Southern comfort.

(From Guardian Unlimited)

In the tropical Brazilian city of Belem, on the banks of the Amazon delta, five Latin American presidents met on Thursday to address the World Social Forum , the huge regular gathering of social movements created nearly ten years ago in the southern town of Porto Alegre.

Conceived as an opposition event to the Davos meeting of presidents and bankers of the capitalist world, the Porto Alegre gatherings originally took pride in their status as a non-governmental movement, the expression of a civil society that could not imagine conquering the peaks of traditional political power. Yet this year's event has brought together the five most radical presidents of Latin America, who all expressed their gratitude to the social movements that had made their improbable political victories possible, and continued to sustain their governments. Hugo Chavez of Venezuela described it as "the most important event of the year", and this year's host, President Lula of Brazil, abandoned his prepared script to walk up and down the platform and to condemn the irresponsibility of the rich countries of the capitalist world. Lula has long been a regular and much sought-after visitor to Davos, but this time he pointedly avoided the Swiss Alps to take up his role as the leader of the progressive forces of Latin America, a position that he shares with Hugo Chavez.

The economic crisis affecting Latin America, cried Lula, was not caused by "the socialism of Chavez" or by "the struggles of Evo" [Morales, the president of Bolivia ], but by the bankrupt policies and lack of financial control of wealthy states outside the continent. "And who is the god to whom they have appealed?" he asked rhetorically. "Why, the state!"

Rafael Correa, the president of Ecuador and a qualified and eloquent economist, also denounced the rich men meeting in Davos, describing them as "those responsible for the crisis". Chavez recalled that Latin America had been "the laboratory for the recipes of neo-liberalism", adding that "we received the largest dose of this poison". Yet in recent years, said Correa, the neo-liberal governments of the continent had been "falling like a pack of cards".

Lula reflected on the extraordinary changes that had taken place in Latin America since the first World Social Forum in 2001, and praised the way in which people had chosen suitable presidents to confront the crisis. "We were not put here by the local elites or the Pentagon," said Chavez, "but by the people." ...