2008 United Nations Year of Languages
7000 world languages. 6 official UN languages. 127 official languages of UN member states The year 2008 has been declared by the UN as the International Year of Languages, in the hope t give more publicity and raise awareness about dying-out languages and universal communication. Exactly this diversity in languages can also form huge obstacles...
Connecting the dots
Complexity thinking and social development By Alan Fowler. How are societies ‘developed’? For years, international aid has failed to provide a convincing answer. This article offers a potential path to improving both aid performance and development in a broader sense. Read more at The Broker…. Related items HOME: It’s Too Late To Be A Pessimist...
10 Stories the World Should Know More About
From the hidden world of stateless people to the often overlooked advances in malaria protection to the steps taken to bring peace after separate conflicts in southern Sudan and Uganda, the United Nations Department of Public Information (DPI) has compiled its fourth annual list of stories it believes deserve greater public and media attention. “Ten...
There’s a Problem up Ahead but We Don’t Change Anything
 Is global warming now irreversible? Climate science maverick James Lovelock believes it is and that catastrophe is inevitable. His reason, (in The Guardian) ‘I see it with everybody. People just want to go on doing what they’re doing. They want business as usual. They say, ‘Oh yes, there’s going to be a problem up...
Kosova and Albania: history, people, identity
The creation of an independent Kosovar state highlights the singular relationship between the Albanians of this former Yugoslav territory and their cousins in the Republic of Albania. The scholar and translator Robert Elsie reflects on a turbulent, unfinished history. Read more at openDemocracy… or take a look at the BalkanInsight website… Related items HOME: It’s...
The Clash of Peoples
Americans generally belittle the role of ethnic nationalism in politics. But in fact, it corresponds to some enduring propensities of the human spirit, it is galvanized by modernization, and in one form or another, it will drive global politics for generations to come. Once ethnic nationalism has captured the imagination of groups in a multiethnic...
Jacqueline Novogratz: Tackling poverty with ‘patient capital’
Jacqueline Novogratz is pioneering new ways of tackling poverty. In her view, traditional charity rarely delivers lasting results. Her solution, outlined here through a series of revealing personal stories, is “patient capital”: support for “bottom of the pyramid” businesses which the commercial market alone couldn’t provide. The result: sustainable jobs, goods, services — and dignity...
Articles by Christopher Baan / Developing Countries / Globalization & Global Culture / Society / Sustainable Development / World
Doen WIJ genoeg voor een betere wereld?
- This article will soon be published in English, too. Sorry for your inconvenience. - Ondernemend idealisme voor een échte verandering. Het huidige praktisch idealisme is voorbij. Een veranderende samenleving vraagt om een nieuw idealisme en nieuwe ideologieën. Ik pleit hieronder voor een nieuw soort idealisme, wat mijns inziens een duurzamer karakter heeft en meer...
Developing Countries / Globalization & Global Culture / Politics & International Relations / Society / Sustainable Development / World
26,500
Around the world, some 26,500 children die every day. That is equivalent to: 1 child dying every 3 seconds 18 children dying every minute A 2004 Asian Tsunami occurring every week An Iraq-scale death toll every 15–36 days Almost 10 million children dying every year Some 60 million children dying between 2000 and 2006 The...
New Idealism
(By Farid Tabarki) Just a few years ago Dutch youngsters were seen as lazy, disconnected from society and media junkies. The Dutch Coolpolitics Foundation was founded because it knew better. By undertaking several projects in line with giving a platform to the rise of ‘new idealism’ amongst young people in the Netherlands youngsters are not...
Beyond abstract solidarity
[Open Democracy] James Mensch asks us to be careful of easy generalisations about “solidarity”. Is it necessarily exclusionary? or grounded in the past, the tribe? No, when we examine the lived examples of solidarity, we find a diversity of practices and habits that is not easily reducible to grand theorising. In our increasingly interdependent world,...
Who will be the Person of the Year 2007?
OneWorld.net provides its own selection of people who made the difference in 2007 in the field of international co-operation, human rights, environment, development or justice. Along them are brights minds such as Rajendra Pachaury/ the IPCC, The Burmese Monks, the $100 laptop designers and Vandana Shiva. Here’s the finalist overview…Â You can even cast your...
