeply about as consumers in the U.S.? While supporting fair trade coffee and chocolate are on the collective radar, it seems that bananas and especially flowers are not understood as emblematic of unjust trade that affects thousands of lives. How do we allow ourselves to be shocked by the familiar? How might flower-flooded holidays like Valentines be a reminder to broaden our vision and compassion and solidarity? The name CACTUS signifies that while a rose cannot be a rose without its thorns, so a cactus always blooms with a flower of hope.