Argentina in Turmoil

Jérôme Duval

Seventeen years after the 2001 crisis in Argentina, the Macri government, which came to power in December 2015, is reinforcing a fierce structural adjustment plan for its population following the loan requested from the IMF. The country, which in 2018 holds the presidency of the G20, is one of the most affected by the rise in interest rates in the United States, the leakage of capital, the soaring dollar and speculation on the stock market, as with the crisis that is emerging in Turkey.

In the context of President Trump’s trade war to favour US exports over others, the rise in interest rates in the United States has led to a rush on the dollar, which is now seen as safer than ever. Dollars are being repatriated to the United States to take advantage of the interest rate hike, cash flows suddenly dry up, the currencies of so-called “emerging” countries fall sharply.

Turbulence in Argentina

The peso is in free fall, prices are exploding, consumption is reduced to a minimum, the middle classes are being squeezed, many firms and businesses are closing, hunger is spreading in outlying areas and speculators are panicking without knowing what to invent to avoid the shipwreck that has been announced. However, we could have learned from past crises not to reproduce them: Argentina has already seen this situation before… the people remember it, 2001; there was hunger, the clatter of empty pots hit by hammering spoons in front of closed banks. This was the “corralito” [1]. On the other side, capital flitters away discreetly to await better times. The scenario orchestrated by the IMF all over the globe infinitely repeats itself, which does not prevent it from distilling its same nauseating recommendations whatever the latitude of the country concerned.

“Zero poverty” Macri repeated during his election campaign. Today his popularity is plunging, and this slogan lies among his many election promises that will never be fulfilled, once again the people’s trust has been trampled on, betrayed by the power of money. At fault, the austerity cure that only aggravates the social situation already rolled out by more than two years of a hard right government.

The first 15 billion dollars of the IMF’s 50 billion dollar mega-loan in June does not seem to be enough to stabilise the economy, which has been buffeted by inflation of around 30%, itself stimulated by a depreciation of its currency. The Argentine peso lost nearly 20% of its value against the dollar in two days, 29^th and 30^th of August, and 98% over the last 12 months (more than 50% since the beginning of the year) reaching an historic all-time low at over 40 pesos for a dollar.

In a frenzy, the Argentine Central Bank raised its key rate from 45% to 60% on 30 August, one of the highest in the world after having increased it from 40% to 45% on 13 August, to encourage investment in local currency [2]. However, this action, like the efforts of the Central Bank of Argentina, which has sold more than 12 billion dollars of its foreign exchange reserves since the beginning of the year to stabilise the peso [3], failed to contain investors’ fear of default, or to mitigate falling prices. As if provocatively, on 31 August, the day after the spectacular rise in central bank rates, the US rating agency, Standard & Poor’s, placed the note of the Argentine debt “under negative watch”.

IMF austerity

Argentine President Mauricio Macri announced, on 3^rd September, a brutal austerity plan under IMF supervision. This included the introduction of a tax on agricultural exports of 4 pesos per dollar exported [4], which Macri himself acknowledged were “very bad taxes”, but the level of the budget deficit required emergency action. After so much austerity applied to the poor, this measure may not appeal to the producers of soybeans and maize, the largest purveyors of foreign exchange of the state, hard hit by a record drought early this year. In addition, Macri announced the removal of 12 out of 22 ministries! Mr Macri is claiming to eliminate the ministries of Culture, Labour, Science and Technology, Energy, Agribusiness, Health, Tourism and the Environment to convert them into State secretariats under the dome of other ministries: Culture and Science and Technology pass for example under the mandate of the Ministry of Education, Work under the orbit of the Ministry of Production, Health is absorbed by that of Social Development and Agro-industry moves to the Treasury Department while dismissing 600 workers. So far, only the dictators Pedro Eugenio Aramburu and Juan Carlos Onganía had ventured to eliminate the Ministry of Health.

On 4 September, Argentine Economy Minister Nicolas Dujovne and Central Bank Vice President Gustavo Cañonero went to the IMF in Washington to negotiate a revision of the agreement signed in June and speed up payments. Argentina is sorely lacking in cash. At the same time, the prosecutor Jorge Di Lello indicted President Mauricio Macri for abuse of authority and violation of the duties of a public official for signing the agreement with the IMF on 7 June, without submitting it to Parliament, thus violating the Constitution. For his part, President Macri is unable to calm the growing discontent. He has said on TV and keeps repeating, “This crisis is not just another crisis, it must be the last (…) the worst is behind us. [5] However, the same mistakes produce the same effects and history repeats itself…

In the street, soaring prices are resurging popular discontent. In Buenos Aires, La Plata, Rosario, Mar del Plata, or in other cities of the country, the people express their anger at the rise in prices or the budget cuts imposed on the public administration in exchange for the IMF loan, like those applied to public universities. On strike for more than a month, the professors of the fifty-seven public universities are demanding pay rises. Awakening the tragic memories of the financial collapse of 2001, soup kitchens are again overwhelmed, not only with children but entire families… Galloping inflation is reducing margins on falling consumption and the US supermarket giant, Walmart, has sold a dozen hypermarkets. The price of bread has increased by more than 20% in a few days [6]. As in 2001, the people are hungry, for social justice and bread.

Chilean police attack pensioners’ protest in Santiago

Cesar Uco

On Wednesday October 24, thousands of Chileans marched on the streets of Santiago protesting against the current pension fund system known as AFP—“Association of Pension Funds.” The march was summoned by a group called NO + AFP (or No M ore AFP ) and it was repressed by well-armed Carabineros (the notorious militarized Chilean police) who beat up demonstrators, used tear gas and brought in water cannon to stop the protest.

