All The World's Estranged IV

AFRICA
Libya and the EU kissed and made up this week by lifting visa bans on each others citizens. The session was complete with an apology from the Spanish Foreign Ministry for blacklisting Libyans, all of which began two years ago when Hannibal Gaddafi was arrested in Geneva and Switzerland initiated a diplomatic tiff.

In the DRC a massacre by the LRA in December has finally come to light, revealing the continued threat of the terrorist group despite the assurances of the government. A former LRA spokesman has denied the association, claiming that it is the Uganda People's Defense Force that is carrying out the killings. After mounting pressure in Washington from groups such as Invisible Children and Resolve Uganda the Senate passed a bill this month authorizing funding for humanitarian efforts in the region as well as military action against the LRA  which the US will likely effect using AFRICOM, the US military command in Africa.

ANTARCTICA
Drilling efforts to reach the largest body of freshwater on the continent and the fourth largest lake on the planet are close to fruition as a multi-national team of British, American and Russian scientists revealed today that they are 300 ft of Lake Vostok. The project is fueled in part by a quest for life on the planet's most harsh environment as well as beyond (Mars, Europa), and also in part by a search for more answers on the prospect of climate change.

Korea is joining the list of nations securing plots of ice for building research stations in Antarctica. The Ministry of Maritime Affairs plans to complete the $88 million research site by 2014 at Terra Nova bay

ASIA
The NLD, Burma's  main opposition party has declared that it will not participate in the country's first elections in 20 years, after the Junta banned its leader Suu Kyi from participating in the process due to a criminal record. The junta recently passed electoral laws stating that parties may not have members with criminal records, which excludes many NLD members who have been prison records for activism.

The theme at the 2010 AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee)  meeting was" Israel: Tell the Story" , which seems to emphasize the revelation of a side of Israel that is often hidden. The council aimed to convince those in attendance that Israel "that Israel is making the world a better place", although some critics viewed it as another "bomb Iran special".

AUSTRALIA
Partyiers in Sydney spend a few more minutes than usual in line at Home nightclub in order to get their pictures taken and fingerprints and IDs scanned into a bio-metric system being tested at club. While Home nightclub is the only one to use the fingerprinting technology, other clubs are using a variety of 13 ID-scanning technologies for the stated purpose of increasing safety for their patrons. ID-tect, the software company which provides the software states that if the patron is not a "ban list", their information is deleted within 28 days, otherwise it may be stored indefinitely.

In Mayo Clinic v CSL Limited, the renowned Mayo clinic has made allegations of conspiracy against  CSL, Australia's largest health care company of forming a conspiracy between its wholly-owned blood-plasma subsidiary CSL Behring and Baxter International, the health care industry's peak medical products company.

EUROPE
The largest trade union in Britain has revealed that it has a piggy bank of £700,000 which it plans to use to aid its British Airways members who are facing up to £900 pay cuts for participating in the recent cabin crew walkout.

Last week's EU summit saw Greece receiving a sustained brush off from Germany, which for the past two years has consistently vetoed proposals for bank bailouts. Germany has a well-known post-war policy of placing European unity before national interests which has been upheld by all post-war chancellors up to this point which is why Chancellor Merkel's ardent stance on the Greek bailout has caught some off guard.

LATIN AMERICA
Brazil's is the country of the month, with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva pledging mid last week to maintain a steady stream of economic stability and later showing a bit of prowess after receiving authorization from the WTO to enforce cross-retaliation measures against the US cotton policy which was found to be illegal in 2008. Brazil has already applied surcharges to many of US products and will be announcing more on US IPR. GM also announced that it will invest $780 million in two Brazilian plants towards adding two new models to the country's lineup. Furthermore, the WSJ sang  Brazil's praises and speculated on a promising future for the biggest economy in Latin America and the 10th biggest in the world. Da Silva also found his popularity rate at its highest since taking office as he finishes his last term.

NORTH AMERICA
A Guardian article raises the question, 'when is the last time Haiti was run by its own government, and not NGOs?'. Clinton, the US special envoy to Haiti publicly questioned this week whether US aid was actually materializing into self-reliance in Haiti despite his role in the historic sandbagging of Haiti by the US.

For a president who did not finish paying off his college loans until taking office due to the increasing costs higher education, one would expect Obama to place higher education initiatives high on his priorities, which he did, for a short while.In the summer of 2009 Obama unveiled a plan to propel 5 million university graduates by 2020, however the education bill that was pork-barreled with the recently passed health care bill catered meagerly to higher education and in almost no way to community colleges, which typically receive no attention from the federal government.

