Everything about the 50 000 strong World Social Forum (WSF): the range of languages, the outward reaching politics, the flexibility and bold ambition of continental and now global networks, the linking of emotion and reason, politics and culture, were all uncomfortable reminders of the parochial conservatism of the English left.

 Our thinking is often too confined to recognise that some of the best ideas for feasible alternatives lie in practical innovations by movements and parties in Latin America, Asia and Africa. We lag in building a strong domestic and European arm to the global network of campaigns that seek to halt corporate pressure for a world economy without constraint.

 In Asia, Africa and the Americas, there are well organised continental coalitions leading mass movements, sometimes winning precarious victories. These movements see the European Union as a major problem. The EU is energetically pushing the WTO to clear the way for corporations to invest without social or economic constraints (the new prohibition on conditions on investment) and to asset-strip the public services of the countries of the South (the new insistence that investment in public services be an open market).

 Yet the European Left is only beginning to organise itself seriously to challenge the global role of the EU. A European Social Forum is to be held later this year, probably in Italy. The English Left -- trapped within the nationalist mentality of Westminster -- has much catching up to do. It has tended to think only in terms of "in or out" debates (from the EU itself to the Euro), rather than building a firm international base from which the "in or out" question is a tactical issue, subordinate to building a continent wide challenge and alternative to the neo-colonial policies of the EU -- in close liaison with the increasingly global challenge.

 What Porto Alegre demonstrated is that such talk of "global challenges" -- and global alternatives -- is no longer rhetorical. Taking place as the Enron hearings and the collapse of the Argentine economy mock the private sector's claims of superior efficiency, the energy and seriousness of the WSF showed that the legitimacy of the corporate world is as deeply in crisis as on 10 September.

 The World Bank representative was turned away from the conference. Seeking moral credibility for the forthcoming elections, twice as many French ministers made their way to Brazil than to the World Economic Forum in New York. The latter gathering of the economic elite is increasingly adopting the rhetoric of a social agenda. The leaders of Coca-Cola, McDonalds and Siemens, amongst others, feel moved, or shaken, to issue a statement on "corporate citizenship". The Financial Times intones about the need to seek profits in a way that "respects the reasonable interests of others". It adds, in a give away line, "but we cannot make this a legal requirement".

 This is the rub. We are going to hear a lot more about "socially responsible business". But legal restraints on corporate power get weaker.

 "The social" will be the add-on, not a central engine in economic driving mechanisms. There were plenty of social add ons to Enron: it ostentatiously supported local hospitals, universities, churches and the arts. But this charity did not constrain a profit drive that led to buying politicians, falsifying its accounts and fiddling its employees. Such activities are an inbuilt tendency of any corporation unconstrained by democratic pressures.

 Central to any alternative to corporate power are the issues of public regulation, intervention, the law, taxation and hence the state. Neoliberalism rode to influence on the back of the state's crisis of legitimacy -- after the failures of the command economy and the increasingly unresponsive character of the welfare state. The World Social Forum addresses this issue directly. The theme of many of the workshops and the governing principle of the municipality and regional state which hosted us, is "participatory democracy". It's impetus comes from the experience of the weakness of representative democracy in the face of corporate power: the ease with which it is taken over, corrupted, undermined. The goal is to reinvigorate democracy, to create new, more direct levers by which the people can control the state and exert a counter pressure on their elected representatives.

 As Red Pepper has reported, Porto Alegre and its regional state of Rio Grande do Sul have opened their budget to popular participation. This has led to wider popular involvement in the administration of services and influence on the economy. It is no island of democracy but in addition to real material gains of redistribution and an enhanced social efficiency, it has led to a politically engaged citizenry with greater bargaining power in the face of the federal government, international agencies and would-be multinational investors. It is a working example of an alternative that holds out many principles of relevance elsewhere.

 Other such working examples came from discussion of the social economy. No longer is this a matter of heroic community or co-operative enterprises. It is a matter of extensive networks with common infrastructures building coalitions with progressive elected authorities and innovative trade unions.

 I was with a small band of delegates from Manchester and Newcastle. We left Porto Alegre determined to globalise ourselves and the English Left (the Scots and Welsh have the process well under way): to learn the languages, marshal the funds, open wider networks of communications, spread the experiences, and engage in global debates. The corporations are politically organised, continent-wide. Others have shown in Brazil that it can be done. There's no excuse not to do it better ourselves.
 

Hilary Wainwright is the editor-in-chief of Red Pepper