WMC News & Features
A Quiet Revolution in the Developing World
The Gates Foundation has found an experienced adviser who knows as much as anyone about the importance of focusing on women to increase agricultural production in those countries where hungry people need it most. And her gender-sensitive policy does not end with the farmers.
WMC News & Features
November 24, 2008 | Hamedah Hasan, Melissa Mummert |
Arts and culture,
International,
Media,
Politics
Concrete Bed
As a result of Draconian federal sentencing laws imposed since the 1980s, the author, caught on the edges of her cousin’s cocaine-selling operation, remains locked up despite what her trial judge called her “extraordinary rehabilitation.” While we seek out family during this holiday season, she longs for her three daughters and hopes that a documentary about her case will influence judicial policy makers.
WMC News & Features
Voices Carry: The Fight for Women’s Rights in the Catholic Church
Roman Catholic supporters of Barack Obama undergo intimidation by church leaders because of their candidate’s pro-choice views. Father Roy Bourgeois faces excommunication for co-presiding over the ordination of a woman as priest. Author Angela Bonavoglia connects the dots within a deeply misogynistic tendency of the church hierarchy that members are resisting—from the pews and from the pulpit.
WMC News & Features
National Security: Women Must Define the Priorities Debate
The ‘guns versus butter’ debate is on the way out. Even the U.S. military has realized the importance of providing the latter. For this election and beyond, women leaders are learning how to recast ...
WMC News & Features
September 11, 2008 International
Russian Women Look Outward to Create Change
The Russian conflict with Georgia may as some predict risk a return to Cold War-style relations. But from what I saw in Chuvashia, an autonomous republic in the Russian Federation, 600 kilometers east of Moscow—from the vantage point of an innovative summer camp that was nearing season’s end—changes in the two decades since the fall of the Soviet Union have taken root.
WMC News & Features
Making Women Farmers "Visible" As They Feed Nations
Meena Bilgi always knows where to start. A half hour after her request the village leader of Boripitha, an underdeveloped community of 1,300 in the Indian state of Gujarat, had summoned 15 to 18 men and boys.
WMC News & Features
Finally! The UN Gets One Right
Last week, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously confirmed Secretary General BanKi-Moon’s appointment for\the post of UN high commissioner for human rights: the distinguished South African jurist Navanethem (“Navi”) Pillay. Women’s rights activists around the world can celebrate.
WMC News & Features
Delving Further into Foreign Policy in Afghanistan
After a grueling 18-month primary campaign, the race for the president of the United States has begun. True to form the candidates have come out sparring.
WMC News & Features
July 09, 2008 Environment,
International
When the Bush Becomes a "Desert Shrub"
“It doesn’t rain here the way it used to.” That was a Senegalese woman’s observation, included in a new report on climate change released by the Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO).
WMC News & Features
June 13, 2008 | Regina Cornwell |
International
Farm Women, an Unsung World Treasure
In the midst of a global food crisis, advocates are trying to convince the world that women farmers are an essential part of the solution. Women are responsible for over half of the world’s food pro...
WMC News & Features
June 09, 2008 | Maria Toro |
International
Nicaraguan Activist Embarks on Democracy Hunger Strike
A legendary Sandinista leader and political activist launched a hunger strike of indefinite duration on June 4, 2008 against the current president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega to protest his authorit...
WMC News & Features
Pakistani Filmmaker Captures the Lives of Iraqi Refugee Children
Award-winning journalist Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is touring the United States with her latest film, “The Lost Generation,” a documentary on Iraq’s refugee children produced for Great Britain’s prestig...
WMC News & Features
March 20, 2008 | Regina Cornwell |
International
Deborah Kanafani: Invisibility Unveiled
Women in the Middle East working for women’s rights and peace are subjects all but invisible in the U.S. media. In her book, Unveiled: How an American Woman Found Her Way Through Politics, Love and ...
WMC News & Features
March 08, 2008 | Zainab Salbi |
International
Please Listen to the Women of Iraq
I hadn’t been to my homeland, Iraq, since so many professional Iraqi women started to be assassinated, including one of my good female friends in fall of 2004. In February I traveled the country to ...
WMC News & Features
Premiere Dame Worries Sarkozy Constituents
She’s a former model turned pop star and her list of exes includes Mick Jagger, Eric Clapton and Donald Trump. No, she’s not the star of a new reality TV show—although you could be forgiven for thin...
WMC News & Features
February 15, 2008 | Laura DeLuca |
International
Lost Girls of Sudan
At a Colorado natural foods store, Rose Lokwang briskly arranges the salad bar. “Can you imagine that there are twenty-two organic items and forty-four conventional items in the salad bar alone?” sh...
WMC News & Features
Camelot Revisited—What’s Lost in Pakistan
In the midst of the U.S. presidential election, with leaders focused on bringing change to Washington, the brutal murder of Benazir Bhutto halfway around the world is a powerful reminder that change...
WMC News & Features
Women World Leaders Reassess Security
“Global security” tends to conjure up “fighting terrorism,” conditioned as we are by the media and government. But last fall, the International Women Leaders Global Security Summit (New York City, N...
WMC News & Features
In Memory of Benazir Bhutto, Cut U.S. Ties to Musharraf
My heart and thoughts are with the Pakistani people as they mourn the death of Benazir Bhutto. I extend my deep sorrow to her family and the millions of supporters who for decades have seen the Bhut...
WMC News & Features
Persepolis—Iranian Feminist as Subversive
It's been a very difficult fall at the box office for political films, especially for those about the Iraq war. But the most interesting political film this fall comes from the most unlikely source—...
WMC News & Features
Sexual Violence as Occupational Hazard—In Iraq and at Home in the U.S.A.
Jamie Leigh Jones was just 20 in 2005 when she took a leap of faith to work in Iraq for her employer, military contractor Kellogg, Brown & Root, then a subsidiary of Halliburton. She went on a mission she believed in. Shortly after her arrival in Iraq, however, Jones’ ambitions were dashed in an alleged gang rape by co-workers.
WMC News & Features
Who Is Making Those Troubling Toys from China?
Just as Detroit is famous for making cars and Napa for producing wine, Cheng Hai in Guangdong Province, not far from Hong Kong, is known for manufacturing toys for children all over the world, espec...
WMC News & Features
WMC Commentary: “Charlie Wilson’s War” and Pakistan at a Crossroads
“Who is this?” I groaned into the phone. It was before noon on a Sunday, and I was a student. Who was up this early? It was my father, having an apoplectic fit. “What the hell are you up to over the...
WMC News & Features
WMC Exclusive: Muslim Women, Taking The Lead
For Pinar Ilkkaracan, coming to New York from Istanbul to receive a prestigious human rights award last month was a welcome respite. “You are constantly struggling,” she said of her efforts on behal...
WMC News & Features
October 29, 2007 International,
Politics
Women’s Delegation Calls for an End to Failed Mideast Peace Formulas
During the past week, according to an AP report, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has reached out to Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, and others to discuss how to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict. Meanwhile, a delegation of Palestinian, Israeli, and international women are speaking out in California, New York, and Washington, DC, calling for a new, “consultative approach” to a negotiated agreement.