All The World'S Estranged III

AFRICA
The United States consumes 22.5% of annual oil production and most of that oil comes from Africa- not the Middle East. China, the next largest consumer at 9.6% as of 2008 is on a path of relentless economic growth and has set it sights on Africa,specifically Ghana and Uganda, as a resource for oil among other things. In the past, there  have been many deterrents to {liquid}gold diggers who eyed African nations, however better drilling technology and current periods of dwindling conflict in some nations have revived the thirst for African oil once more. "Explorers salivate in particular at the prospect of peace in Somalia".

Niger is making  large strides (we hope) towards transparency  and independence in its elections, as supported by its declaration that yesterday , excluding many government officials who would otherwise have a conflict of interest, from running in state elections.

In anticipation of the celebratory activities soon to be beckoned by the 2010 World Cup, Britain has pledged £1,000,000 to the hosting nation of South Africa for the appropriation of condoms. South Africa is the continent's worst afflicted country in the fight against AIDS.

ANTARCTICA
There is time to waste in what I call the Arctic race as proven by the unveiled plans to restore and activate the Polar Star by 2013, one of three icebreakers owned by the U.S. The Polar Star can pierce up to 21 ft of ice and will cost approximately $56 million for a 'fresh paint job'.

"You're one in a million"- says many a high school crush trying to express that immature albeit convincing phenomenon of puppy love. Perhaps the effect of uttering those words could be compounded by upping the stakes- "You're one in a zillion". While such statistics are difficult to prove, this penguin can enjoy the royalties of knowing that it is truly one in a zillion. The all-black penguin was discovered by Andrew Evans for National Geographic Traveler Magazine during a recent trip.


ASIA
Google and China are on the cusp of a nasty breakup as China remains unyielding on its internet censorship policy.

This afternoon in Doha, {Qatar} ,Japan is ramping up to voice its opposition against the proposed ban on the cross-border trade of  bluefin tuna, of which it consumes 80% of the world's annual catch . The ban will be debated at the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. Japan consumes 80% of the species

AUSTRALIA
Victorians have discovered that the Australian government in conjunction with the Victorian Police has contracted a private company AquaSure to gather "intelligence" on protesters during recent protests of the desalination plant project.

PM Tony Abott is {as usual} the subject on the lips of most Australians for his vague proposal to fund a  "fake" parental-leave policy by raising corporate taxes .

EUROPE
 British PM Gordon Brown stated during the Iraq Inquiry that the 2003 invasion "was the right decision and it was for the right reasons" while his Foreign Secretary John Milliband supposed that the result has been a positive Middle Eastern inclination towards during business with the UK, saying " “People in the region do respect those who are willing to see through what they say [they will do],".

The EU and Microsoft found themselves embroiled in another inevitable anti-trust spat over the packaging of IE with Windows OS as the default browser. The EU won, with Microsoft offering five browser options for install on the Windows 7 OS. The options are Safari, Firefox,Opera, IE and Google Chrome.

LATIN AMERICA
The largest of Canada's mining companies have been accused of staging a real-life version of the movie Avatar, facing allegations of human rights abuses in the name of retrieving natural resources in Guatemala.

Twenty-seven years into a class action suit by indigenous inhabitants of the  Ecuadorian Amazon against Chevron for pollution and death caused by the company's oil drilling in the 1960s, a US justice recently determined that the blame would be shared by both Chevron and the national company Petroecuador.

NORTH AMERICA
The U.S DOS- Bureau on Democracy, Human Rights and Labor released a 2009 report claiming that anti-Muslim sentiment is on the rise in Europe. The Bureau backed the claim by calling on the November 29 ban in Switzerland on building minarets as well as the continued ban on burqas and head scarves in France, Germany an the Netherlands.

In an absolute coincidence with the increased interest in African oil, Obama (buttressed by the opinions of some economists and health officials) has frozen US aid distributed from President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief, (PEPFAR) to AIDS treatment projects in many African countries, stating that efforts should be redirected from treatment to prevention.

*Must Read
Geoffrey Garrett from the University of Sydney presented an interesting case for the G-2 comprising the US and China, within the global group of the G-20.

