The Third Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) was held in Seattle from November 30 to December 3, 1999. Trade ministers and other officials from the WTO's 135 member nations met in an unsuccessful attempt to plan negotiations to further deregulate free trade. Tens of thousands of activists for many causes gathered to protest what they saw as the WTO's favoring of corporate interests over social and environmental concerns.

Here, Rainforest Action Network climbers hang from a construction crane near Interstate 5 to protest what they called WTO's anti-democratic policies. Five activists climbed the crane on November 29, 1999, to unfurl their cloth protest banner.

Caption information sources: "WTO Meeting and Protests in Seattle (1999) - Part 1," by Kit Oldham, HistoryLink.org Essay 9183; and "WTO Meeting and Protests in Seattle (1999) - Part 2," by Kit Oldham, HistoryLink.org Essay 9213.
Caption information source: "20 years later: Looking back at the Battle in Seattle, the WTO riots" by Zosha Millman, November 30, 2019, retrieved at https://www.seattlepi.com/local/seattle-history/article/WTO-Riots-Battle-Seattle-1999-anniversary-13431709.php#photo-814429