Between local and global: World Social Forum's network

Author(s)

Fernanda de Almeida

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas
• Defense date: 2008-10-11

Examining board members

Thomas Patrick Dwyer; Maria da Glória Marcondes Gohn; Bruno Wilhelm Speck

• Advisor: Thomas Patrick Dwyer

Abstract

By observing the World Social Forum (WSF) as a political entity that uses the social network logic to organize itself, this research sought to analyze its network by employing Social Networks Analysis tools in order to better understand the barriers imposed to the relationship between the local and global aspects intrinsic to the WSF, searching for answers to the reasons for which large global networks are fragmented in local, regional or national ones. The hypothesis that guided this research suggested the existence of a combination of two factors leading to the fragmentation of global networks and that consequently would allow them to assume a local character, yet globally dealing with their counterparts. Bearing that in mind, both the thematic agenda and the movements of the WSF over regional forums were problematized from the perspective of a local/global relationship, enabling the establishment of a pattern that structures the relations in the "global civil society." Finally, a spontaneous fragmentation movement of the Forum was observed through the operation of the "flexibility" and "translation" concepts on the agenda of the organizations that comprise the WSF, thus ensuring its continuity rather than its extinction, opposing previous belief. This movement was thus confirmed through the observation of a reproduction process and a constant adaptation of the agenda and its contexts such that the the civil society is embraced in closely related ideas of action, mostly suggesting a reproduction of the same in different scales. (AU)