The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
SACSIS seeks to examine global issues, particularly as they relate to South Africa.
Francis Njubi Nesbitt -
Take your guns, pangas, and knives and throw them into the sea.
–Nelson Mandela.
"Who is this man Mandela?" The U.S News & World Report asked in January 1990. Apparently no one much knew, since the magazine could only come up with three short paragraphs about the ANC leader. This sketch of Mandela's life seemed to be drawn from a Who's Who collection, detailing his early education, legal practice, and arrest by South African authorities in August 1962. Referring to him...
Sreeram Chaulia -
Historic change eventually comes via small and modest beginnings. The current revolts in Brazil and Turkey actually started in low-key fashion at least one decade ago. Had they been spotted earlier, there would be less befuddlement about explaining the genesis of the mass protests that have mushroomed to force the governments of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to rethink their policy paths.
Brazil’s middle and working classes shot to...
Alex Kane -
The Egyptian street has erupted once again. Two and a half years after the revolution that overthrew longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak captivated the world and fundamentally changed the Middle East, another massive shock to the Egyptian political system is unfolding.
After a year of rule by President Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood-backed politician who won Egypt’s first-ever free and democratic elections last year, ordinary Egyptians have had enough. Responding to a grassroots...
Alexander O'Riordan -
When the UK announced it would end aid to South Africa, many pundits and African leaders heralded the decision as an end to Africa’s dependency on aid. These African leaders and elites see aid as patronising, an indignity to be resisted, a charity not needed. This critique of aid complements critiques by post-colonial theorists that criticise aid as another form of imperialism. At the same time, since 2007, the financial crisis and protracted narrative of austerity have allowed Western...
Michelle Pressend -
In mid-June, Russia, in it’s role as President of the Group of Twenty Countries (G20), hosted the first Civil Summit (C20) in Moscow in the run up to the G20 Summit that will take place in September this year. The C20 is a gathering of civil society organisations that were brought together, ostensibly, to inform the upcoming G20 discussions.
The C20 joins the ranks of the business lobby: B20 and labour: L20. There is also a group of think tanks called the T20 and recently the youth...
Sarah Lazare -
The Turkish government launched violent raids, mass arrests, and torrents of tear gas and water cannon fire across the country Tuesday in an effort to quell the widespread uprisings against the ruling AKP party, now well into their third week.
Police are shooting water cannons filled with damaging chemicals, say Turkish protesters on a Wikileaks Forum showing photographs of demonstrators with burns across their legs and backs.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Tuesday that...