Workers (both young and old) and students are seeking the elimination of AFPs (which were created under Pinochet’s fascist military dictatorship) and a return to the old system of public pensions.

In spite of the violent repression last Wednesday, dozens of people remained in the center of the city on the main avenue La Alameda, facing continuous harassment by the Carabineros.

While workers and retirees were being beaten up in the streets of Santiago, the right-wing President of Chile, Santiago Piñera, a former businessman and Chile’s wealthiest man, made clear with whom he stood, deciding to spend the day dressed as a soldier. The newspaper La Tercera reported that “dressed in a military uniform, the president joined...the closure of Operation Storm 2018,” a military exercise involving the Army, the Air Force and the Navy.

NO + AFP also held marches across the country from Arica, on the northern border with Peru, to Punta Arenas, on the Strait of Magellan, the southernmost region of South America. Included were the main Chilean cities such as—in addition to Santiago—Valdivia, Antofagasta, Iquique, Valparaíso, Rancagua and Puerto Mont.

Students also demonstrated, linking their fight for free education to the struggle of retirees. Amanda Luna, spokesperson for the Coordinating Assembly of Secondary Students (ACES), said: “Secondary students will be in conjunction with the workers of this country demanding more decent pensions, more dignified working conditions and a free public education. That’s why the high school students are here in support, and we will continue to fight alongside the workers.”

Since 2016, the movement to eliminate the AFP system—a hallmark of Pinochet’s anti-worker measures—has brought hundreds of thousands of workers and youth into the streets. Former president Michell Bachelet (of the Socialist Party) tried to placate the population, promising the reformation of the system by having companies increase their contributions to workers’ pension funds. But her failure to do so opened the way for right-wing Piñera to return to power in January 2018. (He had previously been president between 2010 and 2014.)

The television network teleSUR reported: “In addition to the arrest of several people, including the spokesman and leader of the movement, Luis Mesina, 62, who was violently assaulted and taken to the police station...the teleSUR correspondent’s team was attacked, [including] journalist Paola Dragnic and cameraman Hugo Silva, who were covering the event.” Mesina was arrested along with a dozen leaders representing workers and retirees from the banking, commerce and health sectors.

The leader of the NO + AFP movement said to teleSUR: “For the next few years, it is projected that more than 60 percent of those who retire will get a pension that is lower than the minimum wage and 40 percent will be below the poverty line.”

President Piñera is presenting his own proposed “reform” of the pension system. Given the stark truth that most retirees receive pensions below the minimum monthly wage of $292, it is expected that Piñera’s reforms will be a defense of the neoliberal system with cosmetic changes.

Despite the fact that last week’s mobilizations did not reach the dimensions of those of the last two years, Mesina told the daily La Tercera that “Today we have shown that this movement, despite everything that is done to try to revile it, has managed to express itself throughout the country.”

A review of the Chilean economy following the September 1973 coup reveals why the AFPs are so important to the Chilean ruling class, as well as to world capitalism and institutions like the IMF.

The AFPs were created by decree on November 4, 1980, in the midst of a huge economic crisis that had plagued the Chilean economy since the military coup of September 11, 1973. Dictator General Augusto Pinochet imposed the AFPs upon Chilean workers by force.

Contrary to what bourgeois newspapers said about a “Chilean miracle” arising in the wake of the overthrow of the elected government of Socialist Party President Salvador Allende, the reality is that Chile was plunged into its worst economic crisis during the first decade of the Pinochet dictatorship.

Under shock therapy prescriptions made by the reactionary American economist Milton Friedman and under the auspices of the International Monetary Fund, Chile suffered the greatest drop in GDP in the years following the military coup. (In recent history, the magnitude of Chilean shock therapy was only surpassed in the 1990s when capitalism was reintroduced in Russia.)

It was not until Finance Minister Jose Piñera, brother of today’s President Sebastian Piñera and one of Milton Friedman’s “Chicago Boys,” implemented what amounted to the systematic theft of Chilean workers’ salaries, through AFP monthly contributions, that Chile was able to surpass economically other Latin American countries. These contributions served directly to inject capital into Chilean enterprises

It is significant that both the Chilean Armed Forces and the Carabineros did not adopt the AFP model for themselves, instead staying with the old pension model.

Together with the creation of private pension funds, the dictatorship initiated a large program of privatizations, which resulted in a sharp increase in unemployment between 1980 and 1982, with figures skyrocketing over the rest of South America. A decade had to pass for Chilean unemployment to come close to the average for the continent.

Currently, five of the six AFPs are managed by multinationals such as MetLife, Prudential Financial, BTG Pactual, Sura Group and Principal Financial Group.

For example, in 2013 MetLife bought AFP Provida and Chile became its fourth largest market in the world. Since that year, MetLife’s policy has been to strengthen asset management to increase fee income. If the objective is to increase commissions, it should not be surprising that retirees’ pensions have been decreasing over time.

In March 2016, Prudential Financial bought 40 percent of the Chilean AFP Habitat, one of Chile’s largest private pension funds, for $529 million. It has $43 billion in assets under management. In 2015, it generated about $127 million in revenue before tax and $125.7 million in 2014.

In other words, the Chilean AFPs have mutated from being the growth engine of Chilean industry to becoming cash cows for multinational financial interests focused on increasing commissions.

