Samba and Revolution: Dispatches from the International Youth Camp

Samba, reggae and drum music pounded at the air above a sea of nylon tents. Earnest discussions sizzled in the steaming heat; people mopped sweat off their foreheads as sporadic protests clamored past. In the eclectic, globalized stew of the fifth annual International Youth Camp, 35,000 people from around the planet gathered in Porto Alegre, Brazil during the last week in January to discuss and put into practice their vision of a better world.

Surrounding the Youth Camp was the World Social Forum (WSF), where discussions and debates by activists, writers and politicians took place throughout each day on everything from water privatization in Ghana to alternative media in Patagonia. This year 200,000 people showed up for the WSF. Both events were organized around the theme "Another World is Possible." This other world is meant to be one without war, injustice, racism and economic inequality.

For a week, the Youth Camp’s multitudes packed into Harmony Park, a cramped riverfront location with occasional patches of trees and outdoor showering facilities. It is an offshoot of the WSF, but some argue it has become the heart of the annual gathering due to the feelings of global synergy and community it creates. Though the camp was initially organized to provide cheap accommodation for weary WSF activists, very little sleeping took place. In this 24-hour fiesta of ideas and networking, anyone who might have tried to catch some shut-eye would have had trouble blocking out the hip hop music, campfire concerts, nightly parades and – after about 8 a.m., the scorching Brazilian sun.

The tamer, fresher-smelling WSF crowd who strolled past this primitive tent city of jewelry sellers, radio pirates, upstart shamans and anti-capitalists, might have caught a whiff of this other possible world everybody was talking about.

A Million Heads Think Better Than One …Thousand

The Youth Camp organizing cooperative had been fine-tuning the camp’s layout and events ever since the first WSF in 2001. One afternoon, I spoke with organizer Joao Portella Sobral, a tall, bearded forest engineering student from Porto Alegre about the camp´s development. As we talked in the shade of a tree, dozens of people came up to Joao, giving him high-fives and updates on news from around the camp.

"The first Youth Camp in 2001 was small, improvised and relatively unorganized, though there were about 5,000 participants," he explained. "There were no planned activities, just spontaneous music and discussions. The following year more talks and debates were scheduled around political movements, alternative media and the environment."

In the third year, the group revised the Youth Camp to put their political ideas into action. They created environmentally friendly camping areas, provided free computers and software to young journalists, and invited cooperatively-run and family-owned businesses to sell various products and organic food. Throughout the camp, there were also garbage, recycling and compost systems in place and various spaces for community art projects and murals.

The Youth Camp activities were decentralized, and spread throughout the area. "Action Centers" were home to daily discussions on Che Guevara, herbal medicine, women´s rights and other issues. It was a common sight to see dozens of people sitting in circles on the ground, engaged in these talks.

Joao believed the camp was providing a great opportunity for networking among youth from around the world. "It’s a place to realize that you’re not alone and there are people from all over fighting against the same systems of power and oppression. Older people already have organized networks and we don´t, but we’re creating them now. A million heads think better than a thousand."