Editorials & Actions

European Intellectuals Speak Out AGAINST AUSTERITY–and provide an alternative

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Editor’s Note:  Tikkun author Ulrich Duchrow, a professor of systematic theology at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, and cofounder and moderator of Kairos Euope, an ecumenical network striving for economic justice (see his article A European Revival of Liberation Theology in Tikkun’s Winter 2011 issue) presents us with a statement of European intellectuals speaking out against the neo-liberal austerity economic programs that are the weapon-of-choice by the 1% in its class war against the 99%. 
Stop the neo-liberal crisis politics – dispossess the beneficiaries! We are experiencing the deepest crisis of capitalism since the great depression of the 30s – and the European governments continue to pour oil on the fires! From the very beginning, some governments have prevented a solidarity-based solution to the crisis in Europe and are significantly responsible for its exacerbation. This refers particularly to the German government, which, in August 2008, blocked a substantial economic stimulus package for Europe. Hardly had the recession reached its lowest point in Germany in 2009, when the German government preached the necessity for hard austerity policies.

27.2 Spring

A Conversation with Jeremy Rifkin on His New Book The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World

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The sun shines everywhere on the world, every day. The wind blows around the planet every day. Everywhere we check there is a geothermal core of energy, heat energy underneath the ground. And in the rural areas, we have agricultural foraging waste that can be converted to energy. On the coastal areas, the ocean tides and waves come in every day for energy. Wherever we have garbage, it can be bioconverted back to energy. So these are energies that are found literally in every square inch of the world in some frequency or proportion, enough to provide us till kingdom come.

2012

Localization: The Economics of Happiness

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One of the most destructive effects of globalization is that it eliminates diversity. In order to grow and to provide the “economies of scale” that huge transnational corporations require, whole populations are induced to want the same consumer goods. Economic localization has been described as the economics of happiness.

2012

Loving and Supporting Occupy

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It was forty-seven years ago that I climbed down a rope from the second floor of UC Berkeley’s Sproul Hall, where we in the Free Speech Movement were holding a sit-in. How exciting for me to watch a new generation beginning to open their minds to the possibility that they might take the reins and become tikkunistas—healers and transformers of our world. It’s also important to note, however, that there are struggles in this young Occupy movement whose outcome will determine its long-term significance.

2012

Socialism in Civil Society

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In this project Wright seeks to document, in a manner intelligible to a broad audience, the main problems of capitalism and the realistic possibilities for overcoming them.

2012

Walking Toward Conflict

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At the top of one of Rio de Janeiro’s favela shantytowns—one of several recently occupied by heavily armed military police units—an uneasy gathering begins. This simplest, most ancient of social patterns describes an intention—to recognize the other, to share meaning, to invite truth-telling. Guided by precise questions drawn on the wall for all to see, the participants edge forward in that most counter-intuitive of social discourses: dialogue.

Articles

Let’s End Our Wars on the “Other”: U.S. Interests, Israeli Fears, and the Demonization of Iran

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Among the nations whose regimes it has demonized, the United States has gone to war with North Korea, North Vietnam, Panama, Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya, and sponsored a guerrilla war in Nicaragua and an invasion of Cuba. The current demonization by Western leaders of Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has increased the chance of war in the Middle East by inflating Israeli fears that Iran is intent on developing nuclear weapons with which to eradicate the Jewish state from its Muslim neighborhood.

Articles

Earth Democracy and the Rights of Mother Earth

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The ecological and economic problems we face are rooted in a series of reductionist steps, which have shrunk our imagination and our identity, our purpose on the earth, and the instruments we use to meet our needs. We are first and foremost earth citizens.

2011

The American Empire’s Terrorist Network

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The United States of America is the biggest and worst terrorist nation of the world. And most Americans approve enthusiastically. Those two statements need careful corroboration. They need a careful reading of history.

Articles

The Crisis Enters Year Five

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The current capitalist global crisis began with the severe contraction in the housing markets in mid-2007; therefore welcome to year five. The largest corporations and richest citizens long ago learned that if you want to sustain an extremely unequal distribution of wealth and income, you need a similarly unequal distribution of political power. An increasingly unequal capitalist economy pays for the increasingly undemocratic politics it needs.

Articles

Our Forgotten Tradition

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Socialism, contrary to generations of conservative (often also, liberal) propagandizing, may not be un-American after all. A review of “The ‘S’ Word: A Short History of an American Tradition… Socialism” by John Nichols.