Latest articles

Three years ago, 15,000 scientists declared a climate emergency by signing onto a State of the Climate Report. That signing led to annual updates, for example, the most recent version: The 2023 State of the Climate Report: Entering Uncharted Territory, Bioscience, vol. 73, issue 12, December 2023, Oxford Academic (aka: “The Report”).

The initial paragraph of The Report suggests a planetary juggernaut of cascading ecosystems altering life systems: “Life on planet Earth is under siege. We are now in uncharted territory… a situation no one has ever witnessed firsthand in the history of humanity.” Therefore, it’s fair to say nobody really …

A solution of the present crisis will not take place unless men and women work for it. Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. Even a superficial look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. Without persistent effort, time itself becomes an ally of the insurgent and primitive forces of irrational emotionalism and social destruction. This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.

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(Full article …)

The irony of where calling out a certain racist war criminal country gets you branded a racist.

Israel is urging western states to rally to its side as the International Court of Justice prepares to hear this week South Africa’s case that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

The court is being asked by Pretoria to issue an immediate injunction ordering Israel to halt its military assault on the tiny enclave, to avoid further casualties.

Some 23,000 Palestinians are known to have been killed by Israel so far, a majority of them women and children, and many thousands more are believed to be lying under the rubble. Tens of thousands are seriously wounded. …

Liu Hongjie (China), Skyline, 2021.
Late last year, a colleague sent me a letter decrying some of my writings about China, notably the last newsletter of 2023. This newsletter is my response to him.
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The situation in China is the cause of a great deal of consternation amongst the left. I am glad you have raised the issue of Chinese socialism with me directly.

We are living in very dangerous times, as you know. The United States’ accelerating tension with other powerful nations threatens the planet more now than …

The role of the US State Department regarding Israel’s continued obliteration of Gaza is becoming increasingly clear.  As the actions of the Israeli Defence Forces continue, the Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, is full of meaningless statements about restraint and control, the protection of civilians, the imperatives of humanitarianism in war.  As the war continues, so do those statements.

As the new year began, an official from the White House expressed satisfaction at what appeared “to be the start of the gradual shift to lower-intensity operations in the north that we have been encouraging”.  But the revised Israeli approach did …

Privately-operated charter schools have been around for 32 years. They fail and close every week, abandoning and harming hundreds of parents, students, teachers, education support staff, and principals. Neoliberals cynically call this “free market accountability.”

These closures, moreover, are often sudden and abrupt, revealing deep problems and instability in the charter school sector. Parents, students, teachers, education support staff, and principals often report being blindsided by such closures and how they have to anxiously scramble to find new schools for students.

Officially, 2,315 charter schools failed and closed between 2010-11 and 2021-22 alone (an 11-year period). On average, that is 210 …

Summary of Part I

In Part I of my article, I described how initially the field of social psychology had deep roots in the socio-cultural traditions of Wundt, Royce, Baldwin, Cooley, Thomas and Mead. But by the beginning of World War I a shift towards individualism can be seen in the work first of the behaviorist Watson, and most powerfully in the work of Floyd Allport, Herbert Blumer and symbolic interactionists. When it came to understanding group life these social atomists only tolerated three kinds of groups:

Fleeting face-to-face groups (interactional groups)
Groups that were in laboratory situations (interactional groups)
Derived …

How has it changed over time?

It is crucial to re-examine Samantha Power’s actions and decision-making during the Ebola epidemic in relation to the broader historical context of President Barack Obama and AFRICOM (Africa Command)’s covert Scramble for Africa.

AFRICOM is the brainchild of Dick Cheney who, after his energy task force identified African oil as ripe for the picking, conspired with Donald Rumsfeld to create Africa Command. (1) However, African governments wanted nothing to do with AFRICOM. South African officials in particular criticized the US for attempting to impose AFRICOM to undermine China’s growing influence on the continent. (2) Mao Zedong deserves credit for masterminding China’s …

1. The overview

If you often ask yourself “How can people believe those lies and deceptions?” when facts clearly indicate them to be untrue, you are not alone.  If you ask how so-called leaders can get away with a policy that guarantees disastrous, anti-human consequences, you are not alone either.

In order to examine these questions, let us look at how our minds operate.  We have the conscious part of our minds and the unconscious part of our minds. Both operate together. They can be separated into an instinctual part, a daily operational part, and the part that guides us with set …

Peace activists across the country have embarked on a campaign to mobilize global support for South Africa’s charge of genocide against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The campaign, spearheaded by CODEPINK, World Beyond War, and RootsAction, aims to rally nations to submit a “Declaration of Intervention” supporting South Africa’s case at the ICJ. The focus is on holding Israel accountable for alleged genocide in Gaza and putting an end to the tragic suffering of an imprisoned population. Delegations from major cities engaged with U.N. missions, embassies, and consulates …

From their inception, the Zionists learned how to turn a loss into a gain, how to use debt as collateral, and enrich their interests. Twisting incidents so that their victim becomes the assailant and their assault makes them the victim has been their trademark. Taking a valid reproach to their damaging tactics and converting it into anti-Semitism, a one hundred percent offering, has shielded Zionist distasteful maneuvers from public animosity.

This was apparent in their plan of combating the well-received campus protests that highlighted the ignominious support the United States government gives to Israel’s ongoing extermination of the Palestinian …

A transformation.

Michael Armitage (Kenya), The Promised Land, 2019.

The final months of 2023 pierced our sense of hope and threw us into a kind of mortal sadness. Israel’s escalating violence has killed more than twenty thousand Palestinians to date, wiping out entire generations of families. Horrifying images and testimonies from Palestine have flooded all forms of media, stirring a deep sense of anguish and outrage among large sections of the global population. At the same time, in keeping with the zigs and zags of history, this …