Capitalism’s biggest crisis since the 1930s raises the question of what can replace it. A SPECTER is haunting capitalism. As the world economy plunges into its worst crisis since the Great Depression, political discourse in the United States has been dominated by a...
China
Obama, imperialism, and capitalism | by Phil Gasper
In foreign policy, the Obama administration has continued what Bush began, argues Phil Gasper I DON’T often read the conservative columnist Ross Douthat in the New York Times, but a week after the Obama administration’s assassination of Osama bin Laden, Douthat for...
Who’s profiting from the water crisis? | by Joyce Nelson
Big business sees water scarcity as a money making opportunity. Joyce Nelson uncovers the dodgy dealings of the Aqueduct Alliance. In January 2010, investment banker Goldman Sachs, along with General Electric and a high-powered Washington thinktank called the World...
South Africa’s Dangerously Unsafe Financial Intercourse | by Patrick Bond
Just before last weekend’s meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) board in Washington, South Africa's finance minister dropped us an obscure news item: “Gordhan concerned about rand volatility”(Reuters, April 16). Hidden away in the business...
U.S. Jobs, GDP, and the Eurozone | by Jack Rasmus
Friday, June 1, is a date that marks a shift in the public consciousness of the state of the US and global economy. What was touted for months over the past winter as a rebound taking hold in the US economy and that the US economy was ‘exceptional’ and would not...
The key to ending the race to the bottom
A spectre starting to haunt the international labour movement — a spectre of a descent into barbarism. It is the image of a possible future, reflected in signs such as South Africa’s Olympians marching proudly in London in national colours, made in China, and in the...
China cannot save the world from the economic crisis | by Bruno Jetin
While North America and Europe were hard hit, China has survived the international crisis of 2008, thanks to huge public spending, a low interest rate and consumption subsidies. China’s growth rate reached 9% in 2009 and 10.4% in 2010; in its wake, China dragged Asia...
The Triumph of King Coal: Hardening our coal addiction | by Fred Pearce
Despite all the talk about curbing greenhouse gas emissions, the world is burning more and more coal. The inconvenient truth is that coal remains a cheap and dirty fuel –and the idea of ‘clean’ coal remains a distant dream.This year’s UN climate negotiations are in...
Who’s really South Africa’s foreign policy ‘master’? | by Dale T. McKinley
If one has been relying solely on more recent mainstream press coverage and associated NGO–academic interpretations to understand and analyse South Africa’s foreign policy/diplomacy, then is be only a slight exaggeration to say that the overwhelming conclusion must be...

