Alternative News
Articles from non-mainstream as opposed to corporate for profit sources.
After the Wall Came Down
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- Published on Tuesday, 12 November 2019 08:34
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© Peter Turnley/Getty
Thirty years ago, shortly after the fall of Nicolae Ceaușescu, the journalist Tim Judah arrived as a young reporter in Bucharest. But where does Romania—and the entire former Eastern Bloc—stand now, some 30 years later? That was the question Judah explored for the Open Society Foundations, and it’s what he asked veteran and younger activists in Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania. The answers he found were no less varied, complicated, or fascinating than the region itself.
Voices
Hungary“If the cause is right, there is no room for fear.”
In 1989, the momentum for political reform in Hungary was gathering pace. It would soon be unstoppable. By 2010, though, that era of optimism was long over—and the ascendancy of Prime Minister Viktor Orban had begun. Orban’s rise, and his notion of an “illiberal democracy,” has raised a profound question: What kind of democracy do the people of Hungary want their country to be?
Breaking down barriers
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- Published on Tuesday, 12 November 2019 06:58
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Matching funds until November 30th
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...#ClimateRoundDance action planning call tonight - register now
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- Published on Tuesday, 12 November 2019 05:10
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Union President suspended at Cambodia's giant Naga World Hotel Casino for defending her members' right to bargain their wages!
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- Published on Tuesday, 12 November 2019 00:22
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Read more: Union President suspended at Cambodia's giant Naga World Hotel Casino for defending her members'...
Taxing the Rich is Only a Start, Though its a Good One
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- Published on Monday, 11 November 2019 23:32
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1930 ... November 12, 2019
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Taxing the Rich is Only a Start, Though it’s a Good One
Doug Henwood
It’s become near-consensus on the social democratic left that you can fund a decent welfare state by taxing the rich and shrinking the military. Sad to say that isn’t true. Those are good things in themselves, and you could pay for some excellent things with that agenda, but it would still be well short of actual social democracy.
I’m defining social democracy as a large and robust welfare state that socializes a lot of consumption through taxation and spending, compressing the income distribution, reducing poverty sharply, capping the political power of the rich, insulating people from the risks of sickness and unemployment, and educating people at low cost, all structured to reduce racial, gender, and other inequalities. It’s not the end of capitalism, but it’s a lot bigger than Medicare for All and free college, as badly as we need both those things tomorrow.
We’re sure not spending much on human uplift now. As the first graph below shows,...
Read more: Taxing the Rich is Only a Start, Though its a Good One
[E-News] New handout explains alternatives to prison
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- Published on Monday, 11 November 2019 06:22
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Download the CFSC E-News in PDF (scroll down for links).
CFSC releases new handout exploring alternatives to prison
What would a world without prisons look like? This provocative question is addressed in a new double-sided handout released in October.
The handout, Alternatives to Prison, highlights community-based sentences, Restorative Justice, education, employment, and training, addiction and mental health services, Healing Lodges, and what can be done about the “dangerous few.”
You can see it online at https://quakerservice.ca/AlternativestoPrison, download it in PDF (which may be easier to read), or contact our office for print copies.
...Read more: [E-News] New handout explains alternatives to prison
Revaluing Capitalism for the Long-Term?
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- Published on Monday, 11 November 2019 01:58
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1929 ... November 11, 2019
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Revaluing Capitalism for the Long-Term?
Kyle Bailey
In the wake of the 2007--08 financial crash, the mainstream debate has not focused on the choice between socialism or barbarism, but rather on ‘reinventing capitalism’.
Faced with a populist ‘other’ ranging from ‘Trump and Brexit’ to the popular but as-yet-ill-defined ‘socialism’ of Corbyn and Sanders, the liberal bourgeoisie in the Atlantic heartland of the global political economy has sought to reassert its waning hegemony by way of a resurgent capitalist internationalism. They fear that neoliberal globalization’s intensifying legitimation crisis will lead the growing masses ‘left behind’ by economic stagnation, social inequality, and environmental injustice to ‘scapegoat’ the capitalist system by embracing the ‘totalitarianism’ of the radical left or extreme right.
In response, a leading fraction of the capitalist class has cohered around a hegemonic project of economically ‘long-term’, socially ‘inclusive’, and ecologically ‘sustainable’ capitalism as the apparent solution to the system’s multidimensional and overdetermined organic crisis.
Economically ‘long-term’ means empowering ‘non-financial’ corporate executives and their managerial cadres against ‘the capitalist threat to capitalism’ posed...
Bayer
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- Published on Sunday, 10 November 2019 07:02
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Did you see this, A?
Bee defenders are *this close* to beating the pesticide lobby in a historic court battle. They’re almost at the finish line, but they’re running out of money to keep fighting. I know you care about saving the bees -- can you rush a donation their way today to help them win this case?
If you’ve saved your payment information with SumOfUs, your donation will go through immediately:
Donate CA$92 nowDonate CA$138 now Read more: BayerWebinar Today: Indigenous Sovereignty is Climate Action
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- Published on Sunday, 10 November 2019 03:16
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Read more: Webinar Today: Indigenous Sovereignty is Climate Action
Bayer
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- Published on Saturday, 09 November 2019 07:02
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Bee defenders are in a crucial court battle against the pesticide lobby -- but they’re running out of money in the final stages of this fight.
