U.S. Social Forum Kicks Off in Atlanta

More than 7,500 activists are at the U.S. Social Forum, including Shyria Coleman and daughter Ashallah.

Marcy Rein, a communications specialist with the International Longshore Workers Union (ILWU) Organizing Department, is in Atlanta for the U.S. Social Forum, where she sends this report.

Another world is possible, another United States is necessary.

On the schedule for the U.S. Social Forum in Atlanta, organizers called preparations for yesterday’s opening march “building a living river.” From the middle of the march, the river ran for what seemed at least a half mile in both directions, a ribbon of color snaking through downtown to the rhythms of hip-hop and a brass band. You saw bright red, blue and green T-shirts. Brilliantly painted giant puppets. A few gray heads sprinkled among the youth, faces of every hue from all over the U.S. and every kind of grassroots movement.

Unions, workers’ centers and immigrants’ rights groups flew their banners. So did indigenous rights, environmental justice and peace groups, student activists, community organizations, LGBT rights groups and lots of people who want to impeach Bush.

The U.S. Social Forum is like no other gathering. For five days, from June 27-July 1, the 7,500-plus activists here can participate in a dizzying array of workshops, plenaries, cultural events, street actions and spontaneous gatherings. It’s not a demonstration or a conference, but a space dedicated to movement building from the bottom up. Its organizers set out with just one goal: to create the opportunity for people to listen, learn, make connections and make all our efforts stronger.

As AFL-CIO President John Sweeney says:

The USSF occurs at a most significant moment in our nation’s life. After seven years of the most anti-union administration in American history, as opposition to the war in Iraq continues to grow and the debate shifts in favor of our positions on national health care reform, sensible energy policies and other issues, there is renewed energy and commitment by progressive voices and movements. On the eve of a presidential election next year, having trade unionists join together with allies who share our vision for a more just world could not be more timely or important.

The U.S. Social Forum has roots in the movements for fair trade and the mobilizations at the 1999 World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Seattle and others that followed, said AFL-CIO Voice at Work Director Fred Azcarate, who sat on the planning committee for the forum.

It came from workers saying there is something wrong with the global economy, and it’s not just bad for workers, communities and the environment in the U.S. but all over the world.

It also grew out of the World Social Forums, which started in Brazil in 2001 and have happened every year since.

“The world has shown us we can gather in a conscious way to build a new world,” said Alma Rosa Silva-Banuelos, one of three co-chairs of the Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice. “As the forum’s slogan says, ‘another world is possible, another U.S is necessary.’ ”

The Southwest Network and some 45 other community-based organizations provided most of the ideas, energy and resources that built the forum. The event had only one paid staffer until about a month before it began.

“Volunteers set the agenda, planned the workshops and planned where the porta-potties would go,” Azcarate said. To run the event itself, organizers figured they would to fill some 3,200 shifts for volunteers doing everything from recycling and child-care to security and media outreach.

The event schedule includes 84 panels on workers’ rights, not including the many on other issues that touch workers’ lives closely.

Jobs with Justice (JwJ) Executive Director Sarita Gupta says it’s important for JwJ and the union movement.

to be in this space because we need to be connecting the struggles of workers to broader movements. There are so many groups that are committed to building up a movement for the working class, and so many people in this country who are unorganized, how do we connect with those people? Through these community-based groups and other organizations which believe in mobilizing people to take a stand.

JwJ brought some 330 people to the forum, giving it one of the largest delegations. AFSCME, the North Georgia Central Labor Council, the local chapter of the Coalition for Labor Union Women, 9 to 5, National Association for Working Women and SEIU showed their union colors in the June 27 opening march, all sweating in the sticky, melting heat together with the rainbow of other groups there.

In between the chanting, you could catch the exclamations as friends met unexpectedly, old co-workers reunited. Trying to wrap my mind around what was happening, I realized I had never seen anything quite like this, not in more than 30 years of activism.

Atlanta social justice groups took big part in organizing the forum, and planned the march to pass by Grady Hospital, a public hospital slated to close next month.

“Grady serves people from all over the state of Georgia,” said AFSCME member Ethel Elijah, who retired from the hospital in April. “People come here every day without insurance. It’s the only hospital in the state of Georgia that will take homeless people in and take care of them,” she said. People who depended on it will be out of luck.

“Tough stuff, they’ll just be out in the street,” said Myrtle Johnson, a Grady patient in the march. “You come in bloody, Grady’s going to take care of you. Now they’re talking about health insurance, tough stuff!” A demonstration by a labor-community coalition was just winding down as the march wound past. Elijah took heart from the outpouring of support.

“It seemed the whole city was here,” she beamed. In the same way, people at the march are taking heart from breadth of the forum, and hoping to see it bear fruit.

Says Azcarate:

The U.S. Social Forum is an attempt to bring different groups in the U.S. together to build power. At the end of the day, everything is about power, and we can’t do it by ourselves. And in organizing the forum to this point, in the relationships that have been built and deepened, we’ve already moved forward.

On Thursday, three days of workshops and panels begin. On Sunday, before the Forum closes, participants will meet as a whole to hear a discussion on new models for change in the United States and presentations of resolutions and plans for action.

“I’m here with my 10-year-old daughter,” said Shyria Coleman. “I hope we can foster a new generation of activist and show them how to have fun and organize on a global scale.”

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