The WEF began today in Davos, Switzerland. The New York Times coverage describes it this way:

It seemed like just another meeting of the world’s most exclusive talk shop, held each January in this Alpine ski resort. The trouble is nobody was talking about anything but the global market turmoil and the faltering American economy.

World political figures and CEOs of the largest multinational corporations meet, and we can expect that their response to current economic troubles will be more of the same neoliberal non-solutions that put all faith into "free" markets.

In response to the WEF, the World Social Forum has convened the world's grassroots organizations and advocates of social and economic justice to create an alternative vision of how to "“Act Together for Another World.”

This year, instead of one gigantic gathering, which the WSF has held in different countries each January since 2001, opponents to neoliberalism have called for January 26th to be a Global Day of Action. Actions listed at the WSF site will present an alternative vision of change coming from the people impacted by neoliberal economic and social policies.

In the U.S., the decentralized series of actions launched with a press conference in Atlanta, Georgia, site of the 2007 U.S. Social Forum. Check back on chicagojwj.org for more about actions in Chicago and throughout the JWJ network.