09.02.2009
Integration of the people is the best response to the crisis

“2009 will be a unique year for the whole humanity and especially for the working class”. This is the analysis of journalist Igor Fuser during the international seminar "the challenges of popular press on the construction process of Alba".

For the journalist, the neoliberal process in Latin America is in crisis for more than ten years and the continent has been witnessing a process of popular resistance on the one hand and construction of concrete alternatives on the other. In this context, one of the main alternatives which gains importance and momentum with the defeat of the principles of free trade and the Minimal State is Alba (Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean).

The proposal discussed by the social movements goes beyond the initiative of the governments. Currently, Venezuela, Bolivia, Honduras, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and Cuba participate in this alternative of regional integration which proposes cooperation initiatives especially on the economic field.

Already, social movements and popular organizations are involved in the construction of an integration process based on the interconnection of their campaigns in the whole continent for the construction of an “alternative civilization model to the predatory model of capitalism, which will secure Latin American sovereignty against the exploratory policies of imperialism and multinational companies”. This objective was agreed upon by a wide group of Latin American social movements in the last World Social Forum in Belem, Brazil.

The challenges ahead for popular media  

As part of this process for the construction of alternative integration strategies, more than 40 representatives of popular communication media from ten Latin American countries met from the 3^rd to the 5^th of February in the National School Florestan Fernandes, in São Paulo, in the international seminar “The challenges ahead for popular media in the construction process of Alba”. In addition to the debate on the concentration of mass media in various countries of the region, there were proposals on how to push forward the struggle and dissemination of a regional integration “from below”.

Advance now

The movements pointed out the need to advance now and agreed on a set of priorities such as the organization of joint campaigns and the unification of all continental popular forces against war and the current crisis in a big mobilization on the 30^th of March 2009.