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Social Activists Celebrate 10 Years of Flagship Movement
Ten years ago this month the World Social Forum (WSF) met for the first time to discuss ways of changing global order. A decade on, the movement is still going strong, but just how effective has it been?
The World Social Forum's slogan reads "Another World is Possible." But exactly what form that world should take, is not stipulated in the movement's charter of principles. While it is long on solidarity, fairness, anti-globalization, human rights and the creation of a space for reflective thought and democratic debate, it is noticeably short on strategy.
(photo by flickr user baltine) So what is the WSF really all about? Jackie Smith author of the book
"Social Movements for Global Democracy" describes it as a "movement of
movements," a "process" which aims to connect social forums and build
networks of people involved in pressure groups. And she believes it is
one of the most important political developments in recent history.
"It has mobilized millions of individuals in well over a hundred countries," Smith told Deutsche Welle, adding that the WSF has encouraged "popular discussion and debate as well as action to address some of the most pressing conflicts of our day."
Global competition
One issue on the movement's agenda is the redressing of the poverty balance. But Alec van Gelder, project director at International Policy Network in London, says that while the WSF may have attracted attention to the problem, its left-leaning principles will never solve it.
"More and more countries around the world, whether they are left leaning or right leaning understand that they're in a global competition and the only way to win is to become more competitive," van Gelder told Deutsche Welle.
Citing India as a case in point, he says there is a growing understanding all over the world that a free-market economy is the better way to tackle poverty.
"Back in 1991, it [India] was a series of catastrophic failures and really there was no other option but to pursue a more liberal order," van Gelder said. "India is not exactly a free-market paradise but it is unquestionable in which direction they are moving."
And that is fundamentally at odds with the goals of the World Social Forum.
From the fringes to the mainstream
But Hugo Braun, a member of the coordination council of the activist group Attac Deutschland, holds that the past decade has proved the movement is on the right track, and that some of the WSF's demands have made it into mainstream political consciousness.
"The German chancellor, the US president and the French president are talking about a financial transaction tax that we called for 10 years ago," Braun said. "And that leads me to believe we have put at least one or two issues on the agenda."
Jackie Smith concedes that the WSF could have had a greater impact on policies of economic globalization, but she says where the movement has made the greatest progress is in the minds of the population.
She says it has helped people to imagine alternatives to the kind of globalization being advanced by elites at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos.
What's a fair world anyway?
But critics argue that such talk is too nebulous, insisting instead that if activists really want the fairer world they talk about, there's no way around capitalism.
"Does a fair world actually mean that more and more people are able to enjoy the fruits of economic development, have access to modern technology like live-saving medicines, modern electronics, hospitals and so on?" van Gelder asked.
"If you ask me what a free world is, that would certainly be a characteristic of it."
NGOs stealing the limelight
In honour of the 10th anniversary of the WSF, there won't be a single convention as is usually the case, but a string of events spread out over 12 months. This year, like last, many delegates will be from non-governmental organizations. But that is not as innocuous as it might sound.
The forum has come under fire in the past for allowing too many state-funded NGOs to attend.
"A lot of the NGOs gathering at the WSF are actually funded by governments and their agenda is politically motivated one way or the other," van Gelder said. "And that obviously becomes a problem."
He says the self-proclaimed non-governmental movement is actually running to a Socialist agenda and is ultimately trying to achieve a world-wide Socialist revolution.
For his part, Braun refutes the claim, insisting that while there are certainly many Socialist-leaning forum participants, the WSF has always remained true to its non-party identity.
"We have people of very different motivations, members of religious
and environmental groups," he said. "But what I think is so fantastic
about the forum is that there are so many different groups working
together to find possibilities for this undefined better world."
Editor. Rob Mudge
- Posted in
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23 Comments so far
Show Alltoo late. the pieces are moving on the board and it's checkmate in ? moves...
Like Kosh said in the first season of Babylon 5, "The avalanche has begun, too late for the pebbles to vote."
