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January 19, 2012
Protestors in Cajamarca, Peru, are anxiously awaiting a ruling by the Peruvian constitutional court. The court is expected to decide this week if the Cajamarca regional council overstepped its constitutional authority when it unanimously approved a law on December 28 banning the construction of the new multibillion-dollar Minas Conga gold and copper mine.
The Other Side of Paradise
January 19, 2012
Two thousand and twelve holds both uncertainty and cautious optimism for the Caribbean. The recent election of new governments in Jamaica and St. Lucia, the controversial re-election of an incumbent in Guyana, and the selection of Michel Martelly out of a flawed election in Haiti has sent mixed signals about the overall direction of the region.
Border Wars
January 17, 2012
Maintaining inequality and injustice requires work, and the policing of the associated boundaries between the privileged and the disadvantaged. Increasingly, young people are involved in the project of exclusion—in the borderlands of the United States and Mexico, and Israel-Palestine.
January 17, 2012
On Monday morning, crowds gathered in the community of El Mozote to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Peace Accords that ended El Salvador´s 12-year-long civil war. At the solemn event, El Salvador’s first leftist president, Mauricio Funes, apologized for the state role in the 1981 El Mozote massacre and announced reparations for the victims and their families.
January 17, 2012
With an eye on Mexico’s presidency, Andrés Manuel López Obrador is reaching out to civil society—not seeking a common stance on all social issues, much less any form of explicit alliance, but to pull prominent social activists into the arena of electoral politics. The electoral arena, he argues, is where real social change can take place.
Cuadernos Colombianos
January 15, 2012
The new leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) Timoleón Jiménez has reiterated the call for the urgent resumption of peace talks. However, to get there, the United States must change its position toward favoring a peaceful solution. This is the white elephant whose role has been omnipresent yet underappreciated by analysts of war and peace in Colombia.
January 14, 2012
Obama’s State Department has become indistinguishable from that of the Bush era. Last week the State Department announced that it would expell Venezuela’s Consul General in Miami, Livia Acosta. No official reason was given, but it was clear that the move was in response to an uncredible Univision “documentary” and the response from right-wing Cubans in Miami.
Rebel Currents
January 13, 2012
Fifty-six judges of Bolivia's top courts, elected in a historic but controversial popular vote last October, were sworn in by President Evo Morales on January 3. The new judges, 50% women and 40% indigenous, have changed the face of Bolivian justice, but confront significant challenges of legitimacy and obstacles to implementing judicial reform.
January 12, 2012
Today marks the 2-year anniversary of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. For a year and a half, the International Organization for Migration has coordinated several communications projects aimed at empowering Haitian tent camp residents. There is nothing wrong with encouraging people to take charge of their lives, but these projects are placing the responsibility for aid failures on the Haitian people while promoting a neoliberal “do it yourself” ideology.
January 12, 2012
I have come to a deeply painful decision: I can no longer in good political conscience support the DREAM Act because the essence of a beautiful dream has been detained by a colonial nightmare seeking to fund and fuel the U.S. empire machine.