Labour

AFGHANISTAN: ‘The Doha Meeting Has Raised Concerns the UN Is Indirectly Legitimising the Taliban’

By CIVICUS

 
CIVICUS discusses the exclusion of women from international talks on Afghanistan currently being held in Qatar with Sima Samar, former chairperson of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC). The AIHRC is the Afghan national institution devoted to the promotion, protection and monitoring of human rights. Its status is now a matter of contention: on returning to power, the Taliban decreed its dissolution, but the AIHRC refuses to abide by the decision due to the illegitimate nature of the Taliban regime.

Emergence of a New Proletariat

By Daud Khan
Immigrants are essential to Europe’s economic survival. They are needed for doing the jobs that most Europeans no longer want to do. Jobs that involve manual labor in agriculture and industry; or providing home help, care for the elderly; or working un-social hours in the catering business.

Finance Healthcare, Not Insurance Premia

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Comparative research on healthcare financing options shows revenue-financed healthcare to be the most cost-effective, efficient, and equitable, while all health insurance imposes avoidable additional costs.

Conflict Deprives Children of Education in Northern Syrian IDP Camps

By Sonia Al Ali
Twelve-year-old Walid Al-Hussein, displaced from the city of Kafranbel to a camp for internally displaced people (IDP) in northern Idlib on the border with Turkey, has given up his dream of becoming a lawyer. "The distance of schools from our home (in the camp) made me leave education and give up my dream and my mother's dream of becoming a lawyer who defends the rights of the oppressed," Al-Hussein told IPS.

Indignity, Disease, Death—The Life of a Sewer Worker in Pakistan

By Zofeen Ebrahim
A dark head emerges, followed by the torso. The balding man heaves himself up, hands on the sides of the manhole, as he is helped by two men. Gasping for breath, the man, who seems to be in his late 40s, sits on the edge, wearing just a pair of dark pants, the same color as the putrid swirling water he comes out from.

Climate Change, Pollution Push Karnaphuli Fishers Out of the Profession

By Rafiqul Islam
Jishuram Das, a sexagenarian who was born in Jelepara, located in Chattogram, has been catching fish from the Karnaphuli River since his childhood. But nowadays, he often sits idle without going to catch fish, as their catches have drastically fallen.

Let’s play!

By Heike Kuhn
For the first time ever, we will commemorate the joy of playing with an International Day of Play“ on June 11, 2024. On their website, the UN state that this „marks a significant milestone in efforts to preserve, promote, and prioritize playing so that all people, especially children, can reap the rewards and thrive to their full potential“. But why ist playing so important?

Let the Dead Speak: Forgotten Workers

By Jan Lundius
Immigration policies are among the most hotly debated topics in Europe. Xenophobia, combined with curbing immigration, have become the main reason to why ever-increasing large crowds of voters are supporting populist parties.

Panama’s Elections: Has Impunity Prevailed?

By Inés M. Pousadela
Regional experts called it Panama’s most important election since the 1989 US invasion that deposed de facto president General Manuel Noriega. Panamanians went to the polls amid high inflation and unemployment, with a stagnating economy. Endemic corruption was also high on their long list of concerns, along with access to water, education and a collapsing social security system.

Niger’s Military Coup Triggers Child Marriages, Sex Work in Neighboring Countries

By Issa Sikiti da Silva
A group of young girls aged between 15 and 17 sit tight, following attentively a lesson being taught by a Mualim (Islamic teacher) in a makeshift madrassah (Qur’anic school) located in one of the impoverished townships of Benin’s economic capital, Cotonou. They arrived in Benin recently, fleeing poverty, hunger, climate change, and rising insecurity in their home country, Niger, in the aftermath of the military coup that toppled democratically-elected president Mohamed Bazoum.

Trade Deception Returns in Pan-Africanist Guise

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
The World Bank has exaggerated probable gains from the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to promote partial and uneven trade liberalisation that is unlikely to enhance development on the continent.

Rural Entrepreneurs Thriving Against All Odds in Zimbabwe

By Jeffrey Moyo
With heavy sweat drenching his face and his shirt soaked in the sweat, 39-year-old Proud Ndukulani wrestled with a homemade knife, which he dipped in some used oil, before turning the glistening knife upon a rather tough and dusty tyre obtained from what he said was a forklift. His assistant stood by his side as he (Ndukulani) cut some tough rubber from the giant tyre lying outside an open shade roofed with aging asbestos sheets at Juru Growth Point, located 52 km east of Harare in Zimbabwe’s Goromonzi district in the country’s Mashonaland East province. 

Developing Countries’ Government Debt Crises Loom Larger

By Ndongo Samba Sylla and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Developing countries are being blamed for having borrowed and spent irresponsibly. But they have only been doing what foreign powers and financial interests have urged them to do.

Abandoned Children Growing Problem in Northern Syria

By Sonia Al Ali
Wael Al-Hassan was returning from work in the Syrian city of Harim when he heard the sound of a baby crying. He was returning from work on December 10, 2023. He stopped momentarily, turned on his mobile phone flashlight to investigate, and spotted a baby girl, around one month old, wrapped in a white blanket, lying by the roadside.

Unpaid Caregivers, a Symbol of Inequality in Chile

By Orlando Milesi
In Chile, as in the rest of Latin America, the task of caring for people with disabilities, the elderly and children falls to women who, as a result, do not have access to paid jobs or time for themselves.

New Attempts to Reduce Gender Inequality in Brazil

By Mario Osava
Brazil is beginning to test the effectiveness of a gender pay equality law passed in July 2023, a new attempt to reduce inequality for women in the world of work.

International Women’s Day, 2024


 
On March 8th, we celebrate International Women’s Day. A day to honour the resilience, achievements, and potential of women worldwide. The world faces crises—geopolitical conflicts, poverty, and climate change.

Tracking Global Development in Child Benefits Through New Monitoring and Information Platform

By Naureen Hossain
Inclusive social protections for children would be a positive signifier of social development in a time where 1.4 billion children globally are denied them. A step towards realizing this has been taken through a new monitoring tool on current social protection and child poverty statistics.

North Ignores ‘Perfect Storm’ in Global South

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
A gathering ‘perfect storm’ – due to various developments, several quite deliberate – now threatens much devastation in the global South, likely to most hurt the poorest and most vulnerable.

Illegal Artisanal Mining Threatens Amazon Jungle and Indigenous Peoples in Brazil

By Mario Osava
Artisanal mining, or "garimpo" as it is known in Brazil, has returned to the headlines as a factor in the deaths of Yanomami indigenous people, whose territory in the extreme north of Brazil suffers constant encroachment by miners, which has intensified in recent years.

PPPs’ Private Gain at Public Expense

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
At high cost and with dubious efficiency, public-private partnerships (PPPs) have increased private profits at the public expense. PPPs have proved costly in financing public projects.
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