Scientific illiteracy and religion
The May/June 2010 Utne Reader has a brief piece on science versus religion that reframes classic tensions in terms of climate change. By the way, I’m sorry for disappearing for so long. I originally agreed to blog through the Copenhagen meeting, but I later decided to post regularly through this year. I’ll aspire to do better.
Outer Space Development: Including Everyone in the Process
The first phase of outer space development has already taken place, involving satellite telecommunications industries, television, cell phones, the Internet and a multitude of goods and services linked to these space technologies. The vast majority of people around the world still think of outer space as an elite field for government astronauts and scientists. So, why not expose more people to outer space development?
A NATION AT WAR
President Obama and other senior US officials make constant reference to America being “a nation at war.” This is politically necessary to say and obviously the case because the US has nearly a hundred thousand troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan and reports combat casualties daily.
Raising the Bar on Chocolate: Cocoa Farmers in Ghana Shape the Future
In 1993 Ghana initiated the partial liberalisation of its most significant economic export, cocoa beans. Having resisted World Bank pressure to liberalise fully, the Cocoa Marketing Board retained its monopoly on exports through the Cocoa Marketing Company. It thus sustained its farm-to-port quality control system of every sack and its authority to determine the terms of trade
Why Gender Matters in/to the Global Economy
During the apparent peak of the so-called Global Financial Crisis in 2009, a flurry of descriptions of the crisis as a ‘mancession’ emerged. To ignore or trivialise gender in the global economy is to fail to appreciate the power of a basic and fundamental system of identification through which we understand the world; a system that organises how we respond to our environments, our abilities to survive, our goals in life, and how we approach our relationships.
Whose “World Cup” is this?
As the drift of this (admittedly) curmudgeonly blog suggests, I’m keen to invest in a T-shirt which is carrying a somewhat different slogan, “FICK FUFA”!
Gender Quotas and Women’s Political Empowerment
Despite growth, women continue to constitute only 19% of all parliamentarians worldwide. Quotas are a diverse set of measures that can reach the political agenda for both feminist and non-feminist reasons, leading to diverse effects on the election and empowerment of women. Whilst necessary, more systematic research is needed in order to determine their impact on women as a group.
The Social Bases of Autocratic Rule in Thailand
The political disturbances in Thailand over recent weeks ended with a military crackdown in the third week of May. At least 89 people, including two foreign journalists, died in the clashes, and over 1800 were injured. More than thirty buildings in central Bangkok were set on fire. An election may or may not be called before the end of 2010. Attempts at reconciliation have so far come to nothing, and unless injustices and inequalities are addressed by policies of the national government, further unrest is unavoidable.
Hostages of Culturalism
What is multiculturalism? Is it a concept that is often uncritically used in the contemporary ‘civic’ and academic discourse, whereby those who employ it rarely feel the need to define it? Is it the state of affairs in some countries, the fact that several cultures coexist there, or perhaps some ideal that is still to be reached, something that implies political and social changes in a society? What if three cultures on the same territory promote cultural dogmas which are mutually irreconcilable?
How the Greeks broke Europe
Greece is tiny, its economy only 3 per cent of the EU. But just as the world appeared to be clawing its way out of financial turmoil and recession, Greece reminded the markets that countries, as well as banks, can go bust. The EU has changed its poorer members less than its founders imagined. Perhaps this crisis—the most serious in the EU since its creation, according to Angela Merkel—will finally persuade Greece, and the other weaker economies, to make the reforms they have ducked since joining the euro.
