Mexico Returns to Its Place in the Vanguard

Manuel E. Yepe

Mexico and Latin America are partying! Mexico elected a President who can rise to the nation’s role in history!

A broad, overwhelming and unquestionable electoral victory made Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) the next President of the United States of Mexico. His candidacy was put forth by the Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional (Morena), a party he founded and whose most recent national registration, forming the Together We Will Make History alliance, together with the Labor and Social Encounter parties.

His prestige rests mainly on his honesty and his election theme, la esperanze de Mexico (Mexico’s Hope) which has now become a reality.

The popular victory of AMLO in the homeland of the priest Hidalgo, Benito Juárez, Emiliano Zapata, Pancho Villa and Lázaro Cárdenas constitutes a political history of Latin America and the Caribbean. It is is a milestone in the political history of Latin America and the Caribbean. It significantly shifts the balance of power in favor of popular struggles, Latin American unity and the support for progressive governments against neoliberalism.

The rise of a popular government whose foreign policy heralds a constant struggle in defense of sovereignty, independence, non-intervention and peaceful resolution of conflicts. These were given in the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace agreed by the the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in its Second Havana Summit, a vital instrument for the defense of peace in the region.

Insecurity and violence; social inequalities and poverty, all linked to rampant corruption and a tense relationship with the United States, are some of the most urgent and arduous challenges that AMLO will have to face. He will take the presidency of Mexico on December 1, after a five-month transition. In addition, the US president has threatened to build a wall on the Mexican border to isolate himself from the world and to have it paid for by the Mexican treasury

With regard to Mexico’s and Latin America’s relations in with their neighbor to the north, this proverb always resonates: “Mexico, so far away from God and so close to the United States,” Today we recall the prophetic study published by AMLO in April 2017 in Le Monde Diplomatique, on the strategy that would lead to Donald Trump to the US presidency and the situation that would be created for Mexico under Trump’s presidency:

“About two years ago, the future president (Trump) and his advisers began to systematically study the mood of the American people. Among the most frequent feelings they cited were: disappointment, irritation, anger, sadness and despair. It was enough to take advantage of this general mood, to articulate it and to push this interpretation forward in the hope that it would permeate the whole society.

“Long before Trump’s inauguration, it was clear that his campaign, the anti-Mexican approach, did not originate in an economic analysis of his country, but rather in an economic one. that was (and still is) in the political interest of taking advantage of nationalist sentiment in the U.S..”

Mexico’s new president-elect promises to cut the “top of its head” off privileges”, ending the “power mafia”, ending the the corruption by example and giving priority to the poor.

This son of merchants, born on November 13, 1953 in Tepetitán, Tabasco, and known by his initials as AMLO, embodies for many Mexicans the desire for change.

He is a mass leader who conveys confidence and trust in his speech. With a single call from him, tens of thousands of fill up the public squares.

From an ideological point of view, he is not easy to pigeonhole, but the media and the people generally think of him as a politician of the left or as an honest politician.

In economic terms, he is committed to the internal market, to set prices guarantees for the countryside and to review the opening of the oil sector to private capital.

In the social area, AMLO seeks to reduce inequalities but steers clear of issues that would fall within a traditional agenda of the left, such as abortion and same-sex marriages.

After having lost in the 2006 and 2012 elections, in the current campaign, he moderated his tone to attract sectors that previously distrusted his progressive preaching but never got past it. of his identification with the humble.

In fact, he proposes a change comparable to the big transformations in history such as the Mexican Revolution of 1910, as part of the political system.

He has declared that he is inspired by the fathers of the homeland, who left lessons on the fight for justice, for democracy, and for national sovereignty.

When ISIS is Gone, Iraq Will Remain a Deeply Corrupt Country

Patrick Cockburn

Iraqis disagree about many things but on one topic they are united: they believe they live in the most corrupt country in the world, barring a few where there is nothing much to steal. They see themselves as victims of a kleptomaniac state where hundreds of billions of dollars have disappeared into the pockets of the ruling elite over the past 15 years, while everybody else endures shortages of everything from jobs and houses to water and electricity.

The popular rage against the political class that came to power in 2003 explains why the movement led by the populist-nationalist cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, which demands political and social reform and is allied to the Iraqi Communist Party, topped the poll in the parliamentary election in May. But the low turnout of 44.5 per cent underlined a conviction on the part of many that nothing much is going to change, whatever the makeup of the next government – something still being patched together in snail’s pace negotiations between the parties. “Even friends of mine who did vote are disillusioned and say they will not vote again,” one Baghdad resident told me.

It is impossible to exaggerate the frustration of Iraqis who know they live in a potentially rich country, the second largest oil producer in Opec, but see its wealth being stolen in front of their eyes year after year.

I was in Ramadi, the capital city of the province of Anbar, west of Baghdad, looking at the war damage when I met Muthafar Abdul Ghafur, 64, a retired engineer who had just finished rebuilding his house which had been destroyed in an airstrike. “I did it all myself and got no compensation from the government,” he said, adding bitterly that some whose houses were largely intact had received compensation because, unlike him, they bribed the right officials. “Write that Iraq has no government!” he shouted at me. “It has only thieves!”

Back in Baghdad, I visited the upper middle-class districts of Mansour and Yarmouk to talk to a real estate dealer, Safwat Abdul Razaq, who said he was doing good business. The price of property in this area had doubled in the past two years, but he was less optimistic about the future because of the weak government and, above all, because of the pervasive state corruption. “The government has no credibility,” he said. “Wherever you go, they ask you for a bribe.”

He added that a contractor invariably had to pay off officials to win a contract and one of the three businessmen sitting in the office said that this could easily be 50 per cent of the contract price. There was plenty of private money in Iraq but little of it was invested there because corruption made any business activity insecure: “that is why I buy property in Jordan but not in Iraq.”

These are well-off people, but I heard the same complaints in the Shia working-class stronghold of Sadr city, where heaps of rubbish lie uncollected in the streets. “The young people are a lost generation, who can’t afford to get married because they have no jobs and no prospects unless they know somebody in the government,” said a local paramilitary. Water and electricity were in short supply and expensive to buy privately.

Grotesque examples of official theft have been frequent since a new class of leaders, mostly Shia and Kurdish, took power in Iraq after the US invasion. When the Iraqi government was supposedly fighting for its life militarily in 2004-2005, the entire $1.3bn (£980m) military procurement budget disappeared. A few years later, police at checkpoints in Baghdad were trying to detect car bombs with a useless device that cost a few dollars to make and which the government had bought for tens of thousands.

