Protest for resilience: rallies in Peru were held under the banner of the "Straw Hat Pirates"

The protests of young people in Peru opposing pension reform reflect the problems of many countries in the global South and may escalate into a repeat of the Arab Spring scenario of the 2010s, experts believe. Interestingly, the protesters took to the streets with flags of the "Straw Hat Pirates" from the popular Japanese anime "One Piece". The same symbol was used by protesting youth during the recent riots in Nepal and Indonesia. Protests may also occur in Middle Eastern and African countries, where young people make up a significant part of the population, and solving socio-economic problems is postponed for years or even decades ahead, analysts say. The reasons for the emergence of a new trend and the prospects for its development are described in the Izvestia article.

Protests in Peru

On September 20 and 21, mass protests of young people who disagree with pension reform took place in Lima, the capital of Peru. Taking to the streets under the slogan "Generation Z against President Dina Boluarte," at some point the demonstrators began demanding the resignation of the president, the dissolution of parliament and early elections. The protesters tried to break through to the congress building, throwing bottles and stones at the police. In response, law enforcement agencies used tear gas and rubber bullets. As a result of the clashes, several people were injured and more than 50 were detained. Protests have paralyzed the center of Lima.

The pension reform has become only a formal reason for the protests, which reflect a much deeper and broader dissatisfaction with the actions of the authorities, says Timur Almukov, an expert on Latin America.

— It's no secret that President Dina Boluarte's approval rating is only 3-4%. The reasons lie in the inability of the head of state to lead the country out of the protracted political crisis, aggravated by regular corruption scandals involving Boluarte herself and her entourage," he told Izvestia.

The further development of the protests largely depends on the government's reaction, the analyst believes. In recent years, the Peruvian authorities have been noted for their brutality against demonstrators, and Boluarte's rise to power in 2022 was accompanied by mass demonstrations demanding early elections, during which dozens of people died.

"Today, the youth are the driving force behind the protests, but various public organizations and political forces have already joined them,— Timur Almukov explained.

Interestingly, on the streets of the Peruvian capital, among the posters with political slogans and national flags familiar to any protest, an unexpected symbol appeared: a black flag with a smiling skull in a straw hat — the banner of the "Straw Hat Pirates" from the Japanese anime "One Piece", which has become an international symbol of the struggle against governments.

According to the plot of the cartoon, a team of dreamers and outcasts challenges the "global tyranny" of a cruel and corrupt "World Government." His key themes — the fight against oppression, the pursuit of absolute freedom and unbreakable solidarity — perfectly fit the protest narrative.

At the same time, the new symbol of pop culture, so far devoid of direct political overtones, allows the protesters to avoid harsh repression, remaining a powerful visual expression of resistance. Andrei Kortunov, an expert at the Valdai International Club, explains the choice of such forms of protest by the ineffectiveness of political institutions.

"The fact that discontent takes exactly these forms is already a question for the leaders of the opposition forces, who were unable to integrate these protests in any way into ordinary parliamentary activities," he told Izvestia. — When it is not possible to achieve one's goals, at least to be heard through the parliamentary procedures used, discontent is very often expressed in street protest activity.

Protests by zoomers in other countries

Peru is not the first country where the flag of the "Straw Hat Pirates" has become a banner of civil disobedience. A wave of Generation Z-driven protests has already swept across Asia. Indonesia is one of the most striking examples.

At the end of August, mass protests that began as a reaction to the new labor law paralyzed the country's largest cities. Thousands of people, mostly students and young professionals, took to the streets of Jakarta, Surabaya and Bandung. Their demands quickly evolved from the repeal of a specific bill to the resignation of the unpopular president and the entire government, accused of corruption and authoritarianism.

Many protesters came out with a "pirate flag". It fluttered on barricades, it was painted on billboards, and its image multiplied on social media with protest hashtags. For Indonesian youth, it became not just a reference to anime, but a code for identifying "their own", a visual manifesto that was both daring and safe — the authorities could hardly criminalize a character from a popular comic book, which made it a powerful tactical tool.

Then a wave of protests, accompanied by a recognizable flag, reached Nepal. The mass actions, initially initiated by opposition parties, were quickly intercepted and radicalized by young people unhappy with the economic downturn, unemployment and political instability.

Almost simultaneously, a wave of protests reached the Philippines. On September 21, demonstrators took to the streets of Manila, demanding an investigation into widespread corruption in flood prevention projects. A number of protesters also came out with pirate flags.

The phenomenon of "One Piece" protests, which has swept countries from Indonesia to Peru, makes us think about the formation of a new global language of youth resistance. The prerequisites for its appearance are already being formed in the countries of the global South, Andrei Kortunov believes. The analyst believes that new waves of protests are most likely in the regions of the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa.

"The prerequisites for the formation of such a trend exist precisely in the countries of the global South, where youth make up a significant part of the population and where socio-economic problems are largely postponed for years and even decades ahead," the expert noted.

He did not completely rule out "the possibility of a repetition in one form or another of the Arab Spring scenario."

Denis Korablin, a senior researcher at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, holds a similar position. According to him, protest activity is related to the generational gap and the set of socio-economic problems that are developing in the countries of the global South, as well as migration mobility, which causes transit and the exchange of various practices, including political ones.

"The tense situation remains in India, and in Pakistan, these are countries where the political situation is traditionally very difficult," the analyst notes.

At the same time, the expert is skeptical about the possibility of forming new stable political movements based on these protests, at least in Nepal, since the protest was caused by a combination of reasons, and many processes are sporadic.