Porto Alegre Notebook

Scenes of Resistance in the Global South

by Tarso Luís Ramos

In January 2003, I joined the 100,000+ people who descended on Porto Alegre from 156 countries for the 3^rd annual World Social Forum (WSF): four days of marches, workshops, debates, and speeches. The first forum, two years earlier, had drawn a “mere” 15,000 organizers, activists, academics and public officials from 120 countries. The WSF was founded as a kind of people’s response to the World Economic Forum — the annual gathering of governments and business elites usually held in the luxury resort of Davos, Switzerland. The stated purpose of the Social Forum was to create “a new international space for reflection and organization of all who oppose neoliberal policies and are building alternatives that prioritize human development and seek to overturn of the dominance of financial markets in every county and in international relations.”

In other words, the first WSF focused on some of the same issues under fire during the anti-World Trade Organization mobilizations in Seattle a year earlier, such as the emergence of a global corporate order operating above the laws of nations and, often, in secret. But unlike Seattle, the World Social Forum was organized in and for the global South (Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa and Asia) and was welcomed with open arms (rather than tear gas and riot police) by the host city of Porto Alegre. The second annual World Social Forum adopted the slogan Another World is Possibleand was even bigger, drawing some 60,000 participants.

Even though I had been in Brasil during the first Forum, this is the one I knew I had to attend — if for no other reason than the incredibly charged political atmosphere. Brasil had just elected a left-wing labor leader as its president and was undergoing the first transition from one democratically elected government to another in 40 years. (That’s when a U.S.-backed coup d’etat toppled the leftist government of João Goulart, ushering in two decades of dictatorship and torture and sending my family and me into exile in New York City.) Meanwhile, the Bush Administration was preparing a preemptive war against Iraq and, at the same time, destabilizing the government of Brasil’s neighbor Venezuela, an “oil democracy” headed by socialist president Hugo Chavez. (Venezuela is the only OPEC member nation in the western hemisphere.) This was too much for me. So, after stopping off in Rio for visits with family, I hopped a plane for Porto Alegre to check it all out.

A Political Bazaar

The scale of the WSF was dizzying. We were like a city within a city. There were twenty-five thousand youth camped out in “Harmony Park,” a vast sea of tents.  No one location could accommodate everyone, so the Forum was divided among several sites around the city, including the Catholic University, a sports stadium, warehouses and a converted gas works.  The conference program was an enormous booklet that listed hundreds of sessions each day and Porto Alegre operated a special line of buses just to ferry the hordes of international delegates from one place to another.

The WSF was like a huge bazaar of left/progressive ideas and political tendencies.  Images of Che Guevara were everywhere, as were Palestinian flags and banners for Brasil’s PT (Workers Party), MST (Rural Landless Wokers Movement) and PC do B (Communist Party).  The Mothers of the Disappeared from Chile had a strong presence, as did indigenous communities from across the continent. While all the large, “headline” events were translated into the Forum’s official languages ­ Spanish, Portuguese, French and English.  I spent most of my time in workshops organized by Brasilian groups.  Taken together, these sessions amounted to a separate Brasilian Social Forum since they were offered only in Portuguese and attracted few international delegates. 

That’s a shame, since most WSF delegates likely left Brasil with little sense of many local struggles, such as that of the Quilomberos ­ descendents of Afro-Brasilians who escaped slavery to form free societies, or took over plantation lands upon abolition. (The largest of these, Palmares, was home to 100,000 people at its peak and survived for a century despite annual military campaigns to bring it down.)  Over one hundred such communities ­ Quilombos ­ survive in Brasil today, ranging in size from dozens to hundreds of residents.  Most lack title to their land and are fighting against land thievery by farmers and real estate speculators ­ as well as those who would “help” their communities by dividing the land into privately owned parcels. Although I did not attend any sessions focused on international finance and trade, there was a lot of buzz in the air about the next round of concessions that industrialized nations and transnational corporations were getting ready to demand of the global south in exchange for aid (e.g. from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund).  In the past, demands have included opening up markets and cutting social spending.  On the near horizon are, apparently, demands for territory ­ especially water and land.  (A few governments have already begun selling off their water rights to corporations.)

At the Forum, a series of workshops and a film about Quilombos, communities of self-liberated, formerly enslaved Afro-Brasilians. Click the photo to see a larger version.

