New Internationalist articles from November 2002

New Internationalist archives from November 2002

The other America.(Brief Article)(Editorial)
November 1, 2002... ALMOST everyone--including. A Americans--has their own 'America'. Or, to put it another way, imagine how hard it would be not to have one at all. You would need to suppose that you had never encountered the blues or blue jeans, never...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2002... Benefits of GM Why do anti-GM campaigners such as Jordi Pigem ('Barcoding Life', Patents on Life, NI 349 always pass over the real and potential benefits of GM? I love nature and care about development as much as he does, but do not share...

Seeking Hemalatha. (Letter from Lebanon).(Sri Lankan domestic missing in Lebanon)
November 1, 2002... Reem Haddad encounters the underbelly of domestic servitude in Lebanon My first inclination was to turn them down. Searching for a missing woman was rather beyond my means as a local reporter. But the officials at the Sri Lankan embassy...

Southern exposure: highlighting the work of photographers from the majority world.(Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... AT the height of the civil war in Sri Lanka, I was returning to Colombo from the front lines, bone tired, numb and sick of the war. Although had been to Sri Lanka dozens of times by then, I had never stopped at Anuradhapura, that holy site of...

A narrow victory. (Ike Oguine's View from the South).(Malawi, democracy in Africa)
November 1, 2002... RECENTLY the Malawian Parliament, by only three votes, defeated an attempt by President Bakili Muluzi to change the country's constitution. The change would have allowed Muluzi to run for a third term in office. Many Africans far beyond...

Quest for support: conflict over but catastrophe looming. (Madagascar).
November 1, 2002... THIS year has been one of major upheaval in Madagascar. A civil crisis followed the December 2001 presidential elections, when official results presented no majority winner. The main contenders were Didier Ratsiraka, the incumbent President,...

Clean water from the sun. (Currents).(from Appropriate Technology, Vol 29 No 2)(Brief Article)(Reprint)
November 1, 2002... Solar disinfection of water is beautifully simple. All you need is tropical sunshine, a plastic bottle full of water and some patience. The GATE / Small-Scale Project Fund is pioneering solar water disinfection in Sri Lanka. Transparent plastic...

NASA's climate warning. (Current).(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... If George Bush won't listen to the environmentalists, will he listen to NASA? Pressure is mounting on President Bush to take effective action on climate change after a report led by space agency NASA warned that failure to take action could be...

Trading away the Americas. (Currents).(Free Trade Area of the Americas)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), currently being negotiated by 34 countries of the Americas, is intended to be the most far-reaching trade agreement in history. Based on the model of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA),...

Brazilians say no. (Currents).(to Free Trade Area of hte Americas)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... Approximately 98 per cent of the 10.1 million people who responded to a survey conducted at the beginning of September in 3,894 municipalities throughout Brazil gave a resounding 'no' to the question: 'Should the Brazilian Government sign the...

Cancun or bust. (Currents).(World Trade Organization meeting, September 2003, Cancun, Mexico)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... There were those who feared that the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg last September would mark not two steps forward towards saving the earth, but three steps back. Green campaigners fought long and hard against the...

Shampoo. (Word Corner).(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... Shampoo is from the Hindi, meaning to press or knead, and entered English in the 1760s with the original meaning of 'massage', especially as part of a Turkish bath. Shampooing the hair dates from the mid-1800s. The Turkish bath or hammam gets...

Rats' reward: Colombia's new President bribes his people to inform on one another. (Human Rights).(President Alvaro Uribe )
November 1, 2002... RINCON and his men are bleary-eyed. They were part of a dawn raid on the unsuspecting village of Vallejuelos, northeast of Medellin, which now lies strangely silent below the cliff face where we chat. It seems the higher the altitude here, the...

Seriously: you couldn't make this stuff up.(eyeball team work training)(Brief Article)
November 1, 2002... Corporate executives 'Are you looking for a different team-development programme that does not include the old fashioned physical endurance and macho activities? Then undoubtedly eyeball training is for you. By its nature eyeball will...

Erratum.(Correction Notice)
November 1, 2002... Sorry. There was a production error in the text in the September edition of NI (349). The authors of the article on page 6 entitled 'Desperate escape' were not (as published) Nicolette Jackson and Sean Healy. Rather, the article was an edited...

The other America Tucson or not Tucson.(political issues and activism in Tucson, Arizona)
November 1, 2002... Nowhere is entirely typical of the United States, and nowhere less so than the American archetypes themselves--Hollywood, Washington DC and Wall Street. So how about Tucson, Arizona? David Ransom tells a tale of two very different cities in...

Rolling Thunder.(Rolling Thunder Downhome Democracy tour in Tucson, Arizona)
November 1, 2002... The Rolling Thunder Downhome Democracy (RTD2) tour is inspired by the Chautauqua movement, which was founded in New York State in 1874. People would get together for several days of education, inspiration and enjoyment. By the early 20th...

Time theft. (The Other America/Women).(low-wage labor)
November 1, 2002... No, it's not science fiction--just one of the things that happen to low-paid women. Journalist Barbara Ehrenreich went behind the scenes to discover what it's like to work full-time and still earn poverty-level wages. IT all started with...