By law, the AFPs invest 10 percent of workers’ salaries. The economist Gonzalo Durán of the Economic Commission for Latin America (in Spanish, CEPAL) believes that “an AFP invests workers’ money in banks...whose interest rates fluctuate between 4 percent and 4.5 percent per year.” The banks then offer workers “consumer loans, at annual rates of 25 percent...a very profitable business.”

It is clear for to Chileans who have joined the protests against the AFPs that the system emerged in order to boost the profits of national companies and transnational investment funds at the expense of pauperizing retirees.

UK: NHS subsidiary companies—tools for tax exemption and privatisation

Ben Trent 

The destruction of the National Health Service (NHS) continues apace, with outsourcing one of the most effective methods of diverting public assets into private hands.

At the start of the month, 250 NHS estates, procurement and facilities staff working at East Kent Hospitals had their jobs outsourced to a subsidiary company, 2together Support Solutions. This follows a four-day strike at the end of September by affected staff, after 85 percent of them voted in favour of a strike.

The new subsidiary company was announced in May and formally began trading on August 1. The company was set up by East Kent Hospitals University Foundation Trust (EKHUFT).

The subsidiary company is just one of numerous companies—also referred to as “subcos”—that have been set up primarily as a tax avoidance move by multiple NHS trusts. Private companies that operate within the NHS can apply for VAT exemption, whilst NHS Trusts are unable to apply. The Guardian reported in September that “around 35 trusts have set up “subcos” and moved non-medical staff into them, or said they intend to do so.”

The 250 staff will be added to the already 850 that were transferred from Serco, which used to hold the contract for clearing and catering in the trusts. While the 250 transferred workers will retain the pay and conditions they currently have with the NHS trusts, new hires and the 850 moved from private conglomerate, Serco, are not going to be on NHS pay or conditions, creating a de facto two-tier workforce.

A spokesman for the subsidiary claimed, “We have confirmed NHS staff who are transferring to 2gether Support Solutions do so on their existing terms and conditions, this includes pay, annual leave and access to the NHS pension scheme.”

Such assurances are bogus. On October 11, staff at the subsidiary company iFM Bolton went on strike over pay. The pay deal offered by the subsidiary brings most staff to less than £8 an hour, which is under the rates for counterparts within NHS trusts. This was after promising staff they would be employed on NHS rates of pay. A domestic worker, speaking to the Salford Star, declared, “We need the same pay as the NHS staff. We’re on poverty pay at the moment and we work damn hard.”

Amid the growing concerns over the use of “subcos,” NHS Improvement (NHSI)—the regulator of the country’s NHS trusts—issued a notice to “pause any current plans to create new subsidiaries or change existing subsidiaries.”

Jonathan Ashworth, Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, heralded the move by NHS Improvement as a “victory.” Similar comments came from Unite’s national officer for health and UNISON’s head of health also referring to an apparent victory. These claims have already proved to be false, as both the East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust and the York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust ignored the notice and the strikes opposing the outsourcing.

As the Salisbury Journal reported, Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust began consultation in September to move 375 health care workers into the subsidiary company Salisbury Healthcare Solutions (SHS). Upon the release of the NHSI notice, a spokesman for the SHS merely declared that after the consultation was finished it would simply pause the implementation of the plans. Even though the consultation was made under existing guidelines, the trust is not looking to withdraw the entire proposal. Staff had expressed concerns, outside the September annual general meeting, that the proposal lacked details around pay and conditions of the workers set to be transferred.

Over the last year, several high-profile subsidiary transfers have failed. The Guardian reported in September that Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Foundation backed down from moving 600 staff members to its subsidiary body—Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys Estates FM Limited—after UNISON threatened legal action. Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh foundation trust also abandoned plans to move 900 staff members to its subsidiary WWL Solutions in June.

In 2010, Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust created TQtwentyone—a separated business entity, as a part of the privatisation process—creating the conditions to attack pay, terms and conditions. By 2013, TQtwentyone, which provided social care services to people with learning difficulties and mental health needs in southern England, forced its 1,886 workers to sign new contracts. These included a restructured pay system, an end to unsocial hours payments and a drastic reduction in annual leave.

TQtwentyone managers argued that workers had to agree to lower their wages and conditions because they cannot compete with private providers “who are fiercely competitive on price in the social care market.” However, the crucial role in facilitating the contracts going through was played by the health unions. Unison, Unite and the Royal College of Nursing isolated the struggle of the health workers and made sure that this inferior contract was imposed on health workers as the employers wanted.

NHS Fightback, initiated by the Socialist Equality Party, warned about the consequences, stating, “The [subsidiary] was expected to increase new business by 9 percent a year, by taking over services from other Trusts and local authorities. The merger of services with the accompanying slashing of jobs, wages and conditions and rationing of services is a vital stage in the government’s strategy of privatising the NHS” (emphasis added). Now, large swathes of these services have been sold off to the private sector, driving down the pay, terms and conditions of workers and hugely reducing the quality of services.

In 2014, a document was published by the Smith Institute in cooperation with UNISON, which consisted of case studies examining five different areas of outsourcing of various public services to private companies. One study analysed the outsourcing of patient transport services (PTS) from the University Hospital North Staffordshire NHS Trust to two separate bodies—Parkwood and NSL. It made several key findings, among which were:

“Underlying problems with providing a service for the price agreed … with knock-on effects for patients.” Along with “the breakdown in the employment relationship,” this “made it more difficult for [the staff] to do their jobs.” Other observations were that the overall employment package was “markedly inferior” across all the key criteria—pay, leave, overtime, sick pay and antisocial hours.

