Global Struggles Against the IMF and World Bank U.S. Teach-In Tour on the Impact of – and the Resistance to – the IMF, World Bank, and Corporate Domination, Sept. 6 – 24, 2002 Culminating in Washington, DC • Teach-In/Conference – September 25-27 • Rallies, marches and protests at the IMF/World Bank annual meetings – September 28-29

Register for the Teach-In/Conference
Sept 25-27
online | via mail | housing info

Teach-In Program

WEDNESDAY, September 25
New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1313 New York Ave., N.W.

3:00 pm – 5:00 pm AFTERNOON FILM
PROFIT and Nothing But! by Raoul Peck; 52 minutes
Film Summary: Capitalism has succeeded in convincing us that it is the only truth. It has even convinced its opponents that their failure within the normal scheme of things. Raoul Peck contrasts this heavily-documented illumination of the capitalist system with the devastating reality of his native land, Haiti.
Discussant: Camille Chalmers, Executive Director of PAPDA (Haitian Platform for Advocacy of Development Alternatives)

5:00 pm – 7:00 pm Registration

7 pm – 10 pm Opening Plenary
Sanctuary

End Corporate Rule: Global Struggles Against the IMF & World Bank

Moderator: Marie Dennis – Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns
Religious Working Group on the IMF/World Bank

Speakers: Maria Atilano, Mexico – Mexican Action Network Against Free Trade (RMALC)
Gigi Francisco, Philippines – International Gender and Trade Network
Samuel Nguiffo, Cameroon – Center for Environment & Development
Stella Iwuagwus, Nigeria – Center for the Right to Health
Nora Cortiñas, Argentina – Madres de la Plaza de Mayo
Chie Abad, Philippines/Saipan/U.S. – Global Exchange

PLEASE NOTE:ON THURSDAY, THE TEACH-IN WILL BE HELD AT NATIONAL BAPTIST MEMORIAL CHURCH - 1501 COLUMBIA ROAD, N.W. (nearest metro: Columbia Heights) - AND SURROUNDING LOCATIONS

ON FRIDAY, WE RETURN TO NEW YORK AVENUE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH - 1313 NEW YORK AVE., N.W. (nearest metro: Metro Center)

9:00 am – 10:00 am Morning Plenary
Sanctuary

Moderator: Janneke Bruil, Friends of the Earth International

Speakers: Dennis Brutus, Jubilee South Africa
Demba Moussa Dembele, Forum on African Alternatives, Senegal
Rob Weissman, Essential Action, U.S.
Vanessa Dixon, Service Employees International Union, U.S.
Noeli Pocaterra, National Indigenous Council of Venezuela

Discussion Session Tracks:
Thursday’s sessions depart from the customary workshop format to some extent. They are divided into three “tracks,” with at least one session from each track being offered during each of the three time-slots following the plenary.

Global South Perspectives and Struggles: Activists visiting Washington from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean explain and reflect on their experiences and strategies. All sessions will be led by Global South activists. Possibilities for cross-border coordination will be discussed.

Strategy Sessions: Starting from a broadly-defined sector of our joint struggle, activists compare strategies, priorities, and dilemmas. Facilitators will work to ensure that all voices are heard and that sessions move toward developing common approaches.

Movement-Building: Discussions cover the methods and challenges in building a broader Global Justice Movement which can overcome the formidable power of entrenched institutions and corporations.

Lunch will be provided. Since there is no real lunch break, feel free to pick up your lunch and take it with you to your preferred workshop.

Thursday’s sessions will be held at the following locations:
The Sanctuary and the Chapel at National Baptist Memorial Church –
16th St. and Columbia Road, N.W.

Casa del Pueblo/United Methodist Church – 1459 Columbia Road, N.W.

All Souls Unitarian Church - Eaton Rm. - 16th and Harvard Streets, N.W.

Festival Center - 1640 Columbia Road, N.W.


