Author: Chinta Musundi-Beez
Date: January 14, 2007
Type of article: Commentary
Source: The East African Standard - not available online

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The World Social Forum (WSF) was created to provide an open platform to discuss strategies of resistance to the globalisation model proposed at the annual World Economic Forum at Davos.

The forum is a yearly message to the elites of the world — that we have power and it is growing every year. Therefore, the first and fundamental result of the Forum is the event itself.

Firmly committed to the belief that "Another World Is Possible", the WSF is an open space for discussing alternatives, exchanging experiences and strengthening alliances among civil society organisations, peoples and movements. The aim of the political process launched in 2001 by the WSF remains the same: to permit encounters among "groups and movements of civil society that are opposed to neoliberalism and to domination of the world by capitalism and any form of imperialism, and are committed to building a planetary society directed towards fruitful relationships among Humankind and between it and the Earth".

The WSF is an "open meeting place for reflective thinking, democratic debate of ideas, formulation of proposals, free exchange of experiences and interlinking for effective action", according to the specific nature of each struggle and the type of action of each leading participant.

Following the first global meeting held in 2001 in the city of Porto Alegre, Brazil, the Forum was turned into an ongoing global process, adopting a Charter of Principles, as its main document. The first three editions of the Forum were carried out in Porto Alegre; in 2004, the WSF moved to Mumbai, India, returning in 2005 to Porto Alegre, while in 2006 a Polycentric forum took place in three different places: Caracas (Venezuela), Karachi (Pakistan) and Bamako (Mali).

This year, it will be held in Kenya with the aim of evaluating what has happened with actions proposed by social movements in previous forums, in order to find out whether they are already under way and make their results visible.

Kenyans should take advantage of the open space created by the Forum and create movements that amplify the aim of the Forum. We can expect the birth of many movements, big or small, more or less combative, each with its specific objectives, to perform their own roles in the same struggle — and their development is the primary aim of the square. The objectives of these new initiatives do not have to be all clear and precise, as typical of what occurs in movements, but may still be in the process of formation, waiting to mature.

The Forum should allow each participant to maintain his/her own freedom to choose the sector or the level in which to act. This action could be either, very wide and comprehensive or rather restricted; or it might intend to address either the deeper causes of the problems the world faces or the superficial effects of these problems. Nobody in the Forum should be accorded the power or the right to say that one action or proposal is more important than another. Nor should they have the power or the right to give or demand a bigger visibility to their proposals, ‘usurping’ for their own particular objectives a space that belongs to everybody.

Activists of different movements in Kenya, should take advantage of the space provided to all by the Forum, to: fight for the rights of women, of rural and urban workers and of children; fight for the environment; seek new economic relations within countries or at the international level; seek democratic participation in governments or fight for the enhancement of the spiritual dimension in the human being, etc. Kenyans should emphasise solutions and not ills.

Kenyans should make known to those who come to the Forum to hear how Kenyan activists in their diverse communities are winning their fight and what strategies and ideologies they are employing in that fight. They should use the forum to be heard, pass out flyers or announce websites to disseminate information.

I suspect most delegates would benefit from an emphasis on ideas and solutions rather than lectures and rhetoric. Unfortunately we have heard much more of the latter in the former WSFs. The concern is to be more effective by concentrating efforts and reducing the extent and variety of the struggles that can be discussed — and turned into plans of action — at the Forum.

Therefore, let all Kenyans and other activists use this powerful instrument that is available to us, for expanding and enlarging our presence in the struggle we are all engaged in.