By Samir Amin and - -
DAKAR, May 1 2005 (IPS)

The World Social Forum (WSF) movement has already won a moral victory. \’\’The world is not for sale\’\’ and \’\’Another world is possible\’\’ are not empty slogans but calls to action that have won over public opinion around the world. In this column, based on a document addressed to the WSF International Council, Amin calls for the orchestration of major world effort comprised of: a campaign against the so-called preventive wars of the United States, and, subsequently, for the evacuation of all of its military bases; a campaign in favour of the right to access to land, the recognition of which is vital for three billion peasant farmers on three continents; a campaign to regulate industrial relocation; and a campaign to cancel all Third World foreign debt. The WSF today faces a crucial choice. It has the possibility of becoming a place for the patient construction of fronts capable of bringing about the convergence of the myriad progressive forces worldwide. To achieve this I would suggest the definition of common platforms articulated around the rejection of both neoliberalism and of the militarisation of globalisation under the control of the United States. The broad and open alliance of movements that share this perspective would make it possible to construct positive alternatives.

The World Social Forum (WSF) movement has already won a moral victory. ”The world is not for sale” and ”Another world is possible” are not empty slogans but calls to action that have won over public opinion around the world.

The movement is multi-dimensional and therein lies its strength, although this can be an obstacle to generating consensus on setting strategic priorities.

However, merely asserting the claims of victims of the system, though perfectly legitimate, constitutes neither an alternative nor a strategy that will lead to advancement. Moreover, doing so runs a grave risk of limiting its function to mere denunciation, which is what some of its members want.

The movement has succeed in mobilising important segments of the educated middle classes particularly in countries at the centre of the system. Almost all of its organisations share a single objective — the advancement of women’s rights, and the defence of oppressed minorities, cultural or otherwise, etc — and are usually interclassist by principle.

This intervention within social classes that usually content themselves with voting and other means of representative democracy –lobbies and participation in political groups– is a very positive development. The defence of the individual and freedom of individual initiative and the rigorous moral character of many of these organisations is in no way a ”petit bourgeois deformation” –as certain sectors of the workers movement have considered it– but on the contrary an advance in political practice which benefits, in the long run, all dominated classes.

However, these organisations have not eclipsed those of the working class in the fight for their so-called ”material” interests. Workers’ struggles for jobs, job security, and better wages, of those of peasant farmers for access to land and better pay, remain the backbone of those struggles capable of changing social power relations. Rural and labour unions thus are essential components of the movement.

But there is no doubt that these ”classical” organisations, which are the means of expression and action of the dominated classes, have not managed to adapt themselves to the new challenges. Innovations in the structure of labour and the conduct of economic life caused by the evolution of capitalism demand new ways of organisation and struggle, which are, among other things, the focus of the work agenda of the World Forum of Alternatives. However, this does not justify the disdain with which many of these movements regard the so-called ”traditional” rural and labour unions.

The organisations encounter considerable obstacles in surmounting state borders. I think that the only way this can be achieved is through the orchestration of major world campaigns focused on the most important strategic objectives. For example:

– a campaign against the so-called preventive wars of the United States, and, subsequently, for the evacuation of all of its military bases;

– a campaign in favour of the right to access to land, the recognition of which is vital for three billion peasant farmers on three continents;

-a campaign to regulate industrial outsourcing;

– a campaign to cancel all Third World foreign debt.

None of these campaigns will mobilise ”the whole world”, and its respective centres of gravity will be different, but all of them must resonate powerfully –and not only in directly affected countries– in such a way as to bring about concrete progress in the expression of a new internationalism of the people of the world.

The principal threat to the movement is the naive belief that it is possible ”to change the world without attempting to take power”. Certainly there have been powerful social movements that have changed society. The year 1968 was an example of this. It changed many things in the West in a positive direction, bringing about the peak of the women’s movement and the deepening of individual democratic responsibility. But capitalism has shown that it is capable of absorbing these evolutions without its fundamental modes of exploitation and oppression being called into question.

The WSF today faces a crucial choice. It has the possibility of becoming a place for the patient construction of fronts capable of bringing about the convergence of the myriad progressive forces worldwide. To achieve this I would suggest the definition of common platforms articulated around the rejection of both neoliberalism and of the militarisation of globalisation under the control of the United States. The broad and open alliance of movements that share this perspective would make it possible to construct positive alternatives.(END/COPYRIGHT IPS)

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