2004 Ad

Catholic New Times, Feb 29, 2004 by Richard Renshaw

This year, India hosted the Fourth World Social Forum and in so doing, utterly transformed it.

On January 16, over 100,000 people gathered in Mumbai for the first World Social Forum held outside Latin America--the earlier Forums having taken place in Brazil. Among the delegates were nine persons from Development and Peace, including myself. CCODP has participated in all previous World Social Forums.

The first World Social Forum grew out of a conversation among six Brazilians, who were incensed that Margaret Thatcher should constantly defend her economic and social policies by saying, "There is no alternative." It was also conceived as an alternative to the annual World Economic Forum at Davos in Switzerland that gathers the rich and powerful to advance their plans for globalizing the neoliberal market for the benefit of multinational corporations.

The vision and the initial coordination of the World Social Forum grew out of the deep faith of its original six "founders." They imagined a gathering of peoples from all over the world, a special assembly of the "excluded", the marginalized and those who stood in solidarity with them, a great space of imagination and dialogue for the social movements of the world, where everyone would be welcome and all ideas could be heard about how to create a world that is more inclusive and just and peaceful.

In a sense, the World Social Forum is another expression of the long struggle of Liberation Theology. to provide a space where the voice of the poor can be heard, where it can erupt into the world of the rich and powerful and where God's Kingdom, always present and always challenging us, can be welcomed into the real world of today.

The World Social Forum is not a movement; it does not make decisions; it has no platform or declaration. The World Social Forum is simply a space for people to come together to release their imagination and to connect it with that of others throughout the world.

Mumbai showed the strength of the original inspiration of the Forum in that it was capable of transcending the boundaries of the Western world and its cultural context in order to truly become Asian. The World Social Forum took on a truly Indian character and there will be no going back even if the Forum is held in Latin America next year.

Ninety percent of the 100,000 persons present were from India. Many spoke none of the "official" languages of the Forum (English, French, Spanish), not even Hindi. Many were illiterate. Thus, it was not surprising that they did not make it a priority to attend the major panels and seminars where the world's intellectuals spoke eloquently of the various issues being debated. They came to tell their stories, find one another and dialogue with people whose struggles are similar--or different. They came to march in the street, to sing their songs and drum their stories, present their theatre, as well as to listen to those of others; in all, to make their presence felt and to feel empowered to act together. They generally transformed the World Social Forum into an extraordinary encounter of the poor and excluded from every corner of the planet who felt safe in this environment to proclaim their identity, their presence and their power to make a difference. They truly "irrupted" into the Forum.

Several new and important dimensions of dialogue enlarged the Forum considerably. The original vision focused primarily on the disastrous impact of neo-liberal economics on the poor. Quickly the vision focused also on war and militarism. In Mumbai, in Asia, the very dynamic focus of a diversity of excluded peoples, especially the untouchables, raised the question of caste, racism and religious fundamentalism. The exploitation of water and the privatization of water services became a very strong focus of attention, as did the various forms of exploitation experienced by children, especially in Asia.

And the dialogue led to very concrete results. An assembly of anti-war movements throughout the world was held in one of several Solidarity Tents. There, the decision was taken to hold a Global Day of Resistance on March 20 to oppose the American Occupation of Iraq.

At the same time, various organizations throughout the world concerned about what is happening to our global water supply, have decided to form a People's World Water Movement and to target one of the large multinational water corporations in order to deliver the message that our earth is not for sale. These are a few of the results of a space left open for people to find their voice and their imagination.

In future Forums it will be very important to create a much stronger link between the discourse of the intellectuals who made presentations and the popular education approach required in order to welcome the increased presence of the excluded and oppressed sectors of the world at the Social Forums. There is also a need to discover a process so that the strategies and action proposals brought forward at the Social Forums are effectively made known to all participants.