Nay I say my learned gentlemen, the game has finally just BEGUN! People are awakening to what the world is truly like, and don't like it, and want meaningful change. We KNOW this to be true. Even if we deny it to feed our cynicism.
Don't take off the party hats -- here come the dancing girls.
Gary
PS BTW I am suggesting the name "The People" (or "The People Party") for a new unity party to bring together the dozen or so "third-parties" that better represent the actual positions of the American people than the present duopoly. Imagine campaigning for "The People."
"Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame."
-- Laurence J. Peter
The idea of a "unity" party "...a new unity party to bring together the dozen or so "third-parties".... is already happening in California.
The California Peace and Freedom Party, the only socialist party in California with ballot status, is right now getting signatures for candidates to run in this
November election. The PFP is a "multi-tendency" party that is enabling socialists from the Socialist Party, The Party of Socialism and Liberation, etc. to run as candidates in this November 2010 election.
The differences between the different socialist "third parties" are not so great and are set aside so the greater purpose of promoting socialist consciousness and providing a socialist alternative to the two war parties of Capitalist in November.
You can go to the the PFP home page here:
http://www.peaceandfreedom.org/home/
Also check out the Peace and Freedom Party BLOG:
http://peaceandfreedom.org/blog/
Which has posts and comments from PFP members and various sources of
information of interest to socialists, such as the World Socialist Web Site
http://www.wsws.org
There is some thinking among PFP activists to make the Peace and Freedom
Party to go national, and develop an anti-capitalist and socialist party in every state!
The World Social Forum is impotent by design.
In the real world, democratic political power inheres in political parties.
At the end of its 2001 Charter, the World Social Forum lays out these lofty goals for change:
"The World Social Forum is a process that encourages its participant organizations and movements to situate their actions, from the local level to the national level and seeking active participation in international contexts, as issues of planetary citizenship, and to introduce onto the global agenda the change-inducing practices that they are experimenting in building a new world in solidarity."
So if real political power to build that "new world" inheres in political parties, among its organizations should be political parties such as the Green Party which aspires to do that. Among its organizations in the United States should be the 19 state progressive caucuses in the Democratic Party which aspire to do that. Right?
But noooooo. The WSF Charter specifically excludes the only organizations with the actual power, through elections, to build a new world. To wit:
"Neither party representations nor military organizations shall participate in the Forum."
Look for yourself here:
http://www.portoalegre2002.org/default.html
For the Atlanta United States Social Forum I tried to get our local state progressive caucus a place in the event. The answer was no. Because of the Charter, above.
Someone get them to wake up. Real power comes from winning elections with progressives who can make new laws, amend constitutions, and build a new world through democratic processes, in concert with movements, NGOs, unions, and many other groups. Political parties need to be front and center for implementing visions of change, not excluded, guaranteeing impotence.
Impotent by design? Only if you believe that power grows out of the barrel of a gun.
"No rioting, no armies, no fighting, no slogans; one thing I'll say for him: 'Jesus is cool' ".
The hippies were right, it's just that nobody noticed.
Being born in the San Francisco Bay Area in the Summer of Love, this is the historic point I make. The Hippie Movement was a spectrum of movement. However, one of the down falls of the movement was that the Male Domination over the Women by perpetuating poverty by not taking into account that sperm is not a terrible thing to waste left a lot of mothers like my own impregnated with seeds of the future. But the future was not ready for us. There was nothing but beans and rice and naked beaches. We learned how to avoid the world. Many of my classmates committed suicide by way of going with the flow of drugs. That Movement was caste in false dreams. Many of us have faced poverty for a life time. Those of us who made it out of poverty had to leave the false ideals and merely dream for somewhere over the rainbow.
As one who participated in that "Hippie Movement", arriving in San Francisco in 1967, I would offer that your definition is only a partial truth. There were, amidst the "beans and rice and naked beaches" some very involved people and some evolving new ways of seeing things.
While it is certainly true that the movement died amidst drugs and disinterest the dream lives on in many of us. 'The Digger's', for one such example, were a socially active group and my first experience in political and social organising as well. We fed the hungry, clothed the naked and worked within local govt as well to assist the hordes of kids needing such.