The other America: the facts.(political issues and statistics)
November 1, 2002... MOST AMERICANS FACE VERY MUCH THE SAME SORT OF DIFFICULTIES AS EVERYONE ELSE AMERICANS ALSO HAVE SOME PROBLEMS ALL THEIR OWN INEQUALITY Divisions of wealth and power have reached unprecedented levels in America. While wages and...

Freedom dreams. (The Other America/Race).(adapted from 'Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination')
November 1, 2002... The search for liberation has taken Robin Kelley from battered Harlem to William Morris, the Surrealists, radical feminists of color and young activists for global justice--but he still wants Bootsy. My mother has a tendency to dream out...

Yes we can! (The Other America/Labour).
November 1, 2002... Mark Engler argues that immigrant-driven campaigns at the grassroots plus a dose of 'new internationalism' are key to reviving the US labor movement. IT'S 1 December 1999, just one day after tens of thousands of union members joined...

Oh no you don't! (The Other America/Education).(resistance to 'school choice' in New York)
November 1, 2002... The long-established system of free public education is under siege across the US. but parents, teachers and students don't want their schools sold off. Matthew Reiss reports on the resistance to 'school choice' in New York. THE dining...

Great American rebels: true originals abound in a country that has much to thank them for--here is just a sample of them.
November 1, 2002... 1. Daniel Shays (1747-1825) A VETERAN of the Revolution who fought at Lexington, Bunker Hill and Saratoga, Shays resigned from the Continental Army in 1780 after not being paid. He returned to his small farm in western Massachusetts. Here,...

The other America is America. (The Other America/Conclusion).(dissent)
November 1, 2002... Having taken us to Tucson and introduced us to an alternative America not often appreciated by the outside world, David Ransom reflects on the empire's imperial dreams. What looks like perpetual war on the rest of the world, he argues, is also...

Ralph Klein. (Worldbeaters).(Premier of Alberta, Canada)
November 1, 2002... THE pundits call him King Ralph--in the western Canadian province of Alberta, Ralph Klein can do no wrong. He's a right-wing prairie populist with a streetfighter's instincts. The 60-year-old ex-journalist has been the oil-rich province's...

Bitter Eden. (Mixed Media).(Book Review)
November 1, 2002... by Tatamkhulu Afrika (Arcadia, ISBN 1900850 70 2) The story behind this novel is so extraordinary that there is a danger the book itself will be marginalized. Born in Egypt in 1920 and brought up in South Africa, Tatamkhulu Afrika wrote a...

Anita and me. (Mixed Media).(Movie Review)
November 1, 2002... directed by Metin Huseyin The early 19705 in Tollington, a one-time mining village in Britain's industrial midlands. Meena is nine years old, feisty and rebellious. Every other family is white and Meena wants to be like the other kids: she...

No Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of Women. (Mixed Media).(Book Review)
November 1, 2002... by Estelle B Freedman (Profile Books ISBN 186 197 345-4) This is a very thorough account of women's struggles. Starting with women's position in society in prehistoric times it moves through the centuries and across the globe, from...

Yusa. (Mixed Media).(Sound Recording Review)
November 1, 2002... by Yusa (Tumi Music TUMI 112 CD) 'Yusa is living proof,' announce the sleeve-notes to the debut album from the young singer, 'that not everyone in Cuba is making music like their grandaddy!' Ouch. But there is a point to be made:...

The A to Z of Postmodern Life: Essays on Global Culture in the Noughties. (Mixed Media).(Book Review)
November 1, 2002... by Ziauddin Sardar (Vision, ISBN I 904132 03 0) I don't think I am postmodern. Some days I'm not even sure if I qualify as modern. I tried to approach this book in a suitably ironic way, zapping (chapter 34) and browsing and reading...

The Democracy Owners' Manual. (Mixed Media).(Book Review)
November 1, 2002... by Jim Shultz (Rutgers University Press ISBN o 8135 3038 5) Subtitled 'a practical guide to changing the world', Jim Shultz (better-known to NI readers in recent months for his dispatches from Cochabamba, Bolivia) has created here the...

Nommo. (Mixed Media).(Sound Recording Review)
November 1, 2002... by Slovo (Ruff Life RLCD-o8 CD) Anyone who maintains that rock music has lost its political edge would be advised to check out Nommo, an album that balances passion with deft musical dexterity and still never loses sight of twin goals:...

Making waves: interview with Owens Wiwa.(brother of Ken Saro-Wiwa, Nigeria)(Interview)
November 1, 2002... Dr. Owens Wiwa talked to Katharine Ainger 'We all stand before history. I and my colleagues are not the only ones on trial. Shell is here on trial... its day will surely come.' Eight years after the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, his...

Asia's eco-guerrillas: choosing your battle is important for activists in Asia. Mike Levin sums up the state of the region's environmental movement. (Essay).
November 1, 2002... It's been six years since the canal beside Paiboon Chusakul's house in southern Bangkok burst into flames, five years since his mother and sister started getting strange headaches and four years since Pai, under the cover of darkness, committed...

Kiribati. (Country Profile).
November 1, 2002... KIRIBATI not only straddles the equator but was also until recently divided by the international dateline, leaving only three shared working days between the two time zones: Mondays east of the dateline were Sundays in the capital, and Fridays...