Our movement now plays a central role in the opposition against capitalist globalisation and imperialist war. We proved on February 15 that the forces gathered here can mobilise many millions of people on the streets. The challenges are getting bigger. The rulers of this world are hell-bent on carrying through their war against the workers, peasants and oppressed peoples of the worlds.
We need a clear perspective how to go forward. For this we need a full and democratic debate in our movement and the ability to translate the will of the activists into action. In short, we need DEMOCRACY in the movement.
Democracy means not only recognition of differences – even the bourgeois democratic state allows dissent for some periods – but decision-making and turning decisions into action. Democracy means discussing and voting. Of course we need to win the biggest and most wholehearted majority for such action to make it effective. But not to follow the wishes of the majority after a full and fair debate — to allow a minority to block action– is the opposite of democracy.
The present modus operandi – the consensus principle – is in reality undemocratic. Moreover it is far from transparent It means that decisions are really made in small circles behind closed doors. We have a de facto leadership which is not accountable in any way.
The European Social Forum should therefore include within its annual gatherings a one day assembly composed of delegates from national and local Social Forums and organisations about its main campaigns and political positions. It should also elect a co-ordination which can make statements and calls in between the annual meetings.
A vital step towards transparency would be to lift the ban on political parties’ participation in the ESF. In fact the ban is total hypocrisy since in fact political parties are not only participating anyway but also playing a leading role. Many of the organisers and speakers at the ESF are member of political parties with specific political goals. There is nothing whatsoever wrong with this but it should be open and transparent. Every activist of the Social Forum movement has a right to know which parties are participating in the movement and who is a member of which party .
Will this lead to a dominance of the movement by bureaucratic and conservative Parties- by members of parliament, officials etc who do not want to fight the system and who seek privilege at the movement’s expense? This is indeed a danger, but the ban on parties has not prevented it and cannot prevent it. There are two vital things we must do to stop this happening. The first is to create real and full democracy in our movement. If we build local, regional and national Social Forums under the control of hundreds of thousands of rank and file activists, they will be able to decide on policy and action, and elect people who will pursue their interests, replacing them if need be. It will then be up to the rank and file to decide if they want to have members of political parties as their representatives or not.
The second way we can prevent Parties from dragging the movement into accommodation with capitalism is to demand that these parties break all alliances with capitalist politicians. To take their place in our anti capitalist movement, Parties must declare that they will not govern in coalition with the capitalists or on their behalf but will struggle to overthrow the capitalists.
In this way, we can unite the ESF (and the WSF too) not only into a democratic forum and co-ordinator of action, but also into a new World Party – a fifth International – to struggle for an end to the rule of global capital and the establishment of the rule of the majority of humanity.
Resolution for the Assembly of European Social Movements and Actors
Submitted by the League for a Fifth International