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.
Andrew Rens -
Time to Take Another Look at Jospeh Stiglitz’s ‘Globalisation and its Discontents’
How does the International Monetary Fund (IMF) respond to liquidity crises? How does this affect people in developing countries? Joseph Stiglitz wrote Globalisation and its Discontents in 2002 to address these questions, questions that are more urgent than ever today, in the current global liquidity crises.
Appropriate responses to these crises is a central theme of the book, which makes it...
Fazila Farouk -
Nouveau environmentalists and the super rich are queuing up to fill their hybrid cars with ethanol blends. Agribusiness is selling its corn to the highest bidder while many millions around the world are being deprived of the right to eat.
It doesn’t seem to matter much that the production of corn-based ethanol releases more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than is actually gained by burning it as a fuel. In today’s world, the market dictates whether you eat grain or not --- and...
Jean Triegaardt -
The first decade of democratic dispensation in South Africa was hailed in many ways as an economic success. Macroeconomic stability was restored, the country’s debt level was reduced to internationally accepted norms, and the country attained an investment-grade credit rating. Growth was high in 2005, there were capital inflows and the rand was strong at that time. As a result of these achievements, economic growth and employment were finally beginning to increase, with observers, as...
Glenn Ashton -
Looking at the annual gathering of G8 leaders, one could be forgiven for believing that the real reason behind these meetings is to address global concerns. But it is not. The G8 is nothing more than a meeting where a great deal of political posturing takes place to present the image of a sympathetic west.
Phantom aid is a neat concept coined by Action Aid to describe the kind of aid given to the developing world by Western powers. Action Aid’s clarification of the flow of...
Sean Gonsalves -
My first-born graduated from high school a few weeks ago. Next month, she’ll be heading off to Clark University in Worcester. If all goes according to plan, she’ll have a master’s degree in five short years.
So, naturally, I’ve been thinking about the question adults ask up-and-coming young people all the time: What do you want to be when you grow up?
Ever notice that whenever a youngster is asked that question, the response is almost always the same? “I...
Fazila Farouk -
The current global crisis is being described to as the triple ‘F’ crisis of food, fuel and finance.
Nowhere is the crisis being felt more than among Africa’s poor. The rising price of food, in particular, is a topic that’s on everybody’s lips.
Even the BBC’s head of world news, Nick Gowing, chaired a session examining the food crisis at the recently held African leg of the World Economic Forum (WEF), where the usual suspects were rounded...