ABSTRACT

The post-global financial crisis world will be increasingly dominated by China and the United States. What the de facto G2 do, together, independently or in conflict, will increasingly define the global bounds of the possible. Both countries want to embed their bilateral diplomacy in the multilateralism of the G20. The problem for the emergent G2 in G20 global architecture is that economic relations between China and the US will be increasingly difficult to manage. The large economic imbalances between the two countries, in which China buys American debt and Americans buy Chinese goods, will endure. Before the crisis, the codependence these imbalances created was a source of stability in Sino–American relations. After the crisis, they will be a source of frustration and conflict, as the second half of 2009 showed. To manage economic relations between China and the US effectively, the G20 agenda will have to move from crisis management to strategic planning for the global economy. The G20 will also have to become more institutionalized, but in a way that resembles more a nonexecutive board of directors of a multinational firm than a management committee of C-level executives.

Internet Freedoms in China - Part 3 of 3

Even more divulging is the claim by Dr. Hung that the Ministry of Information Industry aimed this regulation at free, personal websites, rather than business enterprises. Thus far, thousands of personal websites have been shut down for failure to register. Shortly thereafter in July 2005, newer regulations were passed, requiring instant message users and bloggers to use their real names to log in online. These actions, whose alleged purpose was national security and social stability, were also highly recommended to universities by the Ministry of Education (Hung 14). In this case, Singapore and China utilize equally stringent policies to promote self-censorship in the public. Licensing functions to further intimidate those who may otherwise risk sharing and collecting information, because it requires the disclosure of one's identity. The reason why there exists such a wealth of information (whether good or bad) is likely attributable to the ability of anyone to share personal as well as academic ideas without the need for self-disclosure. Taking away anonymity is taking away new material out of that stagnant pool of information that is especially reinforced in one-party states such as China and Singapore.

The last significant measure taken by Singapore and China to limit internet freedom is nationwide surveillance of users and web spaces. These governments require ISPs to retain information on users that is collected in the course of their online activities, in addition to surveillance on cellular phones and mobile devices (Gomez 143). Chinese authorities exert more effort, by training and employing a reported 40,000 cyber police whose intended purpose as stated by China's People's Daily newspaper is "to intensify real-time monitoring, to intercept and delete harmful information and to capture and check illegal server data" (Hung 40). The roaring Chinese economy has even inspired "censorship entrepreneurs who, provide advanced text mining solutions to enable censors to monitor, forecast and manage online public opinion, thereby avoiding scandalous and damaging revelations" (OpenNet.net). These solutions have been used in situations such as that of a popular internet post in 2007 that exposed the kidnapping and forced slave labor of children at illegal brick kilns in Shanxi province. The post was promptly deleted as soon as the authorities were notified. China is able to maintain such penetrating and prompt measures largely due to its large bureaucracy (Yang 416). The bureaucracy also reduces the transparency of operations and makes it difficult for internet users to appeal unfair practices to higher levels of government. Internet surveillance and regulations that require licensing/registration are incredibly intrusive into and obstructive of socio-political and cultural discourse in Singapore and China. In fact, these two policies are further detrimental because they could deter some internet users from internet activity entirely. The fewer internet users there are posting and collecting ideas and information, the less information is circulated, and the self-reinforcing cycle of stagnation emerges once more.

The Chinese media's declining ranking by the RSF in the new millennium indicates that the progression of internet freedom is likely in decline as well. In 2004 the Chinese government deemed websites hosted by the CNN and BBC to be "subversive" websites, and restricted access to them with strict laws, jail sentences and even crackdowns on cybercafés. Case in point, in 2003, a Chinese activist was imprisoned for 8 years for posting content that aligned with the Chinese Democratic Party. In 1999, then Senior Minister of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew gave a speech at the Asian Media Conference stating that Singapore did not intend to block incoming information, rather to state its position on the information. Within a perplexing matter of minutes, he also admitted that “information technology is rapidly undermining whatever monopoly control of the media government might have had" (Hung 22). In addition, he Minister Yew spoke of the promising joint ventures between the Chinese media and U.S-based FOX network. Despite this, the government continues to monitor and regularly block television channels such as CNN and BBC World News. On April 20, 2006, CNN and BBC were repeatedly blocked, apparently to prevent viewers in China from seeing Wang Wenyi, a Falun Gong protester, heckling Chinese President Hu Jintao on the South Lawn of the White House during Hu’s official visit to the U.S (Chung 735). This reveals that while foreign media enterprises may be allowed to join the media networks in China and Singapore, their material is also subject to filtering, and surveillance. Every government retains the right to determine the policies it implements, however these policies seem redundant. What is the purpose of permitting foreign information via the internet if after the filtering, censorship, and surveillance processes, it is only available to a minority who has passed the licensing requirements?

