Americans Too Have a Left Side

By Sanjay Suri

Yes, America too has what you actually could call a left. "Left of the American centre, that is," Saren Ambrose, a member of that country’s delegation, tells TerraViva.

“Because the American left has moved right," Ambrose explains, “but it would be fair to say that the American delegation is not likely to include anyone who would have voted for Bush."

They include some thousand people who have not found a place in the Democratic Party, Ambrose says. “We are very disappointed with the Democratic Party because it has failed to stand up to Bush in any sense."

Informally, up to a thousand Americans are believed to have arrived to attend WSF, including many at the youth camp.

The American presence is significant also because these are not NGO members. “The group is mostly community based activists," Ambrose says. “These are people working in inner cities and in villages to change local and national policy. They are people working with women’s issues, with environmental issues, they are union members and labour activists."

Many people are surprised to hear of an American underclass like this, but it has always been there, he says. “A lot of them are just scraping by with some help from government programmes," he says. The difference now is that they have started to make new links within America and internationally.”

Internet has helped make important linkages, Ambrose says. “There are new links being built city to city among people working on similar issues," he says. “Now a lot of people are here who have never been out of the U.S., who do not follow international politics, because they want to learn how their situation is similar to others or different."

The delegation includes a large group from Los Angeles that has worked to secure new rights from the Los Angeles administration after the riots of 1992. The group hopes to offer lessons from its own experiences to others.

Who they are

The delegation includes a large number of members of Latin American origin, including several who speak no English. There are also a significant number of African Americans. More than half the American delegates are women.

Several of the delegates are from Tennessee in Kentucky who saw their factories closed down after the signing of NAFTA (North American Free Trade agreement) between the U.S., Canada and Mexico nine years ago. Others are engaged in coal and mineral mining, and have serious concerns about environmental damage being caused by the it.

Ambrose is involved with two groups, New Voices on Globalisation, and Fifty Years is Enough Now, a group he launched in 1994 on the 50th anniversary of the creation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Ambrose says he had hoped that the attacks of September 11 would convince Americans “that they are a part of the world, that we are not on another planet from Africa and South America." But that did not happen.