[WSF-Discuss] heads of state in the wsf?

[Reitan, Ruth]

Okay, then, if we are forced to think inside this box, I support option A and 'the Pan Amazonian Council' choice (if they agree to take it on) as stated in the following:

'There were three (3) proposals on the table about who organize the activity:

 a) Being a co-organized activity, according to the experience made in
 other WSFs: the WSF "Organizing Committee" (which could mean the
Brazilian "Facilitating Group", the Pan Amazonian Council - under
 constitution - or the WSF International Council) organizes the event. This
would mean to do the invitations (setting up the list of those who would
 be invited or not,  etc.) and arrives to a consensus on the methodology
 and issues to be dealt with (someone has proposed a "round table of
 dialogue and controversies" model, as it happened with some governments
 and political parties in other WSF events in Porto Alegre, only that now
 it would be held with head of States and who would talk from the side of
 the civil society etc.)'

I agree with Francine that leaving it to complete self-organization (as proposed in Option B) is not feasible given the logistical and security issues of having heads of state on (or near) site, and thus informal or ad hoc coordination would become a necessity. Having the Pan Amazonian Council involved I think strikes the right balance between self-organization and WSF organization. It also avoids the WSF IC taking upon itself such a task as attempting to reach consensus (as Francine suggested) about which heads of state to invite and which not. This would be an entirely inappropriate use of the IC, to my mind.

Option A also avoids too narrow of a focus, as suggested in option C, that heads of state of the Amazon region would be invited on the 29th while all others could come on the 30th. If we are seeking to promote real regional unity among progressive leaders of the South, then I think they should share the same stage.

But again, I, following Gina and Peter, am not very supportive of inviting heads of state; yet as we say in consensus decision-making, I do not have a 'blocking' concern at this point. Inviting them period, as well as inviting them and not armed insurrectionist groups shows very clearly where our collective bets--if not our utopian aspirations--lie. And, as Tord has accurately diagnosed me to be a political pragmatist, the social forums could use some better publicity coverage than we've been getting in the past few years. This is partly our own (collective) fault, and the media/ communication commission that has recently been founded within the IC is a good, but very late and only partial remedy to our huge mistake of failing to develop an assertive publicity strategy from the beginning (a cardinal secular sin, some 40 years after Guy Debord's Society of the Spectacle).  Instead, we learn from the savvy profi's of Oxfam etc. that inviting celebrities (be they musical, political, vegetable) is one quick and dirty way of attracting the press, which publicizes us to broader populaces and at the very least says to the world that 'we (as a collective actor always in construction) still exist'.

This sort of meeting also empowers Southern states on their resurgent attempts to counter-balance the US hegemon and the EU wannabe. Good things, if defeating US economic and military imperialism is our main concern, which I think it is. Also good things, if you wish to shore up the state system and believe that the best world we can get is one where we have regional hegemonic blocks that keep the others, especially the US, in check. Again, I am being practical, and this strategy of hitching our tired wagons to state-stars seems one that is infinitely pragmatic in the world of realpolitik, which is, in fact, the world we have inhabited for some centuries in most parts of the globe.

So, maybe now's the time for cutting our losses, consolidating our gains and taking what we can get, not the time for standing on principle that a 'truly' other world is possible. Perhaps. Probably. We've been here, recently, before (Mandela, Lula, etc.), but what the hell. And maybe if there's enough Mandelas and Lulas taking power, and as the US is structurally wounded, things will go better than a decade ago. Not so for Russia's neighbors. Not so for Tibet. But who cares, right? Let's try our luck within the ol' state system again.

So, if this is our (more or less collective) opinion, then yes, by all means, invite the heads of state. And we should change our banner flying over their heads to read "a multipolar world is possible!". I am not really criticizing it, I am just reading this logic out to what I see are its conclusions. I prefer to stand with Peter on 'neither god nor country', but then there seem to be many Gods, and many countries, all resurgent, all popular, and these are where all that sparkly dark power is emanating from. Why should we not embrace it?

Ruth