A new stage in the US-China trade war

Nick Beams

The economic confrontation between the US and China, the world’s number one and number two economies, has reached a new and more dangerous stage with the escalation of the trade war by the Trump administration.

Since the US first issued its series of demands to China over its trade and economic policies last May, the conventional wisdom in bourgeois circles has been that whatever the extent of the confrontation and the increasingly belligerent pronouncements by the US, some kind of deal on trade would eventually be reached. This belief, together with the supportive monetary policies of the Federal Reserve, formed the underpinning for the rise of the stock market to record highs.

But like all superficial analyses of the capitalist system, this happy scenario simply passed over the fundamental objective contradictions of the profit system which are its essential driving force.

A decade ago, in the immediate aftermath of the global financial crisis, the heads of the major capitalist powers gathered in London for a summit meeting of the G20. There they pledged that in response to the crisis—the most serious breakdown of the global financial system since the Great Depression—they would never resort to the trade war measures of the 1930s. The lessons of history, in particular the role played by trade war in preparing the conditions for World War II, had been learned.

The analysis of the summit presented by the World Socialist Web Site punctured these assertions. As its report noted, “inter-imperialist antagonisms were manifest through the summit” and would inevitably sharpen. “Far from having laid down a globally coordinated plan to rescue world capitalism,” the WSWS stated, “the London summit has only demonstrated the irreconcilable contradiction between the globally integrated economy and the capitalist nation-state system, and the impossibility of the rival national states adopting a genuinely international approach to the crisis.”

It is this fundamental and irresolvable contradiction, rooted in the very structure of the global capitalist economy, which has now erupted in the form of the trade war launched by the US against China.

In his analysis of the outbreak of World War I, Leon Trotsky explained that the contradiction between world economy and the nation-state system manifested itself in the striving of each of the capitalist great powers to transform itself into the dominant world power—resulting in a military conflict of each against all.

After three blood-soaked decades that produced two world wars, the economic devastation of the Great Depression and the horrors of Nazism, the US emerged as the dominant imperialist power. It used its economic strength and preponderance over its rivals to set in place a new economic and political order. The contradictions that had exploded to the surface in the earlier period were suppressed, but they were never overcome.

In fact, the very revival of the capitalist system and the economic growth it produced began to undermine the economic hegemony of the US on which the post-war order had been based. The first overt sign of the US decline came in August 1971 when US President Nixon, facing a gold drain, scrapped the Bretton Woods Agreement of 1944, the basis of the post-war monetary system, by removing the gold backing from the US dollar.

Another major turning point came 20 years later at the end of 1991, when the Stalinist bureaucracy carried out the liquidation of the Soviet Union. While this was hailed as the triumph of capitalism, it represented another phase in the disintegration of the post-war order.

While the Soviet Union existed, the US was able, under the rubric of the Cold War, to contain the ambitions and drives of the imperialist rivals against which it had fought two world wars. Now this stabilising factor had been removed. This fact was immediately recognised by the Pentagon when it issued a strategy document early in 1992 declaring that the post-Soviet policy of the United States was to prevent any power or group of powers from challenging its dominance on a global scale or in any region of the world.

But throughout the 1990s and into the new century, the economic decline of the US continued apace, characterised by the increasing dependence of its economy on financial parasitism and speculation in place of the dominant industrial position it had held in the immediate post-war period—a process that led to the financial meltdown of 2008.

Losing its relative economic hegemony, the US has increasingly resorted to military means to maintain its global dominance, leading to the continual wars of the past quarter-century and more.

Herein lies the source of the deepening conflict with China. While it takes the form of a clash over trade, its roots go much deeper. With its position vis-à-visits old rivals already weakened, the US is not prepared to allow the rise of a new one. This is why its demands on Beijing go far beyond the rebalancing of trade. They are directed at preventing the economic advancement of China, above all in the areas of high-tech and industrial development, which the US regards as an existential threat to its economic and military position.

This is not simply the position of Trump and the anti-China hawks gathered in his administration. It is the position of the entire US intelligence and military apparatus as well as key sections of the corporate and political establishment, as evidenced by the strident call by the Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer for Trump to continue to “hang tough” against China and the support for his measures by so-called “lefts” within the Democratic Party such as Bernie Sanders.

The only economic role the US is prepared to accept for China is one in which it functions as a de facto semi-colony of the US.

However, the Chinese regime of capitalist oligarchs, headed by Xi Jinping, cannot accept such subordination. Having created a 400 million-strong working class through the restoration of capitalist property and the integration of China into the world market, it can maintain any degree of political legitimacy only to the extent that it continues to produce economic growth.

The inexorable, objective logic of this contradiction is war.

And the conflict is not just with China. It arises from the recognition within US ruling circles that the post-war order based on free trade, which had previously benefited American capitalism, is now working against its interests.

Well before Trump arrived in the White House, the chief trade negotiator in the Obama administration, Michael Froman, noted in an article published in the December 2014 edition of the journal Foreign Affairs that there had been “tectonic shifts” in the global trading system fashioned after the war. They demanded, he asserted, a change in the world trade “architecture.” This was because the US “no longer holds as dominant a position in the global economy” as it did at the end of the war, and faced “unprecedented constraints in crafting trade policy.”

In his rants against the present world trade system and the “ripping off” of America to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars, Trump is only expressing more openly and more crudely the widely held position in American ruling circles.

While the China conflict occupies centre stage at present, measures are being prepared against other US rivals. This week the administration will receive a report from the Commerce Department which is expected to say that auto imports constitute a threat to the “national security” of the US, providing the legal basis for Trump’s threat to impose 25 percent tariffs directed against Japan, South Korea and, above all, Germany.

The threat has already been used to pressure Japan and the European Union to enter bilateral, rather than multilateral, trade negotiations with the US, which they had resisted, fearing they would be subjected to the same measures now being directed against China.

The profound significance of the US-China trade war can be grasped only if it viewed within its wider political context. It is not some passing spat. Just as the economic measures of the 1930s are being revived, so all the political phenomena of that barbarous decade are once again rising to the surface.