If we lose, it’ll be game over for the bees.
Can you please chip in to help the bee defenders win this case?
If you’ve saved your payment information with SumOfUs, your donation will go through immediately:
Donate CA$92 nowDonate CA$138 now Read more: BayerWe've got photo evidence
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- Published on Friday, 08 November 2019 13:58
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Paov,
We want to deliver a strong message to the new government as it settles into Ottawa. So we collected dozens of personal stories from people across the country who struggle to connect to the Internet due to pricing, availability or lack of choice — and we put them on ads!1
It’s now official — our crowdsourced ads displaying a handful of powerful Internet stories from real people across Canada are...
Chicago Teachers Transform the City and the Labor Movement
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- Published on Friday, 08 November 2019 03:22
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1928 ... November 8, 2019
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Chicago Teachers Transform the City and the Labor Movement
Rebecca Burns
Chicago teachers and staff returned to the classrooms Friday November 1st, after more than two weeks on strike. Their walkout lasted longer than the city’s landmark 2012 strike, as well as those in Los Angeles and Oakland earlier this year.
The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) strike also lasted long enough for the season’s first snowstorm to blanket thousands of teachers and staff who surrounded City Hall Thursday morning to demand Mayor Lori Lightfoot agree to restore missed instructional days as a final condition of their returning to work. After a few hours, the union and the mayor arrived at a compromise of five make-up days -- a move Lightfoot had resisted until the eleventh hour, despite the fact that it’s a standard conclusion to teacher strikes.
Over the course of an often-bitter battle, CTU and its sister union, SEIU 73, overcame a series of such ultimatums from the recently elected mayor. Before the strike, Lightfoot had refused to write issues such as...
Read more: Chicago Teachers Transform the City and the Labor Movement
Wintry days, bright reflections
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- Published on Thursday, 07 November 2019 14:36
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⚡When the going gets good⚡
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- Published on Thursday, 07 November 2019 07:02
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My story
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- Published on Thursday, 07 November 2019 06:02
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My story
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...How Seven Thousand Quebec Workers Went on Strike against Climate Change
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- Published on Thursday, 07 November 2019 01:42
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1927 ... November 7, 2019
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How Seven Thousand Quebec Workers Went on Strike against Climate Change
Alain Savard
With a crowd of 500,000, Montreal’s march for the climate was the largest in the world during the September 20-27 week of climate action. Yet it was also noteworthy for another reason. Despite provincial labour laws preventing unions from striking over political issues, 11 locals representing 7,500 workers formally voted to go on strike for a day.
Organizing for the strike began in January with a handful of rank-and-file teachers who were also involved in grassroots ecological movements. François Geoffroy and Frédéric Legault had little experience with unions, but when they saw that the international network Earth Strike was calling for a climate strike on September 27, they decided to dedicate all their energy to organizing a real climate strike. They linked up with the rank-and-file union network Lutte Commune (Common Struggle) to make connections with union activists on how to push forward.
The strategy they came up with was to get local membership meetings to pass a strike mandate....
Read more: How Seven Thousand Quebec Workers Went on Strike against Climate Change
Landfills are piling up with iPhones
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- Published on Wednesday, 06 November 2019 11:04
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Paov,
Landfills around the world are piling up with discarded cell phones, laptops, and other electronics. It's the fastest-growing waste problem—increasing at double the rate of plastic waste.1
What's worse, these devices often contain hazardous substances that poison the environment and our health when they're thrown out.2
Many of these electronics could be repaired instead of tossed and replaced—if tech giants like Apple, Google, and Samsung didn't...
Wildest expectations
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- Published on Wednesday, 06 November 2019 07:02
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The GM Strike and the Historical Convergence of Possibilities
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- Published on Tuesday, 05 November 2019 23:12
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1926 ... November 6, 2019
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The GM Strike and the Historical Convergence of Possibilities
Sam Gindin
On September 16, 2019, forty-six thousand defiant General Motors (GM) workers streamed out on strike. This eruption of long-festering worker anger and frustrations was directed not only at a corporation that had treated its workforce so shabbily, but also at the often-complicit role of their own union. The strike call came from the UAW’s top officers, but it was clearly the rank-and-file who were in the lead. Nothing GM was ready to offer before the strike could have met the workers’ goals, and a strike was virtually inevitable. The strike lasted six weeks, the longest at GM’s US operations in half a century.
In taking on GM, autoworkers were driven by their own particular grievances. But they couldn’t help but be emboldened by the wider upsurge of worker militancy in the US. In 2018, almost half a million American workers had participated in major strikes (i.e., strikes with 1000-plus workers) -- the most such strikes since 1986 and a trend that continued into...
Read more: The GM Strike and the Historical Convergence of Possibilities
Hope for Julia
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- Published on Tuesday, 05 November 2019 07:24
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Help us break down more barriers.
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- Jailed, released and jailed again - free trade union leader Erlan Baltabay now!
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- Amazonia on Fire
