Geography Archives: Americas

Winning the “hearts and minds” of the civilian population, according to counterinsurgency field manuals, is key to defeating the resistance.  It is a lesson that imperialists learned a long time ago, but one that they seldom put into practice, let alone successfully impart to their clients.  Israel’s attack on Gaza is a case in point.  […]

There are, of course, other ways to “support and stimulate” the declining US economy: those that congressional debaters, presidential advisors, and the dutiful media never discuss.  All the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury ever do is justify their functions as lenders and spenders “of last resort” (when the private sector will not).  Neither ever […]

The text below is composed of short excerpts (abstract, introduction, conclusion) from Esteban Pérez Caldentey and Matías Vernengo, “Back to the Future: Latin America’s Current Development Strategy,” International Development Economics Associates Working Paper No. 07/2008. The full text of “Back to the Future” is available (in PDF) at <networkideas.org/working/dec2008/07_2008.pdf>. — Ed.

The Alberto Lovera Bolivarian Circle of New York invites you to join us in April for a 10-day trip to Venezuela examining advances in food sovereignty and other initiatives for social change.  Start off in the capital city of Caracas, then travel to four additional states, including visits to newly formed cooperative farms and rural […]

  Since February 2003, Iran’s nuclear program has undergone what the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) itself admits to be the most intrusive inspection in its entire history.  After thousands of hours of inspections by some of the most experienced IAEA experts, the Agency has verified time and again that (1) there is no evidence […]

  Joel Kovel holds the Alger Hiss chair in social studies at Bard College and is the author of Overcoming Zionism among other titles.  He has recently been informed by the college that his contract will not be extended beyond July 1.  In the statement below, he argues that the termination is due to his […]

Few people in the U.S. have paid attention to the island nation of Sri Lanka and to the decades-long struggle for self-determination by the Tamil-speaking minority community.  As the conflict has begun to intensify and make headlines in recent weeks, the Sri Lankan government has done its utmost to control the story being told by […]

Anthony H. Cordesman, a leading military analyst from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, published a “strategic analysis” of the Gaza massacre shortly after it ended.  He reaches the remarkable conclusion that “Israel did not violate the laws of war.”  The report is based on “briefings in Israeli [sic] during and immediately after the […]

  The general strike in Guadeloupe began almost a month ago, and the strike movement has spread to Martinique over the last two weeks, and yet the government and the management are still maneuvering, stalling and buying time, refusing to meet the demands. Backed by the entire population holding the largest demonstrations ever seen in […]

  In spite of the tireless calls of the Liyannaj Kont Pwofitasyon (LKP, Collective against Exploitation), the employers and the French government have let the situation deteriorate. Instead of really facilitating the negotiations, the French government’s representatives went from evasions to evasions (the prefect left the negotiation table on the 28th of January, and the […]

  ‘I didn’t know Che had any economic ideas’ has been a frequent reply I’ve received when telling people about the topic of my research and my book Che Guevara: The Economics of Revolution.   It reflects the caricature of Guevara as a romantic guerrilla fighter with idealist notions of how human beings are motivated […]

2009 marks the 30th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution.  The Revolution ended a symbiotic relation between the US and the Shah, whereby the latter helped to sustain the economic and political interests of the US in the Persian Gulf region and the former helped to preserve the rule of the Shah.  Since the end of […]

The end of eight years of neoconservative belligerence in the White House came with a financial crisis exacerbated by decades of neoliberal economic policies.  As a result of this coincidence, the ideological winds in the United States are blowing powerfully to the left. The possibility of another great depression looming over the economy,1 left-wing and […]

Andy Stern’s SEIU is pouring in millions of dollars to take over the UHW, ousting its leadership.  The first part of the video shows the rank and file of the 150,000-member local, as well as their ousted president Sal Rosselli, speaking out against Stern’s trusteeship; in the second part, Steve Zeltzer interviews former UHW organizer […]

Congratulations to you and your people for a victory which, because of its magnitude, is impossible to measure.

  Washington D.C., February 15, 2009 — Twenty years ago today, the commander of the Soviet Limited Contingent in Afghanistan Boris Gromov crossed the Termez Bridge out of Afghanistan, thus marking the end of the Soviet war which lasted almost ten years and cost tens of thousands of Soviet and Afghan lives. As a tribute […]

In those days when I, as an altar boy, used to walk in the humble church of Sabaneta, at the beginning of the stormy decade of the sixties of the last century, my spirit was first conquered by the blazing and whipping words of Jesus, Christ the Redeemer of the oppressed peoples. The Sermon on […]

The Jewish Association of Venezuela expressed its appreciation to the Chávez government and its organs of security for their investigations of the attack against the Tiferet Synagogue.  Foreign Minister Nicolás Maduro expressed the government’s desire to cooperate with the Jewish community and made it clear that the national government maintains “absolute respect for religious freedom.” […]

It was 2006. I was really very ill but very much aware of what was happening. During those days around the middle of September, the XIV NAM Summit where Cuba was elected to the Presidency was ending. I could barely sit up and take my place at a table. That’s how I received some important heads of state or government. The Prime Minister of India was among them. The highest ranking visitor I received in that emergency room in the Presidential Palace was the Ghanaian Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations, who a few days later would be ending his mandate.

  The Middle East has always been a difficult challenge for Western human rights organizations, particularly those seeking influence or funding in the United States.  The pressure to go soft on US allies is in some respects reminiscent of Washington’s special pleading for Latin American terror regimes in the 1970s and 1980s.  In the case […]