The WSF: The global meeting place for progressives
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Local/Global Encounters
The WSF: The global meeting place for progressives JOA˜ O PEDRO STEDILE
ABSTRACT Joao ˜ Pedro Stedile, leader of MST and Via Campesina outlines why he finds the World Social Forum the meeting point for global progressive politics. KEYWORDS peasant; working class; struggle; Empire; capitalism
Introduction The World Social Forum (WSF) is in its fifth year. Much has been written about it all over the world by intellectuals, members of the media and peoples’ movements. Some are in favour and others against. The fact that so many different opinions are emerging in all places, shows that the WSF has become the global reference point for progressives among intellectuals, social movements, peasant and working class struggles. Many from the right criticize it for being a transmutation of the Woodstock of the 1960s to the present day, preaching freedom of expression for the young. Others from the left instead imagine that the WSF is the new movement, linking all struggles in one political direction. Both are wrong. From the beginning of the first proposal for a World Social Forum and from the first meetings, the MST (Movimento Dos Sem Terra), Movement of Peasants Without Land, and Via Campesina supported the idea of the Social Forum, and had a clear vision of what should be the identity and role of the WSF.We defended WSF as a space, a convergence and point of encounter, for people, institutions, movements, social forces and intellectuals to exchange ideas and visions. And in order for it to be representative of all groups who wanted to exchange ideas and ideals, it had to be a space that was broad, plural and free, so each group could find its political and ideological partners, and thereby, establish long-lasting alliances. To that end, the WSF has encouraged ‘birds’of all species and from all continents, with multiple and different plumage. The MST through the WSF process has forged close partners, been able to meet annually to build collaborative relationship, returning to Porto Alegre for new ideas and programmes, calendars of activities, helping to plan together our local struggles. The world is experiencing a serious crisis due to the increasing domination of the global capitalist production model. On the one hand there are the everyday social crisis of the poor and workers combined with ideological crisis, as they lose their references, their historical meaning and the way to rebuild them. On the other hand, there is a total Development (2005) 48(2), 105–106. doi:10.1057/palgrave.development.1100137
Development 48(2): Local/Global Encounters hegemony of capital at the global level, linked to military might and the thirst to conquer. In such a context, it is crucial to build a space for people’s movements to meet, debate and strategize on how to confront the hegemony of the empire and capital. As the President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez mentioned in his speech during the last WSF ‘The WSF is the main event for the progressive politics all over the world’.
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We, from Via Campesina, will co
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