The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
SACSIS promotes the principle of just economies. We are opposed to economic development that violates social and economic rights and increases inequalities in the pursuit of economic growth.
Didier Jacobs -
They used to be seven. They embodied power and relished it. Other leaders envied their photo ops. They were the cream of the cream, the top of the top. They were the G7.
And now they are 20, and they meet in Toronto this week. The G20 is the Senate of our global government. It sets global economic policy, giving direction to an alphabet soup of global executive agencies, from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development...
Glenn Ashton -
In order to prevent criminal behaviour we are quite correctly forbidden to purchase goods which are suspected to be stolen or to be associated with criminal conduct. While an individual failure to heed this basic tenet of the law can result in personal conviction, a collective failure to observe it leads inevitably to a breakdown in both the rule of law and social order.
Modern commercial law has given similar legal status and rights to both individuals and corporations. People and...
Leonard Gentle -
The World Cup has rightly captured the country’s imagination. Despite Bafana’s anaemic performance against the Uruguayans, there is still a clear sense of relief amongst opinion makers that we’re pulling off hosting the event. The dominant voice proclaims that we’ve proven everyone – meaning the prophets of doom – wrong.
When the idea of the World Cup bid was first mooted, the debate centred around what benefits it would bring to the country....
Glenn Ashton -
Rooibos is as uniquely South African as Champagne is French and Parmesan Italian. It should be one of our roaring success stories while providing a platform for the upliftment of its traditional owners, the indigenous people who introduced it to the colonialists from its home range of the Cederberg Mountains. But while the Rooibos market has grown over the years, indigenous emerging farmers remain largely marginalised and have yet to reap their just rewards.
Under apartheid a Rooibos tea...
Saliem Fakir -
While they may fight on the shop floor and often agree on little, in a rather strange twist of relations between business and the labour unions, they seem to agree on one key macro-economic policy issue, i.e., on the question of the rand’s value.
Both want a lower rand in order to boost the order books for our locally manufactured goods.
A joint statement by South Africa’s three top unions and manufacturers was issued on the 10 of May 2010. The statement called for...
Ebrahim-Khalil Hassen -
Do government departments pay any attention to what the auditor general recommends?
How our government manages its finances is an issue that always stirs up a huge amount of emotions and public debate. Unfortunately, for South Africans, improving public finance management adheres to the adage “one step forward, two steps back.”
Each year, the Auditor-General (AG) conducts an audit of the expenditure of government departments. Despite the fact that few departments receive wholly...
