We welcome letters of up to 400 words. Longer letters may be cut for space reasons. You can email us, or post text to PO Box 1109 London N4 2UU Terry Conway In late December hundreds of people from across Europe met in Paris to discuss a balance sheet of the last three European Social Forums and begin to map out proposals as to how the next, to be held in Greece in 2006, should be organised.
It also discussed how to carry through most effectively the decisions of the last European Social Forum, held in London last October.
For the majority of those who have attended one or more of the continental social forums, the processes by which they are organised are somewhat obscure.
In Europe in general and in Britain in particular a very small proportion of activists have had the opportunity to attend the Social Forums, the fifth of which will take place in Porto Alegre in Brazil in January. Three of the previous events have taken place in the same place, while the other was held in Mumbai, India last February.
The European Social Forums, as with all regional and local forums take place in the context of the Porto Alegre charter, which sets out three basic aims
• To provide a space for
• To provide a space for the elaboration of alternatives place on a two-yearly cycle
That the traditional structure of plenaries, seminars and workshops should be replaced with a new one based on seminars
• That greater consideration should be given to creating space for assemblies of specific groups eg women, migrants, youth and around particular themes eg health or education
There was also debate, but no conclusions at this stage on a number of other topics including the role and functioning of the Assembly of the Social movements and the role of political parties.
A working party has been set up which will explore these and other matters further and bring back proposals to the preparatory meeting for the next ESF in Athens on 2627 February. The working party will meet in Brussels on January 15-16.
Despite the fact that there was a good deal of agreement on many of these issues, the meeting suffered from rather unstructured agenda.
Nearly six hours on the Saturday was devoted to the balance sheet of the previous ESF's, with no specific time given to a balance sheet of the most recent event in London - despite the fact that aspects of this Forum caused a fair amount of contention.
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If the aim here was to restrict debate on these issues; it wasn't successful. Instead this debate became confused with the more general discussion making achieving clarity more difficult.
There was a specific session on organising for March 19/20.
The Assembly of the Social movements in London had agreed (see box) that there should be a central mobilization in Brussels on March 19 and local demonstrations as well on the basis of opposition to neo-liberalism in Europe and the war in Iraq - both focuses being raised at all the demonstrations.
Since then the Belgian Social Forum has been working on the Brussels event where is it likely that there will also be mobilizations by the European TUC and by young people's organizations in Belgium.
There will therefore probably be three assembly points, but coming together after a certain point in a common march. At the same time, marches have been called in a number of countries, including Britain, by Stop the War
asibute CAISE I Groups.
In Paris, most people including the key figures from France and comrades from the Socialist Tendency (the international grouping of which the British SWP is part) were keen not to counterpose opposition to the neo-liberalism of the EU to opposition to the war in Iraq.
Nevertheless, it will be important in Britain to ensure that the European agenda is raised.
The Stop the War coalition, trade and other activists should mobilize delegations for Brussels as well as organizing to send hundreds to London.
The publicity for the London demonstration should at minimum mention the Brussels demonstration and provide links to the web site.
The London demonstration should have at least one speaker on the neo-liberal attacks across Europe.
Neoliberalism and war are two sides of the same coin -campaigning against each of them strengthens our work against the other.