Neoliberal sanitation experts attending the Toilet Summit may well argue that the world cannot afford flush toilets for everyone. But the alternatives they propose are failing.
Like Berlin in 1884-85, the BRICS Durban summit is expected to carve up Africa more efficiently, unburdened – now as then – by what will be derided as 'Western' concerns about democracy and human rights.
There are important lessons for South Africa from the hurricane that hit America last week. But nobody in officialdom is ready to admit the dangers posed especially to the Port of Durban.
How long can the amazing upsurge of class struggle in South Africa go on? Living here 22 years, I’ve never witnessed such a period of vibrant, explosive, but uncoordinated worker militancy.
Forget all the rhetoric. Increased access to oil, imposition of pro-corporate economic policy, hostility to China and attempts to gain cooperation in the ‘War on Terror’ are the most important factors in US foreign policy on Africa. The November elections won’t change that.
South Africa suffers from far too many activists who promote a localist ideology that begins and ends with the municipal councillor, city manager or mayor. There are too many turf-conscious leaders who look inward, failing to think globally while acting locally.
The secretive Bilderbergers aren’t normally a protest magnet. But last weekend, protesters hurled creative abuse at the black limousines rolling past towards the Chantilly Marriott Hotel.
Would the Bank dare practice what it preaches about ending ‘inefficient’ subsidization, given how it amplifies irrational power relations when maintaining the world’s largest fossil-fuel financing portfolio?
The sickening signs of Kim’s retreat in the face of power were unmistakeable beginning in early April, just after his nomination was announced by Obama.