The danger of world war is increasing daily as the US deploys its forces around the world—from Venezuela to the Persian Gulf and the South China Sea—to enforce its interests. Fascist forces, which are to be deployed against the working class, are being actively promoted by Trump in the US and by capitalist states around the world amid the development of ever more authoritarian forms of rule. At the same time, the gyrations of the stock markets point to the development of another financial crisis even more serious than that of 2008.

War, dictatorship and fascism are the response of the capitalist ruling class to the growth of the class struggle and the increasing turn by workers to an anti-capitalist and socialist alternative.

The accelerating plunge into barbarism can be halted only by the intervention of the working class. In the words of Leon Trotsky at the beginning of World War I: “The only way in which the proletariat can meet the imperialist perplexity of capitalism is by opposing to it as a practical program of the day the socialist organisation of world economy.”

New Zealand Labour government rules out capital gains tax

John Braddock

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced last month that her Labour-led government would abandon plans to implement a proposed Capital Gains Tax (CGT), not just for the current term in office, but for as long as she was leader.

Labour had campaigned for the tax in three elections, saying it was necessary to tackle deepening social inequality. However, Ardern told Radio NZ on April 30 she still believed in such a tax, but it was time to look at “other options.” Ardern blamed her coalition partner, the NZ First Party, saying “I just couldn't get the numbers, and it wasn't for lack of trying.”

The Green Party, Labour’s other coalition partner, had also previously campaigned for a CGT. Both parties, however, have promoted NZ First for years, and were eager to work together in government with the right-wing, anti-immigrant party.

NZ First leader Winston Peters vetoed the CGT, declaring there was no “compelling evidence” that it would improve equality. Without the support of NZ First’s nine MPs, the legislation would not have got through parliament.

Ardern’s capitulation over what was a major election promise underscores yet again the right-wing character of her government. At the 2017 election NZ First gained just 7 percent of the vote, yet Ardern gave NZ First four cabinet ministries, with Peters installed as deputy prime minister and foreign minister. The coalition has played a key role cementing NZ’s foreign policy alignment with Washington and opposing Chinese influence in the Pacific.

The ditching of the CGT further exposes Ardern’s fraudulent promise that 2019 would be the year of “delivery” on Labour’s so-called “transformational” election pledges to slash child poverty, reduce inequality and improve the social position of ordinary people.

Labour has already ruled out raising the top tax rate or business levies, and is committed to “budget responsibility rules” which keep a tight rein on government spending. In the face of an upsurge of industrial action by the working class, including teachers, nurses, doctors, public servants and transport workers, Labour flatly declares there is “no more money” to meet pay demands and properly fund health and education. Poverty rates and inequality continue to escalate.

New Zealand, Turkey and Switzerland remain the only OECD countries to not tax capital gains in some form. Income earned from share speculation or the inflation of property prices remains exempted from tax, while wages are not. Working people meanwhile carry the burden of a harsh consumption tax, which was imposed by Labour in 1986. Levied on all goods and services at 15 percent, it is responsible for 31.4 percent of total taxation.

Labour in fact never had any intention of increasing taxes on the wealthy. Its Tax Working Group, ostensibly set up to make recommendations on a “fairer” tax system, was instructed to ensure its recommendations were “revenue neutral,” i.e., there would be no increase in the total tax take. The group was headed by Michael Cullen, who as finance minister in the 1999–2008 Labour government was responsible for record budget surpluses, the protection of massive share market profits and spiralling social inequality.

The group’s recommendations on CGT were very limited in scope. The family home was to be excluded. Economist Shamubeel Eaqub told Radio NZ that other exemptions would likely have been added, meaning the CGT would raise “little revenue.”

The winners are the asset rich, shareholders and property speculators. By the working group’s calculations, the top 10 percent of the population owns 70 percent of the assets that stood to be taxed by a CGT, while the bottom 70 percent have only 10 percent of such assets, and the 30 percent of lowest income earners have 1 percent.

The CGT proposal was subject to bitter opposition from lobby groups such as Business NZ, which claimed, without substantiation, that it would cost “the economy” over $NZ5 billion, and vocal sections of the media. Canterbury Employers Chamber of Commerce chief executive Leeann Watson declared that the final decision highlighted the Ardern government's “commitment to the business community.”

Labour and the Greens made no attempt to advocate for the CGT against big business. Writing in the New Zealand Herald, columnist Heather Du Plessis-Allan declared that if Labour had really wanted to introduce the tax “they would've fought for it.” Instead, Ardern was “AWOL in the debate” and had never made any “passionate defence” of the CGT.

The abandonment of the CGT signifies that even the most limited social concessions are no longer viable under the onslaught of the capitalist crisis. Like social democratic parties around the world, the Labour Party long ago jettisoned any commitment to progressive social reforms and has allied itself with far-right forces to impose the austerity demands of finance capital.

What will inevitably follow are even sharper attacks on the social position of the working class. Labour’s phony election pledges, including a promise to halve child poverty within a decade, will be ditched on the basis that they are “unaffordable.”

Last week a government Welfare Expert Advisory Group released a major report which concluded that, with some 600,000 dependents often living in desperate situations, an urgent and fundamental change was needed to the welfare system. Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni promptly declared that the government had already rejected the key recommendation to lift welfare benefit levels by 47 percent.

The liberals and pseudo-lefts who supported Labour’s election and glorified Ardern have reacted with acute anxiety about the government’s blatant shift to the right. Academic Bryce Edwards noted in the Herald that the entire “progressive” milieu was in a state of “shock” and “despair” over the CGT “betrayal.”

Editor of the trade union funded Daily Blog, Martyn Bradbury, wrote on April 21 that the only reason Labour could “get away with what they have done” is because there is no alternative political vehicle to the left of them. What was needed, he declared was a new political party led by “our own Corbyn or Sanders,” i.e., to replace Ardern with a phony “left” populist equally devoted to protecting the profit system.

Such comments reflect the fear in these middle-class layers that the illusions in Ardern and Labour are being demolished by events and that what will emerge is a movement of the working class fighting against capitalism and for socialism.

