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The open space series
Are other worlds possible ?
A Background Note
for a Seminar Series at the University of Delhi,
August – December 2003
Mukul Mangalik and Jai Sen, with the help of Madhuresh Kumar, July 2003
INTRODUCTION
This Note gives the background to and programme for a series of seminars coming up soon at the University of Delhi on the World Social Forum, the issues with which the Forum is concerned, and the culture of politics that the Forum offers. The series will be spread over two terms, August-September 2003 and mid October-December 2003.
The World Social Forum, initiated in Brazil in January 2001 as a challenge to the World Economic Forum in order to put forward another view of the world and its possibilities, is now widely seen as being a highly significant world initiative. The motto the World Social Forum has coined for itself is ‘Another World Is Possible !’.
At one level, the question we want to explore in this series is precisely whether and which kinds of other worlds are possible, and what roles the Forum is playing and can play in contributing to such worlds.
In principle, the Forum is meant to be an ‘open space’ for the free exchange of ideas amongst those critical of and/or concerned with neo-liberal globalisation and its impacts, and about the social, economic, and political order more generally. This relatively undirected ‘open space’ is one where people from a wide range of streams of thought and action can meet and interact, without feeling that they have to agree with the views of the organisers or that they have to subscribe to one or another’s ideas or prescriptions. The propositions and formulations that emerge from the Forum come out of this interaction, appear in the names of the participants and not of the World Social Forum, which itself takes no positions or ‘leadership’ on any issues beyond what is given in its Charter of Principles.
Since 2001 the WSF has moved from being a major event each January in Porto Alegre, timed to challenge the annual World Economic Forum held at Davos, Switzerland, to being a protest and an efflorescence and celebration across the world.
In November 2002, a European Social Forum was held in Florence, Italy, and some 500,000-1 million people marched in a peace rally in protest against the US-led war threatening on Iraq.
In early 2003, before the third World Social Forum in Porto Alegre in late January, four regional Fora were held in various parts of the world – the Asian Social Forum in Hyderabad, India, the Palestine Social Forum, an African Social Forum in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and a Pan-Amazonian Social Forum in Belém, Brazil, as well as several thematic, national, and city fora.
There are also several ‘side’ or ‘peripheral’ events that take place during the Forum, some planned, many unplanned. These peripheral spaces play very important roles in defining the overall culture of the Forum, and in preserving (and elaborating) its openness. These include, for example, the Youth Forum and parallel events by civil and political entities that wish to relate to the Forum but prefer to maintain a little distance, as well as more formal ‘parallel’ events such as the World Parliamentary Forum, the World Forum of Mayors and Local Authorities, and the World Education Forum.
The annual world event in Porto Alegre is also changing. The first meeting in 2001 was predominantly a challenge to economic globalisation. In 2002 it moved to being a meeting that made a call for alternatives – ‘Another World Is Possible !’. And the third meeting in January 2003 was one marked by critical self-reflection on the WSF itself – both as structure and as process.
The steady growth in numbers attending the world event – from 25-30,000 people at the first one, to 50-60,000 at the second, to 100,000 at the third – attest to the relevance of the Forum to people all over the world. But it is not numbers alone that count. This growth has also brought its own share of organisational and management problems, both at the events themselves and also in the evolution of policy and strategy for the Forum as an idea, sometimes tending to overwhelm it. WSF3 is widely considered to be the point at which organisers, participants and observers began to seriously talk about how to practise alternatives to economic globalisation, and also to reflect on the extent to which the Forum is practising the principles it preaches. The Forum became aware of its own globalisation, as regional and problem-specific Forums mushroomed worldwide. Are the Forum’s ruling bodies, structures, and processes appropriate and adequate to a phenomenon growing exponentially and spreading globally ?
More importantly, there is perhaps reason to think that the WSF has struck at the level of meaning. It has made abundantly clear that there is an alternative to economic, capitalist globalisation, that there are alternatives; and that people all over the world are now mobilising to define and to live those alternatives. In this way, the WSF – along with all the other forms of global civil action that are also taking place - is arguably playing a profound role in freeing peoples all over the world of the shackles of the colonisation of the mind.
During 2002-3, the International Council of the World Social Forum made the decision after prolonged debate that the fourth world meeting of the organisation and process called ‘the World Social Forum’ will, for the first time, be held outside Brazil, in India. Holding the Forum in Asia and in India is a major and ambitious initiative towards the globalisation of the World Social Forum as an idea and as a culture, and will constitute a major landmark in the history of the Forum. Although the fifth world meeting is expected to again be in Porto Alegre, Brazil, holding the meeting in India will set a precedent that will almost certainly be followed in later years. It is therefore a crucial testing time for the Forum, in management as well as political-strategic terms.
