For this addition of Window on the World, Focus on the Global South has put together a list of key networks of social movements active in the social forum process.
Alianza Social Continental/Hemispheric Social Alliance
The Hemispheric Social Alliance is a forum of organizations and progressive social movements in the Americas, created for the interchange of information, define strategies and promote joint actions, all directed to the search of an alternative model of democratic development, that benefits our people. The HSA is an open space for organizations and movements interested in changing the policies of integration at a hemispheric level and in promoting social justice in the Americas. This website is a rich source of information in several languages on trade agreements affecting the Americas and also alternative models of regional and hemispheric integration.
Anti-Privatization Forum South Africa
The Anti-Privatization Forum (APF) was established in July 2000 by community activists and organizations. It has affiliates from the unions, communities, students and the left. The APF's role is to unite struggles against privatization in the workplace and community. It is open to any organization or individual opposed to privatization. This is a useful starting point in linking with mass movements and radical organizations in the region.
Babels
Babels is a network of volunteer interpreters and translators. It was born from the process of the Social Forums, experimental meeting spaces for movements and organizations from different countries and regions. Without interlinguistic and intercultural communication these spaces could not exist. Babels is made up of activists of all tendencies and backgrounds, united in the task of transforming and opening up the Social Forums. Babels works to give voice to peoples of different languages and cultures and fights for the right of all, including those who do not speak a colonial language, to contribute to the common work and to express themselves in the language of their choice. By increasing the diversity of contributions to the debate, the outcome is transformed.
Choike
http://www.choike.org/nuevo_eng/about/index.html
Choike is a portal dedicated to improving the visibility of the work done by NGOs and social movements from the South. It serves as a platform where citizen groups can disseminate their work and at the same time enrich it with information from diverse sources, which is presented from the perspective of Southern civil society.
Indymedia
Indymedia is a collective of independent media organizations and hundreds of journalists offering grassroots, non-corporate coverage. Indymedia is a democratic media outlet for the creation of radical, accurate, and passionate tellings of truth. This website and the links it has is a good source of alternative news and views especially on anti-war and anti-globalization issues and demonstrations.
International Network Against Foreign Military Bases
This website is maintained by a global network of anti-bases activists, researchers, and community organizers involved in a broad international campaign against foreign military bases. The site contains the widest collection of the latest news about foreign, mainly US, military installations around the world from a vast variety of sources. It also features information about local, national, and regional organizations organizing against foreign military bases.
International Occupation Watch Centre
http://www.occupationwatch.org/
This is yet another sample of a concrete project jointly undertaken by organizations from different corners in the world who have been brought in contact with each other in the anti-war and anti-corporate globalization movements. The website has an excellent archive of articles on the war on Iraq organized according to issues.
Iraq Solidarity Campaign Philippines
http://iraqsolidarity.blogspot.com/
An example of an anti-war coalition from the South, the website contains the groups statements, press releases, pictures and other resources. The website is interesting as a reference point in assessing the differences as well as the similarities in outlook, tactics, and approaches among anti-war groups around the world.
Islam Online
Islam Online is a very useful and credible website for those interested in learning more about the movements and organizations in the Arab world. The site aims to create a unique, global Islamic site on the Internet that provides services to Muslims and non-Muslims in several languages, to become a reference for everything that deals with Islam, its sciences, civilization, and nation.
La Via Campesina
La Via Campesina is the global alliance of rural movements, small- and middle-scale producers, agricultural workers, rural women, and indigenous communities from Asia, Africa, America, and Europe. It is an autonomous, pluralistic movement, independent from all political, economic, or other denomination, which has emerged as a major actor in the current popular global struggles against neo-liberalism, demanding accountability from inter-governmental agencies, resisting and opposing corporate control over natural resources and technology, and advocating food sovereignty, among other issues. Their website (in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French) is an excellent source of the movement's campaigns, actions and events, declarations, statements, and interviews with its leaders.
Movimiento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem-Terra (MST)
The Brasilian Landless' Workers Movement is the largest social movement in Latin America and one of the most successful grassroots movements in the world. The MST is in the leadership role in a global trend toward the increasing use of occupations of idle lands as a tool for settling the landless and for putting pressure on governments to engage in real land reform. The MST website features the movement's campaigns, calendar of actions and activities, updates and articles, useful links and websites of 'Friends of MST' in different languages (English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Swedish).