Lebanon: Workers take to the streets to denounce government austerity measures

Jean Shaoul

Public sector workers from telecom, water, electricity, the universities and other government-run services took to the streets of Beirut, Lebanon’s capital, on Friday, to protest the government’s budget proposals to cut their wages, pensions and benefits.

The protests were the second in as many weeks. They were joined by retired army personnel, angry over the proposed cuts to their pensions and benefits. The rallies were part of a nationwide public sector strike affecting schools, universities, state-run media outlets and government offices.

Demonstrators burned tyres and called Lebanon’s politicians “thieves” because they were being made to pay for the failures of “ineffective and corrupt” politicians, demanding the government target “corrupt businesses and politicians” instead of workers who struggle to make ends meet in one of the most expensive countries in the Middle East.

It is the latest in a series of strikes and protests Lebanon has witnessed over the last few months as Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s fragile new government has sought to put together an austerity budget aimed at slashing state expenditure and reducing the budget deficit.

With one of the highest debt-to-GDP ratios in the world, Lebanon must satisfy onerous economic and fiscal conditions if it is to access the $11 billion in loans pledged at the CEDRE conference in Paris last year.

Last month, Hariri warned of an economic “catastrophe” if public spending kept rising and said, “As a government, we are required to issue the most austere budget in Lebanon’s history because our financial position doesn’t allow us to increase spending.” Although he did not specify what measures he would take, he hinted that soldiers would have to make “sacrifices.”

Finance minister Ali Hassan Khalil said that draft budget for 2019, which projects a deficit of 9 percent of GDP, compared to 11.2 percent in 2018, includes major expenditure cuts due to the need for “exceptional austerity measures.” This was only an “introduction to more deficit reductions in the 2020 and 2021 budgets,” he added.

He claimed that the budget would tackle tax evasion, boost customs revenues and propose “tax amendments” for high earners, but not for the poor and those with middle incomes. He did not specify the spending cuts.

The government also announced a plan to reform the country’s failing electricity system that included reducing and ultimately eliminating public funding, while raising tariffs to compensate. This—in a country subject to daily electricity shutoffs—provoked outrage. It is widely assumed that the government plans to privatise the public utilities.

On May 3, central bank workers began an indefinite strike over the government’s budget, forcing the closure of the Beirut Stock Exchange. On Tuesday, the unions suspended the strike for three days, pending discussions with the government.

On May 4, hundreds of migrant workers, mainly from Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, the Philippines and Sri Lanka, marched through Beirut to demand an end to the Kafala system, whereby foreign workers’ residency in the country is tied to their employer’s sponsorship, leaving them with little or no protection under Lebanese law. They are unable to travel, resign, change jobs or return home without permission from their employers, who typically withhold their passports.

There are around 250,000 migrant domestic workers in Lebanon, mostly women. According to a report “Their House is My Prison” published earlier this year by Amnesty International, workers can be subject to violations including physical and sexual abuse, confiscation of passports, non-payment of salaries and restrictions on their movement and food, while the authorities turn a blind eye to these abuses.

Last January, several thousand people protested outside the finance ministry in Beirut over plans to hike the value-added tax and reduce fuel subsidies. It was the biggest protest since the demonstrations over garbage piles on Beirut’s streets in August 2015.

Friday’s protest was joined by scores of students furious over rising university tuition fees and their own non-existent job prospects. It was part of a series of demonstrations that began two months earlier over economic and social inequality with demands for an end to corruption and Lebanon’s sectarian political system, with many wearing yellow vests in sympathy with French protesters.

The protests and the crisis of bourgeois rule in Lebanon are bound up with the imperialist powers and their regional allies’ machinations and wars.

Lebanon, a tiny country of 6 million people, has never had any real political independence. Carved out by Britain and France from the Syrian province of the Ottoman Empire after the Ottomans’ defeat in World War I, it was ruled, along with Syria, by France until 1943.

Since then, Lebanon has been a proxy battleground for influence in the region between the imperialist powers and rival regional states. No political event in Lebanon can be understood as a purely domestic issue.

Various powers whipped up conflicts between Lebanon’s numerous Christian and Muslim sects; between the Lebanese and Palestinians who fled or were driven out of their homeland by Israel in 1948 and 1967; and between Sunni and Shi’a Muslims to further their own agendas, leading to a 14-year civil war that ended in 1989.

Jobs were and still are often restricted, implicitly or explicitly, to a particular sect, often in return for votes in the elections. Government posts are likewise distributed to key political dynasties and sects, making it impossible to implement reforms because that would require the political groups to give up the rewards of cronyism and patronage.

The recent discovery of off-shore oil and gas has increased Lebanon’s geostrategic value in the eastern Mediterranean. Their exploitation requires a reliable government unequivocally aligned with Washington and subservient to Western oil corporations.

It has been a crucial staging post for the war in Syria, where Washington and its regional allies sought to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad. This has been part of their efforts to isolate Iran and Russia, Syria’s main allies, to defeat Hezbollah—the bourgeois clerical group that is close to Iran and holds three cabinet posts in Hariri’s government—and control the Middle East.

Lebanon is now home to around 1 million UN-registered Syrian refugees and 600,000 unregistered refugees, who—with no legal right to work in the country—fall prey to the avarice of unscrupulous employers who pay them poverty wages and the anger of Lebanese workers whose jobs and wages have likewise fallen to unimaginable levels of poverty and hardship, as Nadine Labaki’s heart-breaking film, Capernaum, exposed.

In November 2017, Saudi Arabia forced Hariri to resign in Riyadh over Saudi state media over his inclusion of the Iranian-backed and Shia-dominated Hezbollah movement in his so-called national unity government, in what proved to be an abortive attempt to isolate Hezbollah and further US, Saudi and Israeli preparations for military confrontation with Iran.

Not only has Washington used sanctions and banking restrictions to crash Iran’s economy, it recently passed legislation intensifying the sanctions imposed on Hezbollah, which it designated as one of the five leading transnational criminal groups, and on those supporting it. Given Hezbollah’s significant economic role in the country, this will serve to destabilise Lebanon’s banking sector.