How did successive Iraqi governments get away with such blatant thefts for so long? For years they diverted attention away from their looting of Iraq’s oil revenues by claiming that the struggle against al-Qaeda in Iraq and later Isis was the only thing that mattered. They appealed to the sectarian solidarity of the Shia and, in northern Iraq, to the ethnic solidarity of the Kurds.

But a year after Isis suffered a decisive defeat in the siege of Mosul, these excuses no longer work. Security is better than at any time since the fall of Saddam Hussein, so Iraqis are more conscious than ever before of the failings of a parasitic leadership and a semi-functional state machine.

A word of caution here: Iraqis like to think of their country as uniquely cursed by corruption with billions of dollars paid to shell companies for projects in which not a single brick is placed on top of another. But Iraq is not alone in this, since all the states whose wealth is drawn entirely from the exploitation of their natural resources – usually oil – operate similarly. In each case, members of a predatory ruling elite – from Angola to Saudi Arabia and Iraq – plug into state revenues and grab as much as they can get their claws on.

Obscenely excessive expenditure by the ruling circles in these countries is notorious, but they are not the sole beneficiaries. All these resource-rich states have vast patronage systems whereby a large chunk of the population gets jobs, or receives salaries, though no work may be necessary. Iraqis and Saudis may denounce corruption at the top but millions of them have a stake in the system, which gives it a certain stability. In Iraq, for instance, some 4.5 million Iraqis work for the state and these are the plum jobs that others would like to have. Though political leaders in Baghdad talk about reforming this system, it is politically dangerous to do so because the networks of corruption and patronage established themselves too long ago and involve too many powerful people and parties.

“Anti-corruption campaigns” – in Iraq as in Saudi Arabia – are often just one group of super-rich trying to displace another. The patronage system is the only way that many Iraqis and Saudis get a share of the oil revenues and they will resist being deprived of this in the supposed interest of creating a more functional system.

In Iraq the mechanics of corruption operate in a slightly different way than elsewhere because of the role of the political parties. Mudher Salih, a financial adviser to the prime minister Haider al-Abadi, told me that “unless the political system is changed it is impossible to fight corruption”. He said that the reason for this is that parties use the government ministries they control as cash cows and patronage machines through which they sustain their power. This way of doing things is probably too ingrained, and in the interests of too many people, to be radically changed.

Corruption cannot be eliminated in Iraq, but it can be made less destructive. When al-Abadi became prime minister in 2014 Isis was advancing on Baghdad and oil prices were well. Salih said that in response to the crisis the government “cut expenditure by 37 per cent by removing ‘fishy’ items – money being spent for nothing at all”. Corruption will stay, but in future Iraqis can at least hope to get something for their money.

Australia’s foreign interference laws threaten whistleblowers and media freedom

 James Cogan

An exchange on June 28 in the parliament, prompted by questions from Green senator Andrew Bartlett, underscored the fact that Australia’s sweeping new “foreign interference” laws have immense implications, not only for whistleblowers, but for the right of media organisations to publish leaked information. Aspects of the legislation, relating to espionage and secrecy, appear to call into question what millions of Australians consider to be fundamental democratic rights and the freedom of speech.

Bartlett highlighted remarks made in an interview by Liberal-National Coalition government member Andrew Hastie—the former special forces officer who chairs the Australian Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which drew up much of the legislation.

Hastie insisted that the laws were needed, in part, to criminalise “seeking to get secrets from the United States.” He declared that Australia could not allow “radical transparency.” Asked to define this term, he said: “Radical transparency is Julian Assange dumping a whole bunch of Commonwealth secrets out for public consumption.”

In parliament, Bartlett challenged the government over Hastie’s statement. He commented: “The things he [Assange] exposed and, more specifically and definitely, that Edward Snowden exposed, are things that governments wanted hidden—things so-called democratic governments were doing to their own people. So now we have that definition—‘radical transparency is Julian Assange.’ These laws are attempts to criminalise and attack people like Julian Assange. Let’s not forget that Julian Assange is acknowledged as, and registered as, a journalist and actually won a Walkley Award for his work exposing governments acting against their own citizens.”

Government minister Zed Seselja denied that Assange and WikiLeaks were specific targets of the legislation. He then declared, however:

“With the exception of secrecy offences, it’s not appropriate to carve out journalists from the application of most of these offences. For example, the espionage offences apply where a person intends to or is reckless as to whether their conduct will prejudice Australia’s national security or advantage the national security of a foreign country. There must also be a link to a foreign principal. If a journalist engaged in the relevant conduct, and these circumstances existed, it would be appropriate for the espionage offences to apply.”

Seselja’s “explanation” raises staggering questions about the right to whistleblow on government criminality, and the right of the media to publish leaks that reveal it.

The legislation defines “national security” in the most sweeping terms. It includes, for example, the “protection of the integrity of the country’s territory and borders from serious threats” and, “the country’s political, military or economic relations with another country or other countries.”

“Foreign principal” is likewise defined in a broad and vague fashion. It includes foreign governments, bodies, state-owned entities and political organisations.

A “foreign political organisation” is defined as everything from a “foreign political party” and a “foreign organisation that exists to pursue political objectives.”

In a totally subjective characterisation, which could be interpreted in a completely different manner by opposed tendencies on the political left and right, “foreign political organisation” is also defined as “a foreign organisation that exists to pursue militant, extremist or revolutionary objectives.”

It is incumbent on all defenders of civil liberties and free speech to subject the foreign interference legislation to the most detailed, critical and public scrutiny.

Underpinning the legislation, and a central factor in its development, is the fact that Australia is in a formal military alliance with the United States. It hosts major US military facilities and provides basing arrangements for US ships, aircraft and troops. Its armed forces and intelligence agencies provide information to their US counterparts as part of the alliance and the Five Eyes network, and receive and store information in exchange.

In 2002–2003, Australian agencies were receiving briefings on the American attempt to fabricate a case against Iraq, with false claims its government was concealing “weapons of mass destruction.” At the same time, the same agencies were receiving information from other international, “foreign” sources, who were disputing and refuting the US claims.

In February 2003, Andrew Wilkie, then an Australian intelligence officer, resigned from his position and publicly denounced the case against Iraq as a tissue of exaggerations and lies. His revelations were a factor in the development of mass demonstrations in Australia and internationally against the looming Iraq War. The anti-war movement most certainly had the potential to lead to widespread democratic calls for an end to Australia’s “political” and “military” relations with the United States.

