"Total Debt Cancellation for Poverty Reduction"
Wednesday, February 09, 2005The JCTR Reflections at the 5th World Social Forum (WSF)
Background and Introduction What is the WSF? The month of January has in the last five years come to be associated with an important event on the international calendar of civil society organisations: the World Social Forum (WSF). The WSF is basically an open space for the democratic debate and exchange of ideas about social and economic policies developed throughout the world. Its main objective is the exchange of experiences and the creation of propositions for the construction of a human centred society, which promotes justice, peace, and equality for all. The WSF evolved as a direct response to another important event called the World Economic Forum (WEF) whose meetings are usually held in the Swiss town of Davos. The fifth edition of the WSF was held from January 26th to the 31st January 2005 in the Brazilian City of Porto Alegre. Brazil has hosted the event for the fourth time, with the other event having taken place in the Indian City of Mumbai in 2004. This makes Porto Alegre City a world reference centre on social and policy debates. The recent WSF was the fifth event since its inception in 2001 while the WEF was the thirty-fourth gathering. These are unique meetings in their own right as they have similar agendas but motivated by different set of values. The WSF is driven by social concerns of development anchored in human needs while the WEF is largely pushed by economic and business concerns with pockets of reference to poverty issues as by-the-way issues. Jubilee-Zambia Policy Analyst representing the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection (JCTR) was recently in Brazil for the WSF where he participated in the meetings and now brings us the following report: WSF-For Who and Why? The Porto Alegre forum going by the theme: “Another World Is Possible” brought together over 100,000 civil activists from the Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs), trade unions, academics, human rights activists, environmentalists, women’s and children’s movements, among many others to try to craft a world centred on human development rather than the abstract rule of market forces! During the six days of the deliberations, over 2000 seminars and workshops had been held looking at a wide range of issues including Third world crippling external debts with a high focus on Africa’s immense debts, debt relief for the Tsunami hit countries, the Iraq war and global militarisation, gender and women empowerment, HIV/AIDS and the generic drugs, peace and democracy, trade and commerce, social and economic rights, and resistance against religious fundamentalism. Solidarity in People’s Power and VoiceThere is something to be said about the strength of the WSF and that power lies in its strong mobilisation against a unified force of neo-liberalism that has been unleashed on the poor countries. The fact that tens of thousands of civil activists meet every year to resist and oppose current global economic policy shows that something is fundamentally wrong somewhere! It is therefore suicidal for world leaders, international financial institutions (IFIs), the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Multinational Corporations (MNCs) and others to simply ignore such gatherings as mere noise! The WSF strongly opposes the neo-liberal model of economic development and contends that there must be a new orientation to economics in order to address social and economic human rights. As one Jesuit candidly observed “the current economic model must be changed to build economies of solidarity. These efforts must aim at putting wealth at the service of human beings, refusing to allow the world to become a commodity for sale”. WSF and Neo-LiberalismThe Forum rejects neo-liberalism and those globalisation policies that literally make millions of people across the globe as mere tools of production while massive profits are reaped off their labour and enjoyed by a few international capitalists. Why for instance, should a capitalist in another continent enjoy the toil of a poor mother or rural farmer in Africa? Why are there global imbalances in trade that make one part of the world richer while the other gets impoverished? Why should basic needs of life such as education and health-care be determined through an imperfect market system in a world characterised by large numbers of economically disempowered people? Can an imperfect market system address issues of equity adequately? These and many other hard questions have consistently been raised by the WSF in the last few years and they need urgent answers. For instance, during the just ended World Economic Forum in Davos, British Prime Minister Tony Blair bluntly stated, “Africa’s poverty is a scar on the conscience of the developed world”. What does he mean? Is he not indirectly admitting that the developed world’s policy interventions have failed to move Africa out of the doldrums of debt and poverty? Shouldn’t then the leaders in the West listen to the voices of the poor coming from the WSF? WSF’s Position on External Debt and HIV/AIDS There was a strong recognition that the external debts had continued to frustrate efforts aimed at fighting the HIV/AIDS pandemic in many poor countries. These debts must be cancelled as a matter of urgency to release resources required for a sustained campaign against the pandemic that has left a trail of human suffering with an ever increasing army of orphans! A horde of anti debt campaigners and academicians from Latin America, Europe and Africa joined hands in criticising half-hearted responses from the creditor institutions in dealing with the debt crisis across the World. Southern governments were particularly urged to heighten their call for total debt cancellation if their economies are to make sense and remain relevant in this 21st century. Poor countries were also called upon to prioritise