Via RealClearPolitics, I read a fascinating essay by Ruben Navarrette on the strategy of protests, which, in one case he says are hurting their own cause.

His lede says it all:

It used to be that protesters took to the streets to build public support for their cause. Now they do it to show their strength. Instead of moving you to join them, now they want you to know that they won’t be moved.

Navarrette is talking about special-interest immigration protests that have appeared around the U.S., but his question has got a lot of relevance to demonstrations throughout the world as democratic revolution sweeps the globe.

As I think of the revolutionary demonstrations in France, Ecuador, Bolivia, Thailand, the antiwar movement against Iraq and Venezuela, the question Navarrette asks can be looked at in their cases, too.

In France’s antirevolution, there is a lot of negativity, a lot of rage and burning and violence. All for the right to not have to work competitively! Is such violence a means of building public support or instilling terror? Are flowers being passed out to build public support as the gorgeous woman from Kyrgzystan did, or is violence happening? My sense is, it’s the latter, and for that reason, given that France is a normal democracy, these protests will fail. They might not end but they won’t persuade anyone to join them.

In Ecuador, what happened? Were roads being blocked by free trade activists? Or was it anti-free trade activists who were doing it? And can this tactic build public support? I do not think so. The sad fact is, this violence echoes the cause itself. The antifreetrade marches are about blocking roads and blocking markets – and reinforcing the privileges of inefficient producers and unions by government force instead of by market verdicts. The force being used by the antifreetraders in Ecuador echoes their desire to rule over citizens, including the consumer choices they can make.

In nearby Bolivia, roadblocks, bonfires, hurled dynamite and other violence did seem to be part of the reason Evo Morales got elected. After all, he was roadblocking away, starving the cities into submission, and nevertheless got elected – by a big margin. Mary O’Grady at the Wall Street Journal Editorial Page noted that it was due to fear factors – she said that was why Morales got votes, people just wanted the horrible roadblocks to stop and they didn’t have any other way of doing except by electing Morales. It was a theory I was skeptical of at first, (and she actually told me I was a pollyanna for it!) but I now wonder. Negativity like riots and roadblocks did seem to lead to something in Bolivia last December. Whether it is a democratic revolution is another question. Will Morales bring peace and prosperity to Bolivia? Not on his current political platform, though he sounds as though he’s open to adapting some of it to reality as Hugo Chavez fails to come through with his idea of a program: oil cash.

Then there is Thailand. This I hesitate to make a strong judgment about, because I feel sympathy for both sides. To some extent, like Venezuela, the U.S., Britain, Italy, Brazil and some other places, Thailand had a strong leader elected from an outsiderly position who commanded a huge lead in parliament. His rise, like that of the others, came off a period of incredible mismanagement by previous governments (Think of the idiots who brought Thailand the Asia Crisis and the aftermath. It was inevitable that a Thaksin would rise after that.) Then Thaksin proceded to consolidate power and began to make mistakes and crumble and lose support. We also see that vividly happening in Venezuela’s streets, as well as just politically in the stronger democracies like U.K., the U.S. Italy and Brazil. But that’s not the whole story. The crowds in the streets of Bangkok are intractable, and The Economist magazine said they were antidemocratic. Thaksin says he will negotiate a solution with them but they say the only solution they will accept is his resignation. To return to Navarrette, they are not interested in building support (but it’s obvious they have it or think they have it), they are just interested in showing force.

Unlike the Thais, the antiwar protestors over Iraq, worldwide, don’t have the support or the will to build public support. They just seem to want to show force and immobility, at least the one group I saw in Los Angeles did. They actually did burn things there, what a way to build support! The speakers just shouted and screamed at the people. The chanting was anything but spontaneous – it was forced and weak, the definition of lip service. It was also an unfocused mishmash of causes – the Mexican-flag-waving pro-illegal immigration subgroup there in fact did seem to command more vibrance as a cause. But as Navarrette observed, it seemed more determined to show that it won’t be moved than to change minds and build support.

Lastly, there is Venezuela. Andres Oppenheimer did observe that at the last opposition rally before the recall referendum in 2004, there was an intense feeling that the rally was huge and growing. From his description, it was clear it was designed to build public support. It was big and friendly and colorful and happy. He said it actually changed his own mind about the viability of the Venezuelan opposition. Today, protests, although I thought they were reasonably big, have generally been smaller, in their thousands. Were they designed to show that the opposition cannot be moved? I did not get that impression, based on the one I went to in Caracas. But did they build public support? Not nearly as much as they could have. The character of the subsequent ones seems a bit more like they are out to build support. But I get the feeling they also have a third reason, to show that embattled as they are by a dictator, they are still alive, still holding on. It’s closer to the negative reason but it is also a sign of hope. The movement still has move in Venezuela.

What are your thoughts?