The established order defended itself very well against this generational uprising and, in the end, the pressures of drugs, the need to raise families and the antipathy of our electorate doomed the movement. But there are many of us who dedicated ourselves to political activism and passed much of that on to our children. It is a slow process, this peaceful revolution stuff, but it should not be so easily dismissed.
I used to hear a radio preacher who every Sunday morning would catalogue the evils of alcohol. One of his favorite illustrations was a French army in the 19 century who lost a battle because they were too drunk to fight.
I am not minimizing the suffering of alcoholism to the addict or those close to her. I am not minimizing the suffering of the children of the flower children. But really, what if everybody danced naked and lived on rice and beans, refusing to fight any wars? Sounds much better to me.
What if every soldier was too drunk (or too high) to fight? What if all young people were too busy having sex to register for the draft (coming back soon)?
I hope you are correct in that the draft will be re instituted, but I think not. The involvement of families in the realities of war is one major factor in turning the public against Viet Nam and the ruling class will not soon make that mistake again.
I was not part of the hippie movement. I grew up so poor that I couldn't wait to earn a decent living. I did. For thirty years. Now retired, I live alone, eat mainly rice and beans, shop for clothes at the goodwill store, and pity the thieving bankers. There is no way they could be as happy as I am. But then, my grandchildren visit nearly every day, I care for my aged parents, I care for the ideas in the books in my library.
I believe that's pretty much what it's all about: Having something to care about.
You seem to be a johnny-come lately who doesn't understand the role of the WSF. The role of the WSF is essentially anarchic in nature. It's member orgainzations are not interested in paricipating in the deeply flawed and failed so-called democratic institutions. They have wasted decades trying that path in the pre-Seattle days and earlier. They are interested in building alternative economics and cooperative polity in the shell of the old structures - ultimately replacing them.
Having written the above, I wish the best of the WSF. It seems to have lost much of it's energy since the heady days of Mumbai in 2004 and Porto Allegre in 2005. My own city's social forum, which included the late Dennis Brutis as one of it's most active participants has fallen into inactivity.
Elections are created and maintained by the ruling class in any society to legitimize their power. They very rarely get out of hand and allow people/parties to get into power that orchestrate revolutionary change. Everything is done to prevent this. In the United States, the whole system is organized around money. If you don't have it or can't gather it from those who do, you can't win elections. The illusion that this system is somehow democratic and the right way to make fundamental change continues to confuse and distract people who would otherwise be involved in organizing *outside* the system. (I know; I was one of these people for years.)
The World Social Forum, and other social forum spinoffs, like the US Social Forum, are about working outside the system. The prohibition of parties in my view has had the positive effect of making the debate more civil. Of course many (perhaps most) of the participants *are* members of parties, but they are not representing them at the social forums. Nowhere else have I seen the sort of interesting and useful discussions that happen at social forums. In my view (and that of others too) they are the most hopeful global political development of the last 10 years.
Rather would I liken this moment to a wave building with a tidal force that will not be stopped. The point is to be in a position to catch the wave. Position yourself in thought and expectancy, like a surfer ready to catch the mounting swell. Nay saying and denial of course will not be effective preparation, as the cynic and doubter are likely to be tumbled under the wave, not being in the proper stance to ride upon it. The paradigm shift that the wave represents requires that each ready mind shift its weight in balance with the building torrent. The old 'free market' model is quite a tiny tidepool that might very well be inundated by a much larger potential in the human race. Cooperation is the ocean and the tide is coming in. Surely that might seem nebulous or far off now, but so it ever appears just before the tsunami hits the beach.
Nonsense! A Communist Revolution has already been tried with painfully taught lessons. Peace and cooperation cannot be won by violence and coercion.
Capitalism has been tried. It is already dead but does not yet know it. Peace and cooperation cannot be won by ruthless competition.
Lao Tzu says that the soft and yielding always win out over brute force.
>>You go meditate, and see how many oil barons yield. That just a hip sounding cover for doing NOTHING.