Wilkie could not be charged with any crime and has since become an independent member of parliament.

What would have been the situation if the new “foreign interference” laws had existed in 2003? Could Wilkie have been charged with espionage for exposing the fact that, based on information from “foreign organisations,” the US and Australia were preparing an illegal war of aggression? Could his actions have been labelled a “threat” to the “country’s political, military or economic relations” with another country—that is, with the United States, under conditions where both Australia and the US were preparing a terrible crime?

In 2010, Australian citizen Julian Assange, in his capacity as editor of the WikiLeaks media organisation, published a series of leaks, sourced within the US military, which exposed American war crimes, lies and diplomatic conspiracies.

Among the information revealed by the leaks was the US embassy’s cultivation, over decades, of what it calls “protected sources” among Australian politicians, including an entire cabal that was functioning at the highest levels of the Rudd Labor government.

After the Washington-inspired coup that ousted Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the government of new Labor Party prime minister and beneficiary of the coup, Julia Gillard, declared that WikiLeaks had engaged in “illegal activity.” The legal profession and the media stridently objected to that characterisation because, under Australian laws, nothing Assange and WikiLeaks had done was illegal. They had, as a media organisation and its editor, acted in the public interest and were protected.

What is the situation facing WikiLeaks under the new foreign interference legislation? Could it be classified, not as “media,” but as a “foreign organisation” seeking to “influence” Australian politics by exposing the extent of US intrigues in the country, and by revealing war crimes committed by the US?

In the United States, WikiLeaks was defined last year by the CIA director as a “non-state hostile intelligence agency.” If WikiLeaks had been defined in such a fashion in Australia, then Assange, an Australian citizen, could have potentially been charged with espionage, for assisting it in publishing the leaks.

Millions of ordinary people, of course, welcomed WikiLeaks’ activity because it fulfilled the democratic right of the vast mass of the population to know the truth. Assange not only published extensive information on the criminality of US imperialism. He also shed light on the constant efforts by the American government and its agencies to influence and determine the focus of Australian policy and politics.

The greatest source of “foreign interference” in Australian affairs is its military alliance with the United States.

In 2013, Edward Snowden leaked US National Security Agency (NSA) documents that exposed rampant spying on the world’s population, including by joint US-Australian intelligence bases operating on Australian territory. He did so to expose the extent of the illegal activities of the Five Eyes network, which includes the Australian government.

Snowden’s actions could well have been viewed by the Australian government as “militant” or “extremist.” Under today’s laws, if an Australian journalist, rather than publications in other countries, had been the first to publish the NSA leaks, would they have risked espionage charges, since they exposed the extent of Australian intelligence spying on other countries, and purportedly damaged “national security?”

Many questions relating to the scope and operation of the new foreign interference legislation have not been publicly canvassed. Most people have never even heard it, much less had the opportunity to hear it discussed and debated. One of the reasons for this is that the new laws were rammed through the Australian parliament in barely three days, without being subjected to anything even remotely considered as scrutiny.

The Australian people have been denied their right to be informed about, let alone to vote on, the most serious and punitive legislative measures to be enacted since the Second World War.

It is a fundamental precept of democracy that power derives from the consent of the people. The Coalition and Labor parties have no legitimate authority to deprive the population of the democratic rights that have been achieved through decades, and even centuries, of struggle against tyranny and despotism.

The Socialist Equality Party (Australia) is holding public meetings over the next weeks, beginning on Sunday July 15 in Sydney, in order to inform workers and youth about the dangers inherent in these laws, and the necessity for the development of a broad-based movement demanding the repeal of the foreign interference laws and all anti-democratic legislation.

Allies no more: Trump escalates threats against Europe

Andre Damon

On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump will arrive in Brussels to attend a summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) amid the greatest crisis in US-European relations since the Second World War.

“For the first time,” wrote the Financial Times, “the arrival of a US president on European shores is anticipated with trepidation and even fear.”

After the Trump administration launched a global trade war by levying tariffs on European steel and aluminum imports last month, and then exploded the G7 summit just ten days later by refusing to sign its communiqué, the European powers are worried that Trump might also blow up the NATO summit. US officials have anonymously told the press that Trump could do anything at the event, from announcing a withdrawal of US troops from Germany to threatening to exit the alliance itself.

All international relations, including those between the United States and its closest allies, have been thrown into disarray by Trump’s transactional “America first” approach to trade, geopolitics and diplomacy. As German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas recently put it, the “old pillars of reliability are crumbling.”

It is dawning upon European leaders that Trump is not some fluke or traffic accident on the scene of global relations. His brand of politics—of extreme nationalism based on unadorned self-interest—represents a new world order embraced not only by the United States, but the European powers themselves.

In his demand that the EU countries contribute more to NATO’s rearmament, Trump expresses the predatory drive of US capitalism to extract concessions from the whole world, “allies” and enemies alike. Rearmament on this scale cannot be carried out without the destruction of the social safety net and workers’ living standards. This is a central aim of Trump’s agenda, not an accidental byproduct. The White House is telling the European powers, in effect, to get on with their attacks on the working class, in order to lower labor costs for American corporations operating in Europe.

Even before landing in Brussels, Trump began hurling rhetorical bombs. “I’m going to tell NATO: You’ve got to start paying your bills,” Trump said at a campaign rally in Montana last week. “The United States is not going to take care of everything.”

Trump lobbed insults at German Chancellor Angela Merkel. “Germany, which is the biggest country of the EU, European Union, Germany pays one percent. And I said, you know, Angela, I can’t guarantee it, but we’re protecting you, and it means a lot more to you than protecting us, because I don’t know how much protection we get by protecting you.”

Trump explicitly tied his demand that the US’s EU allies spend more on defense to the escalating trade war between the US and the EU, declaring on Monday, “On top of this the European Union has a Trade Surplus of $151 Million with the U.S., with big Trade Barriers on U.S. goods. NO!”

There is a growing consensus among EU figures that the actions of the Trump administration express an objective and growing divergence between the European powers and the United States.

“What is on the table right now, in a sort of brutal way is a real problem [that] is not created by President Trump and will not vanish at the end of the term or terms of President Trump,” a leading European official told the Guardian. “The transatlantic relationship that all of us around the table consider as a given—is not a given.”

“We used to roll our eyes at Trump’s policies, but now we are seeing the craziness becoming strategic,” another senior EU diplomat told The Hill. “We now have to seek out all kinds of partners to further our goals.” Notably, Trump’s arrival in Brussels was preceded by a visit to Berlin by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and talk of an EU-Chinese alliance to offset threats from the United States.

