Obituaries for the Islamic Republic of Iran appeared even before it was born. In the hectic months of 1979 — before the Islamic Republic had been officially declared — many Iranians as well as foreigners, academics as well as journalists, participants as well as observers, conservatives as well as revolutionaries, confidently predicted its imminent demise. […]
Geography Archives: Americas
South America, Central America, United States & Canada
Mauricio Funes: “We Have Signed a New Accord on Peace and Reconciliation”
The president-elect of El Salvador Mauricio Funes, together with his supporters, celebrated the victory in the elections held this Sunday in this Central American country, giving a speech in which he said that with their vote the people had signed “a new accord on peace and reconciliation.” Shortly after the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) issued […]
What Difference Does Inequality Make?
Although many people believe inequality is socially divisive and adds to the problems associated with relative deprivation, what inequality does or does not do to us has remained largely a matter of personal opinion. But now that we have comparable measures of the scale of income inequality in different societies we can actually see […]
Anti-communism with a Liberal Face
Murali Balaji, The Professor and the Pupil: The Politics and Friendship of W. E. B. Du Bois and Paul Robeson, New York: Nation Books, 2007. W. E. B. Du Bois and Paul Robeson have been poorly served by their biographers. David Levering Lewis and Martin Duberman found these two US communist revolutionaries about as congenial […]
Interview with Deputy Nidia Díaz: FMLN Gets Ready to Combat the Salvadoran Right’s Electoral Fraud
On the 15th of March, the Salvadoran people will go to the polling stations to choose their next president. If the opinion surveys prove right, El Salvador will join the winds of change blowing across Latin America. In an interview aired by the Dimensión 550 program of YVKE Mundial, Deputy Nidia Díaz said that the […]
The Soils of War: The Real Agenda behind Agricultural Reconstruction in Afghanistan and Iraq
In this Briefing, we look at how the US’s agricultural reconstruction work in Afghanistan and Iraq not only gives easy entry to US agribusiness and pushes neoliberal policies, something that has always been a primary function of US development assistance, but is also an intrinsic part of the US military campaign in these countries and […]
The World Bank’s Reforms: Different Image, Same Tune?
The World Bank’s Board of Governors has approved the first of a series of reforms aimed at amplifying the voice and influence of developing countries inside the World Bank Group. The centrepiece of these much-awaited reforms, announced in mid-February, is an additional seat for Sub-Saharan Africa on the Bank’s Board of Executive Directors, a change […]
The Zionist Masquerade
James Renton. The Zionist Masquerade: The Birth of the Anglo-Zionist Alliance 1914-1918. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. xi + 231 pp. ISBN 978-0-230-54718-6; $69.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-230-54718-6. The word “masquerade” is not one to be used lightly by historians. Obviously, James Renton is aware of this, and he strives to justify his choice of […]
An Imperial Transatlantic Market
The process of establishing a transatlantic free trade area is the inverse of the process that led to the construction of the European Union. While the European common market is an economic structure based first on the liberalization of trade and then on the creation of a common currency, the transatlantic free trade area is […]
Israelis Are Beginning to See the Power of BDS
In recent years, there has been a gradual growth in the BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) movement, calling for putting economic pressure on Israel until it recognizes the rights of the occupied Palestinian people and puts an end to the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip […]
The Struggle to Build a Coalition in Cleveland against Foreclosures, Evictions, and Utility Shut-offs: A Personal View
On November 18, 2008, activists in Cleveland, Ohio came together to form an organization called Ohio Moratorium Now on Foreclosures, Evictions, and Utility Shut-offs. A Cleveland winter lay ahead of us in one of the most poverty-stricken, foreclosure-ridden cities in the United States. All around the US on a daily basis came stories of working […]
Eighth of March: A United March in Caracas to Commemorate Fighting Women’s Day
This Sunday, the Eighth of March, Assemble at Plaza O’Leary at 9 AM in Silence, to March toward Plaza Los Museos, the Location of the Cultural Festival We Are Marching to Open New Paths. Big Marches Work Their Magic Because We Make the Path by Marching, Which Is the Legacy of the Collective Memory of […]
Interview with Eric Toussaint
Interview with Eric Toussaint, President of the Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt (CADTM), in Havana. Obama Picked People Who Brought You This Crisis as His Advisers What is your opinion of Team Obama? Toussaint: Obama picked the very people who are responsible for this economic fiasco. Some hoped that Obama would appoint […]
Global Crisis: Economists’ Conference in Havana
The global economic crisis was the main protagonist on the first day of Globalización 2009, the 9th International Conference of Economists on Globalization and Problems of Development, presided over by First Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura; Dominican President Leonel Fernández Reyna; Cuban Vice President Esteban Lazo Hernández; Nobel Laureates in economics Edmund Phelps […]
American Nightmare
They used to tell me I was building a dream, and so I followed the mob, When there was earth to plow, or guns to bear, I was always there right on the job. They used to tell me I was building a dream, with peace and glory ahead, Why should I be standing in […]
The Shift in Canadian Immigration Policy and Unheeded Lessons of the Live-in Caregiver Program
This paper posits there has been a significant shift in Canadian immigration policy over the past two years — a shift which has passed under the radar screens of most Canadians. Formerly based on the precepts of permanent residency and family reunification, from 2006, Canada’s immigration system began shifting to a model of temporary migration […]
Leftists Poised to Win Presidency in El Salvador: New Report Examines Implications
After 17 years since the end of El Salvador’s civil war, the leftist Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) is poised to accomplish what its guerrilla predecessors never did: take over the national government. Reliable polls unanimously project that FMLN candidate Mauricio Funes will win the March 15 presidential elections. What all this means for […]
Obama, Iran, and Israel
The election of Barrak Obama to the office of president of the United States has generated tremendous elation and enthusiasm in the U.S. and around the world. The rise of Obama has been accompanied by the rise of hope and anticipation that a new and better world is about to begin. Some Obama enthusiasts have […]
Elie Domota: “The Movement Is Not about to Quit”
HRIS: Are you satisfied with the results last night? Elie Domota: Overall, yes. This applies only to the employees of the member companies of the employers’ organizations. We will set up a procedure to extend the agreement to all employees in Guadeloupe in the coming days. Julien: The agreement shows that your demand for […]
Békés: A Matter of Inheritance
Sitting in the shadow of an elegant carbet, feeling the trade wind, Roger de Jaham, age 60, lets his Creole accent lilt, talking about the blow that he recently suffered: “For the first time in my life, a man whom I greeted told me: ‘I don’t shake the hand of a béké.” The man […]