An impoverished state, Lebanon provides few public services. The situation deteriorated with the adoption of free-market policies. As a result, access to essential services, education, health and housing is now dependent upon faith-based and commercial provision, which exacerbates divisions.

But the key dividing line is class, not religious affiliation, despite the confusion deliberately generated by the division of Lebanon for electoral purposes into 18 officially recognised sects. Lebanon is characterised by enormous social inequality. Apart from a handful of billionaires and millionaires, the overwhelming majority of the population live in poverty, more than half are unemployed, while around half of those in work are without a contract. Subject to water and electricity shortages, and food contamination, their life is a constant struggle.

Ramaphosa elected to full term as president amid record low ANC vote

Eddie Haywood

In an election marked by a sharp decline in support for the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and a significant decline in voter turnout, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, a union leader-turned multi-millionaire businessman, won election to a full five-year term in the national vote held last Wednesday.

Over the weekend, the country’s Independent Electoral Commission reported that the ANC, which has ruled the country since the end of apartheid 25 years ago, had won 58 percent of the vote in the national parliamentary elections. This marks the first time in the ANC’s post-apartheid history that its vote has fallen below 60 percent. In the previous national elections held in 2014, the ANC obtained 62 percent of the vote.

Overall voter turnout, in elections that included provincial and local offices, fell to 66 percent from 73 percent five year ago. The sharpest fall in voter turnout was among the youth. The majority of the 10 million South Africans who did not even bother to register to vote, some 6 million, are under the age of 30.

The ANC barely maintained control of the province of Gauteng, home to Johannesburg and Pretoria, the economic and political capitals of the country and the center of the black middle class that has enriched itself off the backs of the masses of black workers and poor since Nelson Mandela became president in 1994.

Ramaphosa, the former head of the National Union of Mineworkers, used his connections to become one of South Africa’s richest men following the end of apartheid. After ousting former President Jacob Zuma and becoming leader of the ANC in 2017, Ramaphosa took power as President of South Africa in February 2018. He carried out his takeover of the party and the nation on the basis of pledges to clean up the pervasive corruption that marked the ANC regime under Zuma.

The Democratic Alliance, the successor to the apartheid-era all-white ruling party, which has since incorporated some dissident factions of the Black bourgeoisie, also lost voter share as compared to 2014, winning about 22 percent of the vote. It maintained control, however, of its traditional base in Western Cape province and the city of Cape Town. It is headed by Mmusi Maimane.

The supposedly “far-left” Economic Freedom Fighters, led by former ANC youth league president Julius Malema, himself a millionaire, saw its voter share increase to about 11 percent, but this was below the rise anticipated in pre-election opinion polls.

The deep social and political crisis, under conditions where the aspirations and interests of the working class and youth can find no expression through any of the bourgeois parties, found a malignant expression in the increased vote for the Freedom Front Plus, a coalition of far-right parties advocating “white self-rule,” which increased its number of seats in parliament from four to ten.

The conflict between the Zuma and Ramaphosa factions of the ANC, by no manner settled with the election, is between two right-wing sections of the black elite for positions and control of the spoils of power, in which both defend capitalism and the interests of native and Western big business against those of the broad masses of the population.

Underlining the financial and business interests at stake with an ANC victory is the fact that the South African Rand rallied 0.4 percent to 14.3242 per US dollar over the past week as an ANC win became clear.

Ramaphosa has made clear he aims to impose a right-wing agenda, centered on privatization and making South Africa “more attractive to foreign investment.” He has declared a goal of taking in $1.2 trillion rand ($83 billion) in foreign direct investment by 2023.

One indication of what this means in practice is Ramaphosa’s murderous role in the 2012 massacre of 34 miners at Lonmin’s Marikana operation while he was the company’s Black Economic Empowerment partner. Ramaphosa, then a top ANC official, owned a 9 percent share in the company. When the mineworkers struck in defiance of the official unions, he denounced the workers as criminals and demanded that the authorities “take action.”

The ANC’s aim of imposing Ramaphosa’s agenda of privatization and “attracting investment” has received much praise from international finance and corporations. On Friday the Financial Times suggested in an editorial that Ramaphosa should root out “enemies of progress” in the ANC.

“The problem is not bad apples. The ANC barrel is rotten. Mr. Ramaphosa needs to make examples of the worst offenders by sacking them. He also needs to empower state prosecutors and investigators to pursue convictions … More broadly, the president must make good on his promise to attract investment and get the sluggish economy going again.”

Ralph Mathekga, the author of Ramaphosa’s Turn, told the Washington Post that the ANC receiving a smaller share of the vote will make it easier to implement its right-wing agenda: “Getting less than 60 percent of votes nationally means Ramaphosa will be less tied to the party’s more radical promises, like land expropriation without compensation.”

The South African economy is stagnant, growing only 0.8 percent last year. It is the most socially unequal country on the planet, according to the World Bank, with a 50 percent poverty rate and an official unemployment rate of 27.5 percent. The jobless rate for young people ages 18 to 35 is at nearly 50 percent.

Home to 10 billionaires who collectively control more than $30 billion, the top 1 percent in the country own 70 percent of the country’s wealth, while the bottom 60 percent own just 7 percent.

The coming to power of the ANC and Mandela and the end of apartheid on the basis of a nationalist and pro-capitalist program has produced after a quarter century even greater poverty and inequality for the working class while enriching a grasping black bourgeoisie and privileged middle class, who have plundered the economy in the name of “black economic empowerment.”

The election sets the stage for an intensification of the social crisis and the class struggle in South Africa. Under conditions of a rising wave of class struggle across Africa and internationally, the South African working class will seek a revolutionary alternative outside of the entire existing social, economic and political framework.

