Citizen Reporter

Pauline Bax: A Tale of Two Presidents, Ivory Coast

Citizenreporter.org’s West Africa correspondant isn’t too keen on walking the streets of Abidjan these days and she has to watch what she says, as the country is sharply divided by a political standoff. The standoff is between two presidents and their supporters. One the incumbent with his own dedicated citizenry, the other elected several months ago, internationally certified and recognized. How long can this standoff last? What can be done or is being done to resolve it? In the meantime, what does daily life consist of on the streets of Abidjan as well as for a longtime correspondant in her own neighborhood.

Joining me online from Abidjan, international journalist and prolific West Africa blogger, Pauline Bax.

Her work on bloomberg.com
Her blog West Africa Wins Always

Guardian Piece on Sousa Mendes

Today my piece on visiting the Casa do Passal and the Legacy of Sousa Aristides de Sousa Mendes was published on the Guardian CiF. It looks at the failure to truly honor his memory as well as how even today there are those with the power to decide to break a rule or a law to save lives. Here’s an excerpt, please click the link to read the whole thing:

“So you’ve seen our shame, our disgrace?” Those were the first words from an older gentleman wearing a sash along the parade route. It is carnival in Cabanas de Viriato, the ancestral home of Portuguese second world war hero Aristides de Sousa Mendes, and I’m walking alongside Francisco Antonio Campos, director of the local philharmonic.

He sounds frustrated as he stares in any direction to avoid looking at theghastly abandoned mansion looming over us in the town square. More than 70 years since Sousa Mendes, a diplomat assigned to the consulate in Bordeaux, saved over 30,000 people from the concentration camps of Nazi Germany, his story remains largely unknown and his majestic home, Casa do Passal, is falling to pieces.

Abandoned Casa do Passal — Casa do Passal, What is left of it.

Note: For those in the NYC/Long Island area, there is a special event being put on by the Sousa Mendes Foundation on Saturday in Mineola. Full details here.

Natasha Ezrow: Dissecting Dictators

2011 is the year where many observers and so called experts around the world scramble to understand how it is that so many dictatorships suddenly arrived at a crisis. As people take to the streets and battles take place in city squares throughout the middle east, we discover that in fact many of the dictators of these regions have not been well studied or understood.

Natasha Ezrow, Director of the International Development Studies Program at the University of Essex and author of Dictators & Dictatorships: Understanding Authoritarian Regimes and Their Leaders, has written about the important differences between dictators which we now see being played out by how they handle calls for reform. She also lays out criteria for why types of leaders might flee a country before anyone is harmed, while others would stay til their last breath.

Space For Those Who Don’t Agree

Lisbon, March 2011 Through the numerous jobs I do as both a journalist and an editor to help fund my own work here on this site, I end up editing many documents relating to new media and its significance. Among the terms and theories that are frequently kicked around is the one about how through today’s social media applications and collective spaces on the web, like minded people can find each other and further develop their projects or networks. No doubt, this is happening and will continue to happen; yet while many celebrate this development, I’m left concerned and wondering about the flip side of this coin.

What will a world be like where for the most part like minded people find each other and communicate amongst themselves? Where you unfriend or ignore any person with an opinion that doesn’t match your own. How will future compromises and cooperation occur among people who have very different points of view about how the world works or should work?

In many ways this question has begun to be answered with every passing election in this decade. In Europe for example, increasingly you hear about increase in votes for parties on the fringe or on extreme opposite opinions from each other. The middle ground or voices that express something less pronounced or less strict positions are losing ground (of course in many cases they might also deserve it for a poor track record).

Despite the power of the internet to educate and connect people, and the tools that have made this all possible, the answer to the aforementioned question has not emerged. You can surely follow people on twitter that you agree with just as well as you can follow people you disagree with, but do we really do both? Or do we unfollow the person who’s opinion we can’t stand. After that, we may never have to hear from them and can proceed with communicating with the more pleasant people we tend to agree with.

Of course this is not the same story throughout the internet. There are plenty of people, who disagree on things, listening and communicating with each other. But as systems of social networking become more refined, catering to what you like and who you like, how do we keep the things we don’t like -but might need to live alongside, from being ignored. Are all the great developments for sharing information making sure that NON likeminded people are encouraged (or required!) to keep listening to each other? Perhaps they should, since we do still live on this earth together, and ignoring each other continues to have terrible side effects.

bmtv123 Demonstration in Lisbon

Avenida da Liberdade One Saturday in March some 200,000 people took to the streets of Lisbon to express their frustration and desperation with the government’s performance, corruption and its economic/social policies. It was in fact a beautiful day filled with creative and humorous approaches to protesting from a city (and a country) that knows a bit about taking to the streets to demand a better future.

Matthew Dons in Japan: The Survival Plan

Photo by An HONORABLE GERMAN on flickr You may think the media and the social networks have told you all that needs to be known about conditions on the ground in Japan, but hearing it first hand gives you a far greater understanding. In the days following the massive earthquake and tsunami, Karamoon contacted me from his home in Tokyo. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could remain in his home, or on the other hand, if he wouldn’t have to stay in doors for two weeks to avoid radioactive winds.

In the following podcast he describes his experience and the concerns going forward. He also goes into details about his survival preparations and options on an island where many people face difficult choices in the aftermath.

Follow Karamoon on twitter

Listen to the Learn Japanese Pod

And just now I received an update, Tokyo Hacker Space is taking action for quake relief in Northern Japan but they need your help. (link has been down occasionally today)