“The US is now being viewed in Europe as evolving from a strategic partner to a strategic problem,” Dan Price, a former advisor to George W. Bush told the Wall Street Journal. European Council President Donald Tusk echoed these sentiments, declaring that Trump “should not be underestimated,” because he “is systematic, consistent and has a method to undermine… European values.”

In other words, after the initial shock has worn off, European officials have themselves largely embraced an inverted version of Trump’s worldview, seeing the United States as a strategic competitor in the quest for markets, resources and economic advantages.

The central irony of the NATO summit, however, is the fact that despite the mutual recriminations between the NATO members over spending targets, all members of the alliance are rearming to the teeth.

NATO General-Secretary Jens Stoltenberg boasted in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that “last year NATO allies boosted their defense budgets by a combined 5.2%, the biggest increase, in real terms, in a quarter of a century. Now 2018 will be the fourth consecutive year of rising spending.”

“In 2014, only three allies—the United States, the United Kingdom and Greece—met the 2% target. This year, we expect that number to rise to eight, adding Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania.”

To pay for its military rearmament, every member of NATO has slashed social spending and carried out a frontal attack on its working class, exemplified by French President Emmanuel Macron’s headlong offensive against France’s rail workers.

The alliance set its two percent spending target in response to the proxy war that erupted following the US/EU-backed and fascist-led putsch in Ukraine and the consequent annexation of Crimea by Russia. Since then, NATO has deployed thousands of troops in the Baltics and in Poland, and it has staged a series of provocative war games just a few hundred miles from St. Petersburg.

This week’s summit will aim to continue these policies, including the creation of a “30 times four” plan that would make 30 land battalions, 30 ships and 30 warplane squadrons ready to deploy on 30 days’ notice.

The summit will also set up two additional NATO commands, “one in Norfolk to focus on maritime issues, including reinforcement by sea, and one in Germany to tackle the logistics of moving troops across Europe,” Foreign Affairs noted.

Unsurprisingly, the NATO members’ breakneck pace of rearmament has not brought them unity. Rather, in the four years since 2014, NATO members have seen unparalleled divisions among them, not just between the US and Europe, but within the EU itself, expressed most directly by the UK’s 2016 vote to leave the European Union.

Following Brexit, the UK has been rocked by one crisis after another, culminating in this week’s exit by two high-level cabinet members and rumors that the May government might fall. The remaining EU members, meanwhile, have been locked in mutual recriminations as they race each other in a mad dash to the right on refugee policy.

In other words, the NATO members have responded to every crisis with military rearmament, nationalism, trade war, shutting their borders and retreating behind a “hedge of bayonets,” to borrow Leon Trotsky’s phrase. But each shift to the right has only created the conditions for new crises and conflicts.

A year and a half into Trump’s presidency, it is clear that the current resident of the White House represents not some deviation from the norm of capitalist politics, but rather its most concise expression. Global war, trade conflict, xenophobia, nationalism, the attack on refugees, the dismantling of democratic rights—all the hallmarks of Trump—are in fact the hallmarks of rotten and decaying capitalism.

Floods and landslides in Japan leave more than 100 dead

Ben McGrath 

Torrential rains in southwestern Japan that began Thursday and continued over the weekend led to devastating floods and landslides. At least 126 people are dead as of Tuesday morning. Several dozen more remain missing. At the height of the emergency, at least 5.9 million people were advised to evacuate and hundreds of homes have been destroyed. Such natural disasters are becoming increasingly common in Japan.

In total, 19 prefectures have been affected, with the Hiroshima prefecture being one of the worst hit. At least 30,000 people took refuge in shelters and, as of Monday night, a third of those are still unable to return home. In many cases, cities were struck with record rainfall for the entire month of July in the span of just a few hours. Uwajima, in Ehime prefecture, for example, received 364 millimeters of rain in two hours, or 1.5 times the monthly average.

Masanori Hiramoto, a 68 year-old farmer from Mihara in Hiroshima prefecture, was one of those who evacuated. Heading towards the local shelter, which has only two rooms, he and his wife found it full already and ended up spending the night at a highway rest stop. He remarked to the Japan Times on the flooding, “I have lived here all my life. I have never seen anything like this.”

The Japanese central government’s response to the disaster has been typical. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called for “all-out efforts” in conducting search and rescue operations. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said, “The record rainfalls in various parts of the country have caused rivers to burst their banks, and triggered large scale floods and landslides in several areas.” He said nothing about what could have been done to predict the devastating storms. Some 73,000 personnel, including police, firefighters and military troops have been mobilized to conduct rescue operations.

However, inadequate planning and resources to prevent flooding and protect lives lies at the heart of what makes this and other recent disasters so devastating. Dozens were killed in mudslides last July while in August 2014 Hiroshima was hit by mudslides that killed 74 after then-record rainfall. In 1999, 32 people were killed in mudslides in the same region.

Between 1999 and 2014, the government supposedly undertook measures to prevent a reoccurrence of the 1999 disaster. However, Mitsuharu Hiura, an official with the Sediment Control Division of the prefectural government, said in 2014, “We couldn’t finish the infrastructure work due to a large number of dangerous locations and limited budget.”

In other words, the financial resources in the world’s third largest economy were not made available to protect people’s lives. It has become clear over the last four years that nothing has changed to address the danger of mudslides or improve Japan’s aging levee system. In addition, while annual landslides and floods claiming people’s lives have become the norm, the central government has cut funding to prefectures that would have strengthened flood and landslide prevention infrastructure.

Furthermore, the criteria to designate areas as landslide-prone have not changed over the last decade. This is despite people being killed by landslides in areas considered safe, including during the 2011 earthquake that resulted in the Fukushima disaster. As a result, people living or working in those areas still do not have adequate warning in the event of mudslides from increasingly dangerous rain storms.

The threat that Tokyo faces is growing. In fact, parts of the city have sunk by 15 feet over the past century. In March, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government released a report stating that one-third of Tokyo could be flooded, potentially impacting at least four million people, in the event of a super-typhoon hitting the city. The local government claimed it would update evacuation measures and the distribution of warning messages.

Tokyo has a massive subterranean system to divert flood waters. Construction began in the early 1990s when the government was spending on public works programs and was completed in 2006 at a cost of $2 billion. The frequency of rainfall over 76.2 millimeters an hour has increased by 70 percent over the last three decades in Japan. But the price tag, a drop in the bucket compared to what is spent on war preparations, has caused the government to balk at establishing similar systems in other parts of the country.

