Some doubt may be starting to emerge as to what exactly the World Social Forum (WSF) aims to achieve and how it will go about pursuing its objectives. And it is not only because the forum has come to be regarded in certain quarters, perhaps with a measure of good reason, as a gilded talkshop, but also because some activists view it as an annual ‘social carnival’ that is sinking ever deeper into the clutches of money makers.

Indeed, an article in one of the earlier editions of the The Flame brought to light the grand collusion that seems to be afoot between airlines, hotels and local businesses as they all rush to claim their stake in the inevitable commercial spin-offs generated by the hosting of this annual event. To put it bluntly, there are fears that the forum could be turning itself into yet another profitable cash cow for the merchants of capital.

Questions are being posed about what precisely the WSF has achieved since its nascent beginnings in 2001 in Porto Alegre. Since its inception five years ago, the Forum has maintained its status as “an open meeting place where groups and movements of civil society opposed to neo-liberalism and a world dominated by capital or by any form of imperialism...come together to pursue their thinking, debate ideas democratically, formulate proposals, share their experiences and network for effective action”.

This ‘open access’ concept, to coin a phrase, ensures that the forum remains flexible and horizontal rather than commandist and structured. It constitutes the raison d etre for the forum’s existence as a space for activists to meet, debate and formulate strategise.

For those who desire to see more action however, there is a feeling that the Forum should transform itself into “an effective political force for global change”, as stated in an article in “Terraviva”, one of the many daily publications doing the rounds in the 2005 WSF.

It may not be a sign of things to come but a group of prominent individuals among them two Nobel laureates, a number of prominent authors and the editor of an influential French newspaper have even come up with what has been called the “Porto Alegre Manifesto in an attempt to give more flesh to the activities of the forum. The manifesto is a 12 point plan that will hopefully transform activist talk into action because as “Terraviva” says in quoting one of its presenters, “It’s not possible to continue to speak of ‘another world is possible if we do not make some proposals to reach this world”

But some of the people that The Flame spoke to within the vicinity of the ‘Social Territory’ paid glowing tribute to the WSF calling it an important counter-hegemonic force to the dominant neo-liberal paradigm. “What people need to understand is that the World Social Forum is merely an open space for people to meet, share ideas, discuss strategies and then decide on what individual actions each one of them will want to pursue”, says Aarma Balani from India. “It is not for the WSF to take collective decisions because it is not a super-government, or a super-state that can dictate its will upon all activists across the world.”

Kone Selange from Ivory Coast and a member of the African Social Forum espouses similar sentiments. As she asserts when asked what she thinks of the WSF: “Yes of course, the Forum is important for mobilisation It is a space to meet and network with other people, besides the fact that it is useful for the wide range of information we get as activists through interaction with each other.”

South African activist Trevor Ngwane sees the WSF as “a reference point” for activists because “its vision of ‘another world is possible’ is unifying and gives focus to all the struggles taking place in the world. This struggle also emphasises the failures of the capitalist system and challenges us to look for alternatives which together can constitute a new social system.”

While the debate continues, it is worth asking whether all the monumental planning and the colossal sums of money sunk into the organising of each World Social Forum every year is worth the outcomes that are agreed upon at the end of the six days of deliberations. Would it not make better sense perhaps if the Forum was disaggregated and more space introduced in between the meetings?

Furthermore, the continents and regions within them should be the key drivers of activities, as they ought to under the current arrangements, and the WSF should merely be the open space where all these ideas converge. As an example, continental forums could hold their own meetings every year, while the WSF meets every three to five years. Such a process could ensure that a greater degree of inclusively and participation is maintained as well as a thorough exhaustion of issues taken up for action, while the WSF meeting itself would be the grand finale to the three or five year processes.

Short of that, the WSF may find itself proving the veracity of its critics arguments that it has become a talk shop, an annual jamboree which enables a small coterie of lucky individuals to grab a passport, get on a plane and fly to Porto Alegre or Mumbai or wherever else that the meeting is set to take place. Already, a few of those who have participated in past events are beginning to talk of “fo-rum fatigue”.