Our World is not for Sale
http://www.ourworldisnotforsale.org/
Our World is Not for Sale (OWINFS) network is a loose grouping of organizations, activists and social movements worldwide fighting against the current model of corporate globalization embodied in global trading systems. OWINFS is committed to a sustainable, socially just, democratic and accountable multilateral trading system. This website is a useful starting point for people interested in finding out or linking with organizations, movements and national coalitions working on trade issues.
Peoples' Food Sovereignty or the Agriculture-Trade Network
http://www.peoplesfoodsovereignty.org/
This is the website of a loose global coalition of peasant-farmer organizations and NGOs working on food and agriculture issues. It grew out of the Our World is Not For Sale Network (OWINFS) in order to provide specific attention to globalization of food, fisheries and agriculture issues in the World Trade Organization (WTO). The network's site is a rich source of studies, contacts, statements and announcements from social movements, and civil society groups' worldwide working to democratize international policies and build alternatives to the current global trade regime.
Piqueteros
Piqueteros is a movement of unemployed workers and/or poor from Argentina's de-industrialized suburban slums fighting to create a new economy. This autonomous movement is organized into dozens of different 'federations' with different goals as well as differing politics and strategies but shares a common constituency and tactical methodology. Their website which contains useful updates, contacts and resources is currently under construction.
RISEUP
Riseup.net is a project of the Red Cursor Collective. The collective believes in direct democracy, anti-sexism, anti-racism, anti-capitalism, self-determination, local autonomy, ecology, and communal economics. It offers email accounts, listserves, and server space to those involved in the struggle for social justice. These accounts, unlike corporate accounts on the web, depend on donations from activists who use the service and space.
Social Movements Network
This is the website of the Social Movements Network which emerged out of the World Social Forum process. The SMN unites under the call 'We are social movements that are fighting all around the world against neo-liberal globalization, war, racism, castism, religious fanaticism, poverty, patriarchy, and all the forms of economical, ethnical, social, political, cultural, sexual and gender discriminations and exclusions. We are all fighting for social justice, citizenship, participatory democracy, universal rights, and for the right of peoples to decide their own future.' The website is a little out of date but contains many of the key statements and political demands of the social movements.
The Grassroots Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign
A national grassroots movement against the Apartheid Wall in Palestine, this campaign is coordinated by the Palestinian Environmental Nongovernmental Organizations Network (PENGON), involves communities affected by the Wall, and is widely supported among anti-war and anti-globalization movements. The website contains useful updates, contacts, and resource materials.
United for Peace and Justice (US)
Stop the War Coalition (UK)
http://www.unitedforpeace.org/
http://www.stopwar.org.uk/
These are the websites of the biggest anti-war coalitions at the heart of empire and its closest ally. Along with anti-war movements around the world, they were behind the historic global demonstrations last 15 February 2003. The websites feature listing of local and international anti-war events as well as useful downloadable resources such as posters, flyers, or bus schedules for the next big demonstration.
World Social Forum (official and unofficial sites)
http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br/
This is the official website of the World Social Forum. It is in several languages and includes a very good archive or articles about the WSF.
http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/agp/free/wsf/
It is not quite clear who is behind this website (maybe Peoples Global Action, PGA) but whoever it is, is doing a good job. It contains a comprehensive collection of articles and critiques of all the World Social Forums, plus lots of photos, links, Indymedia reports, and radical critiques.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Social_Forum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Globalization_Movement
The Wikipedia entry for the WSF contains lots of useful links, as does the anti-globalization entry,
World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI)
The WTI is a concrete example of how people in the anti-war movement are moving beyond coordinated protest actions towards concrete and more complex political projects. The website has links to the various tribunal sessions autonomously organized around the world but linked together through the project, reflecting the interesting network-character of the movement.
ZNET
ZNet calls itself a 'community of people committed to social change.' The ZNet list of authors is a who's who of the 'intelligensia' of the anti-globalization and social justice movements, or at least those who write in English. There's something for everyone on this website, including back issues of ZMagazine, founded in 1987 and the intellectual heart of ZNet.
Compiled by Focus on the Global South, www.focusweb.org