A recurring theme, especially in the new millennium is the citation of "national security" as a reason for any and all measures to limit internet freedoms. These two words have become as common as grammatical articles in the English language, ever since the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and as some scholars suspect, are used as an all-purpose cover for authoritarianism. Gomez states that “the repressive practices of media control, from the colonial era to post-colonial and contemporary governments, have been applied to the internet and the information carried by mobile information devices. Thus, to a large extent, the cyber security measures resulting from the ‘war against terrorism‘are simply an extension of existing censorship laws and surveillance strategies (145).Propaganda and other media control has likely not ceased to exist in China and Singapore, but has instead taken on a more digital and more ambiguous form (Kalathil 44).

The most distressing factor about China’s and Singapore’s authoritarian governments’ limitation on internet freedom is that it greatly reduces the democratizing power of the internet. I concur with Gomez when he implores that “democracy requires a public culture of participation”; the internet is presently the most promising tool for fostering democracy across borders but is under intense control. Given the opportunity to defend China and Singapore amongst other nations using similar policies, former Senior Minister of Singapore might say

  “The Internet is as much a purveyor of truth as it is of outright lies. Although it may take some time, morality and wisdom must find a way to control and tame the new technology to preserve the fundamental values of society by which parents bring up their children to be good citizens. In responding to this challenge of new technology, Asian societies will seek solutions different from those of the West” (lawac.org)

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Wang, Stephanie. "China | OpenNet Initiative." ONI Home Page | OpenNet Initiative. 15 June 2009. Web. 20 Oct. 2009. .
Chung, Jongpil. "Comparing Online Activities in China and South Kore." Asian Survey 8.5 (2008): 727-51. Ww.ucpressjournals.com. University of California. Web. 20 Oct. 2009. .
Gomez, James. "Dumbing Down Democracy: Trends in Internet Regulation, Surveillance and Control in Asia." Pacific Journalism Review 10.2 (2004): 130-50. Auckland University of Technology. Web. 20 Oct. 2009. .
Hassid, Jonathan. "Controlling the Chinese Media: An Uncertain Business." Asian Survey 48.3 (2008): 414-30. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .
Kalathil, Shanthi. "Dot.com for Dictators." Foreign Policy 135 (2003): 42-49. Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, LLC. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .
"The Media and Asia." Speech. World Affairs Council. Los Angeles. 19 Oct. 1998. Los Angeles World Affairs Council. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .
"Media Development Authority - About Us." Media Development Authority - Home. Media Development Authority, 29 July 2009. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .
"Press Freedom Index 2009." Reporters Sans Frontières. Reporters Sans Frontières. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .
"World Economic Forum - Global Information Technology Report." World Economic Forum - Home. Ed. World Economic Forum. 26 Mar. 2009. Web. 20 Oct. 2009. .
Yang, Gubon. "The Coevolution of the Internet and Civil Society in China." Asian Survey 43.3 (2003): 405-22. 2 Dec. 2003. Web. 19 Oct. 2009. .

All the World's Estranged II

AFRICA 
Obama pledged this week to extend economic sanctions on Zimbabwe by one year following a similar  extension by the EU despite the south African nation's inflation topping 321 million percent. That bears repeating. 321 million percent. The sanctions, including an arms embargo by the EU ,were imposed in response to human rights abuses by President Mugabe and his government, as well as suspected election fraud . A coalition government is present, partly Mugabe's  ZANU-PF and Prime Minister Tsvangira's MDC, and although British Foreign Secretary David Milliband has expressed interest in cooperating with the MDC party, the sanctions are likely to stay in place, as international leaders struggle to differentiate Mugabe's abusive influence from that of the new coalition government. Deputy Prime Minister Arthur Mutambara goes so far as to call the sanctions illegal

Ministers, assistant ministers, MPs and others allegedly associated with the 2007 post-election violence in Kenya are to be named during a continuing investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The list if left unsealed, will reveal those alleged to have planned and even financed the violence that occurred after President Mwai Kibaki emerged victorious in a heated competition between Kibaki's (Party of National Unity) PNU and RailA Odinga's (Orange Democratic Movement) ODM in which tribalism was a dividing factor.

