[Marxism] Full agenda for World At A Crossroads conference, Sydney April 10-12

[Fred Fuentes <fred.fuentes@xxxxxxxxx>]

[Please forward onto your networks]

World at a Crossroads - Fighting for Socialism in the 21st Century
Easter 2009, April 10-13
Venue: Sydney Girls High School, Sydney


REGISTER NOW AT www.worldatacrossroads.org/register

FULL CONFERENCE AGENDA



The full conference agenda is inserted below, or visit the following
links to view the various topic streams:

* Global economic crisis http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/economiccrisis
* Climate change & environmental crisis
http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/envirostream
* Latin American revolution: alternatives to capitalism
http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/latinamerica
* Resisting imperialism & war
http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/warandimperialism
* Struggles in Asia and Africa http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/asiaandafrica
* Australian radical history & politics
http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/australianradicalhistoryandpolitics
* Left unity: alliances, movement building & revolutionary
organisation http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/leftunity
* Marxist fundamentals http://www.worldatacrossroads.org/marxistfundamentals



Hosted by Green Left Weekly. Organised by the Democratic Socialist
Perspective & Resistance

For more info, email dsp@xxxxxxxxxx or sydney.resistance@xxxxxxxxx, or
phone 02 9690 1230



FULL AGENDA

FRIDAY, APRIL 10

9.30am FEATURE SESSION: Capitalism's crises and our solutions

  Reihana Mohideen, feminist and labour activist in the Philippines,
leader of the newly formed Party of Labouring Masses
  David Spratt, co-author of Climate Code Red
  Michael Lebowitz, Centro Internacional Miranda in Venezuela, and
author of Build it now: Socialism for the 21st century

11am – WORKSHOPS:

Sexism and the system: A rebel's guide to women's oppression - Reihana
Mohideen, feminist activist from the Philippines; Kavita Krishnan,
national secretary of the All India Progressive Women's Association;
and Jay Fletcher, Resistance activist

Challenges of building a climate change movement - David Spratt,
co-author of Climate Code Red; Simon Butler, Green Left Weekly
journalist on environmental issues and People for a Safe Climate
activist

South Korea: A view from the left – South Korean socialist Yongsu Won

Iraq and Afghanistan: The US's unwinnable wars for oil – Alex
Bainbridge, DSP; and anti-war activist from the Labour Party Pakistan

Working-class responses to the economic crisis - Jody Betzien,
activist in the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union; Roger Annis,
activist in the International Association of Machinists in Vancouver,
Canada, and delegate to the 2008 Canadian Labour Congress convention

Marx, Engels and Darwin: Evolution and historical materialism - Ian
Angus, author of forthcoming book on Darwin and materialism

Understanding Marxist economic theory – Graham Matthews, DSP national
executive member and Green Left Weekly journalist on economic issues

1pm – LUNCH

2pm – FEATURE SESSION: Obama, US imperialism and the "war on terror"
  Salim Vally, spokesperson for Palestine Solidarity Committee (South Africa)
  Labour Party Pakistan anti-war activist
  Rob Stary, civil liberties lawyer
  Hosted by Pip Hinman, DSP national executive member and activist in
Stop the War Coalition

3.30pm – WORKSHOPS:

Public ownership and workers' control – Dave Kerin, heading up
initiative to establish worker-run cooperatives to build solar panels;
and Michael Lebowitz on the experiences and lessons of self-management
in Yugoslavia and Venezuela

Evo Morales and Bolivia's Indigenous revolution – Federico Fuentes,
editor of Bolivia Rising and co-author of MAS-IPSP: A political
instrument which emerged from the social movements

Boycott Israel campaign – Discussion hosted by Salim Vally, involved
in the recent actions by South African dockworkers to boycott Israeli
ships and involving activists in the BDS campaign against Israel

Political struggle in Timor Leste: The global, regional and local
context – Tomas Freitas, socialist activist involved in Timor's
clandestine movement against Indonesian occupation and a founding
member of Luta Hamutuk (Fight Together), a research and advocacy
institute focussing on economic issues

The politics of Che Guevara – Duncan Meerding, Resistance

Understanding the economic crisis A - Jamie Doughney, senior
researcher at the Work and Economic Policy Research Unit at Victoria
University of Technology

Why be a Marxist today? Introduction to Resistance and the DSP –
Resistance activist Mel Barnes and Brianna Pike, DSP Sydney organiser

