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Tens of thousands of activists and organizers from across the nation converged in Detroit in late June to participate in the second ever United States Social Forum. A three-mile march through the city, attended by more than 2,000 people, kicked off the event on June 22nd. The first forum was held in Atlanta in 2007, after the World Social Forum International Council declared it imperative that the US hold its own national social forum. The US Social Forum is promoted as a space for activist organizations to network, discuss common problems facing their communities, strategize, and align with international activist movements. The forum places priority on groups that organize with working class people of color in the US. About 20,000 people are estimated to have attended this year’s forum whose theme was “Another World is Possible, Another US is Necessary, Another Detroit is Happening.” Over one-thousand plenaries, workshops, and social events were planned by local and national organizations to take place over the five-day period of the forum. Detroit’s poverty crisis has spurred a number of issues, such as human rights’ violations, lack of healthcare, substandard education, utility shut-offs and home foreclosures. On Day three of the US Social Forum, I spoke with Diana Copeland, Executive Director of the Eastern Michigan Environmental Action Coalition, one of the four main organizations which planned the Social Forum.

GUEST: Diana Copeland, Executive Director, Eastern Michigan Environmental Action Coalition

Find out more at www.ussf2010.org, www.emeac.org, www.mwro.org.