The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
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Drilling for oil and gas releases chemicals into the air, chemicals that in low concentrations (parts per trillion) can affect how babies develop in the womb. Many of these chemicals are not monitored or measured despite the fact that they may also cause cancer, neurological, or immunological problems.
Dr. Theo Colborn, president of The Endocrine Disruption Exchange, looks at the health consequences of drilling for fossil fuels. Nobody is measuring all the chemicals that are being...
There is some reason to believe that the level of political freedom enjoyed by more affluent South Africans isn’t enjoyed by people in poorer communities, argues David Bruce, an independent consultant conducting research on behalf of the Community Agency for Social Enquiry on political intimidation in the run up to South Africa’s 2014 general elections.
There are many poor communities “where the established system is one where a dominant party governs in that area and...
“If you leave it to the Japanese government, we're never going to get transparency,” contends Arnie Gundersen a nuclear specialist. “Japanese researchers are afraid to tell the truth. We've got doctors calling us saying we know our patients have radiation illness and the hospital isn't allowing us to tell the patients that. We've got researchers talking about defects in animals, and they're not allowed to publish their data,” says Gundersen, in response to recent...
A Russian court has ordered eight Greenpeace International activists be held in custody for two months over a protest against offshore drilling in the Arctic. In addition, Vladimir Putin’s government is holding in custody the Arctic Sunrise, Greenpeace’s command ship. The ship was seized by armed members of the Russian Coast Guard after Greenpeace activists tried to board an offshore oil platform as a protest against drilling for fossil fuels in the fragile environment of the...
Scientists announced recently that Arctic sea ice has officially reached its minimum extent for the summer, shrinking to 5.1 million square kilometers. That’s significantly higher than last year’s record low of just over 3.4 million square kilometers. This fact has led conservative news outlets to suggest that worries about global warming and melting ice are overstated.
Climate denialists are no doubt thrilled by this news, but astronomer Phil Plait argues that these claims...
Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats are the clear winners of the German elections on Sunday, September 22, with a result of 41.6%. Backed by relatively good economic figures for the German Republic, Merkel has capitalized on the widespread impression that she has led Germany through the crisis and defends German interests abroad.
However, the opposition, consisting of the social democratic SPD, the socialist Left Party, and the Green Party, now have a slight parliamentary majority....
