Los Angeles Social Forum June 27, 2008

Please join us for a weekend of building bridges between LA-based campaigns for social justice, environmental action, criminal reform, election fairness, gender equity, political power and cultural expression.

The Los Angeles Social Forum is a place where Southern California activists will meet and share power, plans, perspectives, and ideas while building a network for peace and social justice. More than 50 workshops, on topics from immigrant rights to informed enlistment will be offered.

The Forum is being endorsed or sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee and more than 50 other organizations that work in the Los Angeles area.

Register to attend ($10 registration fee, but nobody turned away for lack of funds) http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Rsu_2f62AkA48Ae9pZ_2b2XFLA_3d_3d

Sign up as Volunteer -- http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=6xMNVwC22p85vF_2fJD0T82g_3d_3d

BACKGROUND (World Social Forum)

The World Social Forum and its local and regional offspring are open meeting spaces where progressive social movements, networks, nonprofits and other civil society organizations get together to pursue their thinking, debate ideas, formulate strategies and proposals, share experiences, and network for effective action.

The forums bring together people who want to build a more peaceful, sustainable, and participatory world. They are characterized by plurality and diversity, and they are nongovernmental and nonpartisan.

A social forum is what you make it—a meeting place, a debating forum, an exchange of ideas and solutions, a theater stage, a celebration, a festival, a bazaar. It can be any or all of these.

About 20,000 people attended the first World Social Forum in January 2001 in Porto Alegre, Brazil. The event, which has been held each year since then, drew 150,000 in 2005.

The World Social Forum was created to counter the influence and purposes of the World Economic Forum, an annual meeting of top business and government leaders to shape global, regional and industry agendas.

Official Website: http://lasocialforum.org/joomla/