Life Despite Capitalism *inside* and *outside* the ESF paying ring

[marki_brown]

The proposal (a series of workshps and 2 plenaries, under the 
theme "Life Despite Capaitalism" ..see below) is an excellent one, 
and is very much worth canvassing inside the European Social Forum, 
and before the ESF.

As part of the landrights campaign "The Land is Ours", people 
involved in the campaign would have much to contribute. The basic 
underpinning of the proposed event/s in Life Despite perfectly 
mirrors TLIO's own perspectives: that while the ideal is complete 
land redistribution, the practice of reclaiming for the many 
thousands of people who are attempting to live on the land is one of 
having to work within the system (the planning system), but by 
populating it's own rheoric of sustainability, and actually going 
beyond the planning system's own lack of definition.

I think there is much we could contribute.

Mark (TLIO)
www.thelandisours.org

 
>From: "massimo deangelis" <m.deangelis at ntlworld.com>
>Date: 2004/07/25 
To: <londonsocialforum2003 at yahoogroups.com> 
<anotheresfispossible at lists.riseup.net>, 
<democratise_the_esf at lists.riseup.net>, 
> Subject: [alt-space-esf] Life Despite Capitalism *inside* and 
*outside* the ESF paying ring
 
Dear all
 
a network of people from the UK and Europe, has started organising a 
series of events to be held both inside the paying ring of the ESF 
and outside it, in the autonomous spaces. The series of event is 
called "Life Despite Capitalism". A rough indication of what this is  
posted at
http://esf2004.net/en/tiki-index.php?page=LifeDespiteCapitalism
 
but updates will hopefully  added soon.
 
While the "inside" event will just a seminar, the "outside" will be 
made of two plenaries and about 12 workshops divided in two sets (we 
hope). The idea is however not to have simply a one way talking shop, 
but an opportunity to network, exchange ideas and start to develop 
together a common discourse.
 
In the first plenary -- more traditional format - we will have 
confirmed presence of John Holloway and George Caffentzis. Other 
names have been made and we are in the process of contacting them, 
such as Maria Mies, Mariarosa Dalla Costa, and "PM" (i.e. Hans  
Widmers), who some will remember as the author of the legendary "bolo 
bolo". The list is still open. The idea of this plenary is to hear 
from people who from a variety of backgrounds and experiences have 
thought about the question of alternatives in the here and now, and 
not "after the revolution". 

After the first plenary, we would have two rounds (some say three) of 
simultaneous workshops followed by a  final plenary. The first round 
of workshops we thougth -- called "ROOTS" -- will be on various 
experiences of commons and therefore of reclaiming our powers and 
communities (commons at work, traditional - indigenous- commons,  
creative commons, alternative spaces, "public services" as commons, 
and  migrant creation of commons as survival strategies, precarious 
workers creation of commons, and so on). Here people discuss their 
experences, visions, understanding, struggles, successes and 
difficulties on key specific areas.
 
The second round of workshops -- called SWARM -- will be all 
on "experiences of commons", in which the people working on "single 
issues" in the previous workshop, will be mixed up randomly to cross-
pollinate and contaminate each other. Each workshop would be also 
given the task to come up with proposals for further work, action and 
initiatives.
 
The final plenary would be both a report back from all the two series 
of workshops and a listing on a big screen via computer of the major 
insights and proposals for further work and initiatives.  We could 
then post the result on a web page, which we can then use as a basis 
for both implementing what we proposed and for building on our work 
the next  time we meet collectively.
 
To make it possible, this event would most likely to be held on the 
saturday at the LSE.
 
I would love to have your comments and feedback to this initial 
proposal. Keep in mind that everybody is welcome to contribute to the 
further conception and organisation of the Life Despite Capitalism 
event, so please get in touch.

Massimo