[DEBATE] : Re: Excellent Analysis of WSF

[mfleshman at aol.com]

snip

r it could be seen as the shining anti-oxidant-rich new fruit of a 
world tightly wound by instantaneous global communications and swift 
air transportation.
                                                                         
                      snip

sounds more like a new skin cream than the revolution


-----Original Message-----
From: HiroK8 at aol.com
To: debate at lists.kabissa.org
Sent: Thu, 9 Feb 2006 09:49:01 EST
Subject: [DEBATE] : Excellent Analysis of WSF

  Thought the following would be of interest.   Send criticque to
Sbartlett at ag-missions.org Thanks   Hiroshi Kanno
>From Venezuela with Love & Solidarity
reflections from the AMI (Agricultural Missions, Inc) Agrarian 
Delegation to
the World Social Forum, Jan 19-31, 2006
by Stephen Bartlett (delegation co-coordinator)
               sbartlett at ag-missions.org
February 2, 2006

      Pragmatic idealism is being reborn today in Latin America.   A
socialism grounded in the diverse cultures and struggles of the 
suffering
excluded
ones of the 2/3rds world is rising from the ground, from the 
grassroots.    Our
12 person agrarian delegation to the WSF in Caracas, Venezuela, hailing 
from
the U.S., El Salvador and Chile was witness   and participant to that 
new hope
and idealism, and caught some of the smoldering fever and the passion 
from our
brothers and sisters in struggle across the Americas.
       How socialism is defined and envisioned today goes beyond rigid
Marxist Leninist or even Maoist concepts, and seeks for its roots in 
indigenous
cosmovision and collective governance practices, in a radically 
decentralized
vision for a world in which, as the Zapatistas demand, all worlds fit.  
 This is

so even as the impoverished have-nots from the underclass of the 
Venezuelan
people burst from the seams with hope and transforming actions to 
reclaim the
dignity of those who previously had none.    This is so as the 
indigenous
peoples
of Bolivia rise to power from the ashes of 520 years of exploitation 
and
exclusion.   This is so as the left takes political office from Brazil 
to
Uruguay
to possibly Peru and Mexico.   The alternative, a continuation of 
neoliberal
pillage and ultra exclusion and impoverishment, is simply intolerable 
and Latin
Americans are voting with their feet and upraised fists on the 
barricaded
streets, and they are voting at neighborhood committee meetings and in 
good
works
of all kinds, and they are voting at the polls as well.   The peoples 
rising
to action are the new superpower capable of confronting and standing 
down the
superpower of North America and transnational commercial imperialism 
and
economic colonialism.
      It was gratifying to hear Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez Frías,
outspoken promoter of a socialist future, say that socialism in its 
broadest
sense
existed in the Americas before the arrival of Europeans.   To hear 
Chávez
evoke the names of Tupac Amaru, Bartolina Sisi, and Tupac Katari, the 
latter who

before being executed declared that he would return made into millions. 
  To
hear Evo Morales leader of a socialist party upon his innauguration to 
the
presidency of Bolivia declare that he would, in the words of 
Subcomandante
Marcos,
lead in obedience to the peoples, a concept that serves both as a 
fundamental
principle of indigenous governance as well as of true Christianity.
      But this new day is bringing not just a decentralized concept of
grassroots democratic governance in obedience to the people, but also a 
keen
sense
of the need for international solidarity and coordinated and passionate 
global
struggle and resistance.   For the adversaries of the new socialist 
vision are
centralized and global in reach, mega corporations laying waste to the
environment and human aspirations for economic justice, and their 
international
financial institutions (IFIs), the many headed hydra composed of the 
World Bank
and regional development banks, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), 
the World