Government of Canada Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships 2019 for International Scientists

Application Deadline: 18th September, 2019 (20:00 EDT)

Offered Annually? Yes

To be taken at (country): Canada

Fields of Research: 

• Health research
• Natural sciences and/or engineering
• Social sciences and/or humanities

About the Award: The objective of the Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships program is to:

• attract and retain top-tier postdoctoral talent, both nationally and internationally
• develop their leadership potential
• position them for success as research leaders of tomorrow

Fellowships are distributed equally among the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC)

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: 

• Canadian citizens, permanent residents of Canada and foreign citizens are eligible to apply with the stipulations sstated in the Program (Link below)
• Applicants to the 2019/2020 Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships program must fulfill or have fulfilled all degree requirements for a PhD, PhD-equivalent or health professional degree stated in the Programme (Link below)
• Applicants must not hold a tenure-track or tenured faculty position, nor can they be on leave from such a position

Selection Criteria: The Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships program is unique in its emphasis on the synergy between the following:

• applicant – individual merit and potential to launch a successful research-intensive career
• host institution – commitment to the research program and alignment with the institution’s strategic priorities

An applicant to the Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships program must complete their application in full collaboration with the proposed host institution.

Number of Awards: 70 fellowships are awarded annually

Value of Program: $70,000 per year (taxable)

Duration of Program: 2 years (non-renewable)

How to Apply: It is important to go through the Application Guide before applying for this Fellowship


Visit Programme Webpage for details

Google Indie Games Accelerator 2019 for Game Developers (Fully-funded to Singapore)

Application Deadline: 19th May 2019

Eligible Countries: Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam, Egypt, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Nigeria, South Africa, Tunisia, Turkey, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.

About the Award: According to Google, the Indie Games Accelerator programme is a “special edition of Launchpad Accelerator and is focused on helping top indie game developers from select emerging markets achieve their full potential on Google Play.”
The Indie Games Accelerator programme was previously available for gaming talent from India, Pakistan and Southeast Asia. But Google says they are bringing it back in 2019 and expanding to “select markets in Asia, Middle East & Africa and Latin America to support indie game startups.”
For Middle East and Africa, developers and startups from  Egypt, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Nigeria, South Africa, Tunisia and Turkey are eligible to apply.

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility:

• You must be a registered developer on Google Play.
• You need to be based in one of the eligible countries: Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam, Egypt, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Nigeria, South Africa, Tunisia, Turkey, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.
• You must be at least 18 years old* at the time of entering the competition.
• You must be the developer of the game you are submitting for review.
• If you are submitting an unreleased game for review, it must have a playable demo APK (Android Package Kit) submitted to Google Play as private beta through the Google Play Console and made accessible to the program team by inviting iga2019test@gmail.com as a beta tester within the Submission Period.

Selection Criteria: All eligible entries will be reviewed by Google teams and program participants will be selected on the basis of:

• Game submitted for review, evaluated on innovation, fun, design, technological and production quality
• Ratings, reviews and performance of previously launched games on Google Play
• Developer’s ability to receive coaching 

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: Successful participants will be invited to two all-expense-paid gaming bootcamps in Singapore, where they will receive personalised mentorship, invites to events, and other exclusive benefits to help them grow on Android and Google Play.

How to Apply: APPLY NOW 

• It is important to go through all application requirements on the Programme Webpage (see link below) before applying

Visit Award Webpage for Details

Japan Africa Dream Scholarship (JADS) 2019/2020 Fully-funded Programme for African Students to Study in Japanese Universities

Application Deadline: 31st August 2019

Eligible Countries: African countries

To Be Taken At (Country): Japan

About the Award: The Japan Africa Dream Scholarship (JADS) Program – capacity building in energy sector through skills development for sustainable development– is a joint initiative by the AfDB and Japan that aims at providing two-year scholarship awards to highly achieving African graduate students to enable them to undergo post-graduate studies (i.e. a two-year Master’s degree program) in priority development areas on the continent and abroad (including in Japan). This Japan Africa Dream Scholarship programme is funded by the Government of Japan.
The overarching goal that the AfDB and the Government of Japan seeks to attain is to enhance skills and human resources development in Africa in a number of priority areas pertaining to science and technology with a special focus on the energy sector. JADS’s objectives are aligned with the Bank’s High 5 agenda (i.e. Light up and power Africa, Feed Africa, Industrialize Africa, Integrate Africa and Improve the quality of life for the people of Africa) and key Japanese development assistance initiatives to Africa and the 6^th Tokyo International Conference for African Development (TICAD VI) outcomes.
Upon completion of their studies, the beneficiary scholars are expected to return to their home countries to apply and disseminate their newly acquired knowledge and skills, and contribute to the promotion of sustainable development of their countries.

Type: Masters

Eligibility: The Japan Africa Dream Scholarship is open to those who have gained admission to an approved Masters degree course at a Japanese partner university. Candidates should be 35 years old or younger; in good health; with a Bachelor’s degree or its equivalent in the energy area or related area; and have a superior academic record. Upon completion of their study programs, scholars are expected to return to their home country to contribute to its economic and social development.
Details on Eligibility Criteria are provided in that call’s Application Guidelines, and these detailed eligibility criteria are strictly adhered to. No exceptions are made.

Broadly speaking, nationals of African countries must:

• Be a national of a AfDB member country;
• Be in good health;
• Hold a Bachelor (or equivalent) degree in the energy area (or related field) earned at least 1 years prior to the application deadline date;
• Have 1 years or more of recent development-related experience after earning a Bachelor (or equivalent) degree;
• Be accepted unconditionally to enroll in the upcoming academic year in at least one of the JADS partner universities for a Master’s degree;
• Applicants living or working in a country other than his or her home country are not eligible for scholarships.
• JADS does not support applicants who are already enrolled in graduate degree programs.
• Not be an Executive Director, his/her alternate, and/or staff of all types of appointments of the African Development Bank Group or a close relative of the aforementioned by blood or adoption with the term “close relative” defined as: Mother, Father, Sister, Half-sister, Brother, Half-brother, Son, Daughter, Aunt, Uncle, Niece, or Nephew.

Selection Criteria: The Japan Africa Dream Scholarship programme uses the following four main factors and the degree of cohesion, to review eligible scholarship applications, with the aim of identifying the candidates with the highest potential, after completion of their graduate studies, to impact the development of their countries.

