In The News

The Fate of ‘Made in the USA’

Robert J. Samuelson October 28, 2005
The specter of declining industry has loomed over the USA in recent years. As the imperatives of free trade and globalization send jobs and factories across borders and beyond oceans, the American worker and the American CEO both recognize they’re in a bind. American manufacturing, once the hallmark of the nation’s booming business, now faces a tenuous future. Robert J. Samuelson, writing for...

Dodging the Curse of Diamonds and Gold

Desha Girod August 11, 2005
As the G-8 unveiled an ambitious plan to lift Africa from the mire of debt and double foreign aid, a debate concerning the efficacy of aid has re-emerged. Many critics contend that additional aid money will merely benefit the corrupt leaders of a troubled continent, rather than support the reforms those nations sorely need. Desha Girod counters that, in certain circumstances, aid can be highly...

America’s Truth Deficit

William Greider July 18, 2005
With countless jobs moving overseas and a growing trade deficit amounting to 25 percent of GDP, the United States today is losing ground in global competition and becoming more dependent on its strategic rivals. Leaders in politics, business, finance, and the news media have long been reluctant to discuss these problems. Instead they have obscured the trade problems with debates about currency...

How Africans See the Initiative to Help the Continent

Bashir Goth July 8, 2005
As the G-8 discusses plans to cancel Africa's debt this week, most agree that the world's richest countries can and should aid the ailing continent. In fact, the group agreed to double aid to Africa by 2010. But in the excitement surrounding the G-8 summit, few have asked Africans how they feel about the plan. The answer, supplied by African journalist Bashir Goth, is surprisingly...

Africa Needs an Al-Jazeera

Philip Fiske de Gouveia July 6, 2005
The spotlight on Africa of late has focused on many laudable goals: sustainable development, debt relief, disease prevention and control, and reining in governmental corruption. But promoting democracy and permanently establishing open and honest government, Philip Fiske de Gouveia writes, is inherently linked to a feature which most Africa nations still lack: a free press. The overwhelming...

Choking on Aid Money in Africa

Erich Wiedemann July 5, 2005
When G-8 leaders assemble at the summit in Scotland this week, they face an increasingly complex challenge of reexamining aid packages currently being offered to Africa. Despite the large sums of foreign aid flowing into the troubled continent each year, Africans continue to suffer from malnutrition and disease. Citing factors such as incompetent planning and corruption, a growing number of...

A Truckload of Nonsense

George Monbiot June 15, 2005
The recent agreement by seven of the G-8 nations to cancel impoverished countries' debts to the World Bank and the IMF requires debtor nations to eliminate corruption and promote private-sector development. A close analysis of the past, however, reveals that corruption has seldom been a barrier to foreign aid and loans. In fact, corporations in first-world countries often take advantage of...