The biggest draws at the Forum took place under the big top of Gigantinho sports stadium.  I’ll share a few highlights:

• A dramatic exchange between Willie Madisha, President of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), and José Genoino, President of Brasil’s Worker’s Party.  Madisha said, based on COSATU’s experiences since the victory of the African National Congress, “We can't simply elect a government — the struggle really starts once the new government takes office… We should not have sacrificed mass organizations and mobilization of the people.”  Madisha thus laid out a challenge to Genoino’s Worker’s Party, which in January won the presidency, as well as to organizers across the globe: “Social movements work on specific issues, and it's the job of political parties to represent global demands", he argued. “Social movements need political parties and political parties have to be involved with social movements.”  Genoino took up the challenge, declaring that the Worker’s Party is committed to having one foot in governance and the other rooted in social struggle.
  
• An electrifying speech by Indian author and activist Arundhati Roy, who eclipsed stage mate Noam Chomsky (whose monotone sarcasm translated poorly).  Addressing the coming war against Iraq, Roy brought tens of thousands to their feet with these words: “If we look at this conflict as a straightforward eye-ball to eye-ball confrontation between Empire and those of us who are resisting it, it might seem that we are losing. But there is another way of looking at it. We, all of us gathered here, have, each in our own way, laid siege to Empire. We may not have stopped it in its tracks - yet - but we have stripped it down. We have made it drop its mask. We have forced it into the open. It now stands before us on the world's stage in all its brutish, iniquitous nakedness. Empire may well go to war, but it’s out in the open now - too ugly to behold its own reflection. Too ugly even to rally its own people. It won't be long before the majority of American people become our allies.”

•  The emotional climax of the Forum came during the final session at Gigantinho stadium as Palestinian and Israeli peace activists read their “Letter for Porto Alegre” to a capacity crowd.  Their joint statement called for the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel based on 4 June 1967 borders and with Jerusalem as the capital of each of the two states, a just resolution to the Palestinian refugee problem, and United Nations intervention in order to end violence on both sides and immediately proceed to negotiations to bring about a just and lasting peace.  Cheers filled the stadium as the Palestian/Isreali delegation joined hands and joined the crowd in singing John Lennon’s “Imagine.” Maybe it’s that the majority in the stadium weren’t English-speakers, but, to my surprise, the moment was actually moving rather than corny. There has been a fair bit of criticism of the “big top” program at the Forum for all that was missing from this, the most public face of the WSF.  For my part, I was struck at the absence of content on racial and gender justice as well as the near invisibility of youth ­ despite the 25,000-strong youth encampment.  To be sure, there were fabulous sessions on these and other struggles; it’s just that they weren’t profiled.

Palestinian and Israeli peace activists read their “Letter from Porto Alegre” lick on photo for larger image.

Lula

For many, this year’s Forum held special significance coming as it did mere weeks after the presidential inauguration of Workers Party co-founder Luíz Inácio da Silva — known throughout Brasil simply as “Lula.” Born into poverty, Lula was a metalworker and union leader before co-founding the PT in 1979.  He lost a finger on the job and never earned a high school diploma, but in this, his fourth run for the presidency, Lula won by a landslide.  For Brasilians, the election of a left-wing worker as President has created hope among the poor that change is, after all, possible.  More than a President, Lula has become a folk hero.  For workers’ movements around the globe, Lula’s victory — in the eight largest economy in the world, no less — renews hope that there is an alternative to the global dominance of structural adjustment doctrine (e.g. gut social services and worker protections in the name of competitiveness).

In an enormous outdoor amphitheater Lula was given a hero’s welcome. In a moving speech, he acknowledged the sacrifices made by many Brasilians who never survived to see democracy return to their country. He told the crowd, “I wasn’t elected as a result of the support of a TV channel. I wasn’t elected because of the support of the financial system. I wasn’t elected thanks to powerful economic interests. And I wasn’t elected because of my ability or my intelligence. I was elected on 27 October 2002 because of the high level of political awareness of Brasilian voters… I’m the end result of the work you’ve been doing all those years.” The crowd erupted with enthusiasm. Lula was stopping in Porto Alegre on his way to attend the very World Economic Forum in Davos that the WSF was designed to counteract.  He assured those critical of his decision to go to Davos that he would speak out against the looming war on Iraq and urge world leaders to prioritize human development over military spending.  As further justification for his decision he said, “I believe we have things to do in the world. What we can’t do is stay shut up inside our world, believing that all the bad things around us are caused by those who are outside.”  He continued, “We’re poor. This may be partly the fault of the rich countries. But it may be partly the fault of one section of the elite of the South American continent that has ruled in a subservient way, that has ruled Brasil in such a way as to make it subordinate, perpetrating the most outrageous instances of corruption.”  Again the crowd erupted in applause and in a song to be heard many times before the end of the Forum: “Olé olé olé olá!  Lula Lula!”