5.30pm – FEATURE SESSION: Confronting the climate change crisis: An
ecosocialist perspective
  Ian Angus, founder of the Ecosocialist International Network, editor
of Climate and Capitalism and associate editor of Socialist Voice
(Canada)
  Dick Nichols, author of Environment, Capitalism and Socialism,
Socialist Alliance national co-convenor
  Hosted by Stuart Rosewarne, co-editor of Capitalism, Nature, Socialism

7.30pm Dinner with music, poetry and film footage from struggles
around the world

SATURDAY, APRIL 11

9.30am FEATURE SESSION: The spectre of 21st century socialism
  Michael Lebowitz, Centro Internacional Miranda, Caracas, author of
Build it Now: Socialism For the 21st Century and Beyond Capital:
Marx's Political Economy of the Working Class, winner of the Isaac
Deutscher memorial prize (2004)

11am – WORKSHOPS:

Marxism, Islam and national liberation – anti-war activist from the
Labour Party Pakistan, M. Saraswathy, founding member and deputy
chairperson of the Socialist Party of Malaysia; and Tony Iltis, DSP
activist

Climate refugees and the "overpopulation" debate – Kamala Emanuel, DSP
national committee member

Philippines: Developments on the left – Reihana Mohideen, long-term
activist in the women's and labour movements in the Philippines,
involved in the recent formation of the Party of the Labouring Masses,
and formerly vice-chair for international affairs at the socialist
labour centre Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (Solidarity of
Filipino Workers)

Haiti today: Five years of UN military occupation – Roger Annis,
Canada Haiti Action Network, visited Haiti on a human rights
fact-finding mission in 2007

Production and consumption as a source of global warming: Beyond
capitalism and toward a democratic ecosocialism - Hans Baer,
Development Studies Program and Centre for Health and Society at the
University of Melbourne, author of Global Warming and the Political
Economy of Health

Understanding the economic crisis B – Dick Bryan, Department of
Political Economy, University of Sydney

1pm – LUNCH

2pm – FEATURE SESSION: Building a worker-green-community alliance for
sustainability
  Tim Gooden, secretary of Geelong and Regions Trades and Labour Council
  Dave Kerin, convenor of Union Solidarity and heading up initiative
to establish worker-run cooperatives to build solar panels
  Mel Barnes, Resistance activist in the Stop the Pull Mill campaign in Tasmania

3.30pm – WORKSHOPS:

Indigenous resistance from invasion to intervention – Sam Watson,
Aboriginal leader from Brisbane and Socialist Alliance national
spokesperson on Indigenous rights; and an activist from the Northern
Territory Rollback Intervention Working Group

The struggle for same-sex marriage rights – Simon Margan, Greens gay
and lesbian rights activist; Farida Iqbal, DSP activist and campaigner
for same-sex marriage rights in the ACT; and an activist from
Community Action Against Homophobia, Sydney

The left in Malaysia – M. Saraswathy, founding member and deputy
chairperson of the Socialist Party of Malaysia, and long-term
organiser of plantation workers, urban settlers and women workers in
Malaysia

Crisis and resistance in Africa – Salim Vally, long time
anti-apartheid campaigner in South Africa; and Soubhi Iskander,
Sudanese Communist Party

Experiences of left unity: The New Anti-capitalist Party in France and
Socialist Alliance in Australia – Sam Wainwright, international
observer at the NPA founding congress; and Sue Bolton, Victorian
Socialist Alliance and DSP Melbourne secretary.

El Salvador after the elections: Where next for the FMLN? – Activists
from the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front in Australia

History of Resistance and the DSP – Resistance activist Mel Barnes and
Stuart Munckton, DSP national executive

5.30pm – FEATURE SESSION: Latin America: Revolt, revolution and
socialism in the 21st century
  Abelardo Curbelo, veteran of the Cuban revolution, central committee
member of the Cuban Communist Party, currently Cuban ambassador to
Australia
  Nelson Davila, founding member of Chavez's Bolivarian Revolutionary
Movement (MBR-200), currently head of Venezuela's diplomatic mission
to Australia
  Luis Bilbao, long-time socialist activist on the Latin American
left, participant in the construction of the United Socialist Party of
Venezuela and in the formation of the Union of South American Nations

7.30 pm CONFERENCE DINNER & FIESTA
Celebrating revolution: 50 years of Cuban Revolution, 10 years of
Venezuelan Revolution. With toasts by Cuba's ambassador to Australia,
Abelardo Curbelo, and Venezuela's charge d'affaires, Nelson Davila

