In The News

Where Boys Were Kings, A Shift Toward Baby Girls

Choe Sang-Hun January 9, 2008
For centuries, parents in the agrarian economy of South Korea favored male children. But government campaigns and increasing work opportunities have led to a gender ratio that demonstrates a reversal in the preference for males and perhaps even a new appreciation for female children. Adult males, with the help of their wives, were once expected to care for aging parents. In recent decades, women...

Argentina’s Presidential Front-Runner Goes Global

Monte Reel October 16, 2007
The United States is not the only country contemplating the candidacy of a recent president’s wife. In Argentina, first lady and presidential frontrunner Cristina Fernández de Kirchner powers through the final leg of her campaign, largely run outside of Argentina. In the wake of massive economic collapse in 2001, her husband turned his attention inward to address enormous debt and widespread...

Breastfeeding: A Philippine Battleground

Carlos H. Conde July 18, 2007
Research demonstrates that breastfeeding provides many health benefits for infants. As a result, mothers in developed nations have substantially increased breastfeeding rates since 1990. In search of new customers, pharmaceutical firms that make infant formula target mothers in developing nations, including those in the Philippines. One ad campaign hints that formula’s nutrients can increase...

Lack of Women in Eastern Germany Feeds Neo-Nazis

June 1, 2007
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, many East Germans left their communities in search of education, jobs and other opportunity. But the Berlin Institute for Population and Development reports that most of the emigrants have been young women – with some communities in East Germany losing up to 25 percent of their young women. East Germany has the distinction of leading Europe with such a gender...

Outsourcing a Womb

Gagandeep Kaur May 31, 2007
Physicians first relied on surrogate wombs to assist women who, for health reasons, could not bear children of their own. But healthy career women from Singapore and India, who did not want to take any time off from their work, have also turned to surrogates as well, reports Gagandeep Kaur in the Hindu Business Line. Many doctors reject such requests, but with the number of inquiries on the rise...

Moroccan Immigrants, Spanish Strawberries and Europe's Future

Daniela Gerson May 14, 2007
When strawberries ripen, Spanish farmers seek short-term workers who can pick the berries carefully and quickly – and then return home, rather than stay and cause any problems in European communities that have come to resent illegal immigrants. And the strawberry farmers are adamant about their employment preferences: fit woman under the age of 40 who are married and have children in neighboring...

Prime Minister Abe’s New Clothes

Alexis Dudden March 28, 2007
If the history of the world is the world’s court of justice, as 18th century historian Friedrich von Schiller suggested, then attempts to bury or deny unpleasant episodes can only fail. Since 1993, Japanese leaders have agreed to the Kono Statement, admitting that its military had forced women to serve as sexual slaves before and during World War II. Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, in his post just...