EUROPE: ‘Stop Complaining, Start Planning’

By Julio Godoy Reprint | | Print |

Julio Godoy

PARIS, Nov 17 2003 (IPS) - Proposals for a better world must replace protests against present ways, the European Social Forum concluded over the weekend.

“Social forums have so far been a popular university, an enterprise in people’s education,” says Bernard Cassen, president of the Association for the Taxation of Financial Transactions to Aid Citizens (ATTAC, after its French name). The group is a coalition of union members and university professors, and the main organiser of the European Social Forum (ESF) held in and around Paris Nov. 12-15.

“Now, despite the successes in organising social forums to protest against the state of the world, the alter globalisation movement must think of new ways of influencing political decisions to achieve its goals,” Cassen told a press conference.

“We have to think whether we should create one or several new political parties,” he added. “To answer this question means first to be clear why existing political parties have failed to fulfil people’s expectations of social justice and citizen’s rights.”

The accent at the ESF was on ‘alter globalisation’. That is the term civil society organisations coined to describe a new form of globalisation based on international cooperation, human development and social justice.

Fausto Bertinoti from the Italian party Rifondazione Communista called for the formation of “a new radical European left to substitute the old one which has given up the notion of utopia, the idea of social change, and accepted neo-liberal, capitalist-led globalisation.”

Without an alternative “we risk becoming loud witnesses of the demise of democracy,” he said.

The ESF ended Saturday after three days of intense debates on issues such as war, welfare state under a capitalist economy, women’s rights, organic farming, privatisation of public services, and the transparency of multinational corporations.

More than 40,000 people attended the debates and seminars in a festive but also serious atmosphere. That level of attendance and the level of the debates made the event a success, but several participants said this model is reaching saturation point.

“To protest against the wrongdoings of capital-led globalisation, and of governments and private enterprises is a good thing,” a member of Doctors without Borders in Spain told IPS.

“But the alter globalisation movement must go beyond protests, and present practical proposals, and work on the creation of political conditions to put its solutions in practice,” she said.

ESF organisers seemed to have had this goal in mind already. Most speakers commented on the state of the world, but also proposed ways to improve it.

Activists against the privatisation of public services suggested various reforms of international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

A reform of international law on trade and investment was proposed in order to guarantee the sovereignty of nations in relation to private corporations.

Environmental organisations insisted on compulsory transparency of multinational enterprises to enforce their social and environmental responsibilities.

University professors called for a reform of the European Central Bank to make it accountable to citizens.

Women’s organisations proposed changes in national and European legislation to prevent or penalise violence in marriage against women and children.

The organisers plan to publish a book next year that will include proposals presented at the ESF.

Beyond that, the alter globalisation movement is preparing for the next World Social Forum to be held in the Indian city Mumbai in January 2004, and the next ESF to take place in London next fall.

The ESF has called also for an “action day” next spring to protest against the dismantling of welfare institutions in Europe, and another protest May 9 against the proposed European constitution.

The European constitution is due to be approved in Rome that day. European NGOs have been arguing that the proposed constitution places neo-liberalism and militarism above European Union founding principles.

“This collective appeal against neo-liberalism and capitalist-led globalisation shows that the movement against the dismantling of welfare institutions is becoming international,” says Hugo Braun, a German organiser with the ESF.

Beyond the warnings against reducing alter globalisation to a simple protest movement, the ESF in Paris registered a new success: there were definite signs that the main targets of its criticism such as private enterprises, middle-of-the-road political parties and international financial institutions are becoming aware of the criticism coming from civil society.