Categories
Society Work In Progress

Work → In Progress: Designing A Post-Pandemic Future

Let’s not forget that well before COVID-19, we often referred to the “revolution” underway in the workplace. Automation, digitalization, climate change and other seismic shifts were bringing upon major changes in the ways we work. Now, the economy — and life— as we know it seem more unpredictable than ever. Yet after several months of […]

Categories
Geopolitics Ideas Society

Far From Alabama: Quebec Must Face Its Own Systemic Racism

-OpEd- Let’s talk about the words that are at the center of this wake-up-call of a debate. There’s the word “racism,” for starters. It’s a garbage dump of a word, one that embodies a stinking reality, that brings to mind filth like Hitler and the Ku Klux Klan. That’s what comes to the mind of […]

Categories
Geopolitics

The Latest: Canada’s Killer Heatwave, Tigray Ceasefire Rejected, Railroad Jingle Rock

Welcome to Wednesday, where the toll of Canada’s record heatwave is multiplying, Tigray rebels dismiss a government ceasefire and a British rock legend gets to keep his railroad jingle. As Pride Month draws to an end, we also look at how LGBTQ+ activists in several African countries confront the challenge of overcoming conservative attitudes and […]

Categories
Geopolitics Society

The Pure Folly Of ‘Food Nationalism’ In Argentina

Argentine food production is doing fine and needs no ‘progressive’ state intervention to assure supplies.

Categories
Economy Geopolitics

Angela, Christine & Ursula: Three Wise Women Saving Europe

Which leaders will be remembered from this moment in history? So asks Catherine Chatignoux.

Categories
Paris Calling Rue Amelot

Paris To Prague: A Czech Homecoming And Quarantine Au Revoir

PRAGUE — As I walked down Avenue René Coty on a sunny day in late May, everything was like a Paris postcard — except that my glasses were fogging up over my facemask. But I knew the scenery by heart by then, as I had never left a one-kilometer radius around my student residence during […]

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Delta Variant Hits Russia, Tigray Ceasefire, Facebook’s Trillion

Welcome to Tuesday, where Russia sees record deaths from the Delta variant, former South African President Jacob Zuma gets 15 months and Facebook becomes a $1 trillion company. Meanwhile, ahead of the Chinese Communist Party’s 100th anniversary, The Initium takes us to the “red village” where it all began. • Ethiopia declares unilateral Tigray ceasefire: […]

Categories
In The News

The India-China Conflict And The Ghosts Of 1962

For some, anti-Chinese rhetoric following the killing of 20 Indian soldiers is conjuring up memories of a dark and mostly forgotten chapter in India’s history.

Categories
In The News

The Latest: U.S. Strikes Iraq & Syria, Czech Transphobia, Tour De France Crash

Welcome to Monday, where U.S. airstrikes hit Iran-backed militia in Iraq and Syria, Sweden’s prime minister resigns and a pet lion is rescued from TikTok fame. Die Welt also looks at the growing influence of a Russian mercenary group in several African countries. • U.S. airstrikes in Iraq & Syria: The United States military says […]

Categories
In The News

In Germany, University Profs Line Up Against Online Teaching

In an open letter, more than 2,000 academics made the case recently for bringing students back into real, brick-and-mortar lecture halls.

Categories
In The News

COVID-19 Culprits? Seeking Justice For Pandemic’s Toll

Here in the Italian region of Lombardy, which has been one of the pandemic’s deadliest epicenters, months of grief have now turned to anger. It began as relatives of COVID-19 victims formed a Facebook group Noi Denunceremo (“We will sue”), where 55,000 members are demanding the truth about Italy’s fumbled coronavirus response, La Repubblica reported. […]

Categories
Economy

How The Pandemic Hooked A Nation On Teleworking

In France more than anywhere else, employees seem to find it difficult to give up teleworking to come back to the office. They have more or less valid reasons to hesitate. But employers also have their own.

Categories
Geopolitics Society

Black Lives Matter In The Arab World: Fighting A Multidimensional Racism

In Arab countries, the death of George Floyd has reignited the debate about racism against Blacks, a discrimination that worsens as it descends the social ladder.

