Here's my top 5 on what we can all learn from Brazil - what's your top 10, 5 or 1? chris macrae wcbn007@easynet.co.uk subject Brazil A bit of background. I haven't ever visited Brazil but I have meant some Brazilians who have a greater sense of community than almost anyone from my own country (Britain). I don't speak Portuguese, but I did do about 6 months of work in Lisbon surveying what Portuguese people and businesses wanted in getting a quick start across Europe. I learnt from my mentors in Portugal that their culture is that of not liking to be bossed by national leaders - "to be a leader: please be of the people not above the people". It seems to me that Brazil has much of the same culture; and that is a huge advantage in networking's community-up age. In future, it could mean that Brazil is the passport to many a good social development in the Americas 1 2, at least those ones that need deep grassrooting in community participation. Anyway that's the bias I bring to guiding round my top 5 collaboration tours of Brazil 1 Brazil (Porto Alegre) innovated the world social forum - it's now as influential (all be it in a sometines maddening way) as the world economics forum. That's not my assessment, it is President Lula's who in 2005 made a point of being te only leader in the history of world forums to speak at both. Quite hard to do because their dates are almost coincident though hemispheres apart - the Economics forum being in the swanky skiing playboy town of davos (as much as the Swiss playboy), evry odd year's WSF being in Porto Alegre in Brazil. Lula's ratings by the people are still up in the air because he came to power expected to do even more than link world forums irrevocably, and as per my introduction the transparency conflicts of cone=versing with world leaders and being one of us are hard in the separated 20th C world we have inherited. Let's hope they become easy one day soon they become easier now we are all loosely interconnected. One lesson I am most grateful to Lula for is the way he jokingly but seriously has changed world trade to go interlocally wherever people as intercitizens 1 2 3 boldly go below national radars. This is a topic that 1.3 million bookselling Future Historian Thomas Friedman "Green is the Next Red, White & Blue) speaks most eloquently about with Charlie Rose (my world favourite tv interviewer - ok who's yours). Why is there a G8 and not a BA8 (8 country cluster hubbing round Brazil on what Brazil's people know or need mst) BB8 (8.. 2nd most) BBC8 (8 countries 1 that believe most in public media) 2 The social forum also has Regional editions. Out of London's European one in 2004, the simpol network I belong to helped sponsor one of the world's leading educators on why all 6 billion people should collaborate in how (clean) water flows around the world to be every human's right of life. A topic that is becoming exponentially more vital to the survival of many communities as recent events have shown 3 Franklin had also given courage to and been encouraged by the Catholic church's dedication in Brazil to 2004 as the Year of Water. If you want the people to debate an issue from the grassroots up- the church is Brazil's main social media with its 7000 or so parishes. I met one of the organisers of education of priests on such secular matters, and found out they have their own university retreat -a space for chnage? Nack to Franklin, he's one of those people who deep authority and experience helps connects all of a city's humanitarian networks and co-mentoring -see the sort of collaboration cafe invitation we circulate when he's visiting a city 4 In Rio we have Catalytic Comunities 200 people and my favourite social hub in all the world right now- preneurial benchmarks being something that my father has encouraged me to map for 30 years now since his future hostory survey Entrepreneurial Revolution published in 1976. In 1984, we co-authored a specially focused version of that timelining to 2024 what would either compound brilliantly well if we had 30000 open projects emerging from global village hubs or badly for all people as networks caused the death of distance and every locality became globally interconnected. This is why transparent social hubs- open sourcing what projects work so that they can be licenes by peoples in any locality is so valuable to me. On our goodwill timeline 1, we'll need 30000 projects banked for worldwide exchnage between local communities by 2010. So Brazil's gift to the world of how to do a real socila hub and catalogue virtual guided tours to what works is outstanding . Catcom has also started its own blog here. 5 Back to water and schools education and multicultural understanding and sustainability of communities. In Foz, the world's largest dam is shapred by Brazil and a neighbouring country. Up the river basins on the Brazil side you will find over 100 of project30000 -cleaning up agriculture, connecting 100 ethnicities around their local environmental assets, using water's flow to teach 80000 children and 4000 teachers and all the families in between nof how water interconnects us all, and the specially deep local diversities it sustains throughout the region. Look across the national border and you will see a polluting mess of a region turned in mega-agriculture typically soya. Now which future is likely to sustain the local peoples?