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Liberalizing Food Trade to Death
Introduction People across the world, from Mexico to Mozambique, have once again been taking to the streets in protest. The reason is to demand that their most basic need be met: access to food. With food prices skyrocketing over the last few months, billions of people around the globe have been relentlessly driven towards starvation. […]
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The Complexities of Zimbabwe
A month after Zimbabwe’s March 29 elections, the winner of the presidential poll remains unknown. The delay adds considerable additional complexity to the many undercurrents of the country’s problems. By virtue of the suspicious, poorly explained delay in announcing who won the presidential poll, the authorities in Harare have ensured that the only outcome […]
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Recent Developments in Zimbabwe
16 April 2008 The South African Communist Party has been closely following events in Zimbabwe, including the circumstances surrounding the recently held national elections. We wish to join our allies, the ANC and COSATU, in expressing our concern in how these political developments are unfolding. We are extremely worried and strongly condemn the ZEC’s clandestine […]
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Letter from Nepal, Saturday, April 5th
After ten years of civil war and one and a half years of jittery peace, the Nepali people will be electing a constituent assembly for the first time in their history. The motive force behind the people’s war, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) reached a deal with the main parliamentary parties on a nationwide […]
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Africom Threatens the Sovereignty, Independence, and Stability of the African Continent: A Position Paper of the National Conference of Black Lawyers
The National Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL) concludes that the mission of Africa Command (Africom) infringes on the sovereignty of African states due to the particularity of Africa’s history and Africa’s current economic and political relationship to the United States.
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The G20: The New Ruling Aristocracy of the World?
Introduction On the 17th and 18th of November 2007, the finance ministers and reserve bank governors of the G20 countries, along with leading International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank officials, will be gathering in the seaside village of Kleinmond, South Africa.1 During this meeting — which will be hosted by the current Chair of […]
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Three Letters from South Africa
JENNIFER DOHRN, CNM, is Director of Midwifery Services at the Childbearing Center of Morris Heights, the Bronx, New York, the first birthing center in the United States to serve inner-city women of diverse backgrounds. Jennifer also directs the midwifery education program at Columbia University School of Nursing. She has been working in South Africa to […]
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For the Deaf Who Won’t Listen
A summary of the FAO declaration from its headquarters in Rome, on May 16, 2007. World cereal production is on track to reach a record level in 2007. In spite of this, supplies will be barely adequate to meet increased demand, boosted by the development of the biofuels industry. International prices for most cereals have […]
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Mugabe: Talks Radical, Acts Like a Reactionary
If you want to know what’s going on in Zimbabwe, you could try taking seriously the view commonly argued by the independent left in this region, namely that Mugabe talks radical — especially nationalist and anti-imperialist — but acts reactionary, especially to the urban poor and working people. Fortunately, we have a fresh version of […]
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One Unified African People:An Interview with Obi Egbuna
Annual Fundraising Appeal Friends of MRZine and Monthly Review! The continuing existence of MRZine and Monthly Review depends on the support of our readers. Unlike many other publications, we make all new Monthly Review articles, as well as MRZine articles, available online, free of charge. We do so without drawing any advertising money at all […]
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Post-American Geopolitics
I. Three Metropoles, Four Peripheries Many of us on the Left have pondered what would replace the Cold War division of the planet into the First, Second, and Third World. Though the three worlds thesis was arbitrary at best — the social divisions within nation-states are often more significant than the distinctions between nation-states — […]
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“Popular Anger May Be Something to Behold”: An Interview with Greg Elich
STRANGE LIBERATORS: Militarism, Mayhem, and the Pursuit of Profit by Gregory Elich (with Michael Parenti’s Introduction and Mickey Z’s Afterword)BUY THIS BOOK I first met Greg Elich more than two years when we were both speakers at the One Dance People’s Summit. We’ve since become friends and I was proud to write the afterword for […]
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No Cold Kitchen: A Biography of Nadine Gordimer
NO COLD KITCHEN: A Biography of Nadine Gordimer by Ronald S. Roberts BUY THIS BOOK No Cold Kitchen is a biography of Nadine Gordimer by Ronald S. Roberts (published by STE Publishers). As an activist, Gordimer played a vital role in the struggle against the apartheid. In 1985, Gordimer declared: “I am a partisan […]
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What Brought Evo Morales to Power? The Role of the International Indigenous Movement and What the Left Is Missing
What has been left out of reports and analysis in both the mainstream press and among anti-imperialists and leftists about the triumph of Evo Morales’ election as President of Bolivia is the role played by the three-decade international indigenous movement that preceded it. Few are even aware of that powerful and remarkable historic movement, which […]
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North versus South:Expect More Global Apartheid — and SA Collaboration — in 2006
Unless political elites change strategy and tactics in 2006, North-South relations will continue to degenerate. By the end of last year, opportunities ranging from rock concerts to summits and trade negotiations were lost. South Africa’s role in this failure of global nerve was substantial. Three leading politicians of South Africa — Thabo Mbeki, Alec Erwin, […]
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Labor: Eyeless in America
Whoopee! The Change to Win Coalition has established itself in the labor movement! Happy Days are here again! Andy Stern’s going to lead us to the promised land! And the overwhelming response by American workers: yawn. At the time when American workers — indeed, US society as a whole — so much need a new […]
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Fifty One American Revolutions
50 AMERICAN REVOLUTIONS YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO KNOW: Reclaiming American Patriotism by Mickey Z BUY THIS BOOK In his new book, 50 American Revolutions You’re Not Supposed to Know, Mickey Z has authored yet another incisive examination of the political and social landscape. This time his focus is on people’s victories that have been won […]
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An Interview with John S. Saul
[John S. Saul is professor emeritus of politics at York University in Toronto. He is the author of many highly-acclaimed books on the politics of southern Africa, including Recolonization and Resistance: Southern Africa in the 1990s, Namibia’s Liberation Struggle: The Two-Edged Sword, The Crisis in South Africa, and A Difficult Road: The Transition to Socialism […]