10:15 am – 11:30 am Workshop Series #1

GLOBAL STRUGGLES: Perspectives from Africa
Chapel (National Baptist)
“They should eat GMOs”, Colin Powell said of Africans at the recent World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD aka W$$D). The so-called New Partnership for African Development” (NEPAD), unveiled at the G8 Summit is an identical twin to the failed IMF and World Bank structural adjustment programs. Debt has crippled and enslaves the continent. The HIV/AIDS pandemic, never mind malaria, TB, river blindness, high infant mortality, hunger, impoverishment, and more, is killing off and orphaning the hope and future of Africa. And ‘Still We Rise!’ What are the day-to-day struggles and what are the long-term struggles? Who are the forces amassed against imperialistic and war-mongering social, economic, and political forces? Likely participants include activists from South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Morocco, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Ghana.
Facilitator: Demba Dembele (Forum for African Alternatives, Senegal)

GLOBAL STRUGGLES: Perspectives from Asia-Pacific
Festival Center
Stretching from Fiji to Turkey and from Siberia to Sri Lanka, Asia faces problems from the consequences of the economic crisis of the late 1990s to the crisis of armed conflict and its “resolution.”
Probable participants include: Shalmali Guttal (India/Laos/Thailand); Aderito Soares (East Timor); Shelly Emalin-Rao (Fiji) and Vineeta Gupta (India).
Facilitator: Beckie Malay (Freedom from Debt Coalition, Philippines)

MOVEMENT BUILDING: Global-Local Movement-Building: Lessons from Experience
Casa del Pueblo
(double session - continues until 1:00 pm)
How can global justice activists work more closely with community-based organizations? Discuss the obstacles, lessons, and real success stories of “global-local” movement-building with representatives of Project South, The Praxis Project, The Coalition of Immokalee Workers, and Tennessee Industrial Renewal Network. The workshop will start at 10:15 and run until 1:00 with a 15-minute break. We’ll focus less on “what are the analytical connections” than on “how are organizers actually integrating local and global economic justice work, and what can I learn?”
Facilitator: Mike Prokosch (United for a Fair Economy, US)

STRATEGY SESSION: Trade
Sanctuary (National Baptist)
FTAA, CAFTA, GATS, “new issues” in the WTO, the Cancún WTO ministerial in 2003: what are the priorities and are we balancing them well in our campaigns?
Facilitator: Carrie Biggs-Adams (Communications Workers of America, US)

11:45 am – 1:00 pm Workshop Series #2

GLOBAL STRUGGLES: Perspectives from Latin America
Festival Center
[conducted in Spanish]
The newspaper headlines tell the story -- bailouts (Brazil), defaults (Argentina), uprisings against privatization (Bolivia, Peru, Paraguay, Ecuador), corruption scandals (Nicaragua), momentous elections (Brazil), strikes and intensified civil war (Colombia). What do the individual countries’ struggles mean, and what to do they mean collectively? Participants are expected from Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Mexico, Guatemala, and Nicaragua.
Facilitator: Onecimo Hidalgo (CIEPAC, Mexico)

MOVEMENT BUILDING: Session from 10:15 continues at Casa del Pueblo

STRATEGY SESSION: HIV-AIDS and Globalization
Eaton Room - All Souls
40 million people worldwide are HIV-positive. For the vast majority -- including almost all of the 30 million in Africa -- the diagnosis is a death sentence. For them, lifesaving treatments widely available in the United States are priced out of reach. In this case, global economic inequities are a life and death matter. Debt and proposed new trade agreements threaten to enhance drug company monopoly power and raise drug prices. This session will review these issues, and then focus on how U.S. citizens can organize to make a difference.
Participants include: Paul Davis, Health GAP, US; Demba Moussa Dembele, Forum on African Alternatives (Senegal); Asia Russell, Health GAP, US; and John Bell from ACT-UP Philadelphia.
Facilitator: Robert Weissman, Essential Action

STRATEGY SESSION: Gender and Globalization
Chapel (National Baptist)
Apply the gender lens: how do the hottest issues of the day (debt, SAPs, sweatshops, corporate greed, etc.) affect women, and how do they respond?
Facilitator: Carola Kinasha (Tanzania Gender Networking Programme, Tanzania)

