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?
On June 21, 50,000 people marched through central London from the BBC's New Broadcasting House in central London to Westminster protesting against austerity measures introduced by the UK's coalition government. Comedian Russell Brand addressed the demonstration organised by the People’s Assembly. He argued, "In the week that followed the 9/11 attacks, the bank account of every person that was involved in Al Qaeda was frozen. Their assets were frozen and taken away. Why are these...
Glenn Ashton -
A remarkable thing is happening in the world of economics. Dissatisfied students from various institutions around the world insist that the dominant economics curriculum must change, as it inadequately reflects, or deals with, our current economic realities. They clearly realise that real change occurs from within.
These students demand changes that not only reflect our post-2008 economic crash world, but further insist that the entire theoretical economics framework and curriculum be...
Both mainstream and leftist economists are heaping praises on French economist, Thomas Piketty's book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century. In his review of the book, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman argues, "The big idea of (the book) is that we haven't just gone back to 19th-century levels of income inequality, we're also on a path back to "patrimonial capitalism," in which the commanding heights of the economy are controlled…by family dynasties...This is a book...
Since 1970 global economic growth has quadrupled and is set to quadruple again by 2050. Economic growth is doing extremely well and yet there are some things that aren’t coming along with it. There is more deprivation, increased environmental degradation and growing inequality in the world. So what should economies be aimed at? Politicians are hung up on keeping the growth curve rising. But does GDP really tell us all we need to know about a country's wealth and well-being? In this...
Gilad Isaacs -
It has become commonplace for South African policymakers, business leaders and pundits, to extoll the virtues of South Africa’s “world-class” financial system. Indeed, in post-apartheid South Africa the financial sector has grown at almost double the rate of the economy as a whole. Before we applaud such dynamism we must consider whether the greatly expanded role of finance in our economy helps or hinders our ability to tackle the enormous developmental challenges we face....
Saliem Fakir -
Ask anybody what a market is and they will describe a creature that is self-moving, mythic and almost machine like as its engine drives the economy to a state of equilibrium.
Often this machine-like description fosters the erroneous idea that the market is something that can be calibrated or recalibrated with the turn of a switch.
Adam Smith referred to the ‘invisible hand’ where individual agency within the market wonderfully produces a set of relations, exchanges and...