NHS FightBack urges the formation of rank-and-file committees of action, independently of the unions, to organise and coordinate opposition to the privatisation of the NHS.

We urge health workers to contact NHS FightBack to discuss these vital issues and take the struggle forward.

Bolsonaro’s victory and the debacle of Brazil’s Workers Party

Bill Van Auken

The election last Sunday of Jair Bolsonaro, the fascistic and buffoonish former army captain and seven-term federal legislator from Rio de Janeiro, poses a serious threat to the working class in Brazil and throughout Latin America.

Having won 55 percent of the vote—compared to 44 percent for his opponent, Workers Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores–PT) candidate Fernando Haddad—Bolsonaro has already begun to assemble what will unquestionably be the most right-wing Brazilian government since the end of the two-decade-long military dictatorship that came to power in a US-backed coup in 1964.

What is most striking about the incoming government is the predominant role being assumed within it by senior officers of Brazil’s military. His vice president will be the right-wing general, Hamilton Mourão, who retired only last year after publicly declaring his support for a “military intervention” to secure “law and order.” On the day of the election, it was announced that retired Gen. Augusto Heleno will be the incoming defense minister, an appointment that breaks with the post-dictatorship practice of putting civilians in that post.

Heleno was part of the so-called “Brasilia group,” a cabal of senior military officers who served as a pillar of Bolsonaro’s campaign. The group has reportedly submitted 25 names for appointment to Bolsonaro’s transition team, which if accepted would form fully half of the body.

Over the course of his political career including in a television interview on Tuesday, Bolsonaro has insisted that Brazil’s military regime, responsible for murdering, torturing and imprisoning tens of thousands of workers, peasants, students and left-wing activists, was not a dictatorship.

In 1999, he told a television interviewer that Congress should be shut down and that the country would be changed only by civil war that completes “the job that the military regime didn’t do, killing 30,000 people.” In the final days of his campaign, he indicated that his political opponents, whom he described as “red bandits,” would have to choose between jail and exile.

An emblematic campaign gesture employed by the candidate Bolsonaro, and aped by his followers, was pointing his finger like a gun, meant to symbolize his support for summary executions of criminal suspects. He wants to unleash the police in a country where cops killed over 5,000 people last year—five times the number in the United States—not to mention the many more killed by off-duty police death squads.

The security forces and reactionary sections of the judiciary are clearly getting the message. On the eve of the election, military police acting on the orders of electoral court justices invaded 17 universities across the country, tearing down banners and posters expressing opposition to fascism and support for democracy, confiscating leaflets and interrupting a class on the history of fascism, all on the grounds that they constituted unlawful campaign activities against the candidate Bolsonaro.

How is it possible that such a figure has been elected to the presidency of the largest country in Latin America, with a population of nearly 210 million, and the eighth-largest economy in the world?

It is the outcome of the thorough-going degeneration, under the impact of economic crisis and boiling social tensions, of the bourgeois democratic order established 30 years ago this month with the adoption of the 1988 constitution. The process of transition from military dictatorship to civilian rule was touted by its stewards as “slow, gradual and secure.” It assured a blanket amnesty to the assassins and torturers of the Brazilian military and a defense of the property and profits of the capitalists who had supported the dictatorship.

The pivotal role in this transition was played by the Workers Party, which served to divert the mass strikes and revolutionary militancy of the Brazilian working class that shook the dictatorship at the end of the 1970s back under the domination of the bourgeois state.

Crucial to the formation of this party were the political activities of groups that had broken with the Trotskyist movement, the International Committee of the Fourth International, and rejected the revolutionary role of the working class. Some of them had previously promoted Castroism and petty-bourgeois guerrillaism as a substitute for the development of a mass revolutionary socialist workers’ movement, with disastrous consequences throughout Latin America. In the founding of the PT, they swung over to the conception that a bourgeois reformist party with ties to the unions could provide a unique Brazilian parliamentary road to socialism.

As the PT’s electoral fortunes rose, winning it control of municipal and state governments as well as increasing numbers of seats in parliament, its politics turned steadily to the right. By the time the former metalworkers union leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won the presidency in 2002, the party had become the preferred instrument of rule of the Brazilian bourgeoisie, seen as best equipped to contain the struggles of the working class, while fully committed to carrying out the IMF-dictated economic policies of its predecessors.

Despite its diversion of a small share of the spoils of booming commodity prices and emerging market capital flows into minimal social assistance programs, the PT ruled over one of the most socially unequal countries in the world, with six individuals controlling more wealth than the poorest 100 million Brazilians.

With the advent of the worst economic crisis in the country’s history, the PT government pursued policies that placed the full burden of this crisis onto the backs of the working class, while defending the obscene wealth of the financial elite. With average real wages falling 30 percent and 14 million people joining the official jobless rolls, Brazil’s billionaires’ fortunes only grew, with the wealth of the top 1 percent soaring by 12.3 percent.

The PT, like all of the other bourgeois parties, was fully implicated in massive corruption that siphoned some $4 billion out of public coffers to pay out bribes and kickbacks.

The votes for Bolsonaro largely represented an expression of popular hatred for all the established parties that presided over social catastrophe and rampant corruption, but most particularly for the PT, which tried to dress up its reactionary policies in fake “left” and even “socialist” colors. This same hatred found expression in the record numbers—fully a third of the electorate—who refused to cast a ballot for either candidate.

