New Internationalist articles from August 2004

New Internationalist archives from August 2004

From this month's editor.(Editorial)
August 1, 2004... FROM the outset, we're in trouble. Why that word at all? Why not Yahweh or Allah? Or, for that matter, Rama, Shiva and fellow deities of the Hindu pantheon? Or a non-god like the Buddha? That's even before we get to the thorny issue of...

Sustainable co-ops.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... Hurrah for the return of the co-op! But why are they so successful, as your informative and inspiring June issue (NI 368) shows, not least in a competitive market place? It is not just that co-operation is superior to competition--both have...

A question of choice.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... Having been raised in a housing co-op for 16 years, I was especially interested to read about them. I was disappointed to see only a tiny portion of the magazine dedicated to this wonderful concept. I was further disappointed to see NI's...

Leftwing hang-ups.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... So prostitution is now fine--just as long as the 'sex workers' organize themselves into a self-empowering co-operative ('Sex workers with attitude', NI 368). And any reservations about it are instantly shot down as 'middle class morality' (boo...

GM crops.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... What's to be done to allow poor countries to be self-reliant rather than at the tender mercies of a largely Western world? GMOs developed to be hardier, more nutritious and productive may well be one answer to the problem. After reading...

Faults of the Kabilas.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... Re: 'The looting of the Congo', Wars for Africa's Wealth (NI 367). As someone who has spent two years in Rwanda, I would like to give the Rwandan version of what caused Laurent Kabila to turn from ally to enemy. Having arrived from Kinshasa...

Deaths not announced.(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... I avidly read Reem Haddad's column every month and greatly value her efforts to advance the road to normalization between Israel and Lebanon. However, I wish to take issue with one comment in the piece 'The way back' (Letter from Lebanon, NI...

More on Trotskyists ...(Letter to the Editor)
August 1, 2004... 1 In response to Worldbeaters (NI 367 and Letters NI 369) the 'enlightened' from around the world trotted out (no pun intended) the usual defences of their tired philosophy--working tirelessly for change, diversity within the movement,...

Torn in two: Reem Haddad on the half-lives of the foreign women whose children have been kidnapped by their Lebanese fathers.(Letter from Lebanon)
August 1, 2004... I STILL hear her news from time to time. She's still waiting. I first met Cecilia Castro six years ago. An agricultural engineer, she was working as a cook at the Mexican embassy. It was the only way she could stay in the country. The...

Highlighting the work of photographers from the Majority World.(Southern Exposure)(Brief Article)(Hotel Review)
August 1, 2004... This photograph shows the narrow passageway of a 'floating hotel' at the Shadarghat dockyard, Dhaka. A man locks the door of his room as he prepares to spend his vacation in his home district. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Discarded ships,...

Correction.(Correction Notice)
August 1, 2004... The image of Dhaka Zoo which appeared on this page in our May 2004 edition should have been credited to Iqbal Hossain. The text was by Faisal Ahmed Dadon.

The white curse.(Eduardo Galeano's View from the South)(Haiti's history )
August 1, 2004... On the first day of this year, freedom in this world turned 200. But no-one noticed, or almost no-one. A few days later the country where this birth occurred, Haiti, found itself in the media spotlight. Not for the anniversary of universal...

Rose Revolution ripple effect: oppostion on the march in Armenia.(Former Soviet Union)
August 1, 2004... WHEN Mikhail Saakashvili, the newly elected President of the Republic of Georgia, forced his way into Parliament last November, there were few analysts who didn't examine what impact Georgia's 'Rose Revolution' might have on neighbouring...

The non-renewable World Bank.(Currents)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... Environmentalists and development advocates are sceptical that the World Bank's recent announcement of support for renewable energy is anything but spin. The targets were announced as the first public Bank response to its Extractive Industries...

Adam porter's occasional column wades into the oilfields.(Currents)
August 1, 2004... Well, you read it here first. The NI is up for a prize from Sonoma University in California for its piece on oil depletion in Pipeline cowboys (NI 361). Oilisms was talking to a typical free market economist recently--in fact we can name...

Sri Lanka's press merry-go-round.(Currents)
August 1, 2004... Sri Lanka has just elected its 13th parliament and people are breathing a collective sigh of relief that the polls were relatively free of violence ('only' five political murders). But the dust never settles. The debate over the country's...