Film & Speaker: Cochabamba, Bolivia: The Right to Water vs. The Right to Profit
The Festival Center
1:00 pm - 2:30 pm
Under pressure from the World Bank, Bolivia has privatized the countries oil and gas pipelines, airline, railway, and electric utility. The result has been weaker labor standards, consumer price hikes and service reductions. The opposition to privatization came to a head when in 2000 Bolivian government sold Cochabamba’s public water system to a subsidiary of San Francisco-based Bechtel Corp. Following the purchase, the company increased the water rates by as much as 400 percent. In a country where the minimum wage is $100 per month many families saw their monthly water bill soar past $25. The people of Cochabamba rebelled: a coalition of labor, human rights, and community activists, “La Coordinadora'', brought the city to a halt for four days blockading roads and shutting down transportation. When the government made promises and failed to keep them, a peaceful march was called for February 4, 2000. Protest leaders were arrested, radio stations shut down, and soldiers were sent into the streets firing their weapons. During two days of repression and tear gas attacks 175 people were injured and one killed. When the people of Cochabamba refused to retreat, Bechtel fled. Now Bechtel is suing the Bolivian government in a secret World Bank tribunal in an effort to recover $25 million in projected profits.
DISCUSSANT: Oscar Olivera, Executive Secretary of the Cochabamba Federation of Factory Workers and spokesperson for the Coalition in Defense of Water and Life, known in Bolivia as La Coordinadora.

1:15 pm – 2:30 pm Workshop Series #3

GLOBAL STRUGGLES: Oil and Community Rights: Experiences with the Chad-Cameroon Pipeline and with Caspian Oil
Chapel (National Baptist)
For decades, communities all over the world have been forced to live with the harsh consequences of oil exploitation. Drilling and pipeline construction lead to environmental destruction, local conflicts, increased corruption and human rights violations. However, while its mission is to alleviate poverty, the World Bank continues to support such projects. This session highlights two painful examples by featuring speakers from Cameroon and Georgia.
Facilitator: Samuel Nguiffo (CED, Cameroon)

MOVEMENT BUILDING: Critical Issues Facing the Movement: Should the Global Justice Movement Link with the Peace Movement?
Casa del Pueblo
This session will explore the issues relating to the connections between the anti-corporate globalization movement and the anti-war/ peace and justice movement. The session will begin with an overview of some of the links and issues as stake. The bulk of the session will be a facilitated discussion about the possibilities for greater collaboration between movements and the potential drawbacks and benefits associated with this. Come and share your views!
Facilitator: Representative from SOA Watch (US)

STRATEGY SESSION: Ecology
Eaton Room - All Souls
Environmental organizations led the way in internationalizing the struggle against damaging neo-liberal, pro-business economic policy. Now that the movement for global justice has established itself in the public eye, how does the agenda -- or agendas -- of ecology-focused campaigners fit into the bigger picture?
Facilitator: Anne Peterman (Action for Social and Ecological Justice [ASEJ], US)

STRATEGY SESSION: Taking International Debt Justice to the Next Level
Sanctuary (National Baptist)
This workshop will explore the issue of international debt and the movement for debt cancellation, giving updates and analysis of what has happened to date and strategizing on how to take this movement to the next level. The session will focus on building South/North partnerships in global organizing on this issue.
Facilitator: Marie Clarke (Jubilee USA Network, US), with Demba Dembele (Senegal), Shelly Rao (Fiji) Beckie Malay (Phillipines), Bill Ferguson (Bay Area Jubilee) and other US Jubilee activists and organizers.

2:30 pm – 4:30 pm AFL-CIO Worker’s Forum
AFL-CIO Headquarters, 16th & I Streets, N.W.

7:00 pm Interfaith Service and Vigil
Metropolitan AME Church, 15th and H Streets, N.W.

