Alterglobalism wanders around Russia

The first brief notes about the Russian social forum and the Forum “Education for everybody”.

This preliminary statistics shows the uncommonness of these events for Russia that recently seemed to be fallen asleep forever. However, the variety of people and organizations at RSF and REF is not accidental.

Firstly, the Forums were preceded by regional meetings. Last year there was the Social forum of South Russia in Voronezh (about 100 participants, 15 organizations, 10 cities of Russia’s South), Forum of the social initiatives in Moscow (approximately 150 participants, more than 20 organizations). For two years the Siberian social forum has been taking place in Barnaul and Novosibirsk (more than 100 participants, 15-20 organizations, over 10 regions). Early in this year there was the Public hearing on the problems of the available for everybody education development and so on.

But the birth of the real social initiatives in our society at this period was even more significant. This process became especially evident during the mass protest actions in January-February 2005, when over 200 thousands of Russians demanded stopping of the anti-social activity of the authorities.

So the Forums have their prehistory.

The mass character (of course, regarding Russian potential) of the RSF and the REF is also non-accidental. However, the scale is not the only point. The general atmosphere of the Forums – joyful, creative atmosphere of the dialogue, solidarity, disputes and real collaboration – is of greater importance. The mood of the Forums was set by their opening where we refused the wordy speeches of the leaders and the greetings of the “very important persons”. The Forum was opened by young comrades – L. Ozhogina and A. Demidov – those who were among the dozens of “workers-organizers”. It was followed by two brain attacks – “What are the concrete possible results of the RSF” and “How to assert our social, economic and civil rights”, conducted by A. Buzgalin and B. Kagarlitsky. One of the most romantic revolutionary songs of the 20-th century “Grenada” concluded the opening. All the participants sang it standing, without taking a breath. (By the way, “International” was sung at the closure of the RSF with no less enthusiasm and, in contrast to the former party congresses/старых партийных съездов, without phonogram.)

All the important persons participated in the Forums and their opening with equal reason. Deputies O. Smolin and O. Shein took part in the brain attack on equal terms. (Moreover, Oleg Smolin played the piano, providing the brief musical “comments” to the most brilliant theses of the brain attack participants.) The other deputy, one of the “Rodina” leaders, S. Glaziev stood in a queue for the microphone and received (as all those who wished) 30 seconds for a remark.

This principle of the Forum was applied to the organization of the conferences, workshops, seminars and round tables: any organization could claim and carry out its type of activity. And quite all the proposals of the organizational committee about the fusion of the similar activities were met with understanding. That enabled to conduct workshops and seminars on trade unionism, anti-war issues, self-organization, nature of alterglobalizm and some other with a large number of participants with an open dialogue between many co-organizers that represented various, disputant, but listening to each other speakers. The spectrum of issues was very broad, that is indicated at least by the programs of the Forums: their workshops included such groups of problems, as the provision of available for all education, the protection of the social and economic rights, the problems of alterglobalist movement in Russia, youth problems, the relations between the political and social struggle, counteraction to the wars, chauvinism and nationalism, the human rights, culture and mass media etc.

The open dialogue between the representatives of different ideological and political movements was also very unusual for our country. Anarchists and communists, trotskists and social democrats, leave alone sincere liberal centrists, carried on a dialogue how to act jointly in order to protect civil, social and economic rights of the Russians, how to set up self-organization from below, what campaign to wage and how and so on, rather than whose ideology is true.

The stylistic picture of the Forums was no less uncommon: anarchizing boys and girls in black dresses and respectable professors with ties, workers from the remote parts of Russia and refined students from Moscow… It is impossible to enumerate all of them. But interested and open faces were common. We were different at the Forums, but we went to meet each other, with disputes and conflicts, but with evident intention to find a solution regarding at least the first steps of collaboration and concrete affairs. Of course, the Forums had plenty of problems and disadvantages. Among them was the cheap and extremely Spartan hostel, financial troubles (financing was minimal and only from the social organizations – neither state nor business helped us), some organizational slips… It was not always easy to find the common language between the “old” social organizations and the “new” movements that differ so much... But it was our first step! As regards the main positive results of the Forums, it is necessary to mention, first of all, a serious discussion of the most burning problems in the form of an open dialogue. The very fact of this dialogue on a national (and taking into account guests – international) scale is a relevant achievement for our so different and hard fragmented opposition.

The second outcome is the new acquaintances, contacts and setting up of the horizontal coordination networks.

Thirdly, the creation of environment, in which the future multifarious alterglobalist movement can arise in Russia, was initiated. It should become a real constructive new opposition that will be democratic, social and international. And, finally, the most important result is the dozens of concrete campaigns and actions, projects and measures to build horizontal solidarity in regions on a national scale. They were presented at the final plenaries by dozens of workshops moderators and initiators of the concrete projects. It is impossible to enumerate all of them. As an example, I would like to mention the initiation and the proposals submission concerning the first steps of the movement “Education for everybody” and the idea to use the name ‘Soviet’ for different coordination networks. 1 This name occurred from below 100 years after the First Russian revolution. It occurred to the activists that oppose the federal law № 122 in different regions of Russia.

More thorough reports and concrete information about plans and initiatives will appear on Internet sites of the Forums and organizations (www.soc-forum.ru and www.alternativy.ru) This text was just the first brief notes of one of the Forums’ organizers and participants. Serious analysis and, what is even more important, serious work are ahead.