The growth of the right wing due to the anti-working class policies pursued by the nominal “left” is by no means a uniquely Brazilian phenomenon. In the US, the identification of the Democrats and Hillary Clinton with the interests of Wall Street and the military-intelligence apparatus opened the doors of the White House to Trump. In Italy, the coming to power of the right-wing anti-immigrant government of Matteo Salvini was prepared by the pro-capitalist austerity policies pursued by a series of “left” governments, based on successor organizations to the Italian Communist Party. A similar growth of the right has been witnessed throughout Europe, while in Latin America the so-called “Pink Tide” has receded, giving rise to a series of right-wing governments.

How can the working class confront the threat posed by a Bolsonaro administration and the encroaching grip of the military over political and social life in Brazil? It will not be through support for the Workers Party. PT candidate Haddad responded to the election of the fascistic former captain by wishing him “success” and “luck” in forming his government. Party leaders, including Lula, have appealed for “calm,” while stressing the “legitimacy” of Bolsonaro’s presidency.

The PT has raised the slogan of a “democratic front,” by which it means another rotten parliamentary alliance—like the one it previously had with Bolsonaro himself—in an attempt to save the party’s sinking fortunes. Various pseudo-left groups have tried to dress up this same policy as a “united front against fascism,” in an attempt to justify their backing of the PT. They have all pitched their appeal entirely on the basis of identity politics to the layer of the upper middle class that constitutes their social base.

In the 1930s, with the rise of fascism in Germany, Leon Trotsky stated that the “political situation as a whole is chiefly characterized by a historical crisis of the leadership of the proletariat.” This assessment retains all its validity in today’s Brazil and throughout the planet.

With the debacle of the PT and its pseudo-left apologists, the decisive political task is that of turning to the working class and building within it a revolutionary leadership based upon the program of socialism and internationalism. This means building sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International in Brazil and throughout Latin America.

Government of Greece International Scholarships to attend Modern Greek Language and Culture Courses 2018/2019

Application Deadlines: 

• The application deadline is 19^th November, 2018. The original documentation along with the application and the curriculum vitae shall have a postal seal by this date.
• The electronic application deadline (only the curriculum vitae and the application form) is 11th November, 2018.

Eligible Countries: International

To be taken at (country): Greece

About the Award: This programme is intended for foreign nationals, holders of a graduate degree from a non-Greek university outside Greece, who do not permanently reside in Greece. Courses and seminars are being offered since 1992. From 2006 and onwards candidates from all over the world join activities.
Award takes place in any of the public universities in Greece. It covers all levels of language competency.
The programme also includes cultural events and educational visits to Greek sites of historical interest.
A certificate of attendance is awarded upon completion of the programme.

Type: Short courses

Eligibility: Applicants should:

1. Be nationals of any country of the world excluding Greece (not with dual nationality – both foreign and Greek).
2. Hold a graduate degree from a non-Greek University outside Greece.
3. Not exceed the fortieth (40^th) year of age until the 01/01/2018.
4. Be not permanent residents in Greece.
5. The knowledge of the Greek language acquired during this specific course should contribute to enhance the candidates work opportunities and to promote the Greek language and culture in their countries.

Applicants must meet the above requirements by the application deadline.

Selection Criteria: 

• Incomplete, inaccurate or illegible application files will not be taken into consideration.
• Applicants who are or have been on a scholarship by the I.K.Y. will be excluded from the programme with the exemption of ex-scholarship holders of the Modern Greek Language and Culture programme who wish to approve their Greek language competency.
• Candidates under legal prosecution will be excluded from the selection process.
• Applications by undergraduates who have not yet obtained their University degree will not be considered.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The scholarship covers the following costs:

1. Free meals and accommodation in University residence or in flats provided by the University which will undertake the programme.
2. A monthly allowance of 150, 00€ (net amount) for personal expenses.
3. 200, 00€ for initial expenses.
4. Free emergency medical treatment under the Greek National Health Service (only in    public hospitals). European citizens should have the European Insurance Illness Card from their insurance agency of their country.

Tuition fees and other relevant costs.

Duration of Programme: 

• The duration of this scholarship is seven (7) months and is only offered for a specific course in the Modern Greek language and culture organised mainly at one Greek University. The University, which will hold this course, will be decided by the I.K.Y after a selection process.
• The courses will start on December 2018 and will end on June 2019.

How to Apply: 

1. An application form, duly completed, signed and with one recent photograph attached.
2. An up-to-date curriculum vitae according to the european template “Europass” (in English or Greek language).
3. Certified copies of University Diplomas – Degrees.
4. Certificates indicating the knowledge of Greek (if any) or English or French language.
5. Two (2) letters of reference (in Greek, English or French) by a University Professor.
6. A written evidence of employment as a teacher of Greek, if any.
7. A recent (issued 1 month approximately prior to the application submission) health certificate by a national hospital or from the relevant recognized health service stating that the applicant does not suffer from any infectious diseases.
8. A copy of a valid passport / national identity card.

The above original documentation requested shall be submitted through the Greek Diplomatic Authorities. The Greek Diplomatic Authorities will check the documents and send them to the IKY. Only the application form and the curriculum vitae shall also be submitted earlier (as word documents) to the email: foreigners@iky.gr .
Candidates that are in Greece just before the submission deadline are required to contact their Diplomatic Authorities in Greece.