FRIDAY, September 27
New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1313 New York Ave., NW

9:00am – 10:15am Morning Plenary
Sanctuary

Moderator: Shelly Rao, Fiji – Ecumenical Center for Research, Education & Advocacy
Speakers: Njoki Njoroge Njehu, Kenya/U.S. – 50 Years is Enough Network
Marie Clarke, U.S. – Jubilee USA Network
Michael Guerrero, U.S. – Southwest Organizing Project
Asume Osuoka, Nigeria – Environmental Rights Action
John Bell, U.S. – ACT-UP Philadelphia

10:30 am – 12:00 pm Workshop Series #1

The Plan Puebla Panama: Battle Over the Future of Southern Mexico and Central America
Lincoln Parlor
The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Mexican government have a plan to transform the landscape and the economy all the way from central Mexico to southern Panama. The “Plan Puebla Panama” proposes the industrialization of the region, connecting the region with superhighways and a regional energy grid, and constructing a string of new “development zones” of sweatshops. These megaprojects would literally pave the way for corporate colonialism of the region intensifying the pressure to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement and the Free Trade area of the Americas. This workshop will focus on the two most advanced initiatives of the Plan Puebla Panama: the highway interconnection and energy interconnection initiatives as well as be an opportunity to hear from grassroots organizers from Mexico and El Salvador sharing their direct experiences with this social and ecologically devastating megaproject. Facilitator: Brendan O’Neill (ACERCA).
Panelists include: José Armando Flores Alemán (Center for the Defense of the Consumer) and Angela de Maria from El Salvador; Onesimo Hidalgo (CIEPAC) from Chiapas, Mexico; and Wendy Call.

Argentina
Lincoln Chapel
In the last 20 years, Argentina has endured a vicious military dictatorship, a multi-term populist-turned-neo-liberal president who wants to return to office even now, perhaps the most radical free-market economic reform plan in the world (including a currency tied directly to the US dollar), corruption scandals throughout the political system, the most spectacular national default in decades, and scenes reminiscent in some ways of the Great Depression: banks closed, cash nearly worthless, people laid off, looting of stores, and regular strikes and street demonstrations. Now, with the political system totally discredited, people’s assemblies, or asambleas, have formed in neighborhoods around the country, and a new form of government may be evolving. Is Argentina today the first glimpse of a post-IMF society?
Panelists include: Nora Cortiñas (Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo) and Mario Cafiero, Member of the Argentinian Congress.
Facilitator: Analia Penchaszadeh (Jobs with Justice, US)

World Bank: Hazardous to Your Health
Sanctuary
World Bank-imposed user fees for health care services have placed medical outside the reach of the poor in countries across the South, while decades of structural adjustment mandated cuts in health budgets have decimated the public health infrastructure in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Meanwhile, World Bank Group funding and promotion of incinerators is endangering public health. The hazardous chemicals (including dioxins and PCBs) released by incinerators not only pollute and endanger nearby communities, but can be transmitted long distances and already threaten public health globally. Learn about the issues and alternatives that protect public health.
Panelists: Vineeta Gupta (Insaaf International, India); Monica Wilson (Global Anti-Incinerator Alliance, US); Joanne Carter (Results, US)

Joining Hands to Break the Chains of Debt
Radcliff Room
“Must we starve our children to pay our debts?” asked Julius Nyerere, former President of Tanzania. International debt takes the lives of tens of thousands daily, yet the international financial institutions and wealthy creditors still demand repayment and still promote failed debt relief schemes. Come hear voices from the Global South describe the Jubilee movement to turn around the debt crisis and learn how to get involved in the exciting work happening in the U.S.
Panelists: Demba Dembele (Forum on African Alternatives, Senegal) Shelly Rao (Ecumenical Center for Research, Education and Advocacy, Fiji) Beckie Malay (Freedom from Debt Campaign, Phillipines) Mara Vanderslice (Jubilee USA Network, U.S.)
Facilitator: Nunu Kidane (Jubilee USA Network Chair, Eritrea/U.S.)