Paradise lost in the Maldives.(Currents)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... They call them the Paradise Islands but behind the white beaches and the palm trees lurks a darker reality. Tourists may be pampered but others in the Maldives are routinely murdered--by thugs working for the near-omnipotent President, Maumoon...

Speechmarks.(Currents)(Brief Article)(Illustration)
August 1, 2004... "I do not like this word 'bomb'. It is not a bomb. It is a device which is exploding." Jacques Le Blanc, French ambassador to New Zealand/Aotearoa, responding to criticisms of his country's nuclear tests in the Pacific, October 1995.

Poll/ballot.(Word Corner)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... Poll originally meant the human head and was later used for the counting of heads. Poll in the sense of voting dates from about 1600. Another early method of voting was putting stones or balls into a container. Ballot is from the Italian...

Dance with democracy: renewed US attempts to remove President Hugo Chavez from office.(Venezuela)
August 1, 2004... THE referendum to be held on 15 August in Venezuela on whether to oust Hugo Chavez from his Presidential office is the latest attempt by the US Administration and the corporate interests they represent to overthrow a truly popular democratic...

Seriously ... grey goo-lash.(Currents)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... The scientist who first warned that human-made self-replicating nanobots could theoretically run amok and turn the planet and everything on it into a 'grey goo', has recently tried to calm public fears of robotic Armageddon. Writing in the...

In the name of God: are violence and religion natural bedfellows? Vanessa Baird weighs the evidence.(Keynote)(Cover Story)
August 1, 2004... MY mother had a medical attitude towards religion. If you didn't give children a good dose of it early on they might catch a more extreme case later in life. I'm not sure that Catholicism is quite the vaccine I would have selected, given...

Let's get literal.
August 1, 2004... Dr Laura Schlesinger is a US broadcaster who dispenses advice to people who call her radio show. This is a letter from an appreciative listener. Dear Dr Laura Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's law. I have...

Who needs religion? Most people, in most times, in most cultures, it seems. David Boulton examines the persistent religious itch.(Anthropology)
August 1, 2004... THERE was a time, beginning around the 1850s and culminating perhaps in the 1920s, when it really did seem that the jig was up for organized religion--at least in the Western world. Poet Matthew Arnold had caught a whiff of its death in 1859...

Justice vs Vatican: while the Vatican hammers out its rightwing and authoritarian line, Brazil's 'red bishops' continue to plough a quite different furrow. Jan Rocha reports.(Social Justice)
August 1, 2004... DURING the worst years of Brazil's military dictatorship--from 1968 to 1978--over 120 bishops, priests and nuns and nearly 300 Catholic layworkers were arrested. Many were tortured. Seven clerics were murdered. Thirty bishops suffered death...

Alive & kicking: the facts; Despite rumours to the contrary religious faith is thriving in the world today. And its relation to violence and warfare is as hotly contested as ever.
August 1, 2004... Faith in numbers [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Christianity is the religion with the largest following in the world. Islam is the fastest growing. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] CHRISTIANITY: 2 billion ISLAM: 1.3 billion HINDUISM:...

Why? Psychotherapist Robert M Young examines the motives for religious extremism.(Psychology)
August 1, 2004... IN the 1920s the term 'fundamentalism' was first coined to refer to the Protestant denominations and sects in the US who advocated the return to what they claimed were the 'fundamentals' of their faith. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] They...

On the street: Shaista Aziz examines what's inciting young Western Muslims.(Psychology)
August 1, 2004... I'M a 28-year-old Muslim woman, educated, professional and part of mainstream British society. In 2002, I packed my bags and headed for the occupied Palestinian territories to participate in jihad. I was motivated by my strong belief in Islam...

Saving the secular: in recent elections Indian voters kicked out the ruling Hindu nationalist BJP. But does that mean the country's constitutional secularism is no longer in danger? Sadanand Menon checks its pulse.(Secularism)
August 1, 2004... A FEW weeks ago, in Paris, I was privileged to be present at the emotional reunion of two long-time friends--the legendary photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson and Chandralekha, India's most provocative contemporary choreographer. He, 95; she,...

Suffer little children: religion is not always on the side of the angels, suggests Marilyn Mason.(Education)
August 1, 2004... EVERYWHERE, children's rights are disregarded and childhood is threatened by poverty, war and disease. Religions too often misuse their power and add to children's problems. Of course, the secular world fails children too. But religion does...

God: the unauthorized biography.
August 1, 2004... 1 In the beginning... Creating gods is something humans have probably always done. The human search for 'God' began long before the invention of writing. We know this because archaeologists have recovered artefacts from Palaeolithic...