Application forms are available from the Greek Diplomatic Mission or the I.K.Y. or as downloaded copy from the I.K.Y website at: www.iky.gr.
The application shall be submitted according to the annexes 1 or 2: application form in Greek or in English.
If the documentation is not in Greek a certified translation (by the Greek Diplomatic Authorities abroad) into Greek, English or French must be supplied.
In addition, documents numbered 3, 4, 7, and 8 should bear the Apostille or be certified by the Greek Diplomatic Authorities (the Embassy or Consulate) in cases where the candidate’s state of origin is not a member of the Hague Convention (Apostille) of 5 October 1961 abolishing the requirement of legalisation for foreign public documents.
Applicants must submit only certified copies of the original documents, as these will not be returned.

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

Finnish Government International Gender Equality Prize 2019 (EUR 300,000 Award)

Application Deadline: 31st December 2018.

Eligible Countries: International

To be taken at (country): Finland

About the Award: The prize, which will be awarded for the second time in autumn 2019, can go to a person or organisation working to promote gender equality in an internationally significant way.
The prize includes a sum of EUR 300,000, which is intended not for the recipients themselves, but is rather directed to a cause that advances gender equality. Chancellor Merkel granted her prize money (EUR 150,000 in 2017) to an NGO working to promote the rights of women and children in Niger. The organisation, SOS Femmes et Enfants Victimes de Violence Familiale, is using the prize money to build a residential shelter for victims of domestic violence in the Nigerien capital of Niamey.

Type: Contest, Award

Eligibility: The prize will be awarded to a person or organisation that has advanced gender equality in a globally significant way.

Number of Awards: 1

Value of Award: The award sum for the next prize has been increased to EUR 300,000.

How to Apply: Nominate a candidate
The nomination form must be completed in English.

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

Rondine Cittadella della Pace Program in Conflict Resolution 2019 (Fully-funded to Italy)

Application Deadline: 13th January 2019

Eligible Countries: Countries in MENA, Balkan and South Caucus regions; Nigeria

To be taken at (country): Italy

About the Award: Are you ready to meet your enemy? To learn the art of dialogue? To learn how to transform the conflict into an opportunity and generate social change? The World House is the experience that you are looking for!

Type: Training

Eligibility: Participants will be selected among candidates showing the following characteristics:

• Ages between 21-28;
• Sensibility and readiness to work on the topics of conflict of the country of origin and conflicts in general;
• Predisposition to leadership;
• Predisposition to public speaking and communication;
• Predisposition to team and group work and active listening;
• Predisposition to taking on roles of responsibility;
• Predisposition to team building and active involvement;
• Predisposition to civic engagement and volunteering;
• Predisposition to entrepreneurship and Social Innovation
• Project-oriented attitude, aiming at implementing social projects upon return to his/her home country;
• Knowledge about civil society and the non-profit sector;
• Sensibility about global sustainability or at least about some of the following topics: climate change, cooperation, welfare, civil and social economy;
• A wish to deal with conflict management, during his/her own personal professional growth

Please, note that Italian is the official language for communication and activities in Rondine. For this reason, the program starts with a 3-month intensive course of Italian language and culture. Knowledge of English is also required for a profitable participation in the Rondine training.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: During the whole period of the participant’s stay, the association takes responsibility of covering the following costs:

• Cost of the training activities in Rondine
• Cost of the lodging
• Cost of the academic or vocational training (enrolment fees, learning material, transportation)

A more detailed description of the economic aspects will be part of the Learning and Participation Agreement that the candidate will be asked to read and sign before the start of the trial period.

Duration of Programme: Two-year training program (July 2019 to June 2021)

How to Apply: Those interested in participating in the Rondine program must send the documents mentioned below before the 13thJanuary 2019 to the following email addresses: international@rondine.org, or international.rondine@gmail.com
The required documents are:

• Application form (here attached or to be filled online at: https://goo.gl/forms/fHea9mcpUqZmo19g1);
• Copy of passport, valid at least until June 2020;
• Motivation letter;
• Curriculum Vitae or Resume;
• Copy of the last qualification or certificate, diploma or degree earned;
• The social impact project proposal that the candidate is planning to develop during his/her experience at Rondine and to implement upon return to his/her home country. The project should include the following points:
• ◦Social and geographical contest in which the project will be developed;
• ◦Objectives of the project;◦Expected activities;◦Methodologies to be used;
• ◦Expected time-frame;
• At least one recommendation letter, signed by a professor from the student’s university, or a supervisor of a non-profit or association in which the candidate is active;
• Copy of the driving license;
• Notice on personal data protection (hand-signed

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) Young Scientists Summer Program 2019 – Italy

Application Deadline: 11th January 2019.

Eligible Countries: Applicants from all countries are welcome, although IIASA gives priority to citizens or residents of member countries.

To be taken at (country): Vienna, Italy

Field of Study: 

• Air Quality and Greenhouse Gases
• Advanced Systems Analysis
• Ecosystem Services and Management
• Energy
• Evolution and Ecology
• Risk and Resilience
• Transitions to New Technologies
• Water
• World Population

Type: Training, Research

Eligibility: The program is designed for PhD students (ideally about 2 years prior to receiving their PhD) working on a field compatible with ongoing research at IIASA and a wish to explore the policy implications of their work. Participants will be working under the direct supervision of an experienced IIASA scientist in a unique interdisciplinary and international research environment. They will produce a paper (serving as first step towards a publishable journal article) and will get the opportunity to build up contacts for future collaboration within IIASA’s worldwide network.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award:

• The stipend varies slightly among NMOs, but usually it is EUR 1310 per month plus airfare. If you are not citizen of or resident in an NMO country you must find alternative funds (either from your home institution or other sources) to finance participation.
• IIASA will finance up to 3 candidates from developing countries which are not members of IIASA
• IIASA does not charge a tuition fee. In general, participants are expected to cover all expenses associated with their stay (3 months rent; meals; local transportation; expenses for any accompanying dependents; and health insurance) from their NMO grant or their other funding source.