SUNDAY, APRIL 12

9.30am FEATURE SESSION: Neoliberalism and resistance in Asia
  Kavita Krishnan, Communist Party of India (Marxist Leninist), editor
of Liberation, the CPI-ML's magazine in English, and national
secretary of the All India Progressive Women's Association
  Yongsu Won, socialist activist from South Korea

11am – WORKSHOPS:

Cultural dissent - The politics of art and resistance - Ian Angus on
Racism, resistance and the blues; Jill Hickson from Actively Radical
TV; and Phil Monsour, progressive folk singer

Capitalism, agribusiness and sustainable agriculture – DSP members
Trish Corcoran, Kate Stockdale and Nick Soudakoff

Has racism always existed? – Resistance activist Dom Hale

Australia's hidden radical tradition – DSP national executive member Dave Holmes

Understanding the economic crisis C – Dick Nichols, Socialist Alliance
national co-convenor

The Cuban economy and Latin American integration – Tim Anderson,
lecturer in political economy at Sydney University just returned from
Cuba, and producer/director of The Doctors of Tomorrow

1pm – LUNCH

2pm – FEATURE SESSION: Revolution in Venezuela - Communal councils,
the workers' movement and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela
  Luis Bilbao, participant in the construction of the United Socialist
Party of Venezuela and in the formation of the Union of South American
Nations, founding editor of the Latin America-wide monthly magazine
América XXI, and author of 16 books, most recently Venezuela in
Revolution: the Rebirth of Socialism

3.30pm – WORKSHOPS:

Young socialists fighting back – Kavita Krishnan, former president of
the All India Students' Association (1999-2006); Resistance national
co-organiser Jess Moore and high-school activist Felix Donovan

Sustainable cities: The transition to public transport, accessible
housing and liveability – Ben Courtice, DSP environment movement
activist; and John Rice, Adelaide Ecosocialist Network

Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah and the right of Palestine to exist – Issac
Shuisha, Israeli-born Palestine solidarity activist; and DSP member
Rupen Savoulian

Argentina: The key to the region - Luis Bilbao, Union of Militants for
Socialism, Argentina, author of recently published Argentina as the
key to the region

Imperialism, nationalism and financial collapse: The Canadian
experience – Roger Annis, associate editor of Socialist Voice, Canada

The Tamil struggle for self-determination - Brian Senewiratne,
Sinhalese activist involved for more than four decades in exposing the
human rights abuses perpetrated by the Sri Lankan government and
Sinhalese militias; author of various books on the Tamil struggle that
have been banned in Sri Lanka

Building a revolutionary alternative in Australia today – Resistance
activist Mel Barnes and Ruth Ratcliffe, DSP Adelaide organiser

5.30pm – FEATURE SESSION: Revolutionary organising and
internationalism in the 21st century
  Peter Boyle, Democratic Socialist Perspective national secretary
  M. Saraswathy, deputy chairperson of the Socialist Party of Malaysia
  Daphne Lawless, Socialist Worker-New Zealand central committee
member and editor of Unity journal

7pm Resistance gig with funky tunes from Dhopec and others

* Some session times and speakers listed in this agenda may change.
Please visit www.WorldAtACrossroads for the most up to date agenda.

--
REGISTER NOW AT www.worldatacrossroads.org/register

World at a Crossroads - Fighting for Socialism in the 21st Century

Easter 2009, April 10-13, Sydney Girls High, Sydney, Australia

A conference that brings together socialist and progressive activists
and thinkers from around Australia, Latin America, Asia-Pacific and
North America to discuss the urgent questions of our time.

For more info, email dsp@xxxxxxxxxx or sydney.resistance@xxxxxxxxx, or
phone (02) 9690 1230.

Organised by the Democratic Socialist Perspective and Resistance.
Sponsored by Green Left Weekly.



--
REGISTER NOW AT www.worldatacrossroads.org/register

World at a Crossroads - Fighting for Socialism in the 21st Century

Easter 2009, April 10-13, Sydney Girls High, Sydney, Australia

A conference that brings together socialist and progressive activists
and thinkers from around Australia, Latin America, Asia-Pacific and
North America to discuss the urgent questions of our time.

For more info, email dsp@xxxxxxxxxx or sydney.resistance@xxxxxxxxx, or
phone (02) 9690 1230.

Organised by the Democratic Socialist Perspective and Resistance.
Sponsored by Green Left Weekly.

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