The complex phenomenon of immigration 
By Javier del Rey Morat
An ethically intolerable solution in the 21st century 
By Bernardo Kliksberg (for Safe Democracy)
4,900 children died every day in 2006. 1,800,000 died during that entire year. What killed them? Among several killers, the foremost is a lack of access to clean drinking water. Diarrhea is the second greatest cause of infant mortality around the world. How can we condemn an entire portion of the human race to these mortal risks? Bernardo Kliksberg believes that the issue is not linked solely to a lack of water, but is largely related to the absence of international will to find a solution. The lack of clean drinking water is an offense to mankind and is ethically intolerable especially in the technologically advanced 21st century. In Kliksberg‘s opinion, water must become a priority on our collective agenda.
more…
Obscene Disparities
Social Responsibility and Ethics: The Antidote for Inequality
Posted by , 11th March 2007
Bernardo Kliksberg reflects on the obscenely unequal distribution of wealth in the global system. Calling upon the examples of Wesley Autrey and Los Hijos de Don Quijote, Kliksberg illustrates the need for socially responsible societies that look after those who cannot look after themselves. From the unethical role of agricultural subsidies, to the lack of access to clean drinking water, sanitary facilities, housing, health care, and employment, Kliksberg points out the gross inequalities in the world, the need to find solutions, and the role of social responsibility in reducing poverty.
more…
Countering extremist encroachments on universal rights 
By Robert Wesley (for Safe Democracy)
Robert Wesley writes on the recent threats of violence from Muslim extremists reacting to Western statements and actions perceived as anti-Islam. After the Pope’s comments at Regensburg, and the publication of the Danish cartoons, a manipulative extremist propaganda network has emerged in full force to fuel extremist protests and cow the West into abandoning its core values. Wesley notes the need for a plan by Western leadership to combat the propaganda of Islamic militants, and protect the values of free speech and expression so essential to the functioning of a liberal democracy. In Wesley‘s opinion, backing down or apologizing when threatened will only reinforce the behaviour of Jihadist groups and bring them closer to their goals.
more…
A rare and poorly distributed resource 
By Ferran Requejo (for Safe Democracy)
Ferran Requejo exposes the serious problem that the lack of water at the global level presents for development, growth, distribution and the environment, and that affects the dignity and human rights of more than 2 billion people. Requejo believes that there are four factors that make difficult the reduction of the number of people affected by consuming unsafe water: the lack of fresh water on the planet, the increasing population, the relation between development and contamination, and the increase in demand.
more…
International Summit of Safe Democracy
Saturday, March 10th, Teatro Lara, Madrid
What are the principle challenges that today confront Africa, Latin America, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East? How can we ensure that academics and experts offer solutions to these large regional challenges?
The Safe Democracy Foundation –co-organizer of the International Summit on Terrorism, Democracy and Security in March of 2005 and organizer of the March 11th Atocha Workshop— will reunite this Saturday, March 10th in Madrid with a diverse group of academics and experts from distinct disciplines and nationalities to debate and look for, on the third anniversary of the attacks of March 11 2004, solutions to the principle regional challenges in 9 parallel work groups.
In the first of the summits (March of 2005) co-organized by Safe Democracy with the Club of Madrid, successfully managed to obtain that the highest representative of the United Nations and numerous Heads of State met in Madrid in order to analyze how democracies could fight against terrorism in an effective manner, without losing its spirit. The results are published under the title “Agenda de Madrid (The Madrid Agenda)”.
In this new International Summit of Safe Democracy we want to deepen not only the phenomenon of terrorism, but in those regional disequilibria that directly affect democracy and global security. At Safe Democracy, we understand democracy as not only the opportunity to elect ones own government and representatives, but in a much greater sense: a political and social system that offers security (physical, but also economic and social) and that values education, health, job opportunities, freedom of expression, diversity, that supports innovation without fear, that respects minorities and their cultures and their rights.
The themes to be analyzed range from the fight against terrorism in Spain and Europe 3 years after March 11th to how to create sustainable development in Asia. We will also address the question of immigration and the future of Europe, governance, poverty, and development in Latin America. We will have two tables of experts dedicated to how to avoid the regional mega-crisis of chaos in the Middle East and how to restart the Palestinian-Israeli peace process. Also, the challenges of aid and poverty in Africa and the resurgence of Russia as an international super power will be analyzed.
As part of the multiple activities of Safe Democracy oriented to guarantee the fortification of democracy as a pillar of global development, an opportunity will be opened to analyze public subjects below the dynamic of the work groups in those which will exchange ideas, propositions, and reflections between renowned experts like: Rafael Calduch Cervera, professor of International Relations in the Complutense University in Madrid; Esteban Ibarra, president of the Movement Against Intolerance; Pablo Mieres, president of the Independent Party of Uruguay; Jos
As America’s Discontent with Bush Grows, Europeans Sigh with Relief
By Martin Varsavsky
Martin Varsavsky writes on the relief felt throughout Europe at the fall of President Bush‘s approval rating. During the peak of Bush‘s popularity, his anti-European, confrontational policy of you’re either with us or against us did a great amount of damage to US–European relations. In Varsavsky‘s opinion, although the democratization of Iraq has failed, now that US public opinion is beginning to understand the fallacy of Bush‘s close-minded approach, trans-Atlantic relations will be greatly improved.
more…
Finding alternatives to violence 
By Daniel Bavly (for Safe Democracy)
Daniel Bavly writes on the changing face of War in the 21st century, and how, after two world wars, the menace of terrorism has arisen as a new threat to peace. In Bavly‘s opinion, insufficient coordination, poor planning, cumbersome bureaucracies, and increasing citizen disillusionment are weakening militaries. As war changes, the military must also change, and society must seek new diplomatic alternatives to fighting violence with violence. A century and a half after the statement that War is Hell, Bavly writes, society may finally be beginning to believe it.
more…
The immorality of denying the Holocaust 
By Bernardo Kliksberg (for Safe Democracy)
Bernardo Kliksberg explains that the recent international conference, held in Teheran, to ridicule the Holocaust should not be considered as merely one more anti-semitic and racist act, but as the murder, for the second time, of the six million Jewish children, women, men, elderly, artisans, tailors, farmers, and workers who died in Nazi extermination camps. In Kliksberg‘s opinion, by denying the existence of the Holocaust, Iran is paving the way for genocide and racism of all kinds to be carried out with impunity. If the Holocaust can be denied, why not also negate Rwanda, Darfur, and the countless other brutal massacres that have blemished human history? Now, more than ever, Kliksberg writes, the free men and women of the world must rescue memory, and stand up in defiance of hatred, racism, and genocide.
more…
