"We lived in the future for a few days, the US Social Forum was like a revolutionary society." "Felt like I died and went to progressive heaven." "In my 40 years of activism I've never experienced anything like it in my life in the USA." These are some of the overwhelmingly positive comments from participants after the US Social Forum.

Might this be the Left's most significant breakthrough in recent memory? Is this the turning point for a new left upsurge? The evidence is strongly suggests big changes are afoot.

The first US Social Forum held in Atlanta, GA June 26 to July 1, 2007 was groundbreaking for the US Left. In the course of every political movement there have been significant turning points in which the momentum of the associated forces facilitate the next stage of the movement. There are indications that the Forum will be historically viewed as one of those seminal moments in our struggle against the empire.

What was so historic about the US Social Forum?

Breakthroughs were made in size, scope, content, and the composition of participants as well as the level of unity that prevailed.

Size: Over 10,000 registered activists--and probably several thousand unregistered activists--participated in the USSF. It was not the raw size, which made the Forum so spectacular, there have been larger left gatherings, but most often those have been assemblies of union members or political party conventions.

Composition of the participants: Organizers know that the size of the audience is not nearly as important as who attends. The activists who answered the Forum's call were experienced leaders as well as a multitude of emerging leaders from every corner of the US. Never has there been a more diverse constituency for a major left conference, with as wide a range of national origin, racial, ethnic, and generational make-up. Think back 30 years, even 10 years ago and try to compare the background of participants at this Social Forum with any other left event in the past to perceive the historic progress the Left has made.

• Perhaps a majority of the participants were working people, and a huge number were grassroots activists from impoverished backgrounds. For example, some 300 attendees came on packed buses from Mississippi, the Gulf Coast and New Orleans. Fifty more came from the Miami Workers Center, hundreds more arrived with Jobs for Justice, just to name a few. The fact that this conference was held in the South, in the "capital of the Black Belt," makes the event's composition momentous.

• Almost half the registrants were peoples of color, unprecedented at a left/progressive event of this size.
• Immigrants were perhaps 15-20% of the Forum, a rarity at left events. Conference organizers are to be commended having spent $45,000 for translation services to make sure that bilingualism was practiced.
• Women were admirably represented in virtually all workshops and plenary sessions and active throughout the event. This would not have been the case a couple of decades ago.
• The LGBT constituency was not sidelined, but rather involved across the board on all issues.
• Indigenous leaders have seldom been as integrated and involved in plenary sessions.
• The Forum was multi-generational, and a powerful group of young activists with keen organizing skills and strong opinions to share took the lead on many fronts.
• To top it off, the US Social Forum was internationalist, with over 400 delegates attending from other countries.
  
  

Scope and content: When in the history of the US has there been a gathering of such dimension and breadth? The vast list of workshops filled a hundred-page program. Over 1,000 workshops, demonstrations, events, discussions, strategy sessions, cultural presentations and parties left participants dizzy with decision-making. During any session, there were dozens of workshops too good to miss.

The Forum covered almost every aspect of social life. Over a thousand organizations sent delegates. Not only were there workshops on war, economic issues and social problems, there were also dozens of workshops on nontraditional topics like food, land, spirituality, farm labor, housing, immigration, environment, prisons, green building, arts, schools, disabilities and countless other topics. It was as if there were a hundred national conferences going on simultaneously in the same location.

Level of unity: During the 1960s-80s sectarianism and polemics ravaged every political discussion. At The US Social Forum, it seemed that we began to seriously break the bad habits of our past.

• There was a sense that we began to see each other as part of one movement albeit with different strands, but unified by a common fabric.
• Progressives, anarchists and socialists generally treated each other with cordiality and respect. This was in part due to the fact that so many new activists were in the house.
• The USSF struck a blow against sectarianism and set a new standard for cooperation. For the first time, it truly felt like we were actually forging a genuine united front against racism, patriarchy and imperialism.
• Multiracial unity never comes easily. Left-progressives have worked for decades to transform themselves, as well as society. At the end of the day, the USSF seemed to provide evidence that that hard work is paying off.
  
  

What are the lessons and challenges for the Left and socialist Left?

1. Intersectionality is a word making it into the vocabulary of an increasing number of lefties and embodied the essence of the USSF. All movements saw and experienced the interconnection of their oppression with the political causes of the rest of the social justice movement. There has never been a US conference with such a display of intersectionality. To name one example, the wall between environmental issues and other social justice issues never felt smaller. We must continue to illustrate how seemingly diverse social justice issues are connected; otherwise we will continue to see movements fighting to overcome narrow issues without a clear understanding of how they fit into the bigger picture and why we must fight for a total overhaul of the system.
   
   
2. The Left has made initial inroads into the lower sectors of the working class. However, the Left has not merged itself with the advanced members of that class by any stretch of the imagination. We did collaborate for a few days, though, and that gave us hope. We must continue to engage in ongoing training and base-building among those most affected by the injustices of the system we live under. This is our only hope for revolutionary transformation.
   
   
3. We have to take the example of the US Social Forum back to our communities and duplicate the process at local and regional levels. Few can make a weeklong trip across the country, but locally we can pull in thousands more with accessible workshops and united-front organizing.
   
