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?
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Former Irish president Mary Robinson spoke on a panel about climate change this weekend at the COP16 climate conference in Cancún, Mexico. Robinson talked about the need for a global climate fund that will help poor people protect themselves from the growing threats of global warming.
Robinson recently launched the Mary Robinson Foundation–Climate Justice.
MARY ROBINSON: I believe that this is the biggest human rights issue of the 21st century, and I believe that...
How do moral revolutions occur? How, in today's world, can a universal moral stand bring an end to brutal and questionable social customs, such as honour killings and child marriages?
In trying to provide answers to these questions, Prof. Kwame Anthony Appiah who teaches philosophy at Princeton University explains how cruel and inhumane acts that once qualified as custom (such as slavery), collapsed when they were put under moral scrutiny.
When Appiah was conducting research...
Over the weekend, in Ireland thousands of people protested against austerity measures and against bearing the burden of the Irish crisis. Ireland's austerity program involves raising the sales tax or VAT to 23%. At the same time corporate tax is pegged at 12,5% and will not be raised.
Just how did the Irish miracle turn into the Irish nightmare?
Professor Leo Panitch at York University says Ireland arrived at this mess via the bust of the financial sector that Ireland didn't cause. It...
The whistleblowing website WikiLeaks has begun releasing a giant trove of confidential U.S. diplomatic cables that is sending shockwaves through the global diplomatic establishment. Among the findings: Arab leaders are urging the United States to attack Iran; Washington and Yemen agreed to cover up the use of U.S. warplanes to bomb Yemen; the United States is using its embassies around the world as part of a global spy network and asking diplomats to gather intelligence; and much more....
Wikipedia is the 7th most visited website in the world. The user-edited online encyclopaedia is not without controversy. Many academic institutions question the integrity of the information on the website. But that hasn’t stopped 78 million people around the world from visiting it on a monthly basis and using it as an information source.
So, who really edits Wikipedia articles?
Danese Cooper from Wikimedia describes the demographic that contributes to Wikipedia articles as...
S'bu Zikode of the South African shack dwellers' movement, Abahlali baseMjondolo, is interviewed by Laura Flanders of GRITtv. Zikode, hosted by US-based human rights organisations, is on tour in America building solidarity between the homeless of South Africa and America, and sharing knowledge about strategies to exercise the right to housing. Many Americans who lost their homes due to foreclosures as a result of the sub-prime mortgage crisis appear poorly advised about their housing rights....