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Miami Building Collapse, Calling Out Orban, Ancient Shark Attack

Welcome to Friday, where dozens are still missing in the Florida building collapse, Dutch and Hungarian prime ministers clash, and tourists are confused about Mexico City. We also turn to Les Echos for an analysis of the Sudan-Egypt tensions generated by Ethiopia’s Great Renaissance Dam. • Dozens missing after Florida building collapse: A 12-story oceanfront […]

Categories
Geopolitics Ideas

A Tale Of Three Pandemics: Tracing Mexico’s Evolving Ties With China

Unlike the SARS and H1N1/09 outbreaks, which caused friction between the two countries, the COVID-19 pandemic has, if anything, improved Chinese-Mexican relations.

Categories
In The News

The Vaccine Sprint Accelerates

The global death toll in the COVID-19 pandemic has passed 475,000, and the confirmed cases are now more than nine million worldwide. But there’s another number that looms: fear of the pandemic’s second wave striking countries in the coming weeks and months. Already, clusters of new outbreaks of cases have appeared in countries such as […]

Categories
Geopolitics Society

Across The Americas, The Drive To Cancel Columbus

-OpEd- BUENOS AIRES — Anti-racism protestors who’ve demonstrated in recent weeks, and in countries all over the world, are taking their frustrations out on historic figures, toppling or defacing statues of people who embody past injustices. And one of the more typical targets in all this is the man who, back in 1492, famously sailed […]

Categories
In The News

Privacy At Risk, From GDPR To Israeli Spyware

There is nothing like a highly contagious pandemic to remind us how each of our lives is connected to our neighbors — and the rest of the world. That takes on a different form in our digital age, where tracing applications hold the potential of both protecting us from one another and invading our personal […]

Categories
In The News

Face Masks Around The World, Manufacturing And Moving On

There has been plenty of debate and questions surrounding the use of masks since the coronavirus pandemic started. Should we wear them or not? What type of mask works the best? Should countries make them compulsory? But even as a general scientific consensus has emerged that masks are one of the most effective tools at […]

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Mogul’s Prison Suicide, Indigenous Graves, Britney’s Back

Welcome to Thursday, where software mogul John McAfee is found dead in his Spanish prison cell from apparent suicide, hundreds of indigenous graves are discovered in Canada and French soccer fans get very lost. Meanwhile, the Worldcrunch Express stops at iconic train stations around the world that are being kept alive in unusual ways. • […]

Categories
In The News

How The Pandemic Could Shake Up India’s Political System

The coronavirus crisis could reshape how the country’s leadership goes about its business.

Categories
Geopolitics Society

Belgium Postcard: Fallen Statues And The Politics Of Public Aesthetics

Anti-racism and anti-colonial protests sparked by the police killing of George Floyd raise new questions about how societies fill their public spaces.

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Apple Daily Shuts Down, Taliban Gains, Millions Of New Millionaires

Welcome to Wednesday, where Hong Kong’s pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily officially announces its closure, new clashes have broken out in Ethiopia’s Tigray region and the number of millionaires continues to increase despite the pandemic. Latin American business magazine America Economia also reports on how business schools around the world are now adding the environment to […]

Categories
In The News

Growing Evidence Of COVID-19’s Neurological Impact

The most common symptoms are fever, a dry cough and loss of taste and smell. The majority of deaths are due to respiratory failure. But more studies about COVID-19 are now focusing on neurological factors in what is still a largely mysterious pandemic. In the last few weeks, findings from around the world give support […]

Categories
In The News

When Grown Children Shelter-In-Place With Mom And Dad

Reunited and it feels so…? In France, a number of young adults chose to spend the confinement period with their parents. Families butted heads, of course, but also bonded.

Categories
In The News

WeChat Or Chinese Journalists: Who Is Doing China’s Bidding Abroad?

