The coordinating committee of the Polish Social Forum met on April 30 in Warsaw. Participants included professor Maria Szyszkowska, representing the Pacifist Free Thought Association, Andrzej Radzikowski, vice-chairman of the All-Poland Alliance of Trade Unions (OPZZ), Wacław Czerkawski, vice-chairman of the Miners' Union, and Ewa Ziółkowska, chairwoman of ATTAC. Members of other organizations and unions also took part in the discussion of the shape of the Social Forum, such as OPZZ's Mazovia Regional Section (Jerzy Wiśniewski), the Green Institute (Beata Maciejewska, Dariusz Szwed), Neutrum (Czesław Janik), “Labour-Peace-Justice” Social Movement (Wanda Gontarz), Spaces of Dialogue Foundation (Małgorzata Tkacz-Janik), the Union of the Unemployed (Zbgniew Kaźmierczak), Young Socialists (Daniel Wójcik), European Culture Association (Jan Stępień), “Socialist Review” magazine (Jacek Kłopotowski) and Obywatel Magazine (Rafał Bakalarczyk).
The goal of the meeting was to determine the time, place and duration of the Polish Social Forum and to discuss important issues seldom mentioned in the media. The poor functioning of the media itself was one of the major ones, as they concern themselves mainly with sensationalism and marginal problems.
The topics of the PSF suggested at the meeting include: a Green New Deal, state secularism and religious neutrality, pacifism, the social market economy, wages and pensions, the mechanisms of social exclusion, and the egotistic and apathetic outlook of Poland's elites. At its next meetings the coordinating committee is going to work on creating a detailed plan of each conference and seminar. It was decided that the PSF will take place in autumn of this year.
“Each social forum, from the World Social Forum to the European and national ones, is guided by the slogan that the world is not for sale”, says Ewa Ziółkowska, chairwoman of ATTAC Poland. “The slogan is a protest against global neoliberalism, which created today's world of profit before people. A world in which the rich are becoming richer and areas of poverty are expanding. A world in which both nature and people are exploited to their limits. In Poland each government so far has supported and implemented neoliberal doctrine, and the current one is an especially enthusiastic student. This has caused great harm to Polish society and the Polish Social Forum aims to integrate groups with have a different view of economics and society - effectively, to show that, as another popular motto says, another world is possible.”
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