To contribute to a broader public understanding of the present state of climate science, a series of factsheets clearly set out the evidence for anthropogenic global warming and its interaction with various climatic events, such as wildfires, droughts and flooding. By the Public Research Interest Centre.
A United Nations report slams 30 years of global
policies and ineffective recent austerity measures, arguing that reducing the widening gap between the rich and
poor is not only necessary for social justice, but is also a precondition for sound economic growth. By UNCTAD.
Contrary to the incessant mantra of economists, politicians, and
media pundits, economic growth is not the solution to what ails us. Our
prime need is for a more intelligent distribution of the wealth we
have—giving social and environmental returns priority over financial
returns, argues David Korten.
Financial experts, warning of future crises, call for re-affirming
finance as a global commons, first recognized at Bretton Woods in 1945. The
Transforming Finance group, as beneficiaries and active participants in
global capital markets, affirm their responsibility to reform
finance in a signed statement.
The corporate cabal behind a new trade agreement including Cargill,
Pfizer, Nike and WalMart, has done an exceptional job of maintaining an
almost total lack of transparency as they literally design the future we
will all inhabit, writes Laurel Sutherlin.
Living simply in a consumer society isn't easy, hence a new book brings many learning tools together
in one place so that educators who want to share the rewards and
potentials of simple living with others may have some grist for their
own creative mills. By Mark A. Burch.
If a proposal from Magdalena Sepúlveda - special rapporteur on human rights and extreme poverty - is approved by the United Nations Human Rights Council this month, eradicating poverty shall not only be a moral duty, but a legal
obligation, acccording to Roberto Bissio.
The Commission of Experts of the UN General Assembly President
in 2009, chaired by the Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz,
presented its report to the UN but little of its recommendations were
followed up. Below is an extract of a paper that summarises and comments
on the Commission’s report, by Yash Tandon.
If people cannot freely use the public
and supposedly “common” spaces of the city, then it is critical that
movements emerge to liberate those common spaces for their
participation. Such movements can provide a vital opening for a broader
common politics, explains David Harvey in an interview with Chris Carlsson.
In a declaration from the GCGI's 10th
Annual Conference, 'Sharing the Wisdom, Shaping the
Dream: Reclaiming the Moral and Spiritual Roots of Economics and
Capitalism', a
group of activists, economists, academics and members of the business
community unanimously agreed on the urgent need to create an equitable
and sustainable world for the common good of all.