I agree. The meek shall inherit the earth and practitioners of these religions proceeded to go on a rampage and engage in genocides throughout the planet. Their pope was a nazi party member. This programming that we frequently witness on this board is the idea that you can combat defective genes and flawed cultural programming with love and compassion. Nothing is further from the truth. Our business and political leaders of today are nothing more than defective sociopaths. This attitude of submission promulgated by almost all of the world's religions has allowed these people to increase their power and influence.
You could imagine the most just and good utopia and I can assure you that there will be defective organisms who will struggle against it. These defective organisms today are our leaders. In order for progress to be made, we would first have to wrench the levers of power from these sociopaths, then take steps to protect ourselves from these predators in the future. The time for humanity's immune system to kick in is now.
Communism as implemented in human history is nothing more than government oligarchy. The Soviet Union's government held much in common with America's robber barons. Red China is showing her true colors today and she gets in bed with the western corporate fascists. If you are to look for a model, I would look towards the socialist governments found in western Europe. That said, even those governments are starting to become frayed around the edges due to the increasing influence of the global corporate fascist movement.
Not to beat a dead horse here but what hope does your screed leave us with your denial of both communism and capitalism? Do you see a democratic govt untainted by the scourge of capitalism?
You are correct in that the Communism we have seen has failed but it is not the true communism at all. In the case of both Russia and China their was a co-opting of the govt by an elite. That is not at all the true nature of communism. Capitalism contains within it the seeds of its own destruction and will certainly self destruct.
I think an amalgam of democratic governance and socialist principles will be the wave of the future. How that will be achieved , whether through violence or by peaceful and evolutionary processes is open to debate and to the participation of our citizenry.
>>I think an amalgam of democratic governance and socialist principles will be the wave of the future. How that will be achieved , whether through violence or by peaceful and evolutionary processes is open to debate and to the participation of our citizenry.
I agree assuming this corporate fascist disease doesn't kill us all first.
for each your move the musters have already ten - only frontal democracy can overcome the disadvantage - "the unified system of asking" edweg
what's lacking is the understanding of democracy
activists will not replace government, and private sector gets stronger as the only one on the block - activists, as tony blare once said, are there no longer for the t-shorts
edweg
I wonder who pays the bills for the International Policy Network, when the head's interviewed and tells us that free market economy is the hope of the world. I suspect someone who's tag line is "Another world is NOT possible".
But another world is possible. It's just that it's not going to be done for us by big guys far away, but by us close up. That's the revolution that van G is slamming as an socialist plot. Nope, it's not that old thinking. Just ordinary people taking care of their food and their communities, one by one.
www.RadicalRelocalization.com
"They'll never see us coming."
We're organizing a People's Movement Assembly (a four hour antiwar/rebuilding the peace movement assembly)at the US Social Forum in Detroit this June as part of the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations. We have quite a few cosponsors and are getting more: ISO, PDA, Code Pink, World Can't Wait, Peace and Freedom Party of California, Peace of the Action, ANSWER, etc. Gathering speakers now. It will be a great place to be, so don't miss it.
The US -- including the Progressive community -- still refuses to address US poverty, and doesn't even recognize the existence of Americans worse off than "the working poor." There has been an utter failure to address the consequences of our appalling "welfare reform" policies. By blocking out the voices of the poor, the general public came to accept than American poverty is merely a "lifestyle choice." Not everyone can work, and this is not (never was) a full-employment nation. Tens of thousands of our jobs have been exported in recent years, and unlike other nations, our government prohibits foreign poverty aid to our own citizens. Meanwhile, billions of dollars continue to be poured into covering the costs of annual "tax relief" for the rich.
There are no outcries against such results of welfare "reform" as the escalating infant mortality rates among our poor (which now surpass that of some Third World countries),or the declining life expectancy of America's poor. These policies are actually killing people, and we say nothing. As it was in Nazi Germany, we have embraced the idea that those who aren't gainfully employed have no human worth, therefore no fundamental human rights.