12:00 – 1:00 Lunch

1:00 – 2:00 Afternoon Plenary
Sanctuary

Moderator: Kevin Danaher, U.S. – Global Exchange
Speakers: Dennis Brutus, South Africa – Jubilee South Africa
Carola Kinasha, Tanzania – Tanzania Gender Networking Program
Ricardo Navarro, El Salvador – Friends of the Earth International
Bongani Lubisi, South Africa – Anti-Privatisation Forum

2:15 - 3:30 Workshop Series #2

ECA’s: The Dirtiest Secret of Globalization
Room 520
They are now the world's biggest class of financial institutions, collectively even bigger than the World Bank Group. Yet, most of them have no social and environmental standards. They are called export credit agencies (ECA’s). ECA’s provided the corporate welfare that enabled Enron to expand around the globe. Come learn about the "bottom feeders" of globalization and how to fight back.
Panelists: Beckie Malay (Freedom from Debt Coalition, Phillipines) Doug Norlen (Pacific Environment, U.S.) Aaron Goldzimer (Environmental Defense, U.S.)
Facilitator: Jon Sohn, Friends of the Earth- US

Surviving Against the Odds: Gender’s Challenges to Development Lincoln Chapel
Girls out of school; trafficked women; African farmers; Latin American “busboys”; G-8 leaders and nary a woman; high illiteracy; grandmothers raising AIDS orphans; lip service and rhetoric to gender concerns; all-male policy- and decision-making. Women’s productive and reproductive capacity is a necessary and important piece of the dominant economic order. Women are the “Rescue 911” system. Come learn and share strategies of how women survive against great odds.
Facilitator: Susan Thompson (Religious Working Group in the IMF and World Bank / Columban Justice & Peace Office, US)

Ecology and Globalization: The Ecological Devastation Imposed by World Bank/IMF Policies
Radcliff Room
Issues covered include the most serious ecological crises faced by people around the world. These issues include, global warming and fossil fuels; deforestation; large dams; biotechnology and biopiracy; ecological impacts of war; and water privatization.
Panelists include Oscar Olivera (La Coordinadora, Bolivia); Jason Tockman (American Lands Alliance, US), Monti Aguirre (International Rivers Network, US); Brian Tokar (Institute for Social Ecology, US), and others to be announced.
Facilitator: Anne Petermann (Action for Social & Ecological Justice / ACERCA, US)

U.S. Trade Strategy: Pre-Emption & End-Runs in the Americas Sanctuary
Regional trade and investment agreements like Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) work together to pre-empt growing resistance to neo-liberalism. While the World Trade Organization (WTO) has been easier to thwart (somewhat), the U.S. Trade Representative’s office has found more success with regional trade agreements and bilateral investment treaties containing “WTO-plus” provisions that win concessions the U.S. would be unlikely to get at the WTO.
Panelists: Maria Atilano (RMALC, Mexico) on the FTAA and PPP; Maude Barlow (Council of Canadians) on regional trade and investment agreements; Huberto Juarez (Univ. of Puebla, Mexico) on NAFTA, CAFTA, PPP, and the FTAA; and Karen Hansen-Kuhn (Alliance for Responsible Trade, U.S.) on the movements to stop the FTAA in the U.S. and internationally.
Facilitator: Severina Rivera (Campaign for Labor Rights, U.S.)

Behind the Green Facade: The World Bank’s Environmental Record Room 511
The World Bank markets itself as an institution, that works for the eradication of poverty and environmental sustainability -- as last witnessed during the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg just weeks ago. This workshop will expose the Bank's true environmental record since the Rio Earth Summit 1992 and give insights into its public relations machine.
Panelists: Liane Schalatek (Heinrich Böll Foundation, Germany/US) on the WSSD; Alex Wilks (Bretton Woods Project, UK) on the “Knowledge Bank,” Carol Welch (Friends of the Earth -US) on the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA); and Pamela Foster (Halifax Initiative, Canada) on the Global Environment Facility (GEF).