Duration of Programme: 3 months

How to Apply: 

• Candidates apply via the online application form.
• Applicants can chose 1-2 programs. If there is additional is interest in one of our flagship projects this can be indicated in the box provided in the application form (under “please justify your choice of programs here”).
• We strongly encourage contacting the various program representatives and carefully read through all program descriptions before making your decision.

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) 2019 Science Communication Fellowship (Funded to Vienna, Italy)

Application Deadline: 11th January 2019.

Eligible Countries: Applicants from all countries are welcome, although IIASA gives priority to citizens or residents of member countries.

To be taken at (country): Vienna, Italy

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility:

• A Bachelor’s or equivalent degree in science or journalism, and/or current student or graduate of a science journalism program.
• Applicants from all countries are welcome, but IIASA gives priority to citizens or residents of countries in which IIASA has a National Member Organization. We encourage applications from developing countries.

Qualifications:

• Experience in writing about science for the general public via blogs, newspapers, university web sites, or other outlets.
• Written and oral fluency in English and proven ability to understand complex scientific research.
• Experience with or interest in social media, video, photography, or other multimedia is a plus.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The fellowship covers the cost of travel to and from Vienna and the awardee’s home country at the beginning and end of the fellowship, as well as a modest stipend to offset living expenses during the period of the fellowship.

• The science communication fellow will gain experience in communicating complex systems science for a general audience through a variety of platforms including blogs, website content, video, and articles for our magazine, Options.
• The successful candidate will work in the IIASA Communications Department, assisting with a variety of tasks including editorial work, web publishing, media relations, event coverage, multimedia, social media, and other communication activities.
• The fellow will also work closely with participants in the IIASA Young Scientists Summer Program (YSSP), producing several pieces of work covering research from the program.

Duration of Programme: The fellowship starts on 27 May and ends on 30 August.

How to Apply: To apply, please email the following documents to Ms. Alia Harrison, Recruitment Coordinator, Human Resources Department, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis at harrison@iiasa.ac.at

• CV/Resume
• Cover Letter
• One writing sample of no more than 800 words (longer texts will not be considered) about a scientific topic and aimed at a general audience (e.g., article for a newspaper or magazine, blog post, or op-ed)
• A letter of recommendation

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

Archbishop Tutu Fellowship Programme 2019 for Young African Leaders

Application Deadline: 15th December 2018.

Eligible Countries: African countries

To be taken at (country): South Africa. Other locations will be split between Oxford University and London (UK)

About the Award:  Offered on a part-time basis over six months, the Programme includes two 9-day Group Learning Modules with an impressive array of distinguished leaders and faculty. These are intensive interactive workshops; one at the historic Mont Fleur conference facility (South Africa), and the other split between Oxford University and London (UK).
The Programme has been designed specifically for African leaders in consultation with our African faculty and advisors and with Oxford, whose famous tutorial style has been adopted. It provides participants with an intensive learning and broadening experience on the principles and application of leadership, and an opportunity to explore the issues and specific characteristics of leadership in Africa, as well as the global challenges and dimensions of an African leader.
The programme places emphasis on learning and experiencing, not teaching, offering a variety of formal and innovative informal learning opportunities to enhance the leadership capabilities of the candidate. Emphasis is also placed on peer interaction and feedback, and the participants highly value being able to share pan-African perspectives and experiences. Overall it provides a unique environment for mid-career self reflection on one’s leadership journey in transforming Africa, and has been described as life changing by many participants.
Upon completing the Programme, Tutu Fellows return to play active roles in their respective communities, countries and spheres of influence. Great value is placed upon becoming a member of an established exclusive and supportive network of Africa’s future leaders – the Tutu Fellows. As part of this network of global leaders, all Fellows are expected to attend AFLI alumni events, as well as function as ambassadors for the Fellowship across all segments of society.

Type: Fellowship

Selection Criteria: In terms of selection criteria, AFLI emphasizes integrity, strong values and responsibility, courage and a demonstrated ability to lead and inspire. A candidate must demonstrate a commitment to Africa and to serving the greater community. We seek leaders not managers.

Selection Process: Competition is extremely tough for the 20 fellowship places available; each year we receive over 200 top quality nominations from all over Africa, which are put forward by our existing Fellows, Partners and network of influential leaders.
Only once candidates have been nominated, may they submit an application to AFLI.

Number of Awardees: 20

Value of Fellowship: 

• Entry into awards
• Thought-leadership and speaking opportunities
• Advocacy opportunities
• Networking opportunities and network memberships
• Access to projects, causes and campaigns
• Collaborating with like-minded peers on projects
• Job opportunities
• Pan-African exposure
• Attendance of multi-country meetings
• Leadership of, and participation in, multi-country organisations and projects
• International exposure
• Opportunities for ongoing debate and knowledge-exchange
• Profiling in the media
• Peer to Peer accountability
• Selected as board members or trustees to high profile companies/organisations

Duration of Fellowship: 1 year

How to Apply: Only once candidates have been nominated, may they submit an application to AFLI.

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details


Award Provider: African Leadership Institute (AFLI)

Why a Neoliberal Society Can’t Survive

T. J. Coles

Humans are complicated creatures. We are both cooperative and sectarian. We tend to be cooperative within in-groups (e.g., a trade union) whilst competing against out-groups (e.g., a business confederation). But complex societies such as ours also force us to cooperate with out-groups – in neighbourhoods, at work, and so on. In social systems, natural selection favours cooperation. In addition, we are biased toward ethical behaviours, so cooperation and sharing are valued in human societies.