ANTARCTICA 
China has joined the list of nations clamoring to claim some access to Arctic waters, in response to retreating Arctic sea ice. A report by the Stockholm International Peace Institute inds the Acting Programme Director Linda Jakobson relaying that, "To date China has adopted a wait-and-see approach to Arctic developments, wary that active overtures would cause alarm in other countries due to China's size and status as a rising global power". The report, titled China Prepares For an Ice-Free Arctic can be found here.

Inspire Antarctic Expedition, a program by the 2041 organization will be taking an Antarctic expedition between March 5-18 with group of corporate leaders, environmentalists, entrepreneurs and others in tow. Ok, perhaps that sentence will make less sense upon the extrapolation that 2041 is an organization dedicated to preserving the continent Antarctica, especially with the impending expiration in 2012 of the Kyoto Protocol  for the Environment program. In 2041 specifically, the Protocol for Environmental Protection is open for amendment, hence the name of the program. Upon visiting the sponsors page, one discovers Coca Cola and BP among others. I am puzzled as to why the polar explorer and environmentalist who founded 2041 believes an oil company,a socially irresponsible corporation and a team of corporate leaders will take genuine interest in preserving the fondly described "last wilderness in the world".

ASIA 
Iranian authorities have banned several newspapers including the reformist daily paper Etemad, for unspecified violations. Weekly paper Irandokht which is also in opposition of the re-election of president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was banned due to "not meeting the conditions in the press law on practical commitment to the constitution" 

Indonesia's Vice President and Finance Minister were the subject of an impeachment debate  
on Tuesday March 2 amid criticism of the $700 million bailout of private Bank Century.
 

AUSTRALIA 
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's proposal of a federal takeover of the nations state-run hospital system has been challenged by some, being viewed as a diversion tactic to distract critics of his home insulation program and other controversial programs. {Search queries for the definition and purpose of the program only yield statements of the programs closing as of Feb,19 2010 in addition to criticisms.}

Drought policies in Australia are under amendment as Agriculture minister Tony Burke claims that "Government support and assistance is conditional upon how much debt you are in. If, for whatever reason, you've made some really hard decisions during the good times and are not in debt, your reward for that is to get no government assistance."

EUROPE 
French president Nicolas Sarkozy admitted last week that France had made "grave errors' in its judgment on Rwanda's 1994 genocide, although refrained from an official apology. Several days later, Rwandan authorities have commended the arrest by French police of Agathe Habyarimana , the widow of former president Juvenal Habyarimana whose death is said to have triggered the genocide. French police have not declared the national interest in arresting the widow, and although it is assumed they would extradite her, French officials deny an official request of extradition while Rwandan officials confirm it. After the 2006 accusation by a Paris judge that the current government is responsible for Habyarimana's assassination in 1994, relations between the two nations soured, leaving one to wonder why the French police bothered with an arrest if there is no intention  to honor extradition requests.

In response to the use of fake Irish passports in the assassination of a Hamas leader attributed to Israeli agency Mossad, as  well as "a wholesale disregard for international law", the Irish town council of Carrickmacross has torn from its guest book, the signature of Israel's ambassador to Ireland. I seriosuly doubt the effectiveness of this measure, although I am almost certain more public displays of Israeli disapproval will follow from the other nations whose passports were faked.

LATIN AMERICA 
Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Cuba's Raul Castro are the most vocal national proponents of an organization to represent political consensus in the Americas. The organization is to be called the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States and is expected to consolidate the international interests of those states, especially as a separation from North American interest.

A Spanish judge presiding over the plotted assassination case of Colombian president Alvaro Uribe claims there is evidence linking Venezuelan government official Arturo Cubillas Fontan to Colmbian guerilla organization FARC and Basque separatist group ETA.

NORTH AMERICA 
A trick is a trick and that is it. Or is it? Pennsylvania State University professor and climatologist Michael Mann has been cleared after an investigation of emails between himself and a climatologist at the British University of East Anglia. Emails hacked from the Climate Research Institute at the UEA showed a graph publicly used by Mann to profess global warming as having being created using a "trick". The word trick raised suspicions surrounding the accuracy of the data, however, Mann has been cleared after describing the 'trick' as a statistical method of displaying various ranges of data. So when is a trick really a trick?

