March 2011 - Issue 440

Why has the Great Recession, which has stunned the wealthy West, left the Majority World more or less unscathed? Next month the New Internationalist takes a closer look. We show how the Majority World learned from the bitter experience of ‘structural adjustment’ to keep as far away from financial markets as possible. We listen to the voices of ordinary citizens in Latin America, Africa and Asia for the sense that’s so conspicuously absent from the deluded din of economic orthodoxy. And, as the world wakes up to the true cost of financial markets, and the resistance finally begins, we outline a 3D vision of a future that might actually be worth having.