Trade Organization (WTO), and the governments that do the bidding of
monopoly-seeking corporate ambitions to hegemony and world market 
domination.
In
particular the governments of the G-8 fall within this rarified 
category of
instruments of corporate domination, but the acquiescence of 
governments of
rural
elites within the peripheral or rising nation states of the global 
south also
play to the dark vision of totalitarian commercial interests.  The 
unpayable
and illegitimate foreign debt of these countries is used to make them 
submit to
the agendas of the IFIs, which are the agendas of the transnational
corporations.   And so-called free trade agreements imposed behind 
closed doors
on
increasingly desperately impoverished peoples stalk the continent like 
the grim
reaper.   The FTAA may be, as Chávez asserts, buried in Mar de Plata, 
but
CAFTA'DR is about to take force, NAFTA continues to crush Mexican 
farmers, and
bilateral agreements and Andean negotiations continue.
      In the face of this dark cloud over all our heads, the new 
socialism of
grassroots social movements and international networks of solidarity 
calls for
radical globalization of the bottom-up variety.   This local-global 
strategy
of resistance could be likened to the socialist internationalism of the 
last
century, or it could be seen as the shining anti-oxidant-rich new fruit 
of a
world tightly wound by instantaneous global communications and swift 
air
transportation.
     It was into this positive vibration, this maelstrom of unrest and
organizing, of tolerance and conviction, that our agrarian delegation 
plunged,
ready
to contribute our grain of salt but also to learn and absorb.   We were 
also
riding on the cusp of an emerging focus and emphasis, gradually come to 
the
forefront and brought as new wine from several years of patient 
fermentation:
the need for forging alliances and solidarity between Latin American 
social
movements and those that exist within the United States, within the 
belly of the

beast, as they say.   Chávez had recently spoken at the United Nations 
on the
need of the world to support and defend the poor within the United 
States, in
the wake of the Katrina disaster, portraying the underclass within the 
U.S.
as victim of an imperialistic, militaristic U.S. government bent on 
neglecting
or suppressing them.   This coincided with the strategy chosen by the
committee of the World Social Forum, to provide a tent space for the 
peoples of
North
America to showcase their struggles and engage with representatives of 
Latin
American organized struggles.   The high-profile presence of celebrity 
status
anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan at the WSF made this new solidarity 
connection
even more poignant.
       To our great satisfaction, the US tent space was a billowing 
success,
centrally located and adorned by banners, photographs of poor peoples 
in
action, and nearly always full of people, especially at night for 
dancing.   The

food sovereignty workshop presented by the AMI delegation on the first 
afternoon

was also a success, despite the need for shouting in two languages 
since a
sound system had not yet been installed.   Presentations were made by
representatives of Agricultural Missions, the Missouri Rural Crisis 
Center/
National
Family Farm Coalition, the Community Farm Alliance/National Family Farm
Coalition,
the Justice for Farmworker Coalition of New York State, the Farm Labor
Organizing Committee and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers.   The 
speaking and
dialoguing event was distinguished by the interconnectedness in the 
analyses of
both farmer and farmworker organizations, and the contextualization 
provided by
Alberto Gomez of UNORCA from Mexico who represented a Latin American 
Vía
Campesina perspective.   A symbolic moment was provided by a gift of 
maize seed
 from the Ohio valley cultivated in Louisville to the people of Mexico 
and Latin
America, maize that later ritually adorned the head table at the Vía 
Campesina
tent.   And the debate pro and con about Genetically Modified Seeds 
added
friction and reality to the proceedings.   The surprise words of a 
young
indigenous man from Wisconsin concerning the sacredness of wild rice in 
danger
of being
expropriated through a patent by researchers at the University of 
Minnesota
brought the whole event around full circle, with a powerful critique of 
science
at the beck and call of commercial interests emerging from various 
comments
made by participants to the event.   A smashing event indeed in which 
more than
one participant related that this had broken down stereotypes about 
what is
happening within the U.S.
        The AMI anti-water privatization workshop led by Concerned 
Citizens of
Newport (CCN) in Wisconsin likewise was a big success.   Speakers 
included
CCN activist Arlene Kanno who related how they stopped Nestle from 
building a
bottling plant in their backyard and then contacted the communities in
neighboring Michigan that were subsequently targeted by Nestle for the 
project.

