Holding 18th KWWA's regular general meeting for 2010
On both of the last January 9 and 10, KWWA's 18th regular general meeting was held. The meeting gave a momentum to us for gathering all of our 100 full-time activists from our regional branches, sharing KWWA's activity directions for 2010 and making new resolutions.
On the first day, we at the KWWA had a good time to receive a lecture about a political situation entitled 'the reality of Korean politics and tasks' given by Kim Ho-gi, a professor of the Dept. of Sociology, Yonsei University, in order to have broader perspectives on the society.
He identified our current reality as 'the era of uncertainty.' Although very separate and different seem issues by generation like unemployment amongst those in their 20s, job insecurity, private education costs for their children, and preparation for their golden years in their 30s and 40s, alienation from social changes in their 50s and 60s, he highlighted the great majority of people experience grave uncertainty stemming from their economic difficulties due to the lack of social welfare policies. He also raised his concerns for increases in not only social conflicts but also the crisis over democracy hit by the deepening social polarization.
Under these circumstances, civil NGO's roles are crucial. There have been diverse changes in the Korean NGOs: conservative NGOs represented by the 'New Right' movement have risen and support bases for progressive NGOs has been weakened. In this regime, progressive NGOs have faced difficulties in developing new agendas and gaining supports from people.
He also stressed that the progressive movement should introspect on both of its strong points and demerits to increase its influences in the local election in the coming June and suggested to be concerned for how to communicate with people and what to do with people.
We at the KWWA have been preparing a variety of activities to make the year 2010 the year of beginning to activate projects for our members. In the preparatory process, we had a time to carry out deep discussion on these topics: "How should we fulfill members' project guidelines at regional levels?" and "How should we change the culture of our structures to activate our projects for members?"
We also discussed our various concerns: if our activities were self-content and limited; what we at the KWWA did with our members; How we will explore and increase our membership; and how we should change ourselves. For example, we expressed our opinions like 'More important thing is not a desk theory for increasing our membership, but good and practical communication with the public.'; 'People are not interested in serious and boring topics.'; 'We should adjust our perspectives suitable to the public.'; and 'it is not real and good communication just to upload many articles on our website in this era of two-way communication.' We have decided to approach our public through changing our structures and using various internet cultures in order to activate our activities to increase our membership. For instance, all secretariate of the KWWA joined the Twitter to strive to introduce our activities on our real-time bases and communicate with the public.
In the evening, we had a time of unity and communication by region. We had wonderful and happy moments to dance including belly dance, sing, and change song lyrics.
On the second day, KWWA's 2009 annual report and audit report, and action plan for 2010 were presented. Activity basis for 2010 was decided as the completion of the alternative social movement ▲ to solidify structure powers to meet women workers' demands and cope with realities; ▲ to demand legal reforms to overcome the polarized labor market; and ▲ to overcome the existing values and the principles of the labor market. For this, were set 8 action directions such as △ to gain financial independence through the 50% increase in the number of regular members and support members; △ to make the women involved main forces of their structures; △ to meet women in their 20s and attempt to organize them; and △ to reveal worsening realities of women employment and to carry out activities to correct women's realities.