Japan’s national warning system, known as J-Alert, has also been criticized in the past for being ineffective. While it is unclear whether or not problems with this system contributed to the loss of life over the weekend, it has been too slow to notify people during other events and has even sent false messages. In other cases, people receiving the messages have complained that the appropriate infrastructure is not in place for those seeking shelter. The elderly and small children are especially affected as they cannot move quickly.

More intense storms and other extreme weather patterns are hitting Japan and other countries throughout the Asia-Pacific as climate change takes its toll. According to the International Panel on Climate Change, 12 million people in 23 coastal cities in Japan, China, and Korea live in low elevation regions at risk of major flooding in the future. Some 250 million people throughout Southeast and South Asia, mostly poor rural farmers, live in low-lying regions with millions at risk of being displaced by 2050.

The Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research reported in January that 156 million people in Asia will be at risk from flooding due to climate change within the next 20 years. Millions more in Africa, the Americas, and Europe will similarly be affected.

The response to climate change and the resulting disasters like the flooding and mudslides in Japan this past weekend demonstrates that there is no solution to this growing crisis under capitalism. Only under the rational, socialist planning of society on an international basis can climate change be genuinely addressed and lives protected from natural disasters.

Ontario’s new Tory government slashes social spending, scapegoats refugees

Roger Jordan 

Having formally taken office June 29, Ontario Premier Doug Ford and his Conservative government have moved quickly to shift politics in Ontario and across Canada sharply right.

The Ford government has made a series of policy announcements aimed at demonstrating the new government’s resolve to slash social spending, while further reducing taxes for big business and the rich. It has also underlined its support for a reactionary, “tough on crime” agenda and is employing Trump-style rhetoric to scapegoat refugee claimants for Ontario’s chronic lack of social housing and dilapidated public services.

During the election campaign, Ford demagogically vowed to eliminate $6 billion in annual public spending by cutting “waste” and to order a line audit of the government’s books by “independent” experts. Even the bourgeois media has interpreted the latter pledge as a ruse meant to provide Ford with a pretext for repudiating his snake-oil promises of increased spending on health care and education and for imposing far greater cuts than his promised four percent of current provincial spending.

As a down payment on the coming austerity drive, Ford has imposed a provincial government hiring ban, an across-the-board freeze on incidental expenditures, and an indefinite wage freeze for civil service managers and administrators.

Within hours of the government taking office, Health Minister Christine Elliott made sweeping regressive changes to a recently introduced, aged-limited Pharmacare program that provided free prescription drugs for all Ontarians aged 24 or under. Now these benefits will be restricted to those without any existing drug coverage.

In a provocative and politically inflammatory move, Ford announced last Thursday, just as he was to have his first meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, that his government was repudiating the previous Ontario government’s agreement with Ottawa to jointly provide services to migrants fleeing the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant witch hunt—people he labelled “irregular border crossers.”

Ford blamed Trudeau for the increased number of refugee claimants, a reference to Trudeau’s hypocritical 2016 statement welcoming immigrants to Canada. Employing the rhetoric of Trump and European ultra-right forces like the National Front in France and the Alternative for Germany, he went on to cynically accuse the refugees of endangering Ontarians access to public services.

“The federal government encouraged illegal border crossers to come into our country,” declared Ford, a millionaire businessman and Trump acolyte, and “continues to usher people across the U.S.-Quebec border into Ontario. This has resulted in a housing crisis, and threats to the services that Ontario families depend on.”

Following what was described as a testy meeting between Ford and Trudeau, Lisa Macleod, the provincial minister overseeing the immigration file, repeated Ford’s vow that the Ontario government will henceforth contribute not a penny to assisting the refugee claimants, as well as his slanderous claim that, after a quarter-century of social spending budget cuts carried out by successive Ontario NDP, Conservative and Liberal governments, refugees are “putting a strain on many of our public resources.”

Ford has also come into conflict with the Trudeau government over his jettisoning of the previous government’s cap-and-trade carbon pricing system, which satisfied Ottawa’s requirement for all provinces to impose some form of price, or tax, on carbon. Ford’s move is supported by a faction of the Canadian bourgeoisie, led by the oil and gas industry and sections of the Toronto-based financial elite, that believes Canada should follow Trump’s lead in abandoning the Paris Climate Accord, so it can exploit to the hilt the advantage it enjoys over many of its imperialist rivals as a major producer of carbon-based energy.

Despite concerns over Ford’s crude demeanor, penchant for right-wing bombast, and staggering ignorance, and their fears he could become a lightning rod for popular opposition to austerity and social inequality, decisive sections of the ruling class swung behind a Conservative victory in the June 7 provincial election, with a view to intensifying the class war assault on the working class.

Working in close cooperation with the trade union bureaucracy, the 15-year-old Ontario Liberal government had imposed years of austerity, while reducing the corporate tax rate to the lowest in the country. But big business soured on Kathleen Wynne and her Liberals when, in the face of electoral oblivion, they made a feint left, and allowed the province’s budget to go back into deficit. And did so under conditions where corporate leaders were claiming that their “competitive position,” i.e., their ability to attract investor support and make profits, had been imperiled by Trump’s tax cuts, gutting of regulations, and trade-war tariffs.

Through their support for a hard-right government in Ontario, the country’s most populous province, Canada’s corporate elite is also signaling to Trudeau that they expect his government to pursue a more aggressive policy, both internationally, including by delivering on his promise to hike military spending by 70 percent over the next decade, and at home, against the working class.

The day Ford was sworn in as premier, the National Post, the standard-bearer of the neoconservative right, published an editorial titled “Doug Ford can make Ontario great again by learning from Trump.” Claiming Ontario had been “run into the shoals” by a Liberal government that had presided over an “intrusive and out of control regulatory state” and racked up “runaway debt,” the editorial called on the Ford government to take an axe to social spending and redistribute wealth to the richest social layers. “The Republican administration in the US,” it declared, “has shown once again what a powerful tonic it can be to roll back a business-stifling over-regulating nanny state while reforming taxes to boost growth. … In the first 17 months of his presidency, Donald Trump has repudiated for good the dismal Obama-era defeatists who insisted that the sun had set on the economic miracle of Western capitalism and innovation and truly booming growth could never happen again.”

The Post urged Ford to get on with it, calling on him to eschew his “usual impulse to sugarcoat the truth with … populist slogans” and instead press forward with “change” that will “hurt.”

