[pp.int.general] ESF - details in writing

[Amelia Andersdotter]

Hello,

Initially, if I should happen to forget anything, or if there are any
questions, feel free to ask.

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So, about the European Social Forum (ESF):

They have a website at http://www.esf2008.org (The website is a LOT
better now than it was only a few weeks back, and has a lot more
practical details about the forum and everything about it.)

ESF is a pan-European visionary forum for global movements. It's a
sister forum to the World Social Forum - a counter-forum to World
Economic Forum started in Brazil in the late 90s. Largely, this had to
do with general dissatisfaction with the free-trade treaties of World
Trade Organisation which were a complete disaster for a lot of
developing nations. Also, a lot of developing nations with heavy debts
felt disappointed about the lack of leniency in the economic
community.

It's on between the 17-21 September 2008 in Malmö, Sweden.

So who comes there? ESF has a wide variety of participants. They could
probably be considered leftist, but a lot of human rights or human aid
organisations also come. The idea is that people (not parliamentarian
politicians) can meet and spawn ideas for how to make the world a
better place. So the unique Pirate Parties can not participate, which
is why the _network_ of international Pirate Parties are. As a
network, we're an interest group. As parties, we are politicians. The
benefit for the Pirate Parties is that the forum is based on dissent
about trade treaties we too probably do not like (TRIPS, for
instance). Also, this is a good opportunity for PPI to show a united,
visionary movement to several tens of thousands of social activists
from all over Europe. All the previous ESF:s have attracted
approximately 70-100'000 participants.

Last week (friday actually), the ESF organisers (they are a separate
organisation, working only with organising the forum - they are also
a-political) started the _merging process_. Merging here basically
means they mash different suggestions for activities together. In our
case, this means that we have submitted an suggestion for a seminar at
the ESF. So have another 800 organisations. But the forum can only
handle 200 seminars, so instead of throwing anyone out they suggest
collaborations.

I am currently hoping that we will be able to co-operate with a few
Hungarians (their proposal was Cyberdemocracy) and the Greens (whose
proposal for seminar was file-sharing).

When we, if we, manage to build a co-operation with another
organisation we will plan our further activities with them. I haven't
done this before and don't know how it will work out, but I'm counting
on it being interesting.

Reinier Bakels from the Netherlands and Christian Engström from Sweden
are currently our only seminar holders. RB for immaterial property
rights development (iirc) and CE on patents on medicines. !!! I'd
still like to check if there are any volunteer (young) girls who would
mind holding a short seminar (say tops 20 min), because it's good for
diversity and is possible still. !!!

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Costs and accommodation

Keeping costs down for anyone who wishes to participate is, obviously,
a priority. We will try to arrange accommodation in the south of
Sweden with some of our members.

It is totally _free_of_charge_ to participate in the ESF for all
individuals. Organisations holding seminars have to pay, but this is
all accounted for by PPSE+Ung pirat. Early planning keeps the costs
down, usually.

sincerely,
Amelia Andersdotter