Freedom House released its 2010 Freedom in the World survey, which sadly, shows overall freedom declining around the world for the fourth straight year. The report designates a total of 89 countries as free, 58 as partly free, and 47 as not free. Last week, I asked Freedom House Director of Research Arch Puddington about some of the more surprising developments from this year in freedom:
A nice post on conference organizing, another look at Copenhagen summit and activism, some more interesting posts and images…
There have been a couple of interesting posts I?ve run across in my attempts to find out what happened at the 2009 AAA conference (see especially Lorenz?s run-down at antropologi.info). These discussions of conferences in general have encouraged me to write something about my own experiences organizing and attending conferences over the past year (see also, Lorenz?s What?s the point of anthropology conferences?, Kerim?s What?s Your Favorite Anthropology Conference? and Strong?s How to attend a conference in a couple hours). I thought I?d add a different perspective; that of the amateur, I?ll-never-do-it-again (dis-)organizer.
Cold weather, post Copenhagen blues etc and more from the European agenda…
Open Europe has today published a list of the top 100 most costly EU regulations, detailing the annual cost of the laws, the cumulative cost of them by 2020, and the article base in the Lisbon Treaty for each regulation . We estimate that these laws will in total cost the UK economy a staggering £184 billion by 2020. To put that figure in context: for the same amount, the UK Government could abolish the country’s entire budget deficit and still leave the Exchequer with some £6 bn. All cost estimates are based on the UK Government’s own impact assessments so the figures are instructive.
COPENHAGEN, DENMARK — This past Saturday, on a crisp afternoon in Copenhagen, Jacob Wheeler and Rick Fuentes, two amateur journalists with the non-profit media start-up the UpTake, walked alongside a mostly peacefully stream of demonstrators. Roughly half of the total police force in Denmark followed in step. Conspicuous among the crowd were the hundreds of ad hoc reporters with serious-looking digital SLRs slung around their necks.
In the early hours of this morning the news of the failure of the Copenhagen summit on climate change hit the news wires. I won?t repeat the individual disappointments as the papers will be full of it today. But I would like to comment on the political implications of this disaster. It shows that there is no effective global politics, only global problems.
Yesterday?s decision by the UN to ban a large number of NGO delegates from the main summit venue for the Copenhagen climate change talks was, to say the least, unpopular on the ground.
Copenhagen climate talks: Main issues and state of play
Photos from Copenhagen protests
more from the EU agenda…Our neighbor, Greece is having real economic problems, aftermath of Berlusconi attack and more…
Danish police abuse climate-change demonstrators
from Boing Boing by Cory Doctorow
Zoran sez, “Earlier this week (12th Dec), a massive, peaceful protest of 100,000 people — the largest demonstration for climate justice in world history — was met with a heavy-handed response by the Danish police. Thousands of riot police swarmed the march route, blocked off streets surrounding large groups of protestors, and arrested almost 1,000 people. Arrestees were cuffed and forced to sit in rows for hours, as the temperatures dipped below freezing; numerous people urinated on themselves after being denied use of toilets.”
Dispatch from Copenhagen: Demands for Climate Justice
#147 | Photos / videos from tonight in Athens:
Athens police clash with youths
All eyes in the world should be on the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference as we wait with a stuttering heartbeat to learn about the policies that will guide humanity through the next great evolutionary bottleneck. The topic I will be keeping an eye on is overpopulation.
Next monday, dec 7, the COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference finally start in Copenhagen. All visitors who came by aeroplane (…) will see these billboards at the Copenhagen Airport. They campaign from Greenpeace shows our world leaders in 2020.
The leaders: Sarkozy (FR), Merkel (Ger), Obama (USA), Tusk (PO), Lula (Br), Zapatero (Es), Brown (UK) and Harper (Can). See them all after the break.
Cows will no longer give milk in Switzerland if minarets are allowed to stand.
The rightwing political parties in Switzerland are up in arms, preparing for a vote on Sunday to save their alpine paradise from the dreaded cultural eyesore of mosque minarets. This proposed ban on minarets comes from the same friendly yodelers in the nationalist Swiss People?s Party that has previously campaigned against
Some environmental groups are planning disruptive protests for the upcoming climate talks in Copenhagen, taking cues from the anti-globalization movement:
“We feel that right now in Copenhagen there is a real opportunity for things to come together a little bit like they did 10 years ago at the World Trade Organization protest in Seattle,” Müller told SPIEGEL ONLINE….