Ford is only too eager to oblige. He has indicated that if the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) does not corral striking York University teaching and research assistants back to work, his government will adopt strikebreaking legislation when the Ontario parliament reconvenes next week.

Well aware that the impending brutal assault on public services and working people will trigger a popular backlash, the Ford government is moving to strengthen the state’s repressive apparatus and the Conservatives’ already close ties to an increasingly politically active police. On the eve of its coming into effect, Ford announced he was suspending Bill 175, Liberal legislation that would have enhanced the powers of Ontario’s police oversight body, the Special Investigations Unit, to investigate police misconduct, saying this would “hurt policing efforts.”

Significantly, Ford first announced this move not in a press release, but in a letter to the province’s most important police associations, which had vehemently complained that any increased oversight of its actions, such as the brutal suppression of the 2010 anti-G-20 protests or restrictions on “carding” (racial profiling), would hamper police work and threaten public safety.

Working class opposition to the Ford government is already emerging and will grow rapidly. But if it is to become a genuine working-class counter offensive, it must break free of the political and organizational control of the pro-capitalist trade unions and the social-democratic politicians of the NDP and be armed with a socialist program—the fight for working-class political power and the reorganization of socio-economic life to make fulfilling social needs not profit the animating principle in Ontario, across Canada and internationally.

The unions and NDP have responded to the ever-widening big business assault over the past four decades by moving ever further to the right, jettisoning their reform programs and imposing concessions and austerity.

They opened the door for Ford to come to power, in part by exploiting popular anger over the decimation of industrial jobs and stagnant and declining wages, through their systematic suppression of the class struggle and close collaboration with the pro-austerity Liberal governments of Dalton McGuinty and Kathleen Wynne and their continuing collaboration with the supposedly “progressive” federal Liberal government of Justin Trudeau.

The NDP, which imposed a wage and job-cutting “social contract” the one and only time it held office in Ontario, propped up a minority Liberal government for two-and-a-half years, ending in 2014, as it slashed social spending and imposed concession contracts on teachers by criminalizing teacher job action.

The unions, with Unifor in the lead, funneled millions of dollars to the Liberals in successive election campaigns, beginning in 1999—an alliance struck in the aftermath of the unions’ scuttling of the mass working class upsurge against the Thatcherite policies of the Harris Conservative government.

With Ford now in power, the unions have resorted to pathetic appeals for him to meet with them. An Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL) statement issued the same day Ford was sworn said it is “eager to begin discussions with the government on how to best safeguard the rights of workers in the province of Ontario.”

Violent Haitian protests triggered by IMF austerity measures

John Marion 

A general strike paralyzed the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince Monday. following three days of violent demonstrations, looting and clashes with security forces triggered by drastic hikes in fuel prices. Taxi and mini-bus drivers shut down operations and businesses and stores closed down, while scattered protests and barricades continued, with demonstrators calling for the ouster of the government of President Jovenel Moïse.

On Friday the government of Haiti attempted to drastically cut fuel subsidies, a move it had promised the International Monetary Fund in February. An IMF mission in June to follow up on the “Staff-Level Agreement” it was imposing concluded with a statement that “the mission welcomes the government’s intention to eliminate fuel price subsidies.”

The subsidy cuts would have caused a 38 percent jump in the price of a liter of gas, to more than 300 gourdes. The minimum wage for textile workers in Port-au-Prince is less than 400 gourdes per day, despite a strike last summer demanding a salary increase.

The IMF’s June statement claimed that annual inflation of less than 15 percent in Haiti is a “positive” sign, but that is cold comfort in a country where inflation is 12.7 percent per year and driven by price hikes in basic food commodities.

The subsidy cuts would also add 85 gourdes to the price of a liter of diesel—a jump of nearly 50 percent—and 89 gourdes to the price of kerosene, raising a liter to 262 gourdes.

In addition to the pressure from the IMF, the Haitian government claimed that the price hikes are necessary because it loses money when drivers from the Dominican Republic cross the border to take advantage of cheaper prices.

The reaction in the streets of Haiti was both swift and violent. A member of the Haitian National Police was killed in the Delmas 83 neighborhood outside of Port-au-Prince, although Alterpresse reported that the police presence in the streets of the capital was “timid.” A police station in the Artibonite region was set on fire, as were a courthouse and government tax offices in Petit-Goâve.

Haitilibre reported that a Coca Cola plant was set on fire, and that driving in the capital was impossible because of barricades. Supermarkets were looted and, according to Alterpresse, numerous people were unable to obtain food and water between Friday afternoon and Saturday.

Two young men in Port-au-Prince died in the protests, and a security guard for the leader of an opposition political party was reportedly lynched and then burned.

Cap-Haïtien in the north, Jacmel in the southeast, and Les Cayes in the southwest also experienced violence. Le Nouvelliste reported that all public transportation and traffic in Les Cayes was stopped by flaming barricades.

On Saturday, American Airlines, Air France, Delta, JetBlue, and Spirit canceled all flights to Port-au-Prince. Coverage in the American press focused on two hotels in Port-au-Prince that were housing a mixture of wealthy visitors and Christian missionaries.

President Moïse publicly contradicted his Minister of Communication by stating that the national government would reimburse businesses that have been damaged.

Moïse is in a precarious position, despite having reinstated the army last year to aid the Haitian National Police in suppressing workers and despite having traveled the country in his “Caravan of Change” to announce the funding of infrastructure projects.

The handpicked successor to former president Michel Martelly, Moïse won the 2016 presidential election with less than 20 percent of eligible voters. Less than a year after his inauguration an audit of the country’s participation in the PetroCaribe exposed the no-bid contracts and outright looting that had occurred during Martelly’s administration of the program.

By Saturday night, the mass opposition to the subsidy cuts had forced Moïse to revoke them. In a national address, he stated that “you sent me the message and I received it.” While claiming that “the price of fuel is staying as it was before” and that “there is no longer an increase in the price of gas,” he nonetheless signaled to the IMF that he intends to continue imposing its demands. Moïse ended his speech by boasting that no fewer than 30 private companies are interested in producing electricity in Haiti, in keeping with the June IMF statement’s insistence that the government “ensure sustainable medium-term growth of the electricity sector and improve the environment for private investment.”

Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant surrounded himself with the heads of the national police on Saturday and gave a national address defending the subsidy cuts and begging the people for calm. He was quickly undercut by the president’s address and is now being treated as a scapegoat by influential parliamentary deputies. Pétion-Ville deputy Jerry Tardieu issued a statement on Sunday demanding that Lafontant resign immediately.

