European Social Forum: Where’s the East?

In London, from 14 to 17 of October, will be held the third edition of the European Social Forum (ESF). In this big gathering of the European progressist civil society, symbol of both the Left and alterglobalists, countries from Eastern Europe, the poor parent of Europe, are under represented, if not abandoned.

The first two European Social Forums (ESF), organised in Florence and Paris, welcomed 50 000 participants, of which only 1 000 were from Eastern Europe. According to most expectations, this number should not increase much this year. This low participation rate of Eastern European groups can be explained by technical reasons. First of all, for East Europeans, participating to the ESF is expensive. Additionally, according to Christina Haralanova, director of Internet Rights Bulgaria, “the restrictions tied to the free circulation in the European Union force participants from certain countries to get a visa in order to participate in the forum.”

Eurocentrist vision

There are additional obstacles, more political. Many have the impression that the new members are considered as second class citizens inside the European Union, regrets Joëlle Palmieri, cofounder of the Pénélopes, a French feminist organisation who has developed many projects with groups of women in Central and Eastern Europe. This eurocentrist vision, strongly criticised when the European Union was enlarged in May 2004 because of the unequal sharing of agricultural subsidies and the freedom to work anywhere in the Union, is also reflected in the core of the ESF. Therefore, the entire Central and Eastern European region is considered to be one single monolithic bloc, unlike the Western countries which are considered independently from one another in the process of attributing intervention quotas, conferences and seminars, in which anyone can propose to the program.

According to Tracey Wheatley, coordinator of international relations of the Hungarian network Another World is Possible, “in order to avoid complications, the enlargement committee for Central and Eastern Europe of the ESF prefers to talk with national and unified coalitions. The problem is that, with the exception of Poland and Russia, few countries can provide unified platforms because of the fragmented civil society. This strategy reflects a total misunderstanding of the reality of these countries.”

New movements

After the soviet era, social movements have to reconstruct and barely can build up any weight. Amongst traditional social movements, we find left-wing political parties, Church and unions. But they are still weak. However, new groups are starting to emerge, more original, with new orientations and with different ways of working. In Hungary, for example, we now find a progressist environmental movement in full emergence. It is composed mainly of young people, for whom this new space is seen as an opportunity to express themselves and to organise democratically, autonomously and horizontally. They are dissociated at the same time from “the nostalgics” from the old regime and the new “sceptics” elites who rely only on neoliberalist ways.

However, it is exactly the lack of transparency, inclusion and horizontal decision process, which the new groups are objecting to (Young Greens of Hungary, Another World is Possible network, Internet Rights Bulgaria). The large European left-wing political parties (often under the label of social groups and unions) are a very important influence within the ESF. For example, the proposition to organise the ESF this year in the English capital came from a handful of organisations, including the Globalise Resistance (linked with Blair’s Labour Party), in collaboration with the municipal administration of London. This was done in a unilateral way, without consulting the local civil society organisations.

“Groups from the East who are searching for more participative political alternatives and who wish to keep their independence from political parties are marginalised from the Forum”, says Joëlle Palmieri. According to Gabor Csillag, spokesman of the Young Greens of Hungary, “in Eastern Europe, the categories of Left and Right have lost their meaning in the collective’s mind because of the lack of coherence from the various regimes in power. Everything is to be rebuilt. I have the impression that the traditional European left avoids to talk about the experience of Eastern countries simply because it would challenge them to be more imaginative and to create realist alternatives”, he adds.

Dynamique de réflexion

“In spite of these difficulties, the European Social Forum remains a significant event”, says Gabor Csillag. It exposes the activists from the East to a certain diversity which exists nevertheless in the foundation of the Forum, and allows them to learn new perceptions on what “the Left” and “the Right” means elsewhere in the world. It also presents various conceptions of globalisation, which is widely misunderstood. The Forum is also a space where the activism as a “movement” can be experienced, this is a unknown sensation in the atomised societies in the East. But according to Tracey Wheatley and Joëlle Palmieri, beyond the specific event, the importance of the ESF resides above all in the dynamics of reflexion and of debate continuous it creates at the national and international level.

“In order to stimulate a larger participation of social groups from the East, bigger efforts must be done both from the East and West”, concludes Christina Haralanova. From one side, the available financial resources to facilitate the presence of Eastern participants and a better transparency of the Solidarity Funds must be established. On the other side, a political good-will will be necessary from organisers and participants in order to listen to all proposals and put aside historical differences.

A few signs in this direction. Austria has proposed to organise the next Austrian Social Forum in Hungary, proposing that it be also a regional forum. “We also hope that the next ESF, expected to be in Greece in 2006, will encourage a higher participation from activists from the East. It is closer and shares more affinities with the Balkans”, adds Christina Haralanova. As for Eastern European countries, they will need to invest in campaigns to inform and sensabilise the population, in regions where most have never heard about the ESF. This is why Internet Rights Bulgaria and the Another World is Possible network are concentrating their efforts on media coverage of the ESF in London. And of course, the next challenge will be to engage further in political debates in order to expose alternatives from the East.