Historian and professional photographer Professor John Edwin Mason (University of Virginia/Charlottesville, USA) visited Cape Town in March 2012 to give a historically revealing pictorial presentation of his experience delving inside the Cape Town Carnival bands....
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From a failed uprising in Mali: My diary from a coup d’état | by David Fig
In recent months, The landlocked West African state of Mali has been in an uproar. First there was the renewal of an uprising in the north by Tuareg ex-mercenaries returning from battle in Libya. As this conflict (the northern Mali uprising) unfolded, there were...
The “second transition” – let’s not get sucker punched into a false debate | by Jeremy Cronin
We are now already deep into the silly season of an ANC-led movement electoral year. At the forefront of trying to promote the silliness are some of the usual hacks in the commercial media - especially those with the attention span of a tweetable headline. Last night...
Speech: Dare to struggle for power! Make another South Africa and World Possible! | Speech by Mazibuko K. Jara
The Crises and the Commons Conference Praxis in Durban from 4-7 November 2009 at the University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society cohosted by Amandla! Magazine and iKwezi Institute School of Development Studies, Memorial Tower Building, Howard College Qina...
Forty years of ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa’ | by Nigel Westmaas
Walter Rodney’s seminal work remains a compelling and persuasive living history and totem of critical resistance to the exploitation and underdevelopment of the African continent. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the publication of Walter Rodney’s How Europe...
The late Christopher Hitchens | by Richard Seymour
A review of Christopher Hitchens, Hitch-22: A Memoir (Atlantic, 2010), £9.99 Given Hitchens’s political inconsistencies, Hitch-22 is better than it ought to be, a fact which is a consequence of his undeniable talent A petty bourgeois individualist, in his last years...
Can a Nigerian Squeeze the Poor for the World Bank? | by Patrick Bond
In coming days, the World Bank will have a new president. Smart money backs Barack Obama’s choice: Dartmouth College president Jim Yong Kim. But two weeks ago, Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was endorsed by her Pretoria counterpart, Pravin Gordhan....
The naked truth about our culture | by Simphiwe Sesanti
This week the world witnessed a heated debate around Brett Murray’s painting exposing SA president Jacob Zuma’s genitals. Those in defense of Murray argued that this was purely an artistic act, while those in favour of Zuma argued that it was merely the work of a...
The Nobel Price for (SA) Peace
The latest furore about statements made by former apartheid president FW de Klerk has raised one very pertinent point: the political considerations that go into the decisions regarding the award of the Nobel Peace Prize. It also raises again the circumstances in which...




