History of the WSF – The World Social Forum was born in 2001 by organizations and social movements that, from an initial proposal, called themselves and mobilized for a great meeting in Porto Alegre, in opposition to the neoliberalism represented by the World Economic Forum, which occurred at the same time in Davos, Switzerland.
The world events that followed the first WSF were shocked by humanity’s longings for peace. In the same year 2001 came down the Twin Towers. And in the name of fighting terrorism, the US-led West has come to justify new wars and sow new forms of terror, to stigmatize entire peoples by their ethnic and cultural background, and to violently persecute immigrants. He armed himself without hesitation to fight precisely the diversity that the WSF was born to celebrate.
Against all this, the struggles gathered at the WSF were able to drive changes and point paths. now seriously threatened. In Latin America, in particular, more democratic experiences were possible, from the rise of popular forces, indigenous and workers, or more progressive, to governments. And against which all the conservative forces were also organized.
With the first editions in Porto Alegre (2001, 2002, 2003 and 2005), the WSF toured the world with meetings in Mumbai, Caracas, Karashi, Bamako, Nairobi, Belem, Dakar, Tunis and Montreal. In addition to thematic, regional, continental issues.
In North Africa, the construction of two world editions was part of the events of the so-called Arab Spring. In Canada, it was for the first time held in a country in the North, with a strong youth leadership.
The WSF returns to Brazil after a period of intense debate about the future of social struggles and the WSF process itself, with the perspective of serving the resistance movements against the advance of neoliberal forces and their attacks against the young democracies in Latin America. Next step: March 2018.