SOA: the Military Muscle to Enforce IMF/World Bank Policies
Lincoln Parlor
The workshop will make the case that US militarism is protecting – at any cost – US corporate interests in Latin America. The workshop will include the screening of the 20 min video “SOA: Guns and Greed”, a documentary that shows how combat-ready SOA graduates use their guns to protect the greed of large corporations and world financial institutions. Community organizers, labor activists, and educators who are engaged in the struggle against the policies of the new IMF/World Bank "conquistadors" are consistently targeted by US-trained armed forces. The global enforcement arm of the IMF and the World Bank is the Pentagon which arms and trains despotic militaries around the world. The SOA has served as the training ground for the Latin American “enforcers.” Economic oppression and military repression are flip sides of the globalization coin. The economic rape of the poor that accompanies globalization could not stand without the repressive military apparatus that brutalizes those who rise up to resist.
Panelists include staff of School of the Americas Watch

3:45 – 5:00 Workshop Series # 3

How to Organize A World Bank Bonds Boycott in Your Town, Union, or Church
Radcliff Room
The World Bank Bonds Boycott is a growing campaign which is making the destructive policies and projects of the World Bank a local issue. Based on the fact that the World Bank raises most of its money by selling bonds to investors, including our towns, unions, churches, and universities, the boycott is organizing these institutions to pass resolutions boycotting World Bank bonds. Already, more than 60 entities, including 7 U.S. cities, have adopted the boycott, and campaigns are underway in another dozen U.S. cities, in dozens of unions and churches, and on 5 continents. Come learn about this exciting campaign from people who have organized successful boycott campaigns in their communities and get the tools you need to organize a World Bank Bonds Boycott when you return home.
Facilitator: Neil Watkins (Center for Economic Justice, US)
Panelists: Dennis Brutus (Jubilee South Africa) Frances Bartelt (Wisconsin Fair Trade Campaign) Katrina Abarcar (Center for Economic Justice, US)

Tax the Bank!
Lincoln Parlor
As “international treaty organizations,” the World Bank and the IMF are exempt from property and sales tax, and its non-US employees are exempt from income tax. With ten thousand employees and seven large buildings in Washington, DC, their status deprives the city -- already afflicted with a small tax base -- of substantial revenues. The World Bank makes about $2 billion per year, and the IMF sits on $30 billion in gold reserves. The Tax-the-Bank campaign is designed to mobilize people in Washington DC to pressure the institutions to voluntarily make “payments in lieu of taxes” -- as tax-exempt organizations like the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey do -- to the city.
Facilitator: Soren Ambrose (50 Years Is Enough Network / New Voices on Globalization, US)

Just Say No: IMF Bailouts
Room 511
Recent IMF interventions in South America have revived the controversy that swirled around the institutions’ harsh conditions on “bailouts” during the East Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, as well as its history of supporting Argentina’s ultra-neo-liberal programs. The attempted Brazilian bailout in August is the largest single commitment of IMF funds in its history ($30 billion), appears not to have substantially calmed that country’s markets, and has made the IMF and its bailout the biggest issue in the Brazilian presidential elections in October. Should the IMF just get out of the bailout game? Or do countries in situations like Argentina’s require some kind of bailout that cannot come from anywhere else?
Facilitator: Mark Weisbrot (Center for Economic & Policy Research, US)

The Future of Basic Services – Water, Health and Education
Sanctuary
This interactive workshop will describe the privatization juggernaut; the nature of the political and commercial forces driving policies; the role of the U.S. government in promoting “private-public partnerships;” and way that the IMF and World Bank (together with the regional banks) aim to facilitate the application of WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) rules in these sectors. We will also explore actual and potential impacts of privatization; the timeline for influencing decisions of national governments and global institutions in various arenas; and opportunities for education and coalition-building that will enable researchers and campaigners to help citizens make their voices heard in ways that will ensure a more sustainable future.
Facilitator: Sameer Dossani (Citizens Network on Essential Services, US)

Oil and Gas versus Renewables
Room 520
In the struggle for global justice, it is crucial that we move away from the use of fossil fuels. Oil and gas exploitation cause grave local environmental and social problems, and contribute to dangerous climate change. The World Bank is a major financier of fossil fuel projects. However, a shift towards renewable energy could be an important generator of social change. It could lead to the decentralization of power, job creation and a healthy environment. This workshop explores the possibilities and challenges!
Facilitator: Hildebrando Velez (Colombia), an expert on energy sovereignty

