International Network of Scholar Activists:About

About INoSA(PDF-INoSA Rationale) Recognizing that:

• The work of teachers and researchers is vital to global efforts for social transformation;
• As teachers and scholars, we face particular challenges and opportunities relating to movement building;
• Teachers and scholars to have a stronger organization and a supportive network to support effective communication and cooperation;
• Teachers and scholars need a supportive network to better challenge neoliberal ideology and practice in our daily work experience; and
• There is a general need for more coordinated international action to help advance movement building and the aims of radical movements for social justice and transformation.

INoSA works to:

• Serve as a liaison with radical social movements and the World Social Forum process and related projects
• Aid networking among professional associations whose work complements INoSA’s;
• Encourage and advance scholarly and public attention to radical movements for transformation and movement building;
• Encourage and facilitate teacher-scholar participation in transformative social movements;
• Encourage connections between teach-scholars within and outside of academia
• Promote cross-discipline and cross-national communication, collaboration, and coordinated action within the network;
• Facilitate efforts to advance ideas and proposals made in radical justice movements;
• Mentor young teacher-scholars and provide opportunities for involvement in critical research, evaluation, and related projects; and
• Support efforts to resist neoliberalism/predatory capitalism* on our campuses, within educational systems and institutions, including defense of the knowledge commons.

*Language of “predatory capitalism” draws from ideas in Saskia Sassen’s Expulsions: Brutality and Complexity in the Global Economy

History of INoSA: The International Network of Scholar Activists had its origins at the 2005 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre Brazil, where around 200 scholar-activists outlined three major areas of work that are most relevant to teachers and scholars. These include: 1) resisting neoliberalism/predatory capitalism* on our campuses, 2) defending the knowledge commons, and 3) supporting social movements and radical democracy. We noted how the first two areas are struggles where scholar-activists must be on the front lines to protect and advance equitable access to education and knowledge.

Since then, the network has helped with critical evaluation of the World Social Forums and related movement building processes through scholarship, research, and on-going efforts to raise awareness in and out of our classrooms about the importance of working towards radical social change. Over time, the network has also sought to recognize the vital work being done by teachers and scholars outside of traditional academic or educational professions, and to foster ongoing relationships with leading agents in the global movements for radical social transformation, connecting researcher skills to the needs of the movements. The network consists of nearly 200 participants in around a dozen countries around the world, although most of its members are based in the United States.