STWR - Share The World's Resources

Poor countries have fought hard for a UN summit on the financial crisis but rich countries prefer to control the world economy as the exclusive G8. It is no surprise that the UN fails to play an effective role in global governance when the richest countries prevent it from doing so, argues Nick Dearden.

Diplomats, NGOs and business groups met at the United Nations in May 2009 for the highest level forum on Sustainable Development. But what is the history of the Commission on Sustainable Development, and what is this forum designed to achieve? A backgrounder by STWR.

The G20 summit has provoked a mass mobilisation of campaigners for global justice, whose emerging coalitions may play a key role in shaping the politics of the post-crisis era. Some leading figures make their case.

Large NGO groups in the North often follow the tradition of Victorian philanthropy in their calls for charitable aid to the Global South. A better solution would be one of solidarity and the incorporation of Southern social movements into our calls for change, says James O’Nions.

The rapid spread of communication networks across the developing world, coupled with highly visible global inequality and economic downturn may foment 'a potential revolution of frustrated expectations' in 2009, argues Paul Rogers. 

The "alter-globalisation" movement gathers in Brazil at a moment of crisis in the system it has long opposed. But its triumph is qualified as it searches for a way to turn global breakdown into political opportunity, says Geoffrey Pleyers.

As the World Social Forum meets this week in the northern Brazilian Amazon jungle city of Belem, four analysts give their views on alternative solutions for the global crisis of capitalism now under way, the future of the WSF, and the need to 'propose' not just 'oppose'. Interviews by the Inter Press Service.