Last week, two days before the cuts in fuel subsidies, protests had already broken out in the Pétion-Ville neighborhood where Moïse is staying. The government, claiming to be removing illegal dwellings, has been evicting people in the middle of the night and destroying their homes. One woman told Le Nouvelliste that “they came with heavily armed police to demolish my house without warning.” Another resident pointed out the falsity of the government’s claim to be destroying precariously situated houses, given that the President’s house is next to a ravine.

The mass protests triggered by the fuel price hikes are the product of the immense buildup of social anger over conditions of poverty, inequality and oppression that prevail throughout Haiti.

Germany: Tens of thousands demonstrate against inhumane anti-refugee policies

Gustav Kemper

Under the slogan “Stop the deaths in the Mediterranean,” tens of thousands demonstrated in Germany on Saturday against the savagely inhumane refugee policy of the federal government and the European Union. In Berlin, over 10,000 people demonstrated, more than ten times as many as the organizers of the coalition “Seebrücke” had originally expected. Demonstrations also took place in Hamburg, Hanover, Bremen and a dozen other cities in Germany.

The high level of participation is particularly significant because the initiative was launched only a week earlier by refugee aid organisations. The protests were organised within the space of a few days almost exclusively via social media.

Protesters at the Neptune Fountain in Berlin

The immediate trigger for the protests is the persecution of Claus-Peter Reisch, the captain of the lifeboat Lifeline, and the man who, together with his crew, saved the lives of 234 refugees who faced death by drowning in the Mediterranean in June. The ships and aircraft of the aid organization have since been detained in Malta, where Reisch faces criminal charges. He has been released on bail.

The Facebook page of the “Seebrucke” reads: “Allowing people to die in the Mediterranean in order to advance the isolation of Europe and carry out political power struggles, is unbearable and contravenes all humanitarian principles…Migration has always been part of our society! Instead of closing borders, we need an open Europe, solidarity cities, and safe havens.”

The demonstrations were fuelled not only by indignation at the brutal crackdown on those who risk their own lives to save people from drowning. Those taking part also condemned the so-called “Master Plan” for refugees proposed by German interior minister Horst Seehofer, as well as the recent EU summit, which called for setting up a comprehensive system of camps across Europe.

Many protesters came with homemade posters and banners reading, “Sea Rescue instead of Seehofer”, “Imagine your family was sitting in the boats”, “The dignity of people is inviolable”, and “What should we say when we are called to account in the after-life?” The Seebrucke organization also distributed several hundred lifejackets to participants in a symbolic gesture.

In discussion with those taking part, there was virtually unanimous opposition to any more restrictions being placed on the right of asylum, and to all the obstacles put in the way of refugees to prevent them from entering safe host countries. Many participants not only rejected the policy of the governing parties, the Christian Democratic Union, Christian Social Union and Social Democratic Party, but also criticized the other parties represented in the Bundestag, including the Left Party.

Wolfgang and Irene from Berlin, both in their mid-40s, told the WSWS that they wanted to make a stand against the inhumane policies of governments in Europe. “The isolation of Europe is incompatible with human rights,” Irene said. Wolfgang added: “None of the parties is committed to the protection of refugees and asylum seekers. I also find the position of sections of the Left Party to be disgusting, when they describe refugees as ‘guests’ who can be rejected if they behave incorrectly.” He was referring to statements made by the parliamentary chair of the Left Party, Sahra Wagenknecht. “Just like the CDU/CSU, SPD and Greens, they (the Left Party) are also sending refugees back when they are part of the government, as is the case in the states of Thuringia and Berlin.”

A section of the rally

Philip, a young worker, told our reporters that he had spent an hour and a half traveling to Berlin to attend the demonstration. “The obstruction of rescue operations by the European Union contradicts the basic values of humanism. After plundering countries throughout the Middle East for raw materials and finally destroying them with wars, they are now letting the fleeing population die in the Mediterranean.” When asked about the causes of this disaster, he added, “Of course, this has to do with the capitalist economy, company executives are profit-oriented, they follow the laws of the system. The governments back this up militarily.”

Many participants came to the demonstration for basic humanitarian considerations. Till from SOS Mediterranee (an aid organisation from France, Italy, Germany and Switzerland), which has operated the Aquarius rescue ship for three years, complained about the massive impairment of aid operations which are refused docking facilities in the Mediterranean. “The Aquarius is now in the port of Marseille and cannot sail because of the uncertain situation. A few weeks ago, our ship with 630 people on board was prevented from docking in Italy. We then had to sail to Valencia in Spain. Only then were we accepted.”

In the course of the past year. the obstruction of aid ships and the journalists on board has been deliberately stepped up, Till said. “When no one reports anymore and when people no longer see the pictures, then refugees die unknown and unseen. This makes it easier for governments to enforce their asylum plans.”

Till saw parallels between the refugee camps in Europe and North Africa, which are now to be further expanded by the EU and the German government, with the 1930s: “It is shocking how quickly these parallels can be drawn today. Sinti and Roma are being registered, and one sees that humanity in government circles is no longer an issue today. Human rights are violated without an outcry. That's why it’s time to say today, ‘enough is enough!’”

Sebastian Jung from Doctors Without Borders

Sebastian Jung is project coordinator of Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, MSF) which supported the protest. He reported on the unspeakable cruelty of the internment camps in Libya at the rally in Berlin. In an utterly shattered state, refugees, forced to undertake marches across the desert, often fell into the hands of traffickers, who took them to their own unofficial internment camps, where torture and intolerable conditions prevail. MSF has no access there.

Jung was active in the official refugee camps, which were set up in warehouses and are actually the worst sort of prisons, where people are detained 24 hours a day. The halls are overcrowded, with barely a square meter of space per refugee. When describing a conversation he had had with one MSF-treated asylum seeker, Jung could barely control his emotions.

Following horrific torture, the man’s legs and some fingers had to be amputated. “Extremely overcrowded cells and poor sanitation increase the spread of illnesses such as rashes, diarrhea and mental suffering due to the horrors experienced before they arrive at the camps,” he told the WSWS. “You cannot overcome a psychic trauma in a closed camp.”

MSF is currently working in five so-called internment camps in Tripoli, where it provides emergency medical care. The situation in these camps is critical because they are often overcrowded, and sanitary conditions are bad. “There is a direct correlation between the poor health of people and the type of housing. They also have no legal counsel and are detained arbitrarily for months on end,” he added.

