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New economic territory
France hasn’t seen demonstrations like this for 40 years. President Nicolas Sarkozy’s character, his arrogance and determination to crush the “enemy” have aroused wide opposition. But one man’s whims do not account for all the sound and fury. This is a response to a fundamental and unjust change of social direction chosen by European governments with allegiances ranging from confident right to compliant left, on the pretext of dealing with the financial crisis. Berlusconi has done no more good (...)
Translated by Barbara Wilson
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The explosion of anger seen on the streets of Paris, Madrid, Athens and Bucharest is a sign of people’s exasperation and desire for change, with the hope that would bring. But we are in new economic territory: we do not know what we have to do,
but we have to act now
Original text in English
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Ireland’s neo-liberal economic policies were greatly admired around the world, just as long as they seemed to be delivering high growth rates. Even now, Ireland’s ferocious austerity measures are being emulated
Translated by Stephanie Irvine
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Cuba intends to cut 20% of all jobs and radically revise its economic model as fast as possible. There is already inequality, and soon that may be legal within the constitution
Translated by Tom Genrich
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Challenges for the establishments in us midterms
Politicians are gaining ground with Texas voters by blaming the federal government for all national ills. For Tea Partiers here, Washington appears a distant, almost foreign ruler
Original text in English
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A new strand of rightwing populists in the US, represented by talk show host Glenn Beck and his Tea Party followers, fear al-Qaida less than they do socialism. But in particular all Tea Partiers despise the Republican rich and the elites
Original text in English
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Islam in the Pancasila state
Indonesia’s disasters – October’s tsunami and eruption, the killing of suspected terrorists in Sumatra – get more media attention than its democratic elections. Yet these marked the direct re-election of the president last year and a cautious step away from Islamising agendas, re-affirming the country’s historic balance of secularism with Islam
Original text in English
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Original text in English
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A free society under an authoritarian regime
Russia’s post-Soviet elites of wealth and bureaucracy did a quiet deal with Putin long ago: we’ll keep your governing structure stable if you keep us in the money. And that’s how the country functions, even if it is storing up problems for the future
Translated by Charles Goulden
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Translated by Robert Waterhouse
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From antipathy to military cooperation
India has the world’s third largest Muslim population, and political and economic ties with Arab nations. It is also buying weapons and military expertise from its new friend Israel
Translated By Charles Goulden
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Translated By Charles Goulden
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The military industrial complex doesn’t lack business
War without end * — Jean-Paul Hébert and
Philippe Rekacewicz
Which came first in the 20th and 21st centuries – the pretext for war
or the new weapons with which to fight it?
Translated by Tom Genrich
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Agriculture and transport today’s pressing issues
Lebanon’s Bekaa valley has become a vast yet crude agribusiness supplying fruit and vegetables to the Middle East and drawing its underpaid, insecure migrant labour force from neighbouring Syria
Translated by Tom Genrich
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A season in hell * — Lucile Garçon and
Rami Zurayk
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Planners are thinking up creative remedies for Lebanon’s transport woes: go offshore or renovate the coastal railway line which served the country well in Ottoman days
LMD English Edition exclusive
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Film directors’ critical gaze
Israel’s filmmakers can now say and show almost anything they like onscreen, and be admired internationally for doing so
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OSCE, in the name of peace in Europe
The end of the the cold war provoked many tensions between ‘national communities’ in Europe and Asia. To confront these, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) must collaborate with other European institutions
Translated by Robert Waterhouse
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Russia and Kazakhstan share an endless border, a language and many mutual interests. There should be no relationship crisis, yet the young central Asian republic is increasingly trying to assert its independence
Translated by Robert Waterhouse