Tous les articles et traductions

American policy on the brink

Juan Cole

, by Tomdispatch.com

The problem: Washington’s foreign-policy planners seem to be out of ideas, literally brain-dead, just as the world is visibly in flux. In their reactions, even in their rhetoric, there is remarkably little new under the sun, though from Tunisia to India, China to Brazil, our world is changing (…)

Al-Jazeera becomes focus of leaked documents debate

, by Ma’an News Agency

Conspiracy, a case of bad timing and a dis-service to the Palestinian people were some of the immediate reactions by Palestinian critics and media professionals, as Qatar-based satellite channel Al-Jazeera continued to release documents from over a decade of mediation efforts with Israel. (…)

Indigenous Peoples Gain U.S., U.N. Recognition

, by IPS

As 2010 draws to a close, both the United States and the United Nations have reached out to one of the world’s most marginalised groups in society: indigenous peoples.
The 192-member General Assembly adopted a unanimous resolution last week calling for a first-ever World Conference on (…)

The Dark Side of Globalization

Edited by Jorge Heine and Ramesh Thakur, 320 pages, 35 Dollars US

, by United Nations University

Seen by some as a desirable and irreversible engine of prosperity and progress, globalization is resisted by others as the soft underbelly of a corporate imperialism that plunders and profiteers in the global marketplace. Globalization has brought many benefits, including the reduction of (…)

On South Africa Becoming a BRIC: Don’t Get a Brick Thrown at You

Saliem Fakir

, by SACSIS

On the international scene South Africa plays diplomacy for high stakes. Often in the name of Africa and for itself, but this may receive some heckles from those who know that the game of diplomacy is mostly about enlightened self-interest, as the WikiLeaks diplomatic cables more than capably (…)

Deal won, stakes lost

Cancum deal shifts burden on developing countries not developed

, by NARAIN Sunita

Last fortnight we discussed the clandestine endgame afoot at Cancun to change the framework of the climate change negotiations to suit big and powerful polluters.
Since then Cancun has concluded and a deal, in the form of a spate of agreements, has been gavelled into existence by the chair. (…)

The Big Downturn? Nanogeopolitics

, by ETC Group

The Big Downturn? Nanogeopolitics, ETC Group’s new 68-page report on global governance of nanoscale technologies, is an update of our 2005 Nanogeopolitics survey. In the intervening five years, policymakers – some kicking and screaming – have begun to acknowledge that fast-tracking nanotech has (…)

Questions & Answers with Krystyna Swiderska on the Nagoya Protocol

, by IIED

Last month, after 18 years of negotiations and more than 2 weeks of tense discussions in Nagoya, Japan, the world finally struck a deal on access to genetic resources and benefit sharing. The agreement — the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and Equitable Sharing of Benefits — was, (…)

On Migrants and Movement

, by SACSIS

There are currently about 200 million people living outside their countries of birth. Worldwide the rate of migration grew at six percent a year during the 1990s, a rate faster than population growth as a whole. Better opportunities for employment are among the main reasons people choose to (…)

Public Diplomacy 2.0

, by London Review of Books

On a balmy evening in April 2009 Barham Salih, then deputy prime minister of Iraq, sat in the garden of his Baghdad villa while a young internet entrepreneur called Jack Dorsey tried to persuade him that he needed to be on Twitter. Dorsey, the founder of Twitter, was in Baghdad at the invitation (…)

Education and Resistance

, by Alternative Information Center

The following is a presentation given by Mireille Fanon Mendes France at the World Education Forum- Palestine, on 30 October 2010 in Bethlehem. Fanon Mendes France is from the Frantz Fanon Foundation and the French Jewish Union for Peace.
Education must be a strategic weapon of resistance to (…)

European borders : controls, detention and deportations

For its second annual report on the European borders, Migreurop has chosen to emphasize three main steps of the fights led by the authorities against the candidates to migration : the controls of their movements, detention and deportation.
Based on evidences from fact finding missions, the (…)

Anticipated Indirect Land Use Change Associated with Expanded Use of Biofuels and Bioliquids in the EU – An Analysis of the National Renewable Energy Action Plans

IEEP, November 2010

“A new IEEP report analyses the indirect land use change (ILUC) impact of the substantial additional biofuel usage that will be generated up to 2020 by the targets under the EU renewable energy Directive. Plans from national governments setting out how they will reach these targets, which are (…)

Wal-Mart: Predator Capitalism and the Great Game

By Glenn Ashton

, by SACSIS

At the end of September the rumours were put to bed as Wal-Mart made a formal but conditional offer for Massmart, of R32 billion. To put this in perspective this amount is less than 20% of Wal-Mart’s present annual operating income of $24 billion and a fraction of their $408 billion (R2.8 (…)

European retailers: threatening livelihoods in India

, by TNI

The role of major supermarkets like Tesco in wiping out small retailers across Europe is well known. Now the giants have India in their sights. For a country in which small-scale retail employs 33 million people, what kind of impact will this have? Read more

Fishing for solutions. Transborder fishing in India and Sri lanka

, by Himal Southasian

Vivekanandan has worked with fishing communities for over a quarter-century. Most of that was spent with the South Indian Federation of Fishermen Societies, a cooperative organisation for small fishermen, of which he is currently advisor. He has started a new organisation, Fisheries Management (…)