We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Monday, February 22, 2016

An Austere Place of Refuge

Click here to access article by Joseph Grim Feinberg from LeftEast (based in Romania)

From the "About" section:
This is not an academic platform. Neither is it simply a news agency for the lefties about the region. It seeks to offer a mixture of theoretically – and analytically – informed contributions about current matters, local but not parochial, seeking to engage audiences beyond the national publics and beyond the academic circles. It aims to inform, illuminate and mobilize.

The aim is to constitute an alternative to the way we see the region....
The author attempts, and I believe he succeeds to a great extent, in shedding light on the recent changes in European politics and attitudes, particularly with regard to the immigration issue. This somewhat lengthy article is not something you can read quickly and superficially like so much other content on the World Wide Web.