Mixing it: as part of her BBC radio series Devout Sceptics Bel Mooney interviewed novelists Ben Okri and Amy Tan. They talk here of their eclectic spirituality and how bereavement affected their beliefs.(Devout Scepticism)
August 1, 2004... I WAS born in the north of Nigeria, but my father and mother are from the mid-west of Nigeria. I came to London around the age of a year and a half. I was here until about seven. While here I lived, in spiritual terms, on three levels. School...

Worldbeaters ... taking aim at the rich and powerful.(Maria Livanos Cattaui, Secretary General of the International Chamber of Commerce )
August 1, 2004... 'THE events of 11 September are likely to have a short- to medium-term effect on the costs for business,' said Maria Livanos Cattaui just a few weeks after the events in 2001. She was responding to a question about how they might impact on her...

The Story of the Weeping Camel.(MixedMedia)(Movie Review)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... The Story of the Weeping Camel directed by Byambasuren Davaa and Luigi Falorni The story is simple. A camel, after a difficult labour, rejects its calf, which faces slow starvation. The herders' techniques to get the mother's...

My Architect.(MixedMedia)(Movie Review)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2004... My Architect directed by Nathaniel Kahn Nathaniel Kahn hardly knew his father, Louis Kahn, one of the last century's greatest architects. My Architect records the 'illegitimate' Nathaniel's pursuit of a man who never publicly...

List of Lights and Buoys.(MixedMedia)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
August 1, 2004... List of Lights and Buoys by Susanna and the Magical Orchestra (Rune Grammofon RCD 2034 CD) The murmured lyrics of the song sound so familiar, but it's played at such a slow speed and with so subtle an electronic accompaniment, that...

Seeds of Deception: Exposing corporate and government lies about the safety of genetically modified food.(MixedMedia)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
August 1, 2004... Seeds of Deception Exposing corporate and government lies about the safety of genetically modified food by Jeffrey M Smith (Yes! Books in North America/Green Books in Britain ISBN 1 903998 41 7) I should admit that I was...

The Battle of Venezuela.(MixedMedia)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
August 1, 2004... The Battle of Venezuela by Michael McCaughan (Latin America Bureau, ISBN 1 899365 62 1) There never has been much good writing in English--rather than in translation--about Latin America. To add to a small number of exceptions to...

Somalia: The Untold Story; The war through the eyes of Somali women.(MixedMedia)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
August 1, 2004... Somalia: The Untold Story The war through the eyes of Somali women edited by Judith Gardner and Judy El Bushra (CIIR and Pluto Press, ISBN 0 7453 2208 5) The work of Judith Gardner and Judy El Bushra in bringing this book to...

Attac! Another World is Possible.(MixedMedia)(Video Recording Review)
August 1, 2004... Attac! Another World is Possible by Various (%Attac! UWE 156 CD) Here's an album that embodies contradiction. Indeed, Another World wears it in the form of a bar-coded atlas--right on its very handsome sleeve. [ILLUSTRATION...

The NI prize crossword.(Big Bad World / NI Crossword)
August 1, 2004... Win a copy of the latest World Guide reference book... All correct solutions received by the 25th of the cover month will be put into a draw--though only the winner will be notified. Post your entry to NI Crossword, 55 Rectory Road, Oxford,...

Interview with David Hartsough: co-founder of the Nonviolent Peaceforce.(Making Waves)(Interview)
August 1, 2004... THE country is Guatemala. The year is 1985. Since 1978, the military machine (built with help from the US) has indiscriminately killed as many as 100,000 Guatemalans. Their bodies have been found piled up in ravines, dumped at roadsides or...

In the shadow of the torturer: human rights are being violated in Bangladesh with scarcely a whisper from the West. Jeremy Seabrook argues that the country's history has combined with the methods of the 'war on terror' to produce a lethal cloud of concealment.(Essay)
August 1, 2004... THE images of the soldiery of deliverance torturing prisoners in Iraq have cast long shadows. That the US, triumphal bearer of universal values, should have abused detainees, signals to authoritarian governments that the persecution of enemies...

Iran.(Country Profile)
August 1, 2004... IRAN is not blessed with the loveliest of capitals. Architecturally undistinguished to begin with, Tehran, a vast, sprawling city of 12 million people, is the archetypal Majority World metropolis. Its streets, showing little sign of either...