Adjustment and the IFIs: What Hope for Change?
Peter Marshall Room
The Structural Adjustment Participatory Review International Network (SAPRIN) has been active on four continents mobilizing civil society and challenging the imposition of structural adjustment policies by the IMF and the World Bank. The three presenters will provide first-hand accounts of their engagement of these international financial institutions at the global and national levels. They will explain the difficulties encountered in getting these institutions to respond to the need to open the policymaking process to new economic policy options.
Presenters: Steve Hellinger (The Development GAP/SAPRIN Global Coordinator, US); Mario Cafiero (Member of the Argentinian Congress) Warren Nyamugasira (Uganda National NGO Forum)

Globalization Comes Home to Roost
Lincoln Chapel
The impact of corporate globalization is felt everyday in the United States, and by no group so acutely as recent immigrants. Hear their stories of disempowerment and resistance to the global economy in our “own backyard.”
Panelists include: Francisca Cortez (Coalition of Immokalee Workers -immigrant farm workers in Florida); a representative of Jobs with Justice (US) and a member of HERE Local 27.
Facilitator: Daisy Pitkin (Campaign for Labor Rights, US)

5:15 - 6:30 Workshop Series # 4

Sierra Student Coalition: How to Win a World Bank Bonds Boycott on your College Campus
Sanctuary
The Sierra Student Coalition is sponsoring a workshop on how to organize a World Bank Bonds boycott campaign on your college campus. You will learn about how World Bank projects in the oil, gas, and mining sectors harm the envioronment. You will also learn skills in student coalition building, how to effectively host teach-ins or other events, how to work with your administration, and how to win your Bonds Boycott campaign. All students (high school, college, graduate) are encouraged to attend.
Panelists: Asume Osuoka (Environmental Rights Action, Nigeria); Nick Salter and Nathan Wyeth, (Sierra Student Coalition, US); and Katrina Abarcar or Charity Ryerson (World Bank Bonds Boycott Campaign US)

Stopping the Water Privatizers at Home and Abroad
Radcliff Room
Join a discussion about World Bank, IMF, WTO and domestic programs that are turning public water systems into a billion dollar business for multinational corporations. Learn how to get involved in the amazing campaigns in Bolivia, Ghana, Nicaragua, in the U.S. and around the world to stem the privatization tide and return water to the people and the planet.
Panelists: Oscar Olivera (La Coordinadora, Cochabamba, Bolivia) Rudolf Amenga-Etego (Ghana National Coalition Against Privatisation of Water); Clemente Martinez (Centro Humboldt, Nicaragua); Wenonah Hauter (Critical Mass Energy and Environment Project of Public Citizen, US); Antonia Juhasz, (International Forum on Globalization, US)
Facilitator: Sara Grusky (International Water Working Group of Public Citizen, Washington, DC.)

Don’t Owe, Won’t Pay: Illegitimate and Odious Debt
Lincoln Chapel
The Global South debt campaigns -- and many groups in the North -- label the debts of these countries illegitimate because they come after centuries of ecological exploitation (extracting resources with no or little compensation), slavery, political oppression, and rigged international trade rules. There are also many who believe the debts should be declared odious under international law -- void because the loans were made to dictators and other undemocratic regimes, and most often did not benefit the country’s people, who are now required to pay them back. The most dramatic example of this is South Africa, where the current government has paid, and continues to pay, debts taken out by the old apartheid government to buy weapons and otherwise oppress the majority population. Get on board for debt cancellation, repudiation, and reparations!
Panelists include: Patricia Adams (author, Odious Debt, Canada); Shelly Rao (Ecumenical Center for Research, Education and Advocacy, Fiji); Beckie Malay (Freedom from Debt Campaign, Phillipines)
Facilitator: Marie Clarke (Jubilee USA Network)

