Complexity, technology and the future of transformative politics

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the ‘open space’ idea remains the key source of strength for the World Social Forum as a tool for transformative, liberatory politics. We suggest that this space can be seen as inhabited by two political identities formed on the basis of what we call the conventional left narrative on the one hand and the civilizational narrative on the other. We propose that WSF can continue to fulfil its mission well by serving as a forum where political and social activists and intellectuals can meet and learn from each other to overcome their current weaknesses. Key to such overcoming, we suggest, is that technology and complexity are politicized – a task which may be difficult but the avoidance of which may be irresponsible.

KEYWORDS:

• World Social Forum
• open space
• transformative politics
• civilizational politics
• technology
• complexity

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 The writers have all contributed as participants, speakers and organizers to several global, Asian, European and Finnish WSF events since 2002. Since 2004 we have occasionally represented the Network Institute for Global Democratization (NIGD) and Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – Coalition for Comprehensive Democracy (VK) at the meetings of the International Council of the WSF.

2 See Chico Whitaker's (2019) incisive reflections on this topic in his contribution to this special issue.

3 The charter is available here: http://fsmm2018.org/principles-of-the-world-social-forum/?lang=en (accessed 3.12.2018) and in many other electronic and printed sources.

4 The initiative was spread via e-mail in 2018 with a document attached called: International Peoples Assembly, DOCUMENT, “Notebook no 1 – Basic Documents”, a Publication of the International Operative Secretariat of the International Peoples Assembly São Paulo – SP, Brazil. According to the second page of the document it can be requested at [email protected].

5 See the instructive debate in Fraser et al. (2003).

6 Quote from memory. Nyrup-Rasmussen spoke at a dialogue, organized by Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – Coalition for Comprehensive Democracy, between a team of Indian socialists led by the late Surendra Mohan and a European team led by António Guterres, the current UN secretary general, who was at the time president of the Socialist International. The occasion was 15 years back but the quote has been verified in oral communication between participants many times.

7 See also Liberating Life: Woman’s Revolution (available at http://www.freeocalan.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/liberating-Lifefinal.pdf) and other writings of Abdullah Öcalan.

8 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isiboro_S%C3%A9cure_National_Park_and_Indigenous_Territory#References and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales. (Accessed 3.12.2018).

9 Iceland is exceptional as its president and government respected the popular rejection in two separate referenda held in 2010 and 2011, of bailout agreements related to the bankruptcy of Iceland’s three main commercial banks.

10 Heidegger’s esoteric conception of truth, his primitive philosophical method, and his repulsive rhetoric of depth should not prevent us from benefiting from his remarks on technology in his essay “Die Frage Nach der Technik”, in Heidegger (1954).

11 For a questioning of technology from the perspectives of justice and freedom see Gandhi (2000); Schumacher & Gillingham (1979); Illich (1985).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Thomas Wallgren

Thomas Wallgren is a social activist, professor of philosophy and director of The von Wright and Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Helsinki, Finland. He studied with G. H. von Wright in Helsinki and with Jürgen Habermas in Frankfurt and now works on the relevance of a Socratic and Bakhtinian, sceptical reading of Wittgenstein for democratic theory and the critical discourse of modernity and transmodernity. Wallgren grew up politically in the Nordic ecological and solidarity movements and has been inspired also by the Gandhian socialist tradition. He has been involved in Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – Coalition for Comprehensive Democracy, Corporate Europe Observatory and the Network Institute for Global Democratization. Wallgren is an elected member of the city council in Helsinki for the social democrats.

Vijay Pratap

Vijay Pratap is senior fellow at the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies. Politically aligned to the Gandhian socialist stream since 1968, he was active in the JP Movement (1974–1977) during which he was in jail for 20 months. As a founder member of Lokayan, Pratap has worked on inter-ideological, inter-sectoral dialogues for interrogation and deepening of democracy and redefining development. Along with Rajni Kothari he received the Right Livelihood Award 1985 on behalf of Lokayan. Pratap has founded the South Asian Dialogues on Ecological Democracy (SADED) and popularized the concept of Ecological Democracy in the vernacular social movements in India. Pratap was a member of the High Powered Group of the Helsinki Process (2000-2005), convenor of the committee for bringing the WSF process to India/South Asia, facilitator of the mobilization committee of Asia Social Forum 2003 and WSF-Mumbai 2004. He has been chairperson of the Solidarity Centre for South Asian Democracies.

Ritu Priya

Ritu Priya is professor at the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She is also founding member of the Trans-disciplinary Research Cluster on Sustainability Studies and of the Trans-disciplinary Research Cluster on Plural Health Care in the university. She trained as a medical professional and has been part of people’s health movement groups and networks, convenor of Medico Friend Circle and chair of the Health Swaraaj Samvaad working group of South Asian Dialogues on Ecological Democracy (SADED). She has organized several sessions on health related themes and the politics of knowledge at the Asian and India Social Forums as well as at the World Social Forum in India and Kenya.