I’ll Fight Day / Advertising #2
“The need to rediscover that God is just and sends the Spirit to do his work of justice through God’s people is urgent now. Such an undertaking requires Christianity’s best thoughts, imagination and energy to be worked out in the world.” - Ash Barker (Preface to “Following Fire - How the Spirit Leads Us To Fight Injustice” ed. Cheryl Catford)
Click here for a larger version that you can print and distribute!
Global Monitoring Report 2008
From World Bank PovertyNet Newsletter #113, April 2008:
A new World Bank-IMF report warns that most countries will fall short on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a set of eight globally agreed development goals with a due date of 2015. Though much of the world is set to cut extreme poverty in half by then, prospects are gravest for the goals of reducing child and maternal mortality, with serious shortfalls also likely in primary school completion, nutrition, and sanitation goals.
“In this Year of Action on the MDGs, I am particularly concerned about the risks of failing to meet the goal of reducing hunger and malnutrition, the ‘forgotten MDG’,” said Robert B. Zoellick, President of the World Bank. “As the report shows, reducing malnutrition has a ‘multiplier’ effect, contributing to success in other MDGs including maternal health, infant mortality, and education.”
The Global Monitoring Report: MDGs and the Environment—Agenda for Inclusive and Sustainable Development stresses the link between environment and development and calls for urgent action on climate change. The report warns that developing countries stand to suffer the most from climate change and the degradation of natural resources. To build on hard-won gains, developing countries need support to address the links between growth, development and environmental sustainability.
“Developing countries need more foreign aid and domestic resources to reach the MDGs. High economic growth and a stable macroeconomic environment remain essential for reducing poverty and increasing investment in health and education.” said Dominique Strauss-Kahn, IMF Managing Director.
Progress toward the MDGs differs dramatically across countries, regions, and income groups, the report says. Sub-Saharan Africa lags on all counts, including the goal for poverty reduction, though many countries in the region are now experiencing improved growth performance. At the country level, most countries are off track to meet most MDGs, with those in fragile situations falling behind most seriously.
With stronger efforts by the countries themselves and their development partners, most MDGs remain achievable for most countries, the report says. With this in mind, the report lays out an integrated six-point agenda, with strong, inclusive growth at the top. The agenda also calls for more effective aid; a successful outcome to the Doha round of trade talks; more emphasis on strengthening programs in health, education and nutrition; and financing and technology transfers to support climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Go here for the report: http://www.worldbank.org/gmr2008
Poverty, Accountability & Desire.
The Persistence of Poverty: Why the Economics of the Well-Off Can’t Help the Poor
I think I’d like to get my hands on a copy of this book. Has anyone read it or seen it anywhere? It looks like this guy is thinking outside the square.
In this important book the author asserts that conventional explanations of poverty are mistaken, and that the anti-poverty policies built upon them are doomed to fail. Using science, history, fables, philosophical analysis, and common observation, Charles Karelis engages us and takes us to a deeper grasp of the link between consumption and satisfaction-and from there to a new and persuasive explanation of what keeps poor people poor. Above all, he shows how this fresh perspective can reinspire the long-stalled campaign against poverty.
Charles Karelis is Research Professor of Philosophy at The George Washington University. Formerly professor of philosophy at Williams College, director of the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, and president of Colgate University, he lives in Washington, D.C.
In other news, I’ve been reading a lot about Professionalism lately. It seems that soldiers and officers are well on their way to professional status (not that we necessarily are seeking it.. that’s not my point). My point is that I feel like the criteria that we are falling behind in is accountability, performance measures and commitment to competence. I may be speaking out of line, but I feel that some behavior I’ve witnessed in officers (occasionally) is neither competent, nor accountable to anyone. I’d like to think that as an officer (and soldier for that matter) that I would actually be kept accountable to some kind of performance measure. Is that too much to ask? If I was an employee, I surely would be.
Also, I’m sure you’ve noticed every now and again that God doesn’t give you what you are seeking because he knows that it is not what you need. Have you ever noticed though, that sometimes God gives us the things that we ask for, even though he knows they are bad for us? (1 Samuel 8 -“Give us a king to lead us!”)
Read these:
The Mission, The Stuff & The End
I watched “Millionaire’s Mission” on Tuesday night. I’d recommend it highly. It follows 8 very rich and powerful entrepreneurs into a Village in Africa, where World Vision is conducting an experiment. Is it possible that these entrepreneurs can think of something that we haven’t to change the future of the village, and bring it out of poverty?
Well, their idea was to build a hotel. Sounds outlandish, but their reasoning was reasonably well thought out, in terms of stimulating the economy, and increasing literacy. But when the locals have highest on their priority list, things like “water” and “roads” and “hospital renovation”, I don’t know if they’ll see the hotel idea in the same light. And the shorts for next week see them yielding machetes, so it’ll be VERY interesting to watch!
I guess that is one of the main tensions between short term relief and long term sustainable development.
I was also directed this week to the “Story of Stuff”. It’s similar to things you’ve always heard about the injustices along the production lines of our “stuff”, but it puts it in a very succinct package, that is available to download. If you’re trying to get people around you to understand the impact that their actions have on the sustainability and stewardship of our world’s resources, then host a screening.
From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns.
The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It’ll teach you something, it’ll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.
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If you’re looking for a way to avoid watching copious amounts of TV this week, hook in with a game of Settlers. You’ll not have as much fun anywhere else!!
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For your ammusement…
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And, go here. You’ll find it thoroughly relaxing.
an unheard voice
“give wiping poverty off the earth a go.”
This article was the winning entry in the year 5/6 category of What Matters? 2007—a writing competition, run by The Whitlam Institute, that gives year 5-12 students in NSW and ACT a chance to say what matters in society today. This girl’s writing is inspiring, and not just because she is so young.
If anything, her words are a timely reminder of things we’ve heard a million times and don’t effect us anymore - things like, “one person dies EVERY two seconds from starvation and every year hunger kills more than 12 million children worldwide”.
If she is this full on at this age, imagine the punch she will pull when she’s 15, or 20.
Bring it Lord. Make Poverty History.