Poverty Reduction or Poverty Reinforcement? The Shameless Rhetoric and Reality of IMF/World Bank Policy Conditions
Room 511
Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers are the linchpin in the new (since late 1999) process the IMF and the World Bank have set up to perpetuate structural adjustment programs. Now, instead of a government and the institution “negotiating” a new program in secret, the process is opened up to civil society organizations. In several countries this new method has now been tested, and the institutions have been surprised to learn that people’s organizations want input on macroeconomic conditions, not just the question of how to gauge poverty and budget allocation proportions. The rhetoric of participation does not mean the instiutions are open to policies which challenge the orthodoxy of structural adjustment. The PRSPs threaten to co-opt NGOs into appearing to certify a very flawed process and document. This workshop will describe the nuts and bolts of the PRSP process, their link to previous programs, the ways in which multiple donors can “tag-team” impoverished governments to force certain policies into place, and how the IMF and World Bank could end up enshrining the PRSP as a prerequisite for any assistance whatsoever.
Panelists: Shalmali Guttal (Focus on the Global South, Thailand), Odour Ong’wen (EcoNews Africa, Kenya), Warren Nyamugasira (Uganda National NGO Forum), and Demba Dembele (Forum on African Alternatives, Senegal)
Facilitator: Rick Rowden (RESULTS Education Fund, US)

Beyond “Teamsters and Turtles” and Toward Solidarity: Making the Links Between Corporate Globalization's Assault on Workers and the Earth
Room 520
A panel discussing the connections made between environmental and labor movements in both popular social movements in the Global South and the global justice movement in North America because of the IMF and World Bank, "free" trade, and corporate globalization's assault on the earth and workers. We will look for models and inspiration from struggles blending -- instead of separating -- resistance to environmental degradation and workers' struggles. In addition, the panelists will grapple with the challenges inherent in such cutting edge work, including class, war, and race that many times fracture this essential movement building.
Co-Facilitators: Daisy Pitkin, Campaign for Labor Rights and Jason Ford, Action for Social and Ecological Justice (ASEJ).
Panelists: Jesús Albeiro Martínez Castrillón (SINTRASEMA public sector workers union, Colombia); Jennifer Krill (Rainforest Action Network) Shelly Emalin-Rao (ECREA, Fiji)

HIV/AIDS: Promoting Access to Essential Medicines
Peter Marshall Room
The international campaign to challenge monopolistic price-gouging of HIV/AIDS and other essential medications has won significant victories in the halls of power in the United States and at the World Trade Organization and other international trade regimes. These victories and the threat of generic competition have succeeded in lowering prices in African and other Global South countries -- not sufficiently, but significantly. Yet very few people with HIV/AIDS in these nations are receiving treatment. Cutting-edge campaigns to have drug treatments provided are focusing on employers -- particularly Coke – demanding that they provide treatment to their employees.
Panelists: Asia Russell and Sharonann Lynch (both with Health GAP, USA)

Legislative Approaches to Changing IMF and World Bank Policies
Lincoln Parlor
The IMF and World Bank are more responsive to pressure from rich countries than the poor countries they are supposed to help. Among a key means by which U.S. citizens can exert power over the institutions is through Congress. This workshop will discuss Congressional strategies to change IMF and Bank policy -- reviewing successes and failures.
Panelists: Joanne Carter (RESULTS, US); Warren Gunnels (office of Representative Bernie Sanders, US); Shannon Lawrence (Environmental Defense, US)

7:30 p.m. Closing Plenary
Sanctuary

Performance by La Troupe Makandal

Moderators: Marie Clarke, U.S. – Jubilee USA Network
Njoki Njoroge Njehu, Kenya/U.S. – 50 Years is Enough Network

Speakers: Ralph Nader, U.S. – consumer advocate
Maude Barlow, Canada – Council of Canadians
Mohau Pheko, South Africa – Gender & Trade Network in Africa
Naomi Klein, Canada – No Logo
Oscar Olivera, Bolivia – La Coordinadora (Cochabamba)
Aderito Soares, East Timor – Sahe Institute for Liberation

Biographical Sketches