Beginning last month, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has tightened access to media visas for any journalist holding a Chinese passport. The validity period of each visa delivered will be shortened to 90 days, instead of being unlimited as before. Journalists who are citizens of Hong Kong or the Macao Special Administrative Region are […]

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Vaccine Record, Catalans Pardoned, NFL Coming Out

Welcome to Tuesday, where India sets a daily vaccination record, Spain’s prime minister seeks reconciliation with Catalonia and Australia’s Great Barrier Reef could join the list of endangered World Heritage sites. Les Echos also takes us to Japan, where the business model of its notorious yakuza crime syndicate is crumbling because of the COVID-19 pandemic. […]

Categories
Ideas Son Of A Gunnar

Cold War To COVID-19, A Swedish Priest Answers Susan Sontag

The late American essayist Susan Sontag theorized that people are drawn to watching disaster films to help normalize and rationalize what we find psychologically unbearable. Watching a fictionalized apocalypse on the screen, she argued, inures us to the possibility that a real one may arrive. Sontag’s idea in 1965 about the need for a remedy […]

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Iran’s New Leader, Live Olympic Fans, Vaccine Gum

Welcome to Monday, where Iran’s new leader has tough words for Joe Biden, Olympics athletes will get a live audience after all and Russia is developing a chewing gum form of its Sputnik vaccine. Italian news magazine Internazionale also reports on the harrowing living conditions for migrants in the country’s pre-deportation facilities. • Iran’s new […]

Categories
Geopolitics Ideas

The Problem With Trimming The U.S. Military Presence In Germany

The chief foreign policy correspondent for Die Welt chimes in on Trump’s decision to reduce the number of U.S. troops in Germany from 35,000 to 25,000.

Categories
In The News

Healthier Spaces: COVID-19 Prompts Rethink Of Hospital Design

While it may make sense from a business perspective, healthcare facilities should focus on more than just optimizing space. Hospital architecture lessons from a pandemic.

Categories
In The News

India-China Clash: Border Maps And Facts On The Ground

Zooming in on the territory in question and the shifting history between Asia’s (and the world’s) two biggest nations.

Categories
In The News

From The Freedom Of Vanlife To A Pandemic Quarantine — And Back Again?

SAINT-BLIMONT — Two years ago, my partner and I set off across Europe in our campervan. We called it Foxy — and it was our home on wheels and ticket to freedom. In France, they still call it “la vanlife” — that ultimate mix of wanderlust and practicality that was popularized during the 1960s in […]

Categories
In The News

Italy: Broken, Leaderless And Chasing Germany Yet Again

ROME — “We deserve a smile …” With these words, Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte urged the country to celebrate the reopening of the country’s regional borders on June 3. Unfortunately, there’s very little to smile about, and nothing to celebrate. As it reopens, Italy is a country that has been worn out by the […]

Categories
Geopolitics

The Latest: Germany’s “Supermedizin,” Gbagbo Is Back, Juneteenth Signature

Welcome to Friday, where the global COVID-19 death toll exceeds 4 million, ousted Ivory Coast leader Laurent Gbagbo is back in town and Joe Biden makes Juneteenth official. We also go to Hong Kong where so-called “vaccine hesitancy” is particularly high as a direct result of rising mistrust of the government. • Global COVID-19 death […]

Categories
Geopolitics Ideas

Latin Americans Denounce U.S. Racism — But Are They Any Better?

Latin American media have joined the chorus that has condemned institutional racism in the United States, but rarely denounce discrimination and violence targeting non-white groups in their own countries.

Categories
In The News

Beer And Other Essential Services In Mexico City

-Essay- MEXICO CITY — Confinement has had few consolations, in spite of all the efforts to sell it as an “opportunity for personal growth.” The good news from where I sit is that I can see beer showing up again in Mexico City’s supermarkets and convenience stores. When the country imposed a nationwide shutdown, the […]

Categories
In The News

Globalization Under Fire, From Protectionism To Pandemic

The world’s prevailing trade system was facing major challenges even before the pandemic. But that doesn’t mean globalization is destined to die.

Categories
In The News

The Latest: Biden And Putin Punt, Iran’s Unpopular Elections, Heavenly Harmony

Welcome to Thursday, where Biden-Putin talks reinstate ambassadors but achieve little else, Japan lifts some COVID restrictions ahead of the Olympics and boy is the Rhine river filthy. We also turn to Berlin-based daily Die Welt to understand why hackers (from Turkey and Russia alike) keep targeting Germany’s Green Party. • Biden-Putin summit talks: U.S. […]

Categories
In The News

Contain & Innovate — African Success In COVID-19 Response

Three months ago, as the pandemic began to spread beyond Asia, many worried that Africa was particularly vulnerable to COVID-19. Yet, so far, the toll has been relatively contained across the continent. In Africa, there have been a total of circa 200,000 recorded cases, compared to over two million in Europe and more than three […]

Exit mobile version