Most of the real lessons to be learned from the ongoing chaos in Côte d’Ivoire are being ignored, both by politicians and the popular media. Unless these are ;learned, and the background understtod, little that is happening there makes much sense.
“Religion is the opium of the people” is probably the most often quoted statement attributed to Karl Marx. But it distorts the views of Marx about religion because it is taken out of both literary and historic context.
This is the last Inside Labour column for 2010. So I want to take this opportunity not only to wish all readers the best for the season and the coming year, but also to touch on some of the baggage — on a micro and macro level — being carried forward into 2011. At a […]
Tom Newnham, the man who probably did more than any other single individual in New Zealand to break rugby and other sporting ties with apartheid South Africa, died in Auckland this week, aged 84. And educator, editor, publisher, author and activist, he was the driving force behind the Citizens’ Association for Racial Equality (CARE) that, […]
It is surely time for serious reflection when the lunatic logic of the present system encourages us to spend — all too often on credit — to provide a boost to ailing economies when all this will do is provide a boost to banks and to the profits of importers, producer companies, wholesalers and retailers while the jobs slaughter continues.
The Guardian — The History of South Africa’s Extraordinary Anti-Apartheid Newspaper. By James Zug (Michigan State University Press/UNISA Press) (First published, May 2009) The Guardian, a polemical newspaper that survived three bannings and subsequent name changes and was once charged, alongside 156 individuals, with treason, is part of the anti-apartheid folk lore of South Africa. […]
edited by Adekeye Adebajo, Adebayo Adedeji and Chris Landsberg (University of KZN Press) (First published, June 2008) This excellent volume does not deal with the prospects of a post-Mbeki presidency or with any of the possible fallout from the internecine feuding within the ANC. And this should not matter, for no matter the outcome now […]
South Africa has a justly lauded Constitution and Bill of Rights. It also has some of the best labour laws anywhere. These are victories largely attributable to the labour movement, but they remain paper victories that have constantly to be fought for to ensure that they are applied.
Terry Bell Writes 
Xenophobia poisons the Ivoirian tangle
December 31, 2010
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Most of the real lessons to be learned from the ongoing chaos in Côte d’Ivoire are being ignored, both by politicians and the popular media. Unless these are ;learned, and the background understtod, little that is happening there makes much sense.