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Archive for the 'World Civ-Modern Global Dilemmas' Category

21st Century Slavery

Sunday, November 13th, 2011

Today, 27 million men, women and children are held, sold and trafficked as slaves throughout the world. In Slavery: A 21st Century Evil, Rageh Omaar embarks on a worldwide journey to uncover the truth about the flourishing 21st century slave trade. Episode by episode, his investigation will expose the brutal reality of modern slavery and unpick the reasons why this age-old evil persists.

Check out this series and the accompanying web archives from Al Jazeera

Friend or Foe? A Special Report on China’s Place in the World

Thursday, December 23rd, 2010

four-part special report from the Economist, with a compelling conclusion

A Nation of Racist Dwarfs: Kim Jong-il’s regime is even weirder and more despicable than you thought

Saturday, February 13th, 2010

Unlike previous racist dictatorships, the North Korean one has actually succeeded in producing a sort of new species. Starving and stunted dwarves, living in the dark, kept in perpetual ignorance and fear, brainwashed into the hatred of others, regimented and coerced and inculcated with a death cult: This horror show is in our future, and is so ghastly that our own darling leaders dare not face it and can only peep through their fingers at what is coming.

Hitchens reflects on a trip to North Korea in Slate

One World Under God?

Friday, January 1st, 2010

For all the advances and wonders of our global era, Christians, Jews, and Muslims seem ever more locked in mortal combat. But history suggests a happier outcome for the Peoples of the Book. As technological evolution has brought communities, nations, and faiths into closer contact, it is the prophets of tolerance and love that have prospered, along with the religions they represent. Is globalization, in fact, God’s will?

Read on from The Nation

Why is the modern view of progress so impoverished?

Friday, January 1st, 2010

In the rich world the idea of progress has become impoverished. Through complacency and bitter experience, the scope of progress has narrowed. The popular view is that, although technology and GDP advance, morals and society are treading water or, depending on your choice of newspaper, sinking back into decadence and barbarism. On the left of politics these days, “progress” comes with a pair of ironic quotation marks attached; on the right, “progressive” is a term of abuse.

The Economist’s nuanced view of modern progress

Video: Chomsky on Emerging Framework of World Power

Monday, October 12th, 2009

Noam Chomsky discusses the war on terrorism, US involvement with Afghanistan, and the long-term implications of America’s military attacks abroad. Exploring the repercussions of the attacks on September 11, 2001, Chomsky talks about the war on terrorism, US involvement with Afghanistan, and the long-term implications of America’s military attacks abroad. His extensive knowledge of American foreign policy in the Middle East and South Asia sheds light on the new contours of world power while posing important and troubling questions about our country’s role in international affairs.

Watch it Here

What the Hell Just Happened? A Look Back at the Last Eight Years

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

As we move into the next era of American history, we need to reflect on the bizarre sequence of events we’ve experienced since 2000, and on how we – and not just George W. Bush – handled them.

More form Junod at Esquire

The World is Bumpy: Deglobalization and its dangers

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

In the 1990s and early 2000s, nations around the world witnessed the sweep of globalization–the growing integration of economies, societies, and political systems–and the democratization of trade, migration, technology, and information. In many developing nations, governments threw their countries’ agriculture, resources, and services open to global competition and slashed subsidies for their domestic producers to force them to compete in global markets. Many countries provided incentives for the poor to migrate from farms to cities, where they began to manufacture goods for export to the West.

Many economists believed this global integration had become so deeply rooted it could never be undone. They were wrong. As the global financial crisis deepens, the world is undergoing exactly the reverse of the 1990s–a wrenching period of deglobalization in which governments throw up new walls and the ties binding nations together rapidly unravel. Nations like the United States, Japan, and Germany may suffer, but they will survive, as will powerful developing nations like China or Brazil that have large cash reserves, diversified economies, and enough political clout to protect their industries. On the other hand, poor and trade-dependent countries that remade their whole economies to take advantage of globalization will be devastated. Having opened up, these nations are now highly vulnerable to global financial currents, without the cash on hand to weather the storm. Perhaps even worse, these financial shifts are likely to spark massive social unrest and could take down one government after the next. If you thought globalization was destabilizing, just wait to see what deglobalization will do.

More from the New Republic

Learning to Live With Radical Islam

Monday, March 30th, 2009

The militants are bad people and this is bad news. But the more difficult question is, what should we-the outside world-do about it? That we are utterly opposed to such people, and their ideas and practices, is obvious. But how exactly should we oppose them? In Pakistan and Afghanistan, we have done so in large measure by attacking them-directly with Western troops and Predator strikes, and indirectly in alliance with Pakistani and Afghan forces. Is the answer to pour in more of our troops, train more Afghan soldiers, ask that the Pakistani military deploy more battalions, and expand the Predator program to hit more of the bad guys? Perhaps-in some cases, emphatically yes-but I think it’s also worth stepping back and trying to understand the phenomenon of Islamic radicalism.

Read on from Fareed Zakaria and respond to these Qs

Tom Friedman on Hot, Flat and Crowded

Sunday, February 1st, 2009

Friedman brings a fresh outlook to the crises of destabilizing climate change and rising competition for energy—both of which could poison our world if we do not act quickly and collectively. His argument speaks to all of us who are concerned about the state of America in the global future.

Friedman proposes that an ambitious national strategy—which he calls “Geo-Greenism”—is not only what we need to save the planet from overheating; it is what we need to make America healthier, richer, more innovative, more productive, and more secure.

Enjoy an hour with Tom

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