Meeting under the banner “Another World is Possible,” 100,000 participants at the third World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Jan. 23-28, could choose from around 1,500 panels, “dialogue and controversy round tables,” conferences, workshops and other sessions.
The topics ranged from labor rights and privatization to access to water, land and food, human rights, sustainable development and the role of political parties and social movements. One could call it a giant teach-in. But it was more than that.
Delegates came from 156 countries and represented 5,717 organizations – non-governmental organizations (NGOs), humanitarian groups, environmental groups, unions, religious groups, groups seeking debt relief, land reform and more. The Forum included an international Youth Encampment of 25,000 young people representing more than 700 organizations, and the Via Campesina, a movement of rural workers and landless people.
The World Social Forum arose out of the growing international anti-globalization movement that emerged in the late 1990s, most notably for the Seattle protests against the World Trade Organization (WTO), and those in Washington, DC, against the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. The movement’s theme is the rejection of corporate-driven globalization, a refusal to accept the scenario of a world controlled by the interests of transnational corporations and the super-rich. The World Social Forum is not an organization, and does not include political parties. It describes itself as: an open meeting place where social movements, networks, non-governmental organizations and other civil society organizations opposed to neo-liberalism and a world dominated by capital or by any form of imperialism come together to pursue their thinking, to debate ideas democratically, formulate proposals, share their experiences freely and network for effective action. The common goal: building “another world” where the economy serves the people rather than corporate greed – a more egalitarian, democratic, human-centered society.
At this year’s Forum, it was striking to see how much the American people and the people of the world are battling on the same issues. T-shirts, banners and flyers bore slogans familiar to Americans: no privatization of public services, preserve public education, protect the environment, save family farms and most urgently, no war.
At its conclusion, the Forum issued a “Call of the World Social Movements” whose opening words declare: We are meeting ... in the shadow of a global crisis. The belligerent intentions of the United States government in its determination to launch a war on Iraq pose a grave threat to us all, and are a dramatic manifestation of the links between militarism and economic domination. The Call sets forth a resounding rejection of war and the economic dictatorship of the WTO, IMF and other global capitalist groups. It goes on to call for cancellation of Third World debt, social and political equality for women, solidarity with peoples fighting what it calls imperialist hegemony, and the building of an international network to achieve social justice, participatory democracy, universal rights and a sustainable society.
During and after the Forum, a number of debates cropped up. One centers on the role of political parties and political leaders. Some took issue with the appearance in Porto Alegre of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez; a few even objected to the host country’s worker-President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva addressing the Forum. These critics suggest that social movements are tarnished by involvement with politics. But such complaints seemed to have little impact on most Forum participants, who turned out en masse to hear and cheer Lula and took every opportunity to express support for Chávez’ populist government and its determined resistance to coup plotters. In fact, it was apparent that this Forum was electrified by the fact that it was taking place amidst real-life laboratories of social change.
Listening to delegates from NGOs in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and broad religious, humanitarian or environmental groups like Oxfam or Friends of the Earth, it seems clear that global reality is leading them to essentially political stands – against the transnationals, against imperialism (a word widely used at the Forum) and against capitalism.
A few loud rallies by narrow “left” groups outside the main Forum hall lent some validity to the concept of excluding political parties from official representation at the Forum, keeping it a “space” for broad citizen participation and exchange. One wouldn’t want to see this space taken over by such sectarian forces. Clearly many Forum participants belong to political parties, and the Forum allows plenty of opportunity for expression of political views. A larger question is: are political parties needed in order to change the world? And if so, what kinds of parties? What is their role?
Gladys Marín, leader of the Communist Party of Chile, addressed these issues at the Forum in a panel on relationships between social movements, political parties and governments and how to advance participatory democracy. Before an attentive audience of some 5,000 people, Marín argued that a blanket rejection of politics and political parties is a mistake for social movements. While social movements work on specific issues, it’s the job of progressive, working class and communist political parties to represent global demands and perspectives, she said. “Social movements need political parties and political parties have to be involved with social movements.” Communist parties can exercise leadership as part of the emerging movement for social change, said Marín: “We have to build a new world together.”
What kind of other world do we want to build?
Many of the Forum’s sessions provided gripping descriptions of problems, and there was much discussion about what various groups are doing and about alternative programs in specific areas. But not yet clearly envisioned in the world anti-capitalist-globalization movement is what another world would look like and exactly how it would work. If we get rid of capitalism, what new and better way takes its place?
One Forum activist dismissed “the old communist party and the communist ideology” and “the old socialist kind of system where the state commands the whole economy.” But he and most other speakers did not offer a clear framework for constructing a new society. Is socialism relevant? Doesn’t it in fact provide that necessary framework? Aren’t the alternatives discussed by participants objectively part of a dynamic and variegated socialist reorganization of society, adapted to the specific features of regions, countries and peoples?
And exactly how do we “stand up to the empire” – the topic of one of the sessions? How can the movement win and keep power in order to build that other world?
It’s likely that these topics will increasingly claim the attention of future World and Regional Social Forums.
What does the World Social Forum represent? Is it important for communists and working-class activists in the US? Undoubtedly many international forms and structures – including the United Nations – will play a role in defeating the ultra-right embodied by our Bush administration, and moving to the next stage – building a majority movement that can win a positive people’s program. There is no cookbook recipe for this.
The World Social Forum, with its associated Regional Forums, is a loose and evolving formation, a kind of “people’s United Nations.” It helps to draw the connections between global and local movements and among a multiplicity of issues. For Americans, it expand our horizons, helping us to see how our problems and struggles relate to those in other continents and countries, and especially how movements in other countries help us. It opens up new possibilities for building a powerful international movement that can in fact “stand up to the empire.” Being part of this emerging movement is not only a good idea; it’s both a necessity and an obligation for us here in the “belly of the beast.”
