Summary: Porto Alegre Call for Mobilization (world Social Forum)
Essay by cryptor • November 20, 2011 • Essay • 381 Words (2 Pages) • 3,274 Views
Essay Preview: Summary: Porto Alegre Call for Mobilization (world Social Forum)
The article "Porto Alegre Call for Mobilization" is a manifesto of World Social Forum which is a group of people from different backgrounds, cultures, and ethnicities. This forum is a reaction against World Economic Forum, which in their eyes represents the elite and their undemocratic ways. The group is dedicated in opposing the Neoliberal globalization of the world.
The centre of their agenda is to reshape the global societies' main values which are finances and investments into values of supremacy of human life and respect for nature; what's more they want to live in a world without any price on any animals or humans beings. They are strictly against monopolies in knowledge, mass media and communication. The group believes that in order to make the world a better place, we have to make men and women equals. Furthermore they state that Neoliberal globalization and privatization of world resources are the main cause for undermining world democracy. In addition they say that privatization is the main tool of the elite for transferring public services and resources into private hands, for the same reason they call for safeguards and restrictions against such processes. The World Social Forum also says that huge corporations are creating more unemployment, more poverty and wider gaps between rich and poor, in fact, they state that the free market is not free at all since it allows free movement of goods and money, while on the other hand it restricts the movement of people, which they believe should be abolished and in addition they demand that workers should be allowed to form unions everywhere in the world. Equally important for the group is the cancelation of external debt of poor countries, which they believe has been repaid several times. In addition the forum is urging for solidarity with black Africans and reparation for the decades of slavery and colonialism. They are also strictly against formation of North American free trade area, since they say that this process is the revival of colonization of Latin America. Lastly the group condemns use of violence, wars, arms races and arms trades, in fact, they state the institutions such as IMF, the World Bank, regional banks, WTO, and NATO are an instrument of neoliberal globalization and as such have no legitimacy amongst people.
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