The People’s Forum in New York City, founded in 2018 as a “movement incubator” to unite working class movements in the US and abroad, celebrated its five year anniversary on Saturday, September 9. In its five years of existence, TPF has been able to support the strengthening of progressive and socialist organizations from the heart of world capitalism.
“Over the past five years, TPF has become a reference for people who are seeking to understand what’s going on in the world around them, and who want a place where they can ask questions and exchange ideas, and where there’s space for socialist and internationalist ideas as well,” Layan Sima Fuleihan, the Education Director at the People’s Forum, told Peoples Dispatch. “We’re in a time where there’s less and less public and political space for this and TPF is committed to not only maintaining that space, but growing it.”
The People’s Forum has led major solidarity campaigns with the people of Cuba, such as providing humanitarian aid following the Matanzas disaster, or urging US President Joe Biden to take Cuba off of the State Sponsors of Terrorism list and end the 60 year blockade. TPF has also helped mobilize against US imperialist efforts such as the proxy war in Ukraine. TPF has spearheaded gatherings of socialists and working class organizers in the United States such as the People’s Summit for Democracy in Los Angeles, organized in direct opposition to Biden’s Summit of the Americas, and the recent Dilemmas of Humanity: A Socialist Horizon conference in Atlanta organized in conjunction with the International Peoples’ Assembly.
“This vision started about eight years ago, when we were talking about what was necessary to build movements, which was political education,” said Claudia De La Cruz at the People’s Forum fifth anniversary celebration on September 9. “We built this place for people to breathe together, strategize together and move people towards socialism.”
TPF has become a space for the working class to learn about itself outside of academia, offering classes and series titled “Pan-Africanism: The struggle for our future,” and “Revolutionary feminism: Theory and practice.” The People’s Forum also offers a diverse array of language classes, including Spanish, Arabic, and Portuguese. Teachers and speakers hosted by the People’s Forum include Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign Reverend Liz Theoharis, educator and legendary Black liberation leader Angela Davis, current leftist Colombian Vice President Francia Marquez, journalist and scholar Vijay Prashad, Marxist geographer David Harvey, and British Pan African historian Hakim Adi.
While leading international and nationwide campaigns, the People’s Forum has forged strong relationships with organizations, such as the Martin Luther King Memorial Center in Cuba, the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement in Brazil, the National Union of Metalworkers in South Africa, and others. The People’s Forum is also part of the International Peoples’ Assembly. In the United States, the People’s Forum is known as a host and welcome space for a diverse array of working class formations, from Teamsters for a Democratic Union to the Palestinian Youth Movement to CODEPINK, as well as socialist organizations such as the Party for Socialism and Liberation and the Democratic Socialists of America.
For organizers like Yanett Ramirez, a part of Peruvians en el Exterior: Semillas de Libertad, a Peruvian solidarity organization, TPF is a political home. Ramirez told Peoples Dispatch that TPF’s “comradely spirit” offers hope. “A lot of us under capitalism work a lot of hours, come home and do some other bit of organizing that we can with the remaining hours in the day, and I think TPF provides a good hopeful spirit that a lot of us are missing outside of work.”
“TPF is basically the house, the home, the second place that I look forward to and I find myself going to more and more each time after, continuing my radical education.”
