Round of Trade Negotiations

Since the World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial meeting in Seattle in 1999 social movements and non governmental organizations (NGOs) have seen the need to create global networks to oppose and challenge international trade agreements and organizations like the WTO. This effort has included participation in various alternative assemblies, official meetings of international governmental organizations, and, since 2001, in the World Social Forum, particularly in the years prior to the major bi-annual ministerial meetings of the WTO during the Doha Round of international trade negotiations. Trade has been a theme for workshops, panels and events at the World Social Forum since the launching of the Doha Round of WTO trade negotiations in the fall of 2001. This paper examines the activities and efforts of this global network to educate, mobilize and coordinate opposition to neo-liberal trade agreements focusing, in particular, on the meetings of the WSF in 2003, 2005 in Porto Alegre, Brazil and 2007 in Nairobi, as well as at a number of regional social forums. The paper argues that in the wake of earlier formation of networks and contentious actions to challenge trade agreements, social forums have also come to play an important role in providing a space for educating and raising awareness about neo-liberal trade agreements