1. Quality of Education Background
2. Quality of Professional Recommendations
3. Quality of Professional Experience
4. Quality of Commitment to your Home Country
5. Quality of Statement of Purpose

Japan Africa Dream Scholarship (JADS) awards scholarships to applicants who have had at least 1 year of paid employment in the applicant’s home country or in other African countries acquired after receiving the first Bachelors (or equivalent university) degree within the past 3 years.
The JADS Secretariat uses the following criteria to select the finalists:

• Maintaining a reasonably wide geographical distribution of awards, that takes into account the geographic distribution of eligible applications;
• Maintaining a reasonable distribution of awards across gender that takes into account the distribution of eligible applications across gender;
• Giving scholarships to those applicants who, other things being equal, appear to have limited financial resources
• Unusual circumstances / hardships, when assessing the employment experience and other aspects of an application.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The scholarship program provides tuition, a monthly living stipend, round-trip airfare, health insurance, and travel allowance.

How to Apply:

1. Applicant completes JADS application form
2. Applicant sends documents (application form, university transcripts and certificate, CV, professional references and research proposal), to the JADS Secretariat for first screening
3.  JADS Secretariat sends shortlist of candidates to selected Japanese universities
4.  Universities does second screening and share selected students with JADS Secretariat
5. JADS Secretariat recommends awardees based on its selection criteria to the Japanese Executive Director for approval.
6. AfDB contacts selected awardees, and informs partner universities.

Visit the Program Webpage for Details

Multichoice Talent Factory 2019 film skills development programme for Creative Africans

Application Deadline: 14th June 2019 17h00

Eligible Countries: 

• West Africa: Nigeria, Ghana.
• East Africa: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania.
• Southern Africa: Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Malawi, Angola, Mozambique.

To be taken at (country): Kenya, Nigeria and Zambia.

About the Award: If you frame your world through camera angles, narrate reality like a movie script, and edit the montage of your life like a film director, then here’s a flash-forward into your future – MultiChoice Africa is calling all aspiring film directors, DOPs, sound guys, and scriptwriters to help us ignite Africa’s creative industries. Who knows, perhaps one day your name will be rolling across the closing credits on our DStv channels.
In May 2019, on the occasion of Africa Month, we’re launching a call to entry for the MultiChoice Talent Factory (MTF) Academy class of 2019. We’re recruiting aspiring African talent – that’s you – to gain theoretical knowledge and hands-on experience in cinematography, film editing, audio production and storytelling. Sixty talented students from 13 African countries will get the chance to hone their film and television production skills alongside industry greats.

Type: Training

Eligibility:

1. Applicants who hold a qualification must:
   1. be over 18 years of age;
   2. be citizens and residents of the countries from which they are selected by MultiChoice to participate in the MTF Academy initiative, namely Angola, Botswana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe;
   3. be fluent in English in terms of speaking, reading and writing;
   4. demonstrate passion for the drama, film, television or related media and entertainment industry during selection interviews; and
   5. have completed a relevant qualification from an accredited and/or recognised tertiary education institution in drama, film, television or a related media field, within the last 2 years. For the avoidance of doubt, the said qualification must be obtained only from a post-secondary education institution which has been accredited or recognised by a relevant registered institution.
2.  Applicants with relevant experience Applicants who have experience in the drama, film, television or related media and entertainment industry and who do not hold a qualification from an accredited and/or recognised tertiary institution will be considered for admission to the MTF Academy if they:
   1. meet the requirements stipulated in clauses 4.3.1 to 4.3.4 above;
   2. have the highest secondary school qualification as recognised in the countries where they completed their secondary education;
   3. not more than 2 years’ work experience in the drama, film, television or related media and entertainment fields;
   4. are able to demonstrate knowledge and passion for the drama, film, television or related media and entertainment fields as indicated in clause 3.4; and
   5. possess the foundational technical skills in the fundamentals of Production as determined by MultiChoice in its sole discretion.

Number of Awards: 60

Value of Award: MultiChoice Africa will be providing academy students with a fair and reasonable monthly stipend, calculated at industry standards and in line with MultiChoice Africa’s HR policies, to meet their living expenses. For students who need to relocate, a housing allowance and travelling costs will be provided. Further stipend amounts are set and are non-negotiable.
Expectations: MultiChoice Africa expects students selected to participate in the MTF academies to be:

• Highly passionate about film and television
• Highly engaged and committed to their work in the academy
• Highly focused on extracting the maximum value from the opportunities afforded to them
• Willing to work at all levels of operation to gain a holistic understanding of a very demanding, highly complex environment
• To understand that their ongoing participation in the academy depends on having a professional work ethic at all times – in attitude, output and learning.

Duration of Award: 1 year

How to Apply: If you are driven, committed to developing your skills and interested in participating in the MTF Academy and meet the eligibility criteria set out in either clauses 4.2, 4.3 or clause 4.4, then:

1. you must register on the MTF Academy website at multichoicetalentfactory.com;
2. correctly and fully complete the online application form;
3. write an online a motivation letter; and
4.  collate and electronically submit all of the relevant supporting documents listed below:
   1. your curriculum vitae; including contactable references
   2. certified copy of academic transcripts or certificate from a tertiary institution; and/or
5. You may also be required to provide references or any other documents that MultiChoice may stipulat

• It is important to go through all application requirements on the Programme Webpage (see link below) before applying

Visit Award Webpage for Details

Needs finally explained

Aleksandar Šarović

We need food, clothing, and shelter to secure our existence. It gives us the basic pleasure of living. People are also social beings. Joined in society, they improve their lives significantly and get more pleasure. The most substantial progress comes from the cooperation between free people which may bring the greatest power to satisfy their needs. It may also bring the highest level of personal satisfaction, harmony and love among the people. Cooperation among free people brings a bright future of humankind.

The problem begins when individuals start comparing themselves with other individuals.  Subjective opinion of individuals may increase self-importance and diminish the importance of other human beings. Such thinking alienates people from reality and nature. Alienated individuals often want to reach a better life on the expenses of other people. They invest an effort in building their power which enables them to oppress and control people. The success in it brings pleasure but also it brings an illusion of power which hurts back. In such a society weaker people always suffer. Such life is the origin of social problems which have been damaging society through the whole history of humankind.

