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	Ten humanitarian crises and trends to watch in 2019 by IRIN News, New Humanitarian   Jan. 2019   1. Climate displacement: Tomorrow's emergencies today   From rising sea levels to withering drought and unpredictable weather: projections for what the world can expect if climate change remains unchecked are grave.   Yet extreme weather is already uprooting populations around the globe, and the aid sector and governments are struggling to cope. Vulnerable communities have long known what the aid sector is just beginning to articulate: climate change is a humanitarian issue, and its fingerprints are already evident in today's most pressing emergencies.   2. Syria: It's not over til it's over   A win by President Bashar al-Assad is increasingly seen as a fait accompli, but with large parts of the country still controlled by rebels and others seemingly up for grabs, the fighting isn't finished, nor are attempts to influence the aid effort.   3. Outsourcing risk: Local responders shoulder the danger   In insecure areas with limited access, many international aid organisations subcontract donor-funded programmes to local groups 'remote management' in industry jargon. But aid analysts say this increasingly widespread strategy carries ethical and moral quandaries.   4. Ethiopia: Gambling on reforms   Loosening a political straitjacket on 105 million people and weakening central control at the same time: Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's moves could be the biggest relaxation of state control and the least predictable humanitarian planning scenario since the death of Ethiopia's Emperor Menelik in 1913. In a country whose poorest have little room for error, his experiment is a high-stakes gamble that could backfire and cause less welcome upheavals.   5. Returning refugees: The meaning of 'voluntary'?   Pressure is building on millions of vulnerable people to return to dangerous homelands, with 2019 shaping up as a pivotal year for the world's four largest refugee crises. Between them, Syrians, Afghans, South Sudanese, and Myanmar's Rohingya account for well over half the world's refugees, not to mention an almost equal number of internally displaced people.   6. Infectious diseases: Healthcare as a casualty of crisis   Countries experiencing humanitarian crises are seeing the re-emergence of previously forgotten diseases; for example, diphtheria, which took a toll on Yemenis, Venezuelans, and Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh in 2018. And political and structural challenges in some of the world's least developed countries are fostering rich environments for many other diseases to thrive: cholera, Ebola, malaria, measles, MERS, yellow fever, and Zika.   7. South Sudan and Congo: Politics versus peace   2019 is a political year of promise for the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan: the reason we've grouped them together. While the world watches to see if the DRC can achieve a first peaceful transfer of democratic power and if a fledgling peace deal in South Sudan will hold, how both situations develop also carries major implications for millions of people in need of assistance.   8. Anti-terror compliance: When aid falls foul of the law   It's getting harder to stay on the right side of counter-terrorism legislation, NGOs say. That means more vulnerable people could be left without the aid they and their families depend on. And the penalties for the wrong type of engagement with sanctioned groups can be very costly, as the NGO Norwegian People's Aid found.   9. Militancy in Africa: Weak governments struggle, civilians suffer   Violent jihadism continues to gain ground in Africa, representing a serious trial for weak and neglectful governments, and driving up humanitarian needs for civilians.   10. Yemen: Risk of fragmenting conflict   Yemen's main warring parties are finally talking, and even shaking hands. But even if the 45- month war ends and that's a big if, the country could easily slide into a series of local conflicts, bringing little respite for the 24 million civilians the UN says need some sort of aid, be it food, clean water, or shelter.   http://www.irinnews.org/feature/2019/01/02/ten-humanitarian-crises-and-trends-watch-2019 http://www.irinnews.org/feature/2019/01/03/six-aid-policy-priorities-watch-2019 http://www.irinnews.org/opinion/2019/01/04/humanitarian-change-aid-sector-grassroots-accountability Visit the related web page
	Slavery reparations hearing ignites debate in U.S. Congress by NYT, EPI, New Republic, agencies USA   June 2019   Slavery reparations hearing ignites debate in U.S. Congress. (NYT, agencies)   First US congressional hearing in ten years to debate compensation for the descendants of slaves has been held.   A bill proposing potential reparations for descendants of slaves drew heated debate on Wednesday (June 19) during a U.S. House subcommittee hearing, marking the first time in a decade lawmakers have grappled with the divisive issue.   The bill, H.R. 40, would create a commission to study the history of slavery in America and develop proposals for reparations.   "The response of the United States of America long overdue. Slavery is the original sin," Sheila Jackson Lee, the congresswoman from Texas who sponsored the bill, said during the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties hearing.   Her legislation would establish a 13-person government commission to study possible forms of compensation for the descendants of slaves as well as any other forms of rehabilitation or restitution.   Jackson Lee began by setting out the sobering statistics of slavery and its aftermath. She pointed out the 10 to 15 million Africans who were transported by force across the Atlantic, 2 million of whom died during the Middle Passage.   She then leapt forward to the present day, laying out the similarly stark statistics of African American disadvantage. One million black people are incarcerated, black unemployment stands at 6.6% - more than double the national rate, and 31% of black children live in poverty, also more than twice the national figure.   'I am not here in anger. I am not seeking to encourage hostilities', Jackson Lee said. But she said of the concept of reparations: 'Why not? And why not now? If not all of us, then who?'   The idea of reparations is as old as emancipation itself, having been enshrined in the promise approved by Abraham Lincoln to recompense freed slaves on southern land with '40 acres and a mule'. That pledge was revoked by Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson.   But in the modern era, it has periodically risen up again, championed by advocates and politicians. The Rev Jesse Jackson made it a pillar of his 1988 presidential campaign.   Now a new head of steam has built up, unprecedented in recent times. Of the 20 Democratic White House hopefuls, 15 have indicated they would back a government study of the sort put forward in HR 40.   Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, one of the presidential candidates, said the US has "yet to truly acknowledge and grapple with the racism and white supremacy that tainted this country''s founding and continues to cause persistent and deep racial disparities and inequality."   The hearing drew other prominent African Americans, including actor Danny Glover.   "A national reparations policy is a moral, democratic and economic imperative," Glover told the panel arguing that reparations would cure "the damages inflicted by enslavement and forced racial exclusionary policies".   Economist Julianne Malveaux emphasised that she wanted lawmakers to address structural inequalities affecting black Americans.   "When zipcode [postal code] determines what kind of school that you go to, when zipcode determines what kind of food you eat - these are the vestiges of enslavement that a lot of people don't want to deal with."   Writer Ta-Nehisi Coates who authored an article entitled "The Case for Reparations" in The Atlantic in 2014, highlighting the issue for many African Americans.   Addressing the committee he said: "Enslavement reigned for 250 years on these shores. When it ended, this country could have extended its principles of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness to all. But America had other things in mind."   He argued that compensation was due not just for the historic injustice of slavery, but for the discrimination and depredation, official and unwritten, the community had been subjected to in the time after emancipation. The consequences of inequalities, in housing, employment and education policies, are felt even to this day he said.   But while all of the witnesses acknowledged continued disparities between the races in America, not all of the witnesses favored reparations as a solution. Republican leader Mitch McConnell has made it clear no reparations bill will pass while he controls the Senate.   http://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/40/text http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/the-case-for-reparations/361631/ http://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/19/us/politics/slavery-reparations-hearing.html http://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/23/business/economy/reparations-slavery.html http://newrepublic.com/article/117856/academic-evidence-reparations-costs-are-limited http://edition.cnn.com/2019/04/14/politics/slavery-reparations-explainer-trnd/index.html http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/11/18246741/reparations-democrats-2020-inequality-warren-harris-castro http://theconversation.com/should-the-u-s-provide-reparations-for-slavery-and-jim-crow-58331 http://theconversation.com/what-canada-and-south-africa-can-teach-the-u-s-about-slavery-reparations-120318   MLKs dream of economic justice is far from reality, by Jessicah Pierre.   90 years after King was born, the racial wealth divide is actually growing which drags down the entire economy.   January 15th marked what would've been Dr. Martin Luther King's 90th birthday. Most known for his famous 'I Have Dream Speech', King envisioned a future in which deep racial inequalities, including deep economic inequality was eradicated. He worked tirelessly towards that mission.   Over 50 years after his assassination, sensational media stories have focused heavily on the black unemployment rate. These headlines (and boasts) don't tell nearly the whole story. Most importantly, they exclude data on overall wealth, a critical measure of financial security. Wealth buffers families from the ups and downs of income changes and economic cycles, and allows households to take advantage of opportunities.   A new report by the Institute for Policy Studies takes a more holistic look at where the country is in terms of racial economic parity. It reveals deep, pervasive, and ongoing racial economic division.   The study shows that wealth is concentrating into fewer and fewer hands over time. And though working white people also struggle, the hands at the very top are overwhelmingly white. Far from closing, America's polarizing racial wealth divide is continuing to grow between white households and households of color.   Over the past three decades, the report notes, 'the median black family saw their wealth drop by a whopping 50 percent, compared to a 33 percent increase for the median white household'.   King foreshadowed that if we maintain our exploitive economic and political systems, then we'd get not only racial apartheid, but economic apartheid as well.   And unfortunately, that is exactly where we're heading without systemic change. While one in five Americans of any race have zero or even negative wealth, in the last 30 years we've seen the number of households with $10 million or more skyrocket by 856 percent.   The widening of the racial wealth divide has coincided with the extreme concentration of U.S. wealth. We're currently living in an economy where the Forbes 400 own more wealth than all black households, plus a quarter of Latino households, combined.   As much as we cite the vision that MLK laid out for America, decades later we've not moved in the right direction.   This dynamic is the result of public policies that favor the wealthy, not the 'invisible hand' of the market. This has implications for the racial wealth divide, as well as the entire economy. As the U.S. diversifies, these inequalities are actually driving down America's total median wealth and giving the already rich that much more of a leg up over everyone else.   As the mid-20th century civil rights movement recognized, a major shift in economic policy is needed to end the racial inequality of the past and create a new nation with opportunity for all. Inaction or worse, repeating the same mistakes that led to this situation will simply widen the divide and create greater economic instability for the country at large. http://bit.ly/2RAVifH   http://inequality.org/great-divide/dreams-deferred-racial-wealth-divide/ http://www.epi.org/research/race-and-ethnicity/ http://www.epi.org/publication/top-charts-of-2018-twelve-charts-that-show-how-policy-could-reduce-inequality-but-is-making-it-worse-instead/ http://www.childrensdefense.org/2018/our-national-disgrace-census-data-points-to-continued-child-poverty-crisis/ http://www.poorpeoplescampaign.org/demands/ http://talkpoverty.org/2018/05/14/new-poor-peoples-campaign-wants-change-think-poverty/ http://talkpoverty.org/person/peter-edelman/ http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/06/how-poverty-became-crime-america http://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/08/magazine/cities-fine-poor-jail.html http://www.law.georgetown.edu/poverty-inequality-center/ Visit the related web page
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