Topic: Inequality
Let’s unite and demonstrate the true meaning of Christmas
Article / 20th December 2017The holiday period provides us with a unique opportunity to express the new awareness that must inform a less commercialised and sharing-oriented world. Rather than spending all our time partaking in conspicuous consumption, why don’t we commemorate Christmas by organising massive gatherings for helping the poor and healing the environment?
"American Dream is rapidly becoming American Illusion," warns UN rights expert on poverty
Report / 18th December 2017The United States, one of the world’s richest nations and the “land of opportunity”, is fast becoming a champion of inequality, according to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Philip Alston.
How Orwell used wartime rationing to argue for global justice
Blog / 15th December 2017Innumerable observers have noted that the so-called developed world accounts for a disproportionate share of the world’s resources. Yet even those of us who find global inequality troubling and ultimately indefensible hesitate to raise the subject. Unlike George Orwell, that is, whose support for war-time rationing revealed his motivations towards justice at a global scale, writes Bruce Robbins.
Half the world lacks access to essential health services, 100 million still pushed into extreme poverty because of health expenses
Article / 14th December 2017At least half of the world’s population cannot obtain essential health services, according to a new report from the World Bank and the World Health Organization.
World’s richest 0.1% have boosted their wealth by as much as poorest half
Article / 14th December 2017The richest 0.1% of the world’s population have increased their combined wealth by as much as the poorest 50% – or 3.8 billion people – since 1980, according to a report detailing the widening gap between the very rich and poor.
Universal Health Coverage: Financing and the structural causes of poverty
Blog / 13th December 2017We all support the aspiration to achieve ‘Universal Health Coverage.’ Who could possibly argue against a world in which everybody has access to the high quality health services they need, without incurring financial hardship?The problem is how we can possibly turn such a lofty ambition into reality.
Famine and epidemic disease in Africa
Article / 5th December 2017Without public recognition of the politics behind disease and famine, it is harder to hold leaders accountable, or indeed to take any measures – beyond the purely technical or charity-minded – to mitigate future disasters. And nowhere is the blindness to context in famine reporting more pervasive than in Africa, writes Alex de Waal.
Natale, il sistema ed io
Article / 4th December 2017Tu ed io costituiamo il sistema stesso che incolpiamo per i problemi del mondo, illustrato chiaramente a Natale quando derubiamo la nostra fragile terra nei negozi del centro in nome di Gesù. Quale modo migliore per celebrare la nascita di Cristo quest’anno che unirsi sotto la bandiera della libertà e della giustizia e dimostrare pacificamente per porre fine alla fame e alla povertà in tutto il mondo.
"New gilded age" reaches new heights with world’s billionaires owning staggering $6 trillion
Blog / 30th November 2017In an analysis (pdf) published Thursday that throws into stark relief the "unjust and unsustainable" nature of what economists have termed the New Gilded Age, the Swiss financial firm UBS found that the wealth of the world's billionaires grew by 17 percent in 2016, bringing their combined fortune to a record $6 trillion -- more than double the gross domestic product of the United Kingdom. N
Famine may be unfolding 'right now' in Yemen, warns UN relief wing
News / 23rd November 2017The United Nations relief wing on Friday warned of famine-like conditions unfolding in Yemen, as a blockade on aid and other essential goods by a Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi rebels there enters its 12th day.