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?
Richard Pithouse -
In recent weeks the centre of the unstable and diverse social ferment that has been bubbling and boiling at the base of South African society since at least 2004 has shifted to Cape Town. People have often remarked that the conflict on the slopes of the Sentinel in Hout Bay, in which four people lost their eyes to rubber bullets fired by the police, has evoked the past.
But our cities are the most unequal in the world and many of our people are holding firmly to the promise of inclusion in a...
Saliem Fakir -
Two more passenger “fast-train” routes are being mooted, one between Johannesburg and Durban and the other from Johannesburg to the north of the country.
Ordinary citizens may wonder if we need to spend scarce money on new rail infrastructure. Is South Africa’s money not better spent on improving freight rail that could take lots of trucks off our roads by transporting goods safely and easily to and from our harbours? And what about public transport for the poor?
Have we...
The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to jailed Chinese human rights activist, Liu Xiaobo, has raised tension between China and the West.
Xiabo advocates for human rights, freedom of expression and democracy in China and his activism has resulted in an 11-year jail sentence for what has been described as "subversion" by the Chinese government.
The Nobel Peace Committee, awarded Xiabo the peace prize for using non-violence to demand human rights, raising China's ire....
Walden Bello -
The problem with us progressives as this time of crisis is not that we lack an alternative paradigm to pit against the discredited neoliberal paradigm. No, the elements of the alternative based on the values of democracy, justice, equality, and environmental sustainability are there and have been there for sometime, the product of collective intellectual and activist work over the last few decades.
The key problem is the failure of progressives to translate their vision and values into a...
Militant protests have erupted across Europe over governments' austerity programmes. The European population is angered that they are being forced to pay for a crisis that they did not create.
The news that jobs would be cut, pensions frozen and wages lowered, fired up the masses in Europe. Europeans have overcome their cultural and language differences in a common struggle against austerity programmes.
In a historic event, coordinated strikes and demonstrations have occurred in...
Liepollo Pheko -
“History will be kind to me for I intend to write it,” Winston Churchill said during World War II.
A few weeks ago, the orgy of grief that accompanied the commemoration of 9/11 in the United States was televised across our television screens. It was replete with scenes of the fallen men and women and their grieving families and compatriots. It was human and dignified and even those of us who reject the ensuing War on Terror could understand and share in that loss and the grief....