   
4. We on the Left have internally struggled with the issues of race and patriarchy, which have historically crippled our movements. At most Forum workshops it was evident that conscious efforts had been made not only to include peoples of color, women, youth, and GLBT folks but also to make sure that these workshops felt like theirs. The lesson here is not that we have arrived and our work is done, rather that our wider and deeper work can now begin in earnest. We saw in this moment that there exist enough conscious forces that can mobilize into a national movement to study and change the system of racial and gender privilege.
   
   Together we can identify the pillars that prop up social oppression in the US. The Left seems ready to embrace this epic struggle for true equality, beginning within its own ranks. Again, the USSF is a milestone in recognizing that there is most likely a majority among those who participated who recognize the issue and are ready to begin the effort to unravel the underpinnings of privilege.
   
   
5. People showed that they are ready to talk about revolutionary organization and the need for a unified party. The four-hour workshop entitled "Building Revolutionary Strategy & Organization in the 21st Century: A Multi-generational Dialogue" drew an overflow crowd. After the initial session, almost two hundred people broke into smaller groups, where the overwhelming consensus at the end of the workshop was that we need a unified organization that can bring multi-faceted groups together to lead the way toward a totally transformed society.
   
   While Cindy Sheehan probably has a different meaning for what she referred to as a "revolution," her righteous indignation reflects a growing dissatisfaction with the Republican and Democratic parties. Cindy and millions of Americans share the sense that the system needs more than superficial reforms--and furthermore that the existing political parties' interests will always be contrary to ours. Besides the dire need for a real third party to challenge the two-party state, there is a need for a tighter and disciplined formation.
   
   At the Social Forum there was a sizeable segment of youth and other activists who have adopted the anarchist critique that all organization is hierarchical and therefore counterproductive, even counter-revolutionary. The rest of us know the need for revolutionary organization is a well-established historical mission without which all else will stagnate and fail.
   
   How to build this revolutionary movement was on the minds of everyone at the "Multi-generational Dialogue" workshop. Solutions? Some suggested that the country is too broad for any one existing organization to lead this effort alone. The formation of study groups, networks, collectives and the Social Forum will have to play a big role in the resurgence of revolutionary organization.
   
   The organized Left must help this open-ended process to take root in every city and township across the continent. This will not happen unless we eliminate sectarianism for the greater good. The unified efforts of the organizations that came together to sponsor the workshop--Freedom Road Socialist Organization/OSCL, Solidarity, Bring the Ruckus, League of Revolutionaries for a New America, and the Labor Community Strategy Center--exemplified this endeavor.
   
   
6. Work with youth and training of new leaders is critical for the movement to grow. A new generation of young activists has emerged as a powerful force. Our challenge is to engage with them in a meaningful way. Our struggle will not succeed unless they have a role in creating the new vision and are included in its leadership.
   
   
7. We should learn from the example of the USSF and craft Social Forums on regional and local levels. We must create our own think tanks, programs for political education and training programs. The potential base for the next USSF is enormous and enthusiastic. For every participant in Atlanta there were probably twenty more at home who wished they had been there.
   
   
8. A new style of committee work and democratic participation in organizations is emerging in many cities. The anarchists are to be thanked for raising issues of meeting methodology and urging others to become aware of internal dynamics that limit the participation of some and create a hierarchy that undermines a grassroots democratic process. There are training centers, NGOs and youth groups with advanced practice in movement-building and participatory organizing. SOUL, the Oakland-based School of Unity and Liberation, is one such example. This new style is not only necessary for youth inclusiveness but is essential if we sincerely want our movement to grow. The Left has to change its organizational culture if it is to succeed.
   
   
9. The fear of socialism that has often prevailed amongst working people and peoples of color regarding the Left, and especially the socialist Left, seemed to be diminishing. Dozens of socialist groups at the conference found participants hungry to engage and ask questions and willing to join in a disciplined effort to fundamentally replace capitalism with another system. An anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist perspective seemed universally accepted as the starting point for an analysis of almost every workshop and social issue discussed.
   
   Never has there been a conference where such open exchanges between privileged organizers of the '60s, '70s and '80s and the new generation of working-class heroes emerging from hundreds of mass movements over the last decade, generated such unity. Marta Harnecker, the contemporary Chilean socialist theoretician, talks about the emergence of a new socialist Left, when the "party Left" merges with the "social movement Left" (those participating in grassroots movements). The USSF was a powerful example of what this phenomenon could look like. The USSF gave us hope that a new socialism is possible; a socialism which embodies participatory democratic principles, empowerment from below, self-determination, multi-culturalism, a sustainable economy and deeply humanitarian principles.
   
   
10. The tide has turned; the time and conditions are ripe for a left revival. As the slogan from the Forum stated, "A New US is Necessary." The American people are by and large fed up with the greed, corruption and crimes of the ruling class and their cohorts running the government, media, military and cultural institutions as if they are their private clubs. If we are correct and ready to face the challenges, the social justice movement is on the verge of a massive pendulum swing to the left.
    
    

Victory in our case is not certain. If we are not organized, a single new 9/11-type incident could throw the momentum in the opposite direction. We have seen the fascist and police-state tactics appearing daily. Humanity is ultimately depending on the Left. Collectively we are in a race against time to prevent monopoly capitalism from creating cataclysmic ecological and social devastation, if, as predicted, we reach the "tipping point" of no return on global warming, deforestation, overpopulation, irreversible pollution of the oceans, soils, air and water resources. It is our time to lead. We must seize the time.