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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Scott Thill -
"I don't consider this an environmentalist point of view; I'm just a human who is scared shitless of the future," says the director of the new film "Patagonia Rising."
Set in South America's breathtaking Andes landscape, the visually sweeping new documentary Patagonia Rising bills itself as a frontier story of water and power. But both its frontier and its story nevertheless belong to anyone on the planet that needs water to live.
We are countless compared to the...
Peter Certo -
One of the most resonant details from The New York Times’ recent feature on the Obama administration’s targeted killing program is the president’s apparent fondness for the writings of Thomas Aquinas and Augustine of Hippo, two early Christian thinkers who attempted to reconcile the pacifist teachings of Christ with the compromises that leaders must make in their inherently violent line of work. The president, it is suggested, strives to wage a “just war” against...
Fazila Farouk -
The messages of gloom and doom have been out there for some time now. Just about every other commentator is pronouncing on an impending failure of outcome for the Rio+20 Summit on sustainable development being hosted in Brazil this week.
We are being told to temper our expectations. A colleague of mine has gone so far as to suggest that Rio+20 could be signalling the end of all big summits. To be sure, talk shop fatigue must certainly be settling into the weary bones of diplomats and...
Michael Ratner, a member of Julian Assange's legal team, talks about Assange's application for political asylum in Ecuador.
Assange's legal team argue that if he is taken to Sweden, he will be imprisoned immediately and held in communicado at which point they fear the Americans will ask for his extradition to the US. There's no chance for him to make a bid for political asylum once he is extradited to Sweden, argues Ratner.
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President Obama has unveiled a new US strategy for Africa. The strategy promises to strengthen democracy and encourage economic growth through trade and investment. Though the strategy does mention the importance of countering al Qaeda across the continent, there is no mention of the role of the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM), which was established in 2007 under George W Bush.
Yet, under the Obama presidency the US has expanded its military footprint and its secret intelligence...
Anna Majavu -
Increased police brutality and the prospect of conservative politicians using public money to sue and bankrupt organizations they ideologically oppose - these are the likely outcomes of last week’s Constitutional Court judgment against protest organisers.
In a judgment which upheld a repressive clause in the apartheid-era 1993 Regulation of Gatherings Act, Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng ruled that members of the public who suffer damages from protestors have the right to recoup their...
