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?
Saliem Fakir -
Oil has become the bedrock of South Africa’s economy. But our economy is highly dependent on foreign imports of oil. About 60% of our transport fuel comes from overseas imports of crude, most of it from the volatile Middle East.
Recent and on-going upheavals in North Africa have had a marked effect on oil prices. Oil is now trading at just above US$120 a barrel. This is of concern because a 10% increase in the oil price can lead to a drop in GDP of as much as 0.5%.
The...
Anonymous, or Anon, is a movement made up of a number of nameless internet activists from around the world.
For many, the 'hacktivist' group has become the face of the new cyber-war against oppressive governments and all-powerful corporates.
Others say the group's actions are reckless.
Describing itself as "the freedom of speech, the freedom of information and the freedom of expression taken to a logical extreme," Anon says it breaks laws, but only for the greater good.
Al...
Dale T. McKinley -
Local government in South Africa, like many of our country’s mining operations, is in deep trouble. The slow but sure exhaustion of mineral-bearing seams, the insufficient and crumbling underground infrastructure and the exploitative extraction-at-all-costs mentality that so negatively characterises our mining sector can all be (metaphorically) applied to that level of government which resides at the coalface of our democracy. The resultant and ongoing crisis, for both, has long been in...
Glenn Ashton -
The potential presence of natural gas deep beneath the surface of the Karoo has triggered a national hullabaloo. It is not the gas itself that is controversial; it is the proposed method of liberating it in commercially viable quantities, which has everybody up in arms.
If you asked most South Africans around the Xmas table last year what fracking was, you would probably have been met with blank stares. Now, because of applications by Shell Exploration, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, for...
It is 2011 and a man is still more likely to earn more money than a woman, even while doing the same job. Every year 70 million girls are deprived of getting an education and a staggering 60 million are sexually assaulted on their way to school.
In support of the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day, which took place on 8 March 2011, James Bond star, Daniel Craig, dresses up as a woman in this short film that will be screened in cinemas and streamed online to highlight persistent...
When filmmaker Josh Fox was offered a hundred thousand dollars to lease his land for natural gas drilling, he embarked on a cross-country journey across the US to find out more about the practice of hydraulic fracturing. He discovered communities devastated by fracking.
Fox documented his findings in the Oscar nominated documentary Gasland, which also won the Special Jury Prize for Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival.
It's been reported that the industry aggressively attacked the...