“Sunset Amphitheater,” where Lula addressed the crowd. Click photo for larger image.

Declaring his support for the World Social Forum, in which he had participated since its founding, Lula proclaimed, “For 500 years Brasil has been looking towards Europe. Now is the time to look towards Africa and South America… We cannot accept what has been going on for 40 years, the blockading of Cuba. We cannot accept that countries can be marginalized for centuries and centuries. And we can’t accept that a country the size of Brasil can each year go on having a higher and higher rate of poverty and wretchedness.”  There was cheering and dancing and, soon enough, music, while Lula made his way to Switzerland to deliver exactly the speeches he had promised in Porto Alegre.

Taking it to the Streets

Click the photo to see a larger version.

The Chilean delegation carry flag and banners of President Salvador Allende, toppled in the original "9-11" attack  a US-backed military coup that brought torture and dictatorship to Chile.

Click the photo to see a larger version.

Not surprisingly, some of the most exciting action at the WSF took place in the streets.  I believe all present would agree that the enormous opening and closing marches demonstrated the superiority of Latin American protest culture over the staid marches so common in the United States!  In January, the build-up to Brasilian carnaval was well underway and the United Socialist Workers Party of Brasil (PSTU) demonstrated that samba could be a form of protest, with lively chants and formation dancing in their section of the marches.  Their chants included: “Against FTAA and capital!  Our fight is international!”  Worried that Lula might compromise in his opposition to implementation of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (a NAFTA for the entire hemisphere), the PSTU is organizing to hold the new administration accountable to workers.

Samba as protest: the PSTU chant “Against FTAA and capital!  Our fight is international!” Click picture for larger photo.

Unlike in the U.S., where the common “No Blood for Oil” slogan refers only to the Middle East, in Porto Alegre there was equal concern for the “other,” if low-intensity, oil war underway in Venezuela.  Forum participants rallied in huge numbers during an appearance by Chavez.  (Even before Lula’s inauguration, the Brasilian government began defying Washington by shipping petroleum to Venezuela in an attempt to break a white-collar strike in the petroleum sector.) The Cuban delegation demonstrated its solidarity by distributing thousands of copies — free of charge — of a recent collection of Chavez speeches, in English, Spanish, Portuguese and French editions.

Click the photo to see a larger version. A transgender Brasilian woman falls to the ground, interrupting the march. The sign on her body reads, “Discrimination kills in every place on earth. To respect sexual diversity is also possible.” After a moment, she runs off to “die” someplace else along the march.

Click the photo to see a larger version. “Stop Selling Brasil!” The Brasilian flag morphs into a U.S. one. Privatized state enterprises are shown among the stars in the U.S. flag, while remaining public utilities are shown on the Brasilian side.

Click the photo to see a larger version The Landless Rural Workers Movement (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, or MST) banner calls for a unified left.

Coming Back On my flight back to the States I thought I should brace myself for re-entry by reading that day’s New York Times and the latest Newsweek/Time/US News — whichever.  I was stunned not so much by the news of looming war with Iraq but by the dozens of stories documenting local setbacks: affirmative action on trial in Michigan, English-Only implemented in Massachusetts, and on and on and on.  I knew the elation of standing shoulder to shoulder with vast numbers of people “laying siege Empire,” as Roy put it, couldn’t last, but there was something deeper in my disappointment.

Brasilian newspapers, too, are full of stories that, despite themselves, are testaments to oppression and injustice.  But there had been something tremendously uplifting about spending time in a country where, despite such enormous problems, political events seemed to be bending in the direction of justice.  My time in Porto Alegre renewed my belief that, indeed, another world is possible, and that struggle is what creates that possibility and generates hope.  So I put down the papers and thought about my comrades — known and unknown — doing the work back in the U.S.  This put a smile on my face as a tried to find a position I could fall asleep in.  I had two more flights and another twenty hours before I would land in Portland.

WSF 2004

The next annual WSF will be held in Mumbai (formerly Bombay), India in January 2004 in order to better involve social movements from Asia and Africa in the visioning of “another world.”  In 2005, the event is scheduled to return to Porto Alegre.

Resources

• World Social Forum
• Arundhati Roy’s speech
• Palestinian/Israeli Letter from Porto Alegre:
• Lula’s speech at the WSF

© 2005, Western States Center