Porto Alegre Principles

he World Social Forum Charter of Principles is a document clearly written by the intellectuals of the movement for representatives of reformist parties and capitalist funded NGOs. It asserts the right "to guide the continued pursuit of that initiative" and demands "to be respected by all those who wish to take part in the process".

Buried amongst rhetorical denunciations of neoliberalism and global capitalism the principles slip in some truly reactionary rules - ones which are operating at the European Social Forum too and must be exposed and combated.

"The World Social Forum brings together and interlinks only organisations and movements of civil society". To this it adds: "neither party representations nor military organisations shall participate in the Forum". What is this supposed to mean?

Simply that organisations that are formed around a programme to change society, that struggle to do so by various means, (political parties) are excluded or, what is nearly as bad, obliged to disguise themselves as single issue campaigns or "social" bodies.

It is totally reactionary to exclude parties and their representatives, especially those that are fighting global capitalism and war, as though they were not part of civil society or the body of citizens.

It privileges NGOs, crippled by their funding systems, hog-tied by legal status as charities, and reduces organisations that are not so bound (trades unions and parties) to impotence.

The bigwigs of large political organisations can easily hide behind the scenes as "the organisers" and in any case are specifically allowed to participate "in a personal capacity". It merely disguises their influence and..

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