A prominent advocate of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 ,a standards-based educational program enacted by George Bush II has recalled her advocacy of the program, joining myriad critics of the controversial program. Former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch has authored a book titled The Death and Life of the Great American School System in which she disapproves of  the emphasis of standardized testing and other measures which detract from the real subject, which is successfully educating students.NPR's Steven Inskeep interviews her here

All The World's Estranged- I

* Google Translate may be necessary for some of these links

ASIA

Transfer of troops from Okinawa,Japan to the US territory of Guam expected to increase the island's population by 50%

As unemployment and national debts are compunded worldwide, this author questions whether China should succum to pressure to increase the value of the yuan

AFRICA
For the first time in 36 years a  US ambassador to Libya arrived in 2008, but over a year later, Libyan trade official Mohamed Tahar Siala is calling out the US on dragging its feet to implement its side of the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA), a trade agreement between the two countries

You might not be able to pick up a pound of Kenya blend coffee next time you visit your local gourmet coffee shop, as production of coffee in Kenya and Uganda decreases 

ANTARTICA
Japan plans to continue whaling in Antarctica despite the threat of legal action by Australia

The fossil of an extinct four-legged animal found in Antarctica 30 years ago continues to propel paleontology experts who claim that many species sought refuge in Antarctica to avoid extinction over 250 million years ago

NORTH AMERICA

New credit card laws supported by the Credit Card Accountability ,Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 (CARD Act) go into effect on Monday March 1

The news media have been haphazardly tossing around statistics that are intended to boost our financial ego's but the truth is, statistics do not matter to us if we are not a part of it. Perhaps this is why stimulus initiatives are ineffective.

LATIN/SOUTH AMERICA
Colombia  is faced with disapproval from the Spanish principlaity of Asturias in regards to an Colombia-EU trade agreement. The Asturian Human Rights Commision plans to show evidence of human rights violations in Colombia.

Latin American and Caribbean countries are coming together to form a united front for the purpose of eradicating poverty ,reducing economic inequality and boosting economic development

EUROPE
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is to apologize to abused victims of the Child Migrant Programme

Transparency in appointment of EU Commission ambassador to US called into question as protocol is ignored

Airline strikes must be fashionable in February, as French air traffic controllers strike within 48 hours of a srike by German airline Lufthansa's pilots

AUSTRALIA
 The 14th round of trade negotiations between Australia and China, its largest trading partner, resume as Australia insists on further investment in China

Migration of Muslims to Australia continues to be the target topic of hate groups.

Extra Extra,Read All About It! Global News Series coming to Nimo-ism

It has been obvious to me for quite awhile that my book review topics and other postings may not always be closely relevant to current events. {By the time I finish reading a book and reviewing it, the material may not be quite as 'hot off the presses}.While certain issues can almost always be considered current events, I have been wanting to incorporate current events,preferably in keeping with my blog's main topics; globalization, international relations, global economics/finance and international politics.

Enter: My new bi-weekly series titled " All The World's Estranged'. Eighty seconds is the amount of time it should take you to catch up on current events from around the world. The posts will be concise but will contain links for further information for those long Sundays for which spending hours catching up to the world simply seems appropriate. I will not designate specific days of the week for posting the series, although Tuesdays and Fridays seem best for keeping in the definition of the term 'current' :)

What will be different about this series from other news blogs and sites you ask? I aim to gather my information from a wide range of sources, from private and public, to independent sources in order to let you decide what is news and what isnt. In order to ensure comprehensive coverage, the news will be divided by continent- yes, even Antarctica!

Oh yes- the title. The title 'All The World's Estranged' is a play on words on the famous Shakespeare quote "all the world's a stage" from his play As You Like It. Jacques, a malcontent Lord  from the Exiled Court of Duke Senior in the Forest of Arden opines;

 Act II Scene VII

All the world's a stage

And all the men and women merely players

They have their exits and their entrances

And one man in his time plays many parts

His acts being seven ages

I do not concur with Thomas Friedman's view that the world is flat, nevertheless I find it a futile effort to deny that globalization has smoothed out some curves on the international relations landscape. The global interconnectivity of goods, services, ideologies and cultures has significantly contracted the conceptual distance between physically distant supply and demand marriages. As borders come down , the saying 'it's a small world' seems more relevant and simultaneouly, current events of one country are regurgiated by popular news media world wide, feeding into the idea that globalization = homogeneity.

