Christmas has been over for a few weeks now, but the BMZ’s Christmas ad is still generating discussion after the fact. While Prof. Theo Rauch headlines “Welcome to the stone age of development policy”, the BMZ defends the motive and choice of words of the advertisement with reference to the Christmas story (see below). 
Author Archives: glokal
Black consciousness: Time to breach the white hole of oppression
Here there is another contribution by Malaika wa Azania to the debate on anti-racism in South Africa, which is also important for our work at glokal: “Education must either function as an instrument that is used to facilitate integration of the younger white generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity, or it becomes the practice of freedom – the means by which they deal critically with reality and discover how to transform their thinking.”
Dear White People
“Settler Sister” Gillian Schutte started the year with a letter to her white fellow citizens and thus once again flared up the debate in South Africa about historical responsibility and the strategies of anti-racist and decolonial struggles. In their response, Black Consciousness activists Athi-Nangamso Esther Nkopo and Andile Mngxitama criticize Schutte for producing herself as the good white woman and suggesting that whiteness can be individually discarded or transformed into a good, anti-racist whiteness. Jackie Shandu’s critique is more directed at blacks who are celebrating Schutte and thus indulging their longing for the white messiah rather than fighting their own battles. Here is a collection of many worthwhile comments in response to the letter and on the debate as a whole. Schutte then also spoke up again yesterday. Such politically engaged and intellectually high quality debate in the mainstream press … And all that is left for us to do is to get angry about the thin-board drilling in Zeit and Spiegel.
Consuming Africa (at Christmas Time)
On the blog “Africa is a country” Elliot Ross analyzes the changes in fundraising advertising of the British “charity-industrial complex”: from “disaster porn” to an aesthetic of absence. You can find the article here.
Delhi gang-rape: look westward in disgust
Emer O’Toole, writing in The Guardian, sheds light on the neocolonial way in which the gang rape of a female student in New Delhi is being reported in the British and U.S. media. This comment is again criticized by Sunny Hundal: According to him, India does not need a well-meaning defense by whites who are afraid of being labeled as racists. Rather, Indian women should finally be listened to.
Radiator Aid? No, thanks!
Following our criticism of “Radi-Aid,” two scientists from the Norwegian Institute for International Affairs have also spoken out. They criticize the neglect of key development principles such as “good governance,” “ownership,” “effectiveness,” and “holistic approach.” Their detailed analysis can be found here.
Press release of the Initiative in Memory of Oury Jalloh e.V. from 06.12.2012
Circumstantial evidence for the murder theory is accumulating, the court rejects the corresponding motions for evidence and presses for a quick end of the procedure – In Saxonia-Anhalt a murder is obviously covered up! is covered up!
The evidence in favor of the murder of Oury Jalloh continues to grow. The Nebenklagevertretung therefore filed an urgent motion on Tuesday with the urgent demand to obtain a supplementary fire expert opinion. The chamber, visibly annoyed, rejects this and urges senior prosecutor Christian Preissner to make his plea. The latter demands 90 daily sentences of €70 each for Andreas Schubert, because he is guilty of negligence by omission.
Representatives of the Nebenklage now also speak of Tőtung Oury Jallohs by third parties
The Chamber mőwants to bring the appeal proceedings, which have been ongoing since January 2011, to a conclusion with all determination in the next days of the trial. In the meantime, Gabriele Heinecke, representing the plaintiff’s side, presented a series of circumstantial evidence in her motion for a preliminary ruling, which has now led the lawyers representing the family to speak openly of the murder of Oury Jalloh. Among other things, Heinecke demanded that a supplementary fire report be obtained in order to clarify all contradictions regarding the origin of the fire.
You can read the full press release here.
Twisting History
We were recently in Munich for a workshop and were made aware of the Völkerkundemuseum. The museum celebrates 150 this year. The company is celebrating its 50th birthday with a new slogan: “Weltoffen seit 1862” (“Open to the world since 1862“). Given the close involvement of ethnologists with colonial conquest and exploitation as well as with race theory, such a slogan is more than cynical. While most ethnological museums refuse to return so-called collection items to their countries of origin, Munich’s Museum of Ethnology is celebrating its birthday with an exhibitionentitled “Network Exoticism“. The elementary connection between racism and exoticization is not only ignored. Through its cosmopolitan slogan, the Ethnological Museum actively rewrites history and denounces its own entanglement in violent history.
A week later in Göttingen, we stopped by the Institute of Zoology and Anthropology. Here the ethnological proximity to biologistic ideas is even anchored in the name.
International Migrants’ Court
In the last week of November, the first “International Migrants’ Court” was held in the Philippines. The court found 37 states, including Germany, guilty of modern slavery. More info on the ruling can be found here.
From Germany, Rex Osa from The Voice was present and presented a detailed testimony.
Christmas marathon in fundraising
Berlin and other cities are once again full of new advertising campaigns by development NGOs before Christmas. Even if they are new images, the messages remain the same: If we do not take action here in the Global North, people in the Global South will starve and die of thirst. And it is made easier and easier for us to calm our conscience: we only have to send an “action” by sms to a number of terre des hommes or bite into a delicious UNESCO pizza and already we “free” children from work and misery. We may, of course, continue sponsorships, although the concept of paternalism-generating sponsorship programs has been