Minutes of the Berlin LINKE Internationals Orga meeting, 3rd February 2021

1. Meeting on the “Arab Spring”

Our meeting on the “Arab Spring” will be on February 9th

Hossam will speak alone. Hanna and Phil will chair

To Do: find someone to look after the technics on the night

This discussion will continue here

2. Meeting on Gentrification

Proposed title: Gentrification: are migrants to blame? And how can we involve them in the referendum to expropriate housing?

Speakers: someone from DWE, Karen Narefsky from DSA Brooklyn, someone from Bizim Kiez

If we can’t get Bizim Kiez then maybe someone from Barcelona

Date: 2nd or 3rd week of March (after 8 March)

To Do: Phil to speak to DWE and DSA Brooklyn. Giorgio to speak to Bizim Kiez

This discussion will continue here.

3. Meeting on Palestine

Date: May 17th, which is the second anniversary of the Bundestag resolution on BDS

Title: Discussing Palestine in Germany

Speakers:

• Susan Neiman (Einstein Forum Potsdam and Initiative GG 5.30 Weltoffenheit),

• Haneen Zoabi (former Member of the Knesset)

• Christine Buchholz (LINKE MP)

This discussion will continue here

4. Meeting on Latin America

We had planned a meeting on the Latin American Left in April but are struggling to find a current issue to hang it on, and which we haven’t covered already.

To Do: decide whether we stick with Latin America as a subject

If yes, find a good title and suggest countries for speakers. If no, find a new subject

This discussion will continue here 

5. Meeting on Ten Year Occupy Wall Street

This is also the meeting on “How can the Left be more radical?” (title is not so popular so we maybe need to rethink it)

The anniversary will be in September, but then we’ll be concentrating on the election / DWE referendum. In July and August, people may be away

To Do: decide the month for this meeting

This discussion will continue here 

6. Offenes Neukölln

We have been invited to organise 1 or 2 workshops at the Offenes Neukölln Festival from 4-6 June

We had a few ideas for possible subjects such as Local elections, Climate, Police brutality and racism, Antifa and “Left terrorism”

However, we’re not exactly sure who else is organising similar workshops

To Do: Talk to Ferat and Antigoni about what exactly is expected of us

7. Work with Steglitz-Zehlendorf

Die LINKE Steglitz-Zehlendorf has offered to work more closely with us this year

(Franzisky Brychcy, the LINKE Berlin speaker for Europe is from S-Z)

They are planning a meeting on Brexit and Erasmus in April

They also suggest organising some joint meetings around the election campaigns.

To Do: Talk to Jana, who works for Franziska and is active in S-Z

8. Summer Camp

The Naturfreundehaus Hermsdorf has been booked for 4-5 September

We will have 2 main meetings:

• on the elections with candidates for the national and local elections (suggestion: Zaklin Nastic and Ferat Kocak)

• on the referendum against gentrification with a speaker from Deutsche Wohnen & Co Enteignen

We will also organise 9 workshops, including the following:

• on the Green New Deal (Ian C)

• DSA Berlin on taking stock of Biden

• one organised by Co-Liberation

• Berlin for India on Caste politics

• one organised by the Tech Workers Coalition

• one on Israel/Palestine (speakers tbd)

• one on COVID and the Global South (speakers tbd)

We will decide the remaining 2 workshops closer to the date, when we know which campaigns are being discussed at the time

To Do: contact the campaigns and speakers already selected

This discussion will continue here

9. 2021 elections

We want to produce and translate a leaflet soon telling non-Germans how they can vote and why

In the main election period, we want to produce a leaflet with more arguments for voting Die LINKE

To Do (1): find our previous leaflets with information about voting rights

To Do (2): collect arguments for taking part in local elections (Mietendeckel, anti-AfD, ...)

This discussion will continue here

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10. Future orga meetings

We would like to have an orga meeting every month in the first week of the month

To Do: set up a doodle to find the best day of the week for this meeting