their national budgets with a clear focus on the provision of basic social services, clean and safer water for their populations and not squander meagre resources through debt service payments on debts that had already been paid several times over! As one activist Ana Maria R. Nemenzo from the Philippines, President of the Freedom from Debt Coalition puts it, “Southern governments, under duress had been cooperative with creditors, sacrificing their respective people just to meet the payments of these debts. The practice must be stopped to give these countries a fighting chance to develop”. How else can one put it other than to say that external debts are “decimating” lives by destabilising national budgets through needless resource diversion! The Forum also saw the launch of the Global Campaign Against Poverty that was witnessed by the President of Brazil Silva De Lula and he became the first world leader to support this initiative. Lula stressed, “Peace is only possible if we end poverty. The transformation we see in Brazil and other parts of Latin America did not come over night. It is a mark of resistance and perserverance. We have to take small steps to get where we need. But we will get there!” And sitting next to President Lula was Wahu Kaara a long time civil activist of the African Ecumenical Council from Kenya who in her own words was ‘disgusted at the powerful people who choose to remain as spectators as young girls are forced into prostitution and children continue to die from treatable diseases like malnutrition’. She said that the current strategies on poverty reduction were ineffective and hence needed to be reviewed. WSF Puts Globalisation On the Chopping Board! It is important to underscore one point here lest the disciples of globalisation misunderstand us. The Porto Alegre meetings do not reject globalisation per se, however, they question the type of globalisation being pursued at the moment. Surely no one in his/her right frame of mind would oppose the current advancements in human medicines through sound scientific research that have brought relief to millions of sick people or the high techs in computers, laptops, internet, DVDs, VCDs, etc that have literally made the world a better place to live in. Imagine a modern world without planes or cell phones! These are the positive elements of globalisation that need to be galvanised and made available to many of our people for a decent living. However, what is being opposed within the globalisation process is the deliberate move that deifies profits at the expense of human needs. The current process is evidently faulty as can be seen by the rising numbers of economic casualties in form of the poor people that it has created in its trail of destruction! Certainly there are a lot of factors that cause poverty in the poor South and key among them is the inappropriate economic frameworks literally imposed on it by external forces. Like I mentioned in a similar article in 2004, most world leaders continue to reaffirm their commitment to eradicating poverty within the context of corporate globalisation and neo-liberalism. However, the stark reality and empirical evidence on the ground clearly show that the fight against poverty is not being won under these conditions. It is clear that most poor countries particularly in the global South will not be able to attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015 unless something drastic is done to reverse the poor trends in development policy. Poverty eradication cannot be achieved in boardrooms or seminars using the state-of-the-art power point presentations! It has to be done outside those beautiful air-conditioned offices! And that is precisely the message from the WSF to the world leaders. Another World is Possible! Let’s Build It! People’s movements across the world are now working to demonstrate that the path to sustainable development and social and economic justice does not lie in neo-liberal globalisation but in alternative models for people-centred and self-reliant progress. Since 2001, the World Social Forum process is questioning the rules of global investments and governance dictated by the World Economic Forum. It proposes democratic, people-centred alternatives to imperialist globalisation. The WSF is a response of the growing international movement that is challenging capitalist-led globalisation and the neo-liberal economic policies pursued by most countries. Firmly committed to the belief that Another World Is Possible, the WSF is an open space for discussing alternatives to the dominant neo-liberal processes, for exchanging experiences and for strengthening alliances among organisations, people’s movements and civil society organisations. Indeed Another World Is Possible as observed by the JCTR in their statement released at the 2005 WSF if indigenous policies and the local people drive the development process. It is possible if there are equitable trade relations between the North and the South and if there is a genuine willingness by developed countries to institute democracy in the manner and way global structures such as the WTO, IMF and the World Bank are governed. Certainly another world is possible if all Third World debts including those of Zambia are cancelled in full and harmful economic conditionalities are dropped from the developed agenda. Conclusion In conclusion I want to assert that the WSF should be seen as an excellent platform that helps world leaders to remain accountable for their actions and evaluate their contributions to the overall global development process. From the proceedings of the Forum it is clear that peoples’ movements are building alliances not only with each other but also with partners who are willing to work with them to bring back human dignity. The stage for social and economic transformation has been set: can anyone ignore it and at what cost? By Jack Jones Zulu (Jubilee-Zambia Policy Analyst) |
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