In general, the perspective of many participants remained limited to finding some sort of immediate solution to the problems that impelled them to protest. A member of Seebrucke, Gonzalo, who attended an IYSSE meeting at the Humboldt University on the same topic, called upon German Chancellor Angela Merkel to respect the “C”, i.e. the “Christian” in the name of her party. He expressed the hope of many participants that pressure on the political elite through demonstrations and public actions could bring about a change in politics.

In fact, a solution to the refugee crisis cannot be achieved within the decaying capitalist system, which is responsible for the wars and social depredation which cause millions of people to flee their homelands. The leaflet distributed by representatives the Sozialistischen Gleichheitspartei (Socialist Equality Party, SGP) at the demonstration in Berlin, stated:

“The fact that the EU and all the governing parties in Europe—from the pseudo-left Syriza in Greece, to the grand coalition in Germany and overtly far-right governments in Italy, Austria and Eastern Europe—are all pursuing austerity policies and terror against refugees, makes clear that workers and young people are confronted with revolutionary tasks. European capitalism cannot be tamed, but must be overthrown and replaced by the United Socialist States of Europe.”

NDDC Foreign Postgraduate Scholarship for Nigerian Students to Study Abroad 2018 – Masters & PhD

Application Deadline: Friday 20th July, 2018

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Niger Deltan states in Nigeria which includes Akwa Ibom State, Bayelsa State, Cross River State, Delta State, Edo State and Rivers State.

To be taken at (country): Universities Abroad

Eligible Fields of Study: The Scheme is for suitably qualified applicants with relevant Bachelor’s/Master’s Degree(s) from recognized universities in the following professional disciplines:

1. Agricultural Sciences
2. Engineering
3. Environmental Sciences
4. Geosciences
5. Information Technology
6. Law
7. Management Sciences
8. Medicine
9. Education
10. Humanities

About Scholarship: As part of our Human Resource Development initiatives, the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, is commencing the 2016 Post-Graduate Foreign Scholarship Programme, to equip Niger Deltans with relevant training and skills for effective participation in the Local Content programme of the Federal Government, as well as compete globally in various professional fields.

Type: Masters, PhD

Eligibility/Criteria:

• First degree with minimum of 2nd Class Lower Division for those wishing to undertake a Master’s Degree programme and a good Master’s Degree for PhD candidates from a recognized University.
• Applicants must have gained admission for a Post Graduate Programme in any of the listed disciplines above, in a foreign University.
• Applicants who have already enrolled in Overseas’ Universities are NOT eligible to apply.
• Guarantor’s written consent of good conduct of the applicant from any of the following persons from the applicant’s community/clan.
  • Member of National Assembly/State House of Assembly
  • Chairman of the LGA
  • First Class Traditional Ruler
  • High Court Judge
• Persons with evidence of cult membership or criminal record shall not be considered for the award.
• Applicants must have completed the mandatory National Youth Service (NYSC).

Number of Scholarships: Several

Value of Scholarship: Full-fee scholarship

Duration of Scholarship: For the period of the programme

How to Apply: Application must be made online at the Commission’s website: with the following attachments:

• Recent passport photograph
• Local Government identification letter.
• Post Graduate (PG) admission letter from a recognised Overseas University.
• Relevant Degrees from a recognized University.
• N.Y.S.C Discharge/Exemption Certificate.

Successfully completed application form will be assigned a registration number automatically.
Print the hard copy of the on-line generated acknowledgement for ease of reference.
All shortlisted applicants will be posted on NDDC website,
Select Your Preferred Program from the Links Below to the appropriate application form

Masters Degree – forms.nddc.gov.ng
PhD Programme – forms.nddc.gov.ng

• For further enquiry, please contact:
  Director, Education, Health and Social Services (NDDC)
  E-mail:  gochua.okejoto@nddc.gov.ng
  Mobile:  084668158: Email:  seledi.thompson@nddc.gov.ng

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Scholarship Provider: Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC

International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) Global Fellowship Programme 2019

Application Deadline: 20th July, 2018 at 17:00 EDT

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: All (with particular attention paid to applicants from developing economies)

To be taken at (country): Home country and New York, USA.

About the Award: The International Society for the Performing Arts’ (ISPA) Global Fellowship Program provides one-year access to ISPA’s extensive international network of arts professionals to emerging and mid-career leaders from the global performing arts community, with particular attention paid to applicants from developing economies.
Participants join the ISPA membership and attend the New York ISPA Congress where they engage in the development and exchange of ideas with leaders from some of the world’s most significant presenting
organizations, performing arts organizations, artist management agencies, cultural policy groups, foundations, festivals and related professionals.
In considering applying, please be aware that the ISPA Congress is not a traditional arts market and opportunities for self-promotion are limited. This opportunity is intended for those working in the management of the performing arts. Performing arts professionals who are deeply committed to increasing the global connectivity of the performing arts industry, as well as those who take initiative in their own professional development, are most likely to benefit.

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: ISPA accepts applicants from all regions of the world, with priority given to applicants from developing economies.
Applicants must:

• Be currently employed/working in the professional performing arts
• Have a minimum of 5 years professional experience in the performing arts field
• Demonstrate a need for financial assistance
• Ability to attend and fully participate in the New York 2019 ISPA Congress, January 8 – 10, 2019, including the one-day Fellows-only Seminar on January 7, 2019
• Have received no more than two ISPA Fellowships in the past

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Fellowship: Fellows receive:

• One-year ISPA membership with access to all member benefits
• Full Pass registration to the New York 2019 Congress (January 8 – 10, 2019)
• One-day Fellows-only Seminar prior to the New York Congress (January 7, 2019)
• Subsidy to assist with travel and accommodation expenses related to attending the Congress (subsidies do not generally exceed 2,500 USD)
• Introduction to a current ISPA member who will welcome the Fellow to the Congress and help facilitate their participation as part of ISPA’s Community Building Program

Duration of Fellowship: 1  year.

How to Apply: To apply to the Global Fellowship Program, please download and review the application instructions and submit the online application form. Applications are reviewed and selected by the Fellowship Review Committee which consists of ISPA members and staff.

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, many Fellowship Challenge and Patron donors

Important Notes:Please note that for the purpose of ISPA’s Global Fellowship, the professional performing arts includes individuals working principally in the arts and culture sector either with organizations/institutions or as independent producers/managers. Generally those working within academia, education, community organizations, and independent artists are not eligible.