All the world's a stage, indeed, but the monologue and dialogue of the players differ. Globalization brings the world to our fingertips, and the task at hand {pun intendend} is to determine the associations and correlations relayed by the information we have access to. In lieu of dealing with the seven stages of a man's life  pronounced byShakespeare's Jacques, I will attempt to provide snippets of associations in current events, from the seven grand theatres -Asia,Africa, Antarctica,Australia, Europe, North America and  South America.

Curtain Up.

The Works of William Shakespeare

The Clash of Civilizations

My review of pages 1-15 of the article :

The Clash of Civilizations
by Samuel P. Huntington
later aggregated to this book

For one and a half centuries after the Peace of Westphalia created the modern international system, wars and conflicts were engaged by monarchs, emperors, and other such heads of state. These leaders were motivated by personal or familial desires such as continuity of ruling and expansion of territory. As nation-states developed, conflicts were engaged in my peoples, rather than individual leaders. WWI emphasized the varying ideologies in the world's nation-states, and as such, once again the battle lines shifted to reflect ideological differences, culminating in WWII and continuing on to the Cold War. Post-Cold War, the international political arena began to include the over-looked non-Western nations, and in 1993, Samuel Huntington hypothesized that the basis of conflict in the all-inclusive world would now be culture. Nation-states will continue to be the guiding structures, as compared to a reversal to conflicts between national leaders; but varying civilizations will cause global conflict.

Huntington defines a civilization as a cultural entity which generally has similarities with other cultures within a relatively defined geographical form, such as a nation, but yet differing from relatively foreign culture . For example, he points out the minor differences, but great commonalities between Northern Italian and Southern Italian cultures versus Italians and Germans. Short of identifying ourselves as members of certain species, the broadest cultural entities to which we belong, are our civilizations. These civilizations are of varying sizes and just as their members, will be dynamic, as individuals redefine themselves.

Huntington states that the reason civilizations will clash will be the interaction between the seven or eight major civilizations, namely Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and possibly African civilizations. To explain why the differences among civilizations will take center stage, Huntington first explains that these differences are real and basic. By this, he means that members of each civilization can relate to each elemental difference, and can define themselves at least somewhat, based on that element. These elements could be religion, culture, language and others , all tied by the fact that they took years to develop, and thus are unlikely to be abandoned soon. Although differences may not necessarily translate into conflict, they often do, and according to the article, civilizational differences have resulted in the most prolonged and violent wars of time.

The second reason why civilizations will become more prominent is that people from different civilizations are coming into ever closer contact and this more intimate contact will bring into focus the inherent differences. While Huntington does not explicitly state it, I believe globalization is the force responsible for the more intimate contact between civilizations. This view could present a new perspective of discussing globalization , since current discussion tends to focus on either the diversifying or homogenizing effects of globalization.

The third propeller of the clash of civilizations is what is referred to as "economic modernization" and the ongoing social change in various parts of the world, both of which Huntington expects to weaken the nation-state as a basis of identity. In place of nation-stated, people will are themselves by religion, an element that is far more transcendental to most people than nation-state identity.

The fourth propeller is essentially the clash between the Western and non-Western nations. At the time of writing this article, Huntington believed the West was at the peak of its power, and simultaneously, there were 'grass roots' movements in various civilizations across the world. The combination of one civilization being at its peak, with the increasing fervor of other civilizations to affect the world in new ways, would lead to a momentous crossroad in the power to affect.

The fifth propeller of the clash harks back to the first one, which is based on the high personal regard and commitment that lends itself to cultural identity , versus economic status or political ideology. The last propeller is the rise of economic regionalism evident over a decade ago, and more evident today in the European Union and American Union.

Huntington predicts that the clash of civilizations will occur at two levels; the macro and micro levels. At the micro level, specific groups along civilization fault lines will conflict about exactly where the lines are drawn, while at the macro level, the dominant nation-states in different civilizations will battle for the international spotlight. Thus far, there have been conflicts along fault lines such as ; the West vs. Islam, Protestant vs. Catholic Europeans Christianity vs. Islam. In Africa, the fault lines lie between Christianity vs Islam vs Animism. One important distinction made between the contact within civilizations is the violence that abounds historically. Ethnic cleansing in Eurasia is a large source of cultural violence and continues to be so today.

In the article, Muslim Indian author M. J. Akbar predicts that the next the clash of civilizations and battle for a new world order will be instigated by Islamic confrontation of the West. Considering esoteric knowledge, I am not convinced that the Islamic world is the instigator, but rather the vehicle of confrontation ,which already began with the attacks of 9/11.

Find the article here