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?
Maeve McKeown -
In this, the year of renewed British patriotism, with a recent Royal wedding, the Olympics and the Queen’s Jubilee, a troubling truth has raised its head. Three elderly Kenyans are pressing claims against the British government for the torture they were subjected to under colonial rule. Apart from upsetting 2012’s patriotic apple cart, the Mau Mau court case raises complex questions about responsibility for colonial injustice, with potentially far-reaching implications....
Speaking at the Biennial International World Aids Conference being hosted in Washington DC this week (attended by 20,000 people), US Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton predicted that we could be looking forward to an AIDS free generation -- apparently because the suppression of the virus is proving successful in developed nations. There has also been talk that a cure for AIDS is imminent. But justice of the South African Constitutional Court, Edwin Cameron, who has been living with HIV for 27...
"South Africa is a complete global outlier in terms of its inequality and how inequality has been persistent over time," says Sandeep Mahajan, World Bank lead economist for South Africa. The bank has developed a Human Opportunity Index, which it has started applying for the first time in the country. According to the Word Bank, the factor that matters most in a child's ability to advance in South Africa is his/her "location" with respect to access to opportunities and...
Anneli Rufus -
Asking friends for loans is like asking them for sex: Whatever happens, the relationship will never be the same again.
At this point in history, money holds such massive emotional baggage that asking "Can I have some of yours for a while?" or "Will I ever get it back?" are some of life's weightier questions.
And now, we the people -- underwater, unemployed and terrified -- are forced ever more into the position of borrowing and lending among...
One of the biggest banks in the US, Wells Fargo, has agreed to pay $175m to settle allegations it charged higher mortgage rates and fees to Black and Latino customers. Discriminatory lending practices in the banking industry left Black and Latino neighbourhoods blighted by foreclosures after the housing bubble burst.
A government investigation found tens of thousands of cases of African Americans and Hispanics being charged more than White customers with similar credit profiles. The...
Glenn Ashton -
All over the world the youngest, historically most employable sector of society is struggling to find secure employment. In China an estimated one third of college graduates are unable to get work. In Spain and Greece unemployment amongst the youth has risen above 50%. In South Africa it is possibly higher than this, even amongst high school leavers.
The elitist World Economic Forum termed the trend “a social and economic time bomb.” The impacts are exemplified by the Arab...
