Welcome to Eureka Street

back to site
Forgot your password?
Subscribe

Section: International

  • INTERNATIONAL

    'Career' Brexiteers fail the Edmund Burke test

    • Max Atkinson
    • 02 August 2019
    17 Comments

    Now that the UK is in the final phase of leaving the Union we should ask, before the bell tolls, how much this misadventure — or folie de grandeur — was due to politicians putting their interests above those of the nation, ignoring democratic theory and long-settled constitutional practice.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Scarf stories: Travelling the material world

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 30 July 2019
    1 Comment

    Three times in the past three years I have received a spontaneous gift in the form of a scarf. The gifts came from three different people, on three different continents. As it happens, there's a shelf in my bedroom cupboard stacked with neatly folded scarves and wraps in rainbow hues. Every last one of them has a story to tell.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    The politics and ethics of the moon landing

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 23 July 2019
    5 Comments

    In 1964, sociologist Amitai Etzioni noted the misgivings of the scientific fraternity to the space program. The effort risked losing perspective. An 'extrovert activism' had taken old, obsessed with gadgets, 'rocket-powered jumps' and escapism. In terms of budgetary expenditure, this showed, with NASA spending $28 billion between 1960-73.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Religious freedom feint has Liberals in knots

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 17 July 2019
    9 Comments

    The conservative base wants religious protection for Christians, but has a long history of vilifying Muslims, who, presumably, could also claim protection from any new law. One struggles to imagine a law that might enable a footballer's right to send homophobic tweets, while enabling courts, parliaments and schools to ban burqas.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    The west's fossil fuels problem is strategic, too

    • Jeff Sparrow
    • 08 July 2019
    5 Comments

    When discussing climate change, it's easy to depict the world's reliance on fossil fuels as primarily a technological problem, to be resolved by new methods for harnessing renewable energies. But that's only part of the story, as the example of Saudi Arabia shows.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Fool Britannia: On bad mannered Brexiteers

    • Gillian Bouras
    • 08 July 2019
    31 Comments

    As a celebratory anthem, Beethoven's 'Ode to Joy', was played, the Brexit MEPs, all 29 of them, turned their backs, thus insulting the Parliament, the young and talented musicians, and Beethoven himself. They clearly did not realise they were demeaning themselves by acting in this fashion.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Indonesian democracy is at a crossroads

    • Nicholas Bugeja
    • 02 July 2019
    7 Comments

    Indonesian democracy has proven resilient to challenge and made inroads into combatting problems that have beset the country for decades. But a crossroads approaches. A failure to manage religious radicalism and intolerance, corruption, and other social tensions may imperil or destabilise this democratic epoch.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Drowned children point to larger migrant stories

    • Ramona Wadi
    • 01 July 2019
    4 Comments

    To what extent has society reacted to the deaths of these two children? Awareness stops with the available imagery. Drowned children on western shores are processed differently in our psyche to the children killed in drone attacks, their absence of identity compounded by statistics which dissociate humanity from numbers.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Lessons from the US-Iran 'lucky escape'

    • Justin Glyn
    • 25 June 2019
    8 Comments

    The first lesson would seem to be that Iran would be foolish to return to talks with the US. There seems precious little to talk about, and absolutely no assurance that the US would keep its side of the deal even if talks did result in the new and better deal the US has claimed it always wanted.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Sri Lanka limps on from bloody Easter Sunday

    • Devana Senanayake
    • 24 June 2019
    1 Comment

    During Poson, a celebration of the entrance of Buddhism into Sri Lanka, I passed three tents presenting free sago, tea and jaggery. Though the fanfare of past years did not exist, it appears the country, though still damaged, is limping through to recovery. But can this recovery be sustained if the emotional pain is still to be unpacked?

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Timor-Leste's missing oil millions

    • Sophie Raynor
    • 05 June 2019
    9 Comments

    For years, we've positioned ourselves as an international champion of moral righteousness, of sovereignty and of self-determination, and as Timor-Leste's liberator. But we can't have it both ways. Taking unearned Timor Sea wealth is another in a long line of Australia's failure to do the right thing by Timor-Leste.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    The radical implications of 'they are us'

    • Genevieve Lloyd
    • 04 June 2019
    8 Comments

    When Jacinda Ardern uttered the words 'They are Us' in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in Christchurch, a powerful vision hovered over the impending debates on the meaning of what had happened. Something hitherto invisible came into view and was repudiated: a conceptual structure underlying the operations of social power.

    READ MORE