When people achieve power over others, they expect a significant improvement in their lives, but it cannot happen. For example, Egyptian pharaohs created absolute power over people and wanted to stay in control forever. They built pyramids to ensure their status. However, what exactly did they get by building pyramids? They enjoyed the power over people, but I think watching their tombs grow every day reminded them of leaving this world. They could not possibly feel well no matter what they believed in about the afterlife. I think pharaohs were much more afraid of leaving this world than their slaves who did not build an illusion of power.

Privileged people are very afraid of losing power. For example, I recently saw on TV Facebook’s founder Mark Zuckerberg so concerned about the future of his company that I believe he has lost the pleasure of living. Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, literary cried when his Internet Explorer lost the user demand battle with Google Chrome. What fools they are! The illusion of power has damaged their lives. Such a power indulges people so that everyone tries to build privileges which give them power in society. If people succeed in it, they enjoy it, but then they fear losing power much more than they can enjoy having it.

Besides, one day everyone has to lose to stronger people, and this always brings pain. Wise people think fighting for power and privileges is not worth it. However, people who live in alienated society cannot abandon privileges because they enjoy them very much. As a result, the effort to win and stay the winner create enormous stress which prevents people from sensing their real needs and then of course from satisfying them. Such people cannot feel well. Then their misery oppresses other people more, and then everything goes wrong. Privileges are evil, and the illusion of power harms society.

Those who search for power over others cannot achieve a good life no matter what they do. They can hardly love. They may look like they are capable of loving and caring for people, but this is just narcissism. They love their power and success in society. If something hurts them, they would furiously attack the origin of their trouble. Hurting someone’s narcissism means initiating hatred which does not forgive. That is how we can recognize a narcissistic person. Dissatisfaction makes narcissistic people cruel which brings a lot of suffering to the community. It builds sadomasochism among the people where no good future can be expected for anyone.

When society gets alienated from its nature neither successful nor unsuccessful people have good lives. The attempt to raise power over others is a historically proven mistake. The control over people should not be needed at all. The pyramids and all other significant achievements of dictators do not deserve to be appreciated. If this energy were used productively, we would have lived much better today.

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People need freedom. Freedom from authorities relieves us from oppression in society. Free people may get to know and develop themselves, their ideas and feelings. They may learn the objective values of life. It would tell them that all values they can reach lie within them. They are the most important creation of themselves. The more they get to know themselves, the more capable they are of build harmony with the environment, the closer they can come to another individual, the more easiness of living they can find. Then they do not need to compare themselves with other people. Then they do not produce problems in society.

Those who live freely following their nature are much more capable of feeling their needs and satisfying them. Freedom is necessary for the development of a productive way of living. Only free people may do great deeds and improve themselves and society. The less people feel powerlessness in society the less they need power over others. That is how a productive orientation of society is built. Productive people are capable of loving. Love is the most significant achievement people can make in their lives. Love itself brings the most stable satisfaction to people. Contrary to narcissists, people who love are never destructive.

Everything good people do stays in memory and hearts of people who are affected by them. People who left good influences initiate good actions of other people. It is as a kind of reincarnation. Good people live positively in the minds of other people while bad ones do not, no matter how significant the monuments they left are. However, the prime benefit from a productive way of living comes from the fact that good people may have good lives while bad people cannot.

Free people who chose to live naturally, responsible for their lives and for the nature that surrounds them, live good lives. They are satisfied, relaxed, and full of understandings for others. Such people can accept the limitations of their nature. When they recognize that their way of living meets the life expectations they do not need anything anymore. They are not afraid of death. Death brings them freedom in the broadest sense. Wise people declare such a way of living as the best possible.

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The policy of society based on the cooperation of free people is the only one that may create a good society. But when we try to implement it, we run into the same problem since the beginning of time. The more alienated society is, the more alienated values are accepted by people, the less satisfied people are, and then the greedier they are. People alienated from their nature require a greater share in the division of power and in the distribution of wealth than society can deliver. Then people cannot agree about anything. We have tried to call upon a human conscious to accept a good policy, but human conscience was never able to change society. We have also tried to make rules which will enforce creating good policy, but we were never successful in it. The fact is we do not know how to create a good society.

I have decided to define a policy which will create a good society. After an extensive study, a conclusion comes to me that the democratic acceptance and implementation of equal human rights will do it. Through the history of humankind, the development of equal human rights policy has improved society greatly. Its further development will improve society much more. The problem is the further development of equal human rights requires the implementation of completely new ideas which cannot be easily accepted by society. However, it should be well understood once people accept these ideas they would create a good society unconditionally. Now I will present the essence of equal human rights.

Free individuals may choose to improve and damage society. States have a strong power to restrict people from damaging society and have some power to encourage people of producing benefits. However, the authorities of states were never efficient enough in creating a productive orientation of society as people might be by the implementation of equal human rights. People may radically improve society by getting equal legislative, judgmental, and executive powers. Each person should get an equal right to punish and award other people. Then everyone will try to produce maximal benefits to people and avoid hurting them. This is an essential step in building a good society.

In essence, every person will get an equal right to evaluate a few people of their choice monthly. A positive assessment will bring a small award to the assessed person, and a negative evaluation will carry a small punishment. Such assessments will encourage every person to do everything they can to enrich the lives of other people and avoid producing evil in society. Such a right will make a radical transformation of powers in the society which will completely change the world and make it a beautiful place to live. I’ve called such evaluation democratic anarchy.

Equal human rights will give each person the right to work. As long as unemployment exists, such a right does not exist. Unemployment will be eliminated by shortening working hours proportionally to the unemployment rate. Elimination of unemployment would increase the demand for workers on the free market so that employers would have to pay them more. Better paid workers will be able to purchase more which will grow the economy. Such a simple measure will remove the problems of capitalism. It will also release people from the fear of insecurity of living in a capitalist society and give them more choices to find a pleasant job. These two simple measures will make capitalism a decent social system.

