To oppose the neglect of proper resettlement and rehabilitation plans for 40,000 affected families, Medha Patkar and 11 other villagers in Madhya Pradesh, India took a stand. They commenced a hunger strike against the government’s decision to open the gates of the Sardar Sarovar Dam. The hunger strike is a continuation of struggle that stretches back 32 years.
Of all the great powers in the contemporary world-system, India is the one that receives the least attention. Why should this be? India after all is rapidly approaching the point where it will have the world’s largest population. It is respectably high on most measures of economic strength and improving all the time.
Decades of military adventurism have done more to destabilize the world than any of the “rogue states” the U.S. targets.
As sea levels rise, the already low-lying landmass of Bangladesh is doubly threatened. Much of the country is less than five or so meters above sea level, constituting one of the most vulnerable areas on the planet when it comes to potentially devastating environmental change.
Most politicians, journalists, and academic analysts describe the relations of China and the United States as one of hostile competition, especially in East Asia. I disagree. I believe that the top of both countries’ geopolitical agenda is reaching long-term accord with the other. The major bone of contention is which of the two prospective partners will be the top dog.
Every country has mixed feelings about its future, but some are more self-confident than others. At the present moment, there are very few countries in which self-doubt does not seem greater than self-confidence. This seems to me true of the United States, both western and eastern Europe, Australia, the Middle East, and most of Africa and Latin America. The biggest exception to this global worry and pessimism is China.
Copyright Toward Freedom 2019