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Below you will find a compilation of articles and analysis on the World Social Forum phenomenon by Peter Waterman (*). Among his books are "Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms", and (co-editor) of ""World Social Forum: Challenging Empires" published online by Choike. - Trade Unions, labour and the World Social Forum
Source: IPS News
Following the World Social Forum (WSF) 2002, Peter Waterman wrote a piece on "The Still Unconsummated Marriage of International Unionism and the Global Justice Movement". If the preparations for the Nairobi WSF, 2007, are anything to go by, "it looks as if we might be able to talk at least about an engagement. There are two striking features about these preparations; the first is that the newly-merged International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) is coming in forcefully, under the banner of 'Decent Work'. The second is the at least marginal presence of autonomous labour groups with an orientation toward what might just be conceived as the 'Emancipation of Labour'. January 2007.
- Labour at the World Social Forum
Between Decent Work and the Emancipation of Labour. This note is meant to be both a resource for and a reflection on labour at the World Social Forum (WSF), to take place in Nairobi a couple of weeks from now. It has been written in haste and may be therefore somewhat icoherent, but I wanted to get it out today, before the end of 2006.
- The Bamako Appeal: a post-modern Janus?
Since its launch the Bamako Appeal has been reproduced, often without commentary, in newspapers, magazines, on websites and lists, in Europe, the USA, Latin America, South Africa and India. Further information about the BA, its participants/endorsers and funding has had to be gleaned from one of its initiators, or provided unsystematically by some of those involved. There is so far no formal report on the event either by its sponsors, nor an extensive analysis from independent or critical sources. April 2006, pdf format.
- Toward a global labour charter for the 21th Century
The Labour Chapter in the Bamako Appeal may represent the most radical public statement on the contemporary global labour question to be found so far. Considering the present nature of work and workers worldwide, it recognises the limitations of the trade unions -traditionally considered to be either the sole or the central form of worker self-organisation. But it nonetheless suggests a significant role for labour within the new global justice and solidarity movement, thus re-articulating labour with the general social movement of our epoch. April 2006.
- Making the road whilst walking: communication, culture and the World Social Forum
The World Social Forum has grown exponentially since its first edition, January 2001. It has travelled to Mumbai, India, 2004. It has taken on regional, national and local form. And at Porto Alegre, January 2005, some 150,000 people were present. Despite repeated complaints of organisational confusion and political incoherence, the WSF is the most organised expression of what the Call of Social Movements has called the Global Justice and Solidarity Movement. This paper is not intended to evaluate or to theorise the communications and culture of the World Social Forum (WSF), but rather to draw attention to these and to make available some relevant information and sources. By Peter Waterman, May 24, 2005, pdf format.
- Developing a crucial social movement triangle
The triangular relationship between trade unions, the global justice and solidarity movement and academia seems to provide a space within which it is possible not only to reflect, at some critical distance, on the movements themselves but also one within which there can be some serious dialogue on the relations between the three. Although the new movements have little trouble looking critically at themselves and each other, trade unions and political parties do have a problem here. August 2005.
- International social movements and hegemony under a globalised networked capitalism: The role of research, documentation
We include this Waterman's paper because we consider it useful in the framework of the WSF: "The old, established and traditional social movement (developed under a national industrial capitalism, institutionalised, Westocentric, incorporated into old understandings about and with capital, state and ‘development’) needs to take congnisance of its relative power and privilege. And it then needs to make space for something that might be relatively marginal and weak but that nonetheless comes out of a globalised and networked capitalism. The ‘movement of movements’ proposes new understandings of the world; it identifies new arenas of dispute with the hegemonic forces; and it suggests new forms of dialogue between social movements". September 2005.
- Trade Union internationalism and a global civil society in the making
Two events, held in January 2004, suggest major ways in which the international trade union movement is trying to respond to the shock of globalisation. The question is whether union participation at these two very different events, one at the Fourth World Social Forum (WSF4) in Mumbai, India, and the other at the Internacional Labour Organisation's (ILO) Training Centre in Turin, Italy, represents competing or complementary ways of expressing internationalism in the era of globalisation. This chapter of the book "Global Civil Society 2004/5" has been concerned with a quite specific, yet rather complex, matter: the past and present relationship of the international labour movement to demoratisation of the social. By Peter Waterman and Jill Timms, pdf format.
- Place, space and the reinvention of social emancipation on a global scale
The Third World Social Forum, held in January 2003, was marked by a questioning of the extent to which the Forum itself -now an increasingly globalized phenomenon- embodies what it is preaching to others. A Peter Waterman paper analyzing the complexities of the WSF and its future challenges. April 2003.
- The Still Unconsummated Marriage of International Unionism and the Global Justice Movement
A Labor Report on the World Social Forum, Porto Alegre, January 31-February 5, 2002
(*) Peter Waterman (London 1936), began his working life with international Communist organisations in Prague (1955-8, 1966-9). He taught university in Northern Nigeria (1970-72). He spent 26 years at the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, in the Labour Studies and the Politics programmes (1972-98). In the 1980s he published the Newsletter of International Labour Studies. Since 1984 he has specialised on the new labour and other internationalisms, and on (electronic) communications in relation to such. He has had attachments to universities in the UK, US, South Africa, Mexico and Peru. He published Globalisation, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms (1998/2001). He has written extensively and co-edited collections on (international) labour and on the World Social Forum. Pending publications include a collection of his papers in Spanish, a dictionary entry on internationalism, and a collection of his recent writings in English, From the New Internationalisms to the New Global Solidarity. He is currently writing his own international/ist memoirs. This document is in no sense the property of the author, though he would hope to continue to contribute to its development. It can be used, abused, improved and substituted for. He would, however, appreciate relevant reference to it and copies of any response to it.
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World Social Forum (WSF)
The first and fundamental result of the Forum is the event itself. The World Social Forum (WSF) was created to provide an open platform to discuss strategies of resistance to the globalization model proposed at the annual World Economic Forum at Davos.
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