In The News

Illegal Immigrants in Greece

Andreas Ulrich June 5, 2012
Greece is a favorite point of entry for immigrants seeking to begin new lives in Europe. About 100,000 arrive per year from Iran, Syria, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Africa – far more than attempt to cross borders in central European states like Germany. The immigrants are unpopular in the troubled economy, and Greece is stepping up security and border patrols. With so many willing to...

Elites Loot Africa While Foreign Debt Mounts

James K. Boyce, Léonce Ndikumana February 27, 2012
Too often, borrowed monies are salted away from Africa’s most impoverished nations to offshore banks through inflated contracts or kickbacks. The complexities and bank-secrecy laws of the international finance system, combined with a lack of enforcement, assist such transfers, contend James K. Boyce and Léonce Ndikumana, authors of Africa’s Odious Debts: How Foreign Loans and Capital Flight Bled...

Can Social Media Campaigns End Child Labor?

Humphrey Hawksley February 10, 2012
Acts of intervention – with military action, aid and promotion of trade – have characterized international politics since the Cold War. Corporate intervention can now be added to the list of tools for alleviating poverty and encouraging development and education in impoverished nations. Social media and attention to global supply chains are exposing unfair labor practices, particularly child...

Where Will the Muslim Brotherhood Take Egypt’s Economy?

Mohamed El Dahshan February 6, 2012
The Muslim Brotherhood is Egypt’s largest opposition group, so it’s no surprise that its political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, secured nearly half the votes in parliamentary elections. Campaign rhetoric proposed alcohol restrictions, gender-segregated beaches, and revision of Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel. Ready to step into power, Islamists already have more pressing matters: an...

Egypt: 10,000 March in Protest at Woman Dragged Half-Naked Through Street

December 26, 2011
A military loses credibility when it emphasizes power over security, turning on its own citizens – especially after abuses are documented and released over the internet for the world to see. About 10,000 women marched on the streets of Cairo to protest brutal treatment of female protesters. “Even before the protest was over, the military council issued an unusually strong statement of regret for...

Conciliatory Tones From Egypt’s Islamist Leaders

Jackson Diehl December 7, 2011
Islamist candidates have surged in Egypt’s elections, but Jackson Diehl of the Washington Post cautions against regarding all Islamists as one and the same. Yes, the Muslim Brotherhood, banned by the Mubarak regime, has a history of violence. Yet many of the Brotherhood’s Islamists have abandoned violence in favor of democratic reforms, argues Jackson Diehl in an opinion essay for the Washington...

Chocolate-Fueled Growth

Kandeh K. Yumkella December 5, 2011
Poverty continues to linger in most Sub-Saharan countries, in large part due to the shortsighted nature of their export-based commodity economies. In an opinion essay for Project Syndicate, Kandeh Yumkella, director general of the UN Industrial Development Organization, suggests the time has come for these nations to upgrade their economies by focusing on ““value-added, agro-industrial...