Global Voices

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The world is talking, are you listening?

Here were the nominees for the Public Eye Awards, a contest listing the worst companies of the year, was published by the website Public Eye. Organized by the Berne Declaration and Pro Natura, since 2000, the awards is a counter-summit critique of the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. To date, readers have ranked Goldman Sachs at the top of the list.  The reason for this is their actions in Greece :

A scam that amounted to half of Greece's debt, for exorbitant fees, a scam that led to the country's ruin.

Rick Falkvinge, the founder of Pirate Party, reinterprets the wars of religion that devastated Western Europe in the XVI and XVII centuries in terms of the current struggle to control information through overbearing legislation related to copyright and freedom of expression:

The religious wars were never about religion as such. They were about who held the power of interpretation, about who controlled the knowledge and culture available to the masses. It was a war of gatekeepers of information.

A small team of Greeks in Zurich decided to expose Greek police brutality with a traveling photo exhibition in various European capitals. @Ypopto_mousi tweets a link to a poster in his blog, [el] which gives more information on his friends’ effort to bring this project to life, as well as a police violence case summary.

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The Genevan blog of Rémi Mogenet, Le Savoyard de la Tribune, explains with supporting examples that [fr]: “Mythological African traditional stories have made a remarkable entrance into francophone literature”. He quotes the Mandika epic tale of Soundjata, written and published in French by Guinean D. T. Niane, as well as, for Cameroon, Au Pays des initiés by Gabriel Mfomo and La Marseillaise de mon enfance by Jean-Marton Tchaptchet, without forgetting L’ Anthologie nègre by Blaise Cendrars.

Gedankenbörsen Blog draws attention to [GER] a new magazine in Switzerland – Echo – about Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.

SRF from GeoCurrent Events blog writes about the economic geography of the 2010 FIFA World Cup participant countries.

There is time until January 4th, 2010 to send in your video pitch for your cause if you want a chance to participate in the World economic Forum at Davos in Switzerland. Read all instructions and Conditions to participate on the Davos YouTube Channel or on their site.

Polandian writes about Poland's plans to legalize chemical castration for those who commit sexual crimes against minors – and about the arrest of Roman Polanski in Switzerland and the Polish foreign minister's intention to ask the U.S. president to pardon the film director: “Now, if the 1977 charge had been for shoplifting, one might just about argue that Poland has the right to go asking for a pardon for this famous son, however, the charge was for the rape of a 13 year old girl when Polanski was 44.”

The Temasek Review has an article comparing the National Day celebrations in Singapore and Switzerland.

Cairo's Scene & Heard celebrated entrepreneur and hotelier Sameh Sawiris's new project in Switzerland saying: “Now that we're branching out into Europe…do you think we stand a chance next to the already existing competition?!?”

Desmond McGrath of A Fistful of Euros writes about football and politics: “Part of the fun of football is the way in which it overturns the international order of power politics.”

Social Science in the Caucasus examines the Internet presence of Armenian and Georgian communities in Switzerland. The blog of the Caucasus Research Resource Centers says that examining the extent of activity in online communities is one way of tracking how organized migrant communities abroad are.

The Armenian Observer features a guest post by a Swiss ex-pat worker in Armenia who compares how elections are conducted in Europe with how they are conducted here in the South Caucasus.

A few more links on the Polish election: the beatroot explains Kaczynski's defeat; Dr. Sean's Diary sums up the results and notes a “a complete slaughter of minor parties“; Edward Lucas declares that the “era of the ‘terrible twins’ is over”; Yascha Mounk‘s general summary at Harvard International Review; Europhobia cheers Poland, but boos Switzerland; Jonathan Newton writes about the election and Poland's EU business.

Carlos Gustavo Machicado of Guccio's [ES] comments on a recent speech by President Evo Morales, who stated his desire for Bolivia to follow the example set by Switzerland. Machiado writes, “The reactions have been favorable because it is good that we want to be like Switzerland, and not like Venezuela or Cuba.”

Gillian writes about the decision by the Swiss government to remove all tarrifs on trade with Tanzania: “The Swiss government has removed all tariffs and quotas standing in the way of Tanzanian exports destined for Switzerland. The new regulations came into force in April 2007, and are expected to benefit a wide range of Tanzanian businesses trading in products such as flowers, cashew nuts and fish.”

Says Le Pangolin [Fr]: “Marthe Moumié is the widow of Cameroonian nationalist Félix Moumié, assassinated in Geneva by the French Secret Service in 1960. Marthe writes a book prefaced by [Algerian President] Ahmed Ben Bella… In the book, Victime du Colonialisme Français [ i.e "Victim of French Colonialism"], Marthe explains how after her husband's death she was tortured in Equatorial Guinean jails for 5 years. “