The ultimate stage of equal human rights will affect the public economy. It will be necessary to develop the market of work in public companies. Everyone will get equal rights to work at every public work post at any time. The best productivity offer of workers would get the right to work. It sounds impossible to achieve because such a division of labour never existed. However, the realization of it is just a technical problem.

The new economy will bring more market than capitalism may afford. To implement the competition of workers for every work post, we will need to develop a system that will effectively evaluate the productivity of work offers, harmonize rewards for work, and define the job responsibilities of workers. In short, the workers who offer the highest productivity and responsibility, and demand the lowest salary will get the job. This is a complex task which is explained in my book Humanism. No economy can be better than the one where each job gets the best available worker. Publicly owned companies will send capitalism down to history.

Better workers will always win. They will constantly bring the most efficient progress to society. But nobody will be privileged anymore, and the losers will not suffer because the whole system will be based on the harmony of the market. The market allocates every good to the most capable purchaser who needs and loves it the most. The producers profit from it the most as well. The market of work will eliminate work privileges which will make each job equally demanded. Such a market will allocate every job to the most productive worker who needs and loves it the most. Shorter work hours will eliminate unemployment while less desirable jobs will be compensated with higher incomes. The market will help society to reach the best life possible.

Equal human rights will bring much more benefits to people. These three measures will dis-alienate society. People will find objective values of life. People will respect each other which is the first step in the productive orientation of society. People will be able to follow a natural way of living and to satisfy their needs. People who permanently satisfy their need are never destructive. They enjoy life.

The lack of equal human rights has always made problems in society. It was the only reason society was never good. Full acceptance of equal human rights will prevent all social evil and build permanent harmony among people. Such a policy will build freedom, peace, joy, love, wisdom, and a good-quality life to everyone unconditionally. Equal human rights are our real need which we do not recognize enough. Only equal human rights may build a bright future of humankind.

An Education that kills

Ramanujam Meganathan

It is not that education is in crisis. Education is a crisis now. When people involved in education face problems in practicing it, it is an educational problem or educational crisis. Education as a crisis is it has become an instrument of crisis in society. How? Everyone, be it a politician, administrator, educationist, teacher, parent, student and thinker wants education to become an instrument of change and transformation, but in their own perspective and perception. Education needs to fulfill the basic material needs of an individual  is one thing, a major thing, but it needs also serve the greater purpose of societal and human needs of transforming the society to another level of human development. Does it serve the purpose? It is time for all stake holders of education to reflect and introspect on it. ‘Current tragedy’ of suicides by children soon after the board examination in the state of Telangana and the places where the coaching factories operates stands a testimony of how education is posing a crisis  in today’s children, parents, teachers and the society as a whole. An education which is mandated to nurture children with values and qualities to face the world with courage and determination is killing them. The recently reported number of suicides reported in the above mentioned state is about 20. This is only reported and there may be many more. Why do children commit suicide? This is an open open known fact. They expected above ninety, but failed or secured less than the expected number. Who expected – the child, parent, school, everyone in the neighbourhood and whole country?  Yes, the whole country expects only above 90 and cracking the high stake examination like the NEET, IITJEE and to realise the great ‘Indian American Dream’. No one asks for how the child with her familial and school circumstances has been able to put up a brave face and cleared the examination. Everyone wants to be the first class first ranker so that they can get into the premier institutions and move to any other lucrative job giving country. Aspirations are not a crime; everyone should aspire to achieve something in life. Do we need to put our children’s life at stake and push them to end their life?  The most worrying thing is nobody seems to bother about these suicides, loss of young lives. It is news, as usual, part of 24X7 breaking news.  They are repeated once or twice and forgotten. Release of the highest money invested movie, slapping of a politician or an official or by someone who matters, who has twin electoral voting cards, drunken driving accidents are reported a hundred times and discussed in the ‘yelling intellectual talk shows.’ Death of 20 children after a board examination is only passing news. It appears this country has come into terms with educational suicides as normal or ‘new normal’. Even educationist and educational administrators seem to be accepting it as normal.

It is high time that the country woke to the bitter truth that our educational system has become a crisis. Children are burdened for unfounded reasons. Education has been commodified to the extent that rich get rich education and poor get poorer education. Privatization of education is the order of the day. The state where the suicides has  happened has a series of residential schools where children are stressed to the extent that they have no time except studying, coaching, drilling and learning the techniques of cracking the board examination and high stake entrance examinations like NEET and IITJEE.  Quarter of a century ago (in 1992-1993) as a follow up to eminent writer R.K. Narayan’s maiden speech in the Rajya Sabha the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi appointed a committee to study the burden on children under the chairpersonship of noted scientist and educationist Professor Yashpal. The report of the committee, rightly titled as, Learning Without Burden, brought out appalling condition of teaching-learning in school which burden children. There were efforts to reduce burden- no or less homework for early learning stages in primary school, reduction in the number of tests, abolition of corporal punishment, reduction of curriculum load were some of the initiatives. National Curriculum Framework – 2005 (available at www.ncert.nic.in) which is under implementation across the country has also recommended reduction of curriculum load as one of its five guiding principle. Right to Education Act 2009 (which is now diluted) also set some non-negotiable norms to make learning less burdensome for children in school. But the real stress and trauma begins in high school where learners think of or are made to think of their higher education and making a career. This is being influenced by many factors. Who decides this matter more than what the children wants to become in life.  Majority of the cases it is not the child who decides what she will do in her higher education. It is the over ambitious parents, skewed society which runs after one kind of professional courses or looking forward to job outside the country. This shows that school education has failed to instill confidence in our children. The gap between board examination and the high stake entrance examinations is another major reason for this tragedy. Has education failed? No. Even it has, we ought to believe that education cannot fail.  The way it is practiced has become a threat to children and society as a whole. It is high time that the governments, particularly state governments and institutions working in and for education of children in school gave a renewed thinking on the crisis. Any concerned citizen would not hesitate to suggest that there needs to be high level committee of educationist, administrators, politicians, people from judiciary, writers, thinker, artistes, students and teachers to delve deep into the problem and check the educational menace which affects the society as a whole before it (education) becomes a catastrophe.