Irish Social Forum Oct 8-10

national | public consultation / irish social forum | event notice Sunday October 03, 2004 21:45 by Liz Curry - Irish Social Forum keykiet at yahoo dot com

Fri Oct 8th 7.30pm: Introduction to the Social Forum with music and films
St. Nicholas’ Parish Centre, Carmen Hall Rd., off Francis St., The Liberties, Dublin 8.

Sat Oct 9th 10.30am: Speakers and open floor discussion on Anti-Racism
All day Workshops
UCD Student Centre, Belfield, Dublin 4.

Sun Oct 10th 10.30am: Discussions on different forms of opposition to Neoliberalism
Workshops and Assembly of the Social Movements
ATGWU Hall, Middle Abbey St., Dublin 1.

The Irish Social Forum is a space to bring together everyone who wants to see an actually sustainable world and is working on it right now or has ideas about how .

What kind of world do we want?
How possible is it?
How exactly will it work?
How will decisions be made?
How do we cope with our differing opinions on how to proceed?

This is not a convention with speakers and audience, it is a participative forum for discussion and action. Get ready to back up your opinions.

Launched in July 2003, the Irish Social Forum draws its inspiration and energy from the international movement of social forums, such as the World Social Forum and the European Social Forum, coming together to build alternatives in the belief that “another world is possible”. The forum is created by and for the movements and is organised in accordance with the World Social Forum Charter of Principles of Porto Alegre (visit www.fse-esf.org/en/charter.html).

How to get involved:

This year’s Irish Social Forum will take place October 8-10th 2004 in Dublin. This is a chance for people from around Ireland to come together to engage in debate, organize action and build networks to strengthen the global justice movement.

Friday night will feature music with Man & the Machine and film-showings celebrating the global movements.

This will be followed by two plenaries over the weekend, one on the theme of anti-racism - what methods are most effective?featuring speakers such as Aisling Reidy (Irish Council of Civil Liberties), Ronit Lentin (Campaign Against Deportation of Irish Children) and Rosana Flynn (Residents Against Racism).

The second plenary focuses on neoliberalism and the speakers will be Peadar Kirby (DCU lecturer), Aileen O’Carroll (Workers Solidarity Movement), Mick O’Reilly (trade unionist) and Mary Murphy (former national policy officer with St. Vincent de Paul). The discussion will focus on the state, beyond the state and social partnerships.
One hour of talks, one hour open discussion.

The weekend will also host a variety of workshops on issues such as the arms trade, anti-racism, trade justice, the Coca-Cola boycott, waste management and incineration, the EU constitution, heritage protection, the upcoming "less lethal" weapons conference in Dublin and the upcoming European Social Forum taking place in London in October.

Please note the invitation is still open to individuals, organisations and groups to shape the content of the ISF by proposing workshops. All proposals are being collated and arrangements made for groups suggesting similar titles to club together. This is only one of the ways in which the ISF seeks to promote cooperation across Irish civil society. The deadline for applications is Friday September 24th 2004 but still possible to combine with existing ones.

For a workshop form, please contact Mary Kinane at mkinane@dlrcoco.ie (086 – 6097532). To cover the costs of organising the Irish Social Forum, organisations who wish to hold a workshop are asked - if possible - to give a donation (recommended €50). No one will be excluded for lack of funding.

You and/or your organisation is also encouraged to help support and organise the event by coming along to the weekly Dublin Social Forum Working Group meetings on Mondays at 7pm in the Comhlámh offices, 10 Upper Camden St., Dublin 2. Alternatively you can get involved in regional social forums such as the Cork Social Forum, the Southeast Social Forum in Waterford or the Northeast Social Forum in Belfast.

See you on the 8th.