Following this were women from impoverished communities in Detroit 
fighting the
same Nestle bottling plants, efforts to privatize their water and a 
conspiracy
to
do away with the poor through selling their water to outlying 
communities and
charging exorbitant prices for public services, especially water.    
Yours
truly related these struggles to the fight against the World Bank and 
IMF,
notorious for pushing for water privatization in 2/3rds world nations, 
and for
being investors and financiers for those deals.   He also spoke of 
coordinated
actions protesting SUEZ during its shareholders meeting in France and 
its U.S.
subsidiary United Waters, including sending a Bolivian water activist 
to speak
with the Vice President during that protest in New Jersey.    Finally a
Colombian activist joined the analysis with advice for how to globalize 
the anti

water-privatization struggle based on the legal framework of the 
recently
ratified
international treaty on tobacco.   An excellent event indeed!
       Another solidarity building event that took place at the U.S. 
tent
concerned the U.S. embargo of Cuba and the imprisonment of the Cuban 5 
political

prisoners.   In short, the U.S. tent space was a tremendous success and 
will
further the building of greater understanding and solidarity of Latin 
American
movements with U.S. social movements, including the farmer and 
farmworker
movements for economic justice.
       AMI delegates led other workshops, one on farmworkers struggles 
and one
on farm policy in the U.S., and a third activity which consisted of a 
highly
spiritual celebration of cultures of the land (which miraculously 
converted a
curious Chávez critic passing by in a park into a sympathizer of an 
ecological
vision and spiritual values for humanity).   AMI delegates attended 
many
seminars and workshops including ones on community water projects in 
Venezuela,
on
urban agriculture, and some delegates even climbed the mountain 
standing tall
and forest-covered to the north of Caracas in the company of Jaime 
Mariqueo,
our Mapuche advisor on indigenous cosmovision, healing and ritual.   
The fresh
fruits we ate upon the mountain known as Ávila but revealed to us by a 
local
historian as named originally Guaraira Ripano, were exquisite.   Fresh 
peach
juice and powerfully sweet and sour raspberries, among others!   We 
harvested
eucaliptus leaves   and cedar from the farmer's fields on the north 
side of the
mountains near Galipan, using these elements in our gratitude ritual 
during
our celebration.
      Another high point was the speech delivered by Hugo Chávez at the
Poliedro, a modernistic stadium big enough for 25,000 or so.   Some of 
our
delegation attended in person and others watched from our hotel room 
with
friends from
campesino organizations in Ecuador, while recording the proceedings on 
a VHS
tape.   We have now transferred the VHS to DVD and intend to provide 
subtitles
and distribute with some written materials as part of our follow up 
from the
WSF.
       The degree of solidarity and connection we experienced far 
surpassed
expectations.   The warmth and hospitality of the Venezuelan people was
palpable.   Nights dancing in the Cuba house, or following impromptu 
Brazilian
drummers down the boulevards will long be remembered.
      On our last day in Venezuela we had the opportunity to visit two
agricultural cooperatives a couple of hours from Caracas, in vehicles 
provided
by
the Venezuelan government.   I had made the contacts with the 
cooperative
organizer Omar Guerra   during a stay in Venezuela last August, with 
the help of

leaders of CANEZ (Coordinadora Agraria Nacional Ezequial Zamora).    
What we saw

that day on January 30 in a municipality called Paz Castillo, visiting 
Ranchón
de la Hortaliza and Pais del Futuro '86 Agricultural Cooperatives was
unexpected in its intensity and beauty.   We saw lands being 
productively worked
by
farmer cooperativists where previously the land lay idle.   We saw 
people
occupying lands illegally usurped years ago by wealthy local families,
determined
to make it productive and to live from its production.   We saw 700 
families
spread across a vast field along a road, squatting in tiny huts, for 
the right
to build their houses there, on land, once again, proven to have been 
illegally
usurped by a   large land holder or latifundista.  We saw, felt and 
embraced
people taking their struggles to the land, and hoping for a better day! 
  And
they did not hesitate to ask for our help.   They asked us to make 
known what
we had learned to international media outlets and to their own Channel 
8
government-run television station, to lighten the burden of 
bureaucratic traps
and
obstacles, to move their revolution forward, step by step!   They fed 
us with
papaya and sugar cane and later beer, chicken and arepas and received 
us with
joy and alert friendliness and the hospitality that makes campesinos 
famous
throughout the world.
       Or to repeat the slogans we sang in the opening march of the WSF, 
along
with the highly disciplined phalanxes of farmers composing the Frente
Ezequiel Zamora (a Venezuelan farmers confederation), Wherever we Go, 
People Ask
Us,
Who are You?   And so we reply; Campesinos, Si Señor, De lo Bueno, Lo 
Mejor!
(Campesinos, yessir, Of the Good, we are the Best!)   This vindication 
of a
farming vocation and rural pride was music to our ears!




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