But what happens when we are forced into an economic system that makes us compete at every level? The logical outcome is societal decline or collapse.

NEOLIBERAL DOGMA IN THE 20TH CENTURY

In “The Individual in Society,” Ludwig von Mises, teacher of Friedrich Hayek (the granddaddy of modern neoliberalism), wrote that in a contractual society, the employer is at the mercy of the mob. But in a self-interested market economy, “[t]he coordination of the autonomous actions of all individuals is accomplished by the operation of the market.” So, in this fantasy-world, employers can fire workers and replace them with cheaper ones without incurring the social costs associated with contractual societies.

Particularly after the 1970s, this kind of thinking began to permeate the culture of “free market” planners in Ivy League economics courses.

Robert Simons of the Harvard Business School notes that economics is by far the dominant academic discipline in the United States today, and that many graduates take that acquired ideology of self-interest into the workplace of asset management, hedge funds, insurance, liquidity, and so on. Simons criticises what he calls “the unquestioning and universal acceptance by economists of self-interest—of shareholders, managers, and employees—as the conceptual foundation for business design and management.” Simons notes that workers are self-interested “tribes,” as are managers, in that they try to gain more benefits. “To remedy this potentially catastrophic situation” of worker rights, “market economists attempt to channel errant behaviors by using stimulus-response theory” in the form of anti-union legislation, cuts to social services, and the threat of outsourcing jobs. Market economists “have elevated self-interest to a normative ideal.”

INFECTING THE LEFT

In 1988, then-Chancellor and Tory, Nigel Lawson, wrote that by the 1970s, “capitalism, based on self-interest, was felt to be morally disreputable” by the majority of Britons. But equally immoral for Lawson is state-intervention: “there is nothing particularly moral about big government,” he said (unless it is a big government to rescue big business). But, fortunately for the Tories, “the tide of ideas turned,” allowing them to re-enter office and impose further neoliberal reforms.

Perhaps the worst aspect of neoliberalism was its infection of the Labour party. To give some examples: one US neoliberal, Lawrence Summers (later Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary), taught a young Ed Balls, soon to become the economic adviser to future Chancellor, Gordon Brown. Then still an MP, Brown met with US Federal Reserve Chair, Alan Greenspan. This began in the UK a period of further financial deregulation under the self-styled “New Labour.”

Economists in the mid-2000s just prior to the crash, began seeing cracks in the ideology, noting:

“We see in the general public widespread unease about market solutions. Free trade and globalization, privatization of social insurance, and deregulation of energy markets all elicit opposition from many consumers, sometimes reasoned but often inchoate. It is no coincidence that support for market solutions is concentrated among the economically successful, and opposition among the less successful. Free choice has moral appeal, but moral fiber is strongest when not cut by self-interest.”

In 2008 the US, and thus global, economy was in meltdown. Greenspan testified to the House of Representatives: “I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interest of organizations, specifically banks and others, were such that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders and equity firms.” But self-interest means self-interest. The CEOs and top managers saw no need to honour their supposed obligations to their shareholders, let alone the general public.

THE SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES

The political consequences of decades of neoliberalism have led to disenfranchisement, particularly during the expansive period (1970s-2008), as marked by declining or stagnating voter turnout and the embrace of so-called extremist politics in the aftermath of the collapse (2009-present). But the ideology is deep-rooted among the ruling class. So, even after the inevitable crash of ’08, both the European Central Bank and the Bank of England continued with neoliberalism by imposing austerity on the populations of Europe and the UK, respectively.

Against this backdrop, predatory transnational financial institutions are profiting from the chaos. The collapse of the construction giant Carillon is a case in point. The company was allowed to collapse and its decline profited several hedge funds, including some based in the US.

The societal consequences of neoliberalism are even more dire. The American middle class has declined since the 1970s, as individuals become either very poor or very rich. A study in Harvard Business Review noted that by the early-1980s, up to 49% of Americans thought that the quality of their products and services had declined over the last few years. Male and female suicide rates have continued to rise since the mid-1990s. And a recent study suggests that life expectancy has dropped across high-income countries

In the UK, Tory-driven austerity has created over a hundred thousand corpses over a ten-year period, according to the BMJ. Populations in more fragile countries have suffered even more. Between 1990-2005, Sub-Saharan countries whose governments adopted neoliberal IMF and African Development Bank structural adjustment loans experienced an additional 231 and 360 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, respectively. Latin American countries which experienced just a 1% rise in unemployment between 1981 and 2010 experienced “significant deteriorations in health outcomes,” according to another report in the BMJ, including a rise of 1.14 child deaths per 1,000 births. All of this translates into millions of deaths.

As I’ve documented elsewhere, the most vulnerable societies, namely indigenous communities dedicated to maintaining their traditional ways of life, are literally going extinct, as “civilization” encroaches.

CONCLUSION

If this decades-long model continues to be imposed across the world, especially in nations with huge populations like India and China, which are increasingly adopting neoliberal policies, today’s divisive politics and crumbling infrastructure will seem like a minor headache, particularly against the backdrop of diminishing resources and climate change. If the cultural shift against neoliberalism that we are seeing today, taking expression in everything from progressive social movements to workers’ strikes, can sustain and expand, we might just save ourselves and plant seeds for a more equitable future.