Refugees Face Often Neglected Mental Health Challenges – Report

While refugees globally face insecurity and uncertainty, a new World Health Organization (WHO) report highlights that they also face poorer health outcomes.

A World in Crisis Needs Both Trade and Aid

We are in the toughest period the world economy has faced since the creation of the multilateral system more than three-quarters of a century ago. A quadruple shock of COVID, climate change, conflict and cost-of-living has undone years of hard-fought development gains.

Stagflation: From Tragedy to Farce

Half a century after the 1970s’ stagflation, economies are slowing, even contracting, as prices rise again. Thus, the World Bank warns, “Surging energy and food prices heighten the risk of a prolonged period of global stagflation reminiscent of the 1970s.” In March, Reuters reported, “With surging oil prices, concerns about the hawkishness of the Federal Reserve and fears of Russian aggression in Eastern Europe, the mood on Wall Street feels like a return to the 1970s”.

The Hunger Factory (II): The Modern Horsemen of the Apocalypse

While often too quickly attributing -quasi exclusively- the world unprecedented hunger tragedy to the current proxy war in Ukraine, other major causes remain hidden in plain sight.

ECW Interviews Three Inspiring #Youth4EiE Advocates on International Youth Day

On this International Youth Day, ECW interviewed three inspiring #Youth4EiE Advocates – Nataly Rivas, Angela Abizera, and Jean-Paul Saif. Nataly, Angela, and Jean-Paul are three Global Youth for Education in Emergencies panel members.

‘Aid Organizations Must Include the Youth Voice’ August 12, 2022—International Youth Day

Today marks International Youth Day, a global celebration of the transformative power of young people. Introduced by the United Nations General Assembly in 1999, the event was inaugurated not only to observe the power of the youth voice, but to serve as a promise from those in power to activate the power of youth across the development sector.

A Safe Haven for Ousted Political Leaders Escaping Executions and Hangings

When world political leaders, mostly presidents and prime ministers, are ousted from power following military coups or street demonstrations, they flee to “safe havens” to avoid being jailed, executed by firing squads or hanged in public. Perhaps one of the secure “safe havens”—and a popular “political retirement home”-- is Saudi Arabia, a traditionally authoritarian regime, which has provided sanctuary for leaders from Uganda, Tunisia, Pakistan, Yemen and Qatar.

The Hunger Factory (I): The Miracle of the Sudden Rise and Fall of Food Prices

The benchmark for world food commodity prices declined “significantly” in July, with major cereal and vegetable oil prices recording double-digit percentage declines.

Climate Change Conclusion: Time for Bold Action

With climate change bringing about increasing numbers of human deaths and untold suffering, and rising economic, social, and environmental consequences worldwide, it’s time for governments to take bold action to address the climate change emergency.

UN’s Education Summit: An Opportunity to Create a Bottom-Up Global Governance

The upcoming summit on Education, part of the UN Secretary General’s ambitious agenda, can truly bring accountability and participation to the inevitably new ways education will be imparted in the future.

Women Have Always Trailed Men in Research Output: How COVID Made the Situation Worse

The under-representation of women in research is well documented. Emerging evidence suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated this inequality and disrupted the research enterprise globally.

April Fool’s Inflation Medicine Threatens Progress

The world economy is on the brink of outright recession, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The Ukraine war and sanctions have scuttled recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Of the Far West, the ‘Good Cowboys’… And the ‘Bad Indians’

Nothing --or too little-- has changed since Hollywood started producing its spectacular western movies. Rough men, ranchers, mercenary killers, saloons, cowboys, guns, gold fever, the ‘good sheriff’… and the ‘bad indians”. Those movies were anything but fiction–they were real history.

Indigenous Women at the Forefront of Transformational Change

The International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, commemorated annually on August 9, is a day to celebrate the many contributions of the 476 million Indigenous peoples worldwide.

The Plastic Crisis Has Deep Corporate Roots: To Protect Our Planet, They Need To Be Exposed

This spring, I taught a new undergraduate course in environmental sociology. Most of my students took the course because they were curious to see what their desire to live more sustainably had to do with sociology.

Technology Helps Traffickers Hunt Their Victims, Enslave Them, Sell Their Organs

Human beings have proved to be capable of producing innumerable practical inventions while much too often making the worst use of them. Take the case, per example, of how criminal groups heavily rely on digital platforms to trap and enslave their victims also for extracting and selling their organs.

The Politics of the Hangman’s Noose: Judge, Jury & Executioner

A spike in state-sanctioned executions worldwide – including in Iran, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and more recently Myanmar – has triggered strong condemnations from the United Nations and several civil rights and human rights organizations.

Slow food, Accelerating Biodiversity in the Field and On Our Plates

Edward Mukiibi was forced to do agriculture at school as punishment for misbehaviour. Instead of hating the punishment, he loved it, especially when he realised farming was the future of good food, health and wealth.

To End AIDS, We Need to End Punitive Laws Perpetuating the Pandemic

This week, the global HIV response community is gathering in Montreal to address the crisis of stalling progress that is putting millions of people in danger.

Of the Secret Leaks and the Baking Planet

Strangely enough, two major scientific findings, both announced in July, did not attribute the current dangerous world’s disasters to the proxy war unfolding in Ukraine.