October 2007
ANSA
Alternatives to Neo-Liberalism in Southern Africa
Towards a people-driven development agenda
In the past years resistance against neo-liberal globalisation and its devastating effects on the common people has grown and gained strength all over the world. Civil society has responded by stating that "Another world is possible," it is high time we no longer remain defensive and reactive, but to shape and push for a true and radical alternative of sustainable, human development!
The Alternatives to Neo-Liberalism in Southern Africa (ANSA) initiative of the labour movement of the region has taken up the challenge. This book [PDF] provides the building blocks for a common perspective on alternative policies and strategies in Southern Africa, which can bring about people driven, sustainable, human development. It is both visionary and practical and aims at stimulating the growth of a mass movement which can successfully advocate for a radical alternative for (Southern) Africa.
Ideas are a powerful force once they are seized by vast numbers of people. The transformation of any society, let alone a whole region containing more than 200 million people, is not a one-day wonder. Hence it is part of the objective and process of the ANSA-strategy to broaden the ownership of the project and turn it into nothing short of a mass movement over a period of sustained research, education, consultation, debate, action and re.ection.
Another Africa is not only possible, it is already in the making!
The ANSA alternative is based on 10 principles:
1. It is led by the people
2.Autocentric development, based on domestic, human needs and the use of local resources
3. Regional integration, led from the grassroots
4. Selective delinking and negotiated relinking
5. Alternative science and technology
6. National, regional and global, progressive alliances
7. Redistribution to empower the non-formal sectors
8. Gender rights as the basis for development
9. Education for sustainable human development
10. A dynamic, participatory and radical democracy
While ANSA is an initiative of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), it is a programme of the Southern African Trade Union Co-ordination Council (SATUCC) in conjunction with the African Labour Research Network (ALRN). ANSA is not an organisation, it merely provides a stimulus, a direction for the countless localised centres of resistance and initiatives for alternatives to join forces and pressurise for change from a common perspective.
Read book [PDF]
View cover art [PDF]
ANSA:
Alternatives to Neo-Liberalism in Southern Africa
www.ansa-africa.org
Posted to gpn.org November 30, 2007
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