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Archive | 2020

Photo: Frans Ari Prasetyo

Neoliberal ‘Omnibus Law’ sparks rebellion in Indonesia

A major protest movement is underway in Indonesia against the neoliberal, authoritarian-populist regime of Joko Widodo and his collaborators in the House of Representatives. Frans Ari Prasetyo explains the so-called ‘Omnibus Law’ that sparked the protest, and reports on the clashes now unfolding in Bandung and many other cities.

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Wikimedia Commons Communist party supporters - (Photo: Flickr - Al Jazeera English)

One hundred years of Indian communism

The economic programme suggested for such a front included the right to strike, banning reductions of wages and dismissals of workers, an adequate minimum wage and 8-hour day, a 50 per cent reduction in rents and banning the seizure of peasant land against debt by imperialists, native princes, zamindars and money lenders.

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U.S.-China relations

The end of engagement

In November of 1967, just months before announcing his entrance into the 1968 presidential race, Richard Nixon outlined in Foreign Affairs what would become a north star for Washington’s orientation towards China for the next half-century.

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Jacopo Tintoretto (1518 – 1594)

Contagion in art

As the world continues to grapple with COVID-19, Maeve McGrath takes a look at how artists have depicted plagues and epidemics in times gone past.

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Chart of the day

Chart of the day

U.S. billionaires have recouped all of their wealth—and more—during the Pandemic Depression. Meanwhile, since May, the number of poor Americans has grown by about 8 million.

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Demand A New Normal

Normal is gone—where do we go from here?

Your parents at the dinner table laugh and say revolution will not happen in two months. You respond saying perhaps they are right—revolution may not occur in the next two months. But, as Che Guevara said, “the revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall.”

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Clifford D. Conner, The Tragedy of American Science: From Truman to Trump, Haymarket Books, 2020, 300 pages

American Science: Triumph or Tragedy?

A historian of science himself, Conner is fully cognizant of the accomplishments of American science and technology. In an earlier book, A People’s History of Science: Miners, Midwives and “Low Mechanicks” (2005), he demonstrated the contributions of ordinary citizens to science, but he also warned of the corruptive potential of corporate money and military power.

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