Over the last three years, which are precisely the years in which the World Social Forum has taken shape, some very important developments have taken place internationally. Across the world, capitalist globalisation is riding triumphant even as the economy unravels within its heartland, the United States, while wars have been unilaterally launched by some nations against others in declared pre-emptive defence of their self-interests, in defiance of world public opinion and the opposition from a majority of nation-states, brazenly bypassing the multilateral world order that has been built up over the past century.
One of the more audacious acts of militance in history took place on September 11 2001. In reaction, a ‘war on terrorism’ has been launched by nation-states across the globe and ‘security’ and surveillance measures are being relentlessly tightened, largely against civil and political protestors. The US has already moved decisively to the right; Europe seems to be moving that way; and Hindu, Islamic, Christian, and Jewish fundamentalisms are rampant in different parts of the world, including of course in India and other parts of South Asia. The shadows of imperialism and authoritarianism are increasingly evident. It is in this context too that we need to see the World Social Forum and what it means.
Specifically, it is important to critically examine the vocabulary and culture of the politics of the Forum. When it was formed, and as still stated in its Charter of Principles, the singular position of the World Social Forum was opposition to neoliberal globalisation, and implicitly also to a politics of violence. Over time, and especially in the world context that emerged in the period immediately following its formation, this has also come to include opposition to war and militarism. But this vocabulary has come to be dramatically expanded now that the world meeting is being held in India, to also include opposition to caste, communalism, and patriarchy. After much debate at its recent meeting in Miami (June 2003), the International Council of the Forum approved this widened vocabulary for the next world meeting of the Forum.
The WSF is also becoming stricter on this count, with both WSF India and the WSF International Council deciding during this year (2003) that organisations wanting to be members of its bodies have to give their written declaration of adherence to the WSF Charter of Principles. But do we perhaps not need to ask what purposes this widening vocabulary and growing conditionality are serving ? Is this helping to persuade more people in the world of the value of opposing these empires ? And beyond the taking of these positions by its leadership, just how effectively is the Forum confronting and contesting these empires ?
Given the volatile world context within which the Forum is taking shape, the important initiatives and also positions that it itself is taking, as well as the major challenges it is facing, there is reason to think that the WSF is at a critical juncture. Maybe the Forum, as well as the thousands of organisations from across the world that are participating in and supporting it, would do well to take a step back and get a view of the larger picture of which it is one part, one frame.
The seminar series proposed here is seen as a contribution to such a perspective. It is moreover proposed in a context where the Forum is as yet hardly known in India, neither as an organisation / initiative or as the movement it is widely seen to be elsewhere, nor in terms of the interesting culture of politics it appears to offer, the culture of ‘open space’. There has been very little critical public examination in India as yet of the Forum, either as an idea or as a significant world institution.
The Open Space Series
In an attempt to address this obvious gap, we propose to organise a sustained series of seminars at the University of Delhi during August-December 2003, called ‘The Open Space Series’, with the overall theme
Are Other Worlds Possible ? Cultures of Politics and the World Social Forum.
These seminars will be organised in two interweaving streams. One stream will deal with the structural issues that the World Social Forum has so far been concerned with and in many senses is organised around – economic globalisation, and militarisation and war – and also with the new issues that are being added to this vocabulary by it being held in India - religious fundamentalism and communalism, and caste, race, and patriarchy. In short, the empires that confront us and attempt to bind us, the empires that the Forum has decided to confront, both implicitly and explicitly. The other stream - alternating and intertwining with the ‘first’ - will deal with the relationship of the Forum to such issues and to such empires, but organised not in terms of the issues but of themes that we suggest are crucial to understanding the evolving culture of politics that the Forum offers : the question of old versus new politics; the increasingly contested question of the Forum as space or as movement; the crucial question of the Forum’s relationship to and understanding of violence; and the challenge that ‘the Forum’, though commonly understood only as a world meeting that takes place each year, is – like much transnational movement - in many senses a construct in virtual space.
We close with two potentially very stimulating sessions : one examining the question of whether socialism is really the only possible other world; and the other exploring the possibility of whether the university can possibly adopt the radical culture of politics that the Forum in theory offers, of open space.
The seminar series are being organised under the banner of The History Society, Ramjas College, University of Delhi, by Mukul Mangalik, teacher of History at Ramjas College, and Jai Sen, independent researcher and civil actor, with the help of Madhuresh Kumar, a student working with Jai Sen, and Janaki Abraham, teaching at the Delhi School of Economics. The speakers being invited come from many different fields and persuasions, some well known others less so but all with important and fresh contributions to make.
The Series will also be punctuated by the publication of an important book on the World Social Forum that in many senses has the same objectives and that explores broadly the same themes – but on a world scale. Co-edited by Jai Sen, Anita Anand, Arturo Escobar, and Peter Waterman, this critical but committed collection of essays and documents on the Forum – tentatively titled ‘The World Social Forum : Challenging Empires’ – is expected to be out in November, and is likely to contribute strongly to the debate that this Series will hopefully generate.
One of the main objectives of this initiative is to involve and engage students in the idea and process of the World Social Forum, and the initiative will not be restricted to a series of seminars alone.
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The Open Space Series - Proposed Timetable and Panellists :
Notes :
The seminars will be held at different colleges in Delhi University, North and South Campus, but will generally start at around noon. The sessions will be moderated by Mukul Mangalik and/or Jai Sen unless otherwise indicated. Reports will be prepared on each session, and a Reader is also under preparation. The sessions may be followed by film screenings, plays, other performances. Let’s see.
August 19, Tuesday : Cultures of Politics : The Idea of the World Social Forum
Venue : Seminar Room, Ramjas College, University of Delhi (North Campus), Delhi 110 007
Panellists :
Veena Das, Professor, University of Delhi and The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA
Nivedita Menon, Department of Political Science, University of Delhi
Jai Sen, independent researcher and civil actor, New Delhi
+ member of WSF India Organising Committee
August 29, Friday : Empire 1 : Globalisation - Questions of Capital, Labour, and Sustainability
Venue : Seminar Room, Ramjas College, University of Delhi (North Campus), Delhi 110 007
Expected panellists :
Praful Bidwai, journalist and commentator, New Delhi
Jean Drèze, Delhi School of Economics
Jayati Ghosh, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Mahesh Rangarajan, Fellow, Jawaharlal Nehru Museum and Library
The panellists are still being finalised for the following sessions :
September 9, Tuesday : The WSF and Old vs New Politics : Parties, social movements, and civil groups
September 19, Friday : Empire 2 : Authoritarianism, Militarisation, & Nuclearisation : Questions of War, Peace, and Terror-
September 26 or 30, Friday/Tuesday : Contested Space ? The Forum as Space, the Forum as Movement
[BREAK FOR DUSSEHRA HOLIDAYS]
October 21, Tuesday : Empire 3 : Caste and Race : Questions of Identity and Exclusion
October 31, Friday : The Politics of Boundary : The Question of the WSF and (Non)Violence
November 11, Tuesday : Empire 4 : Fundamentalism, Communalism, and Nationalism
November 25, Tuesday : The WSF and New Internationalisms : The Culture and politics of Cyberspace
December 2, Tuesday : Empire 5 : Patriarchy, Sexuality, and Questions of Openness
December 12, Friday : How Open ? Is Socialism the Only Possible Other World ?
December 19, Friday : Cultures of Politics : The University as Open Space ?
For further details :
Madhuresh Kumar and/or Jai Sen
A-3 Defence Colony, New Delhi 110 024, India
Ph 91-11/5155 1521, 2433 2451
Eml jai.sen@vsnl.com cc : kmadhuresh@hotmail.com
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Prepared by js-mm 040803 / rvsd js-mk 090803 / RF 160803 / rf2 170803
Endnotes and References
These three, while agreeing on the need to put together the series of seminars proposed in this document, do not necessarily agree on every word and formulation contained in it.
For a discussion of this concept of ‘open space’, see : Francisco Whitaker, nd [January 2001] – ‘World Social Forum : Origins and targets’. Typescript in English, 3 pp. Available on the World Social Forum website, http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br . Originally appeared as an article in Portuguese, in Correio da Cidadania, January 22 2001. Translated by Jesus Bengoetxea and Sandra Guimarães; Chico Whitaker, March 2003 – ‘Notes about the World Social Forum’. Revised version, dt March 17 2003; and, for a critique : Jai Sen, May 2003d – ‘The WSF as logo, the WSF as commons : Take a moment to reflect on what is happening in the World Social Forum’. A discussion note. Available on http://www.choike.org/cgi-bin/choike/links/page.cgi?p=ver_informe&id=1192 and http://www.choike.org.
The few articles that have appeared in the more important national press include : Devaki Jain, January 2003 – ‘The Empire Strikes Back : A Report on the Asian Social Forum’, in Economic and Political Weekly, January 11 2003; Sukumar Muralidharan, January 2003 – ‘Globalising Resistance’, in Frontline, Volume 20, Issue 2, January 18 - 31, 2003. Cover Story. Vol:20 Iss:02 URL: http://www.flonnet.com/fl2002/stories/20030131009100400.htm; and : Jai Sen, January 2003d – ‘The Long March to Another World’, in The Hindu, January 29 and January 30 2003, p 10. Also available on Transnational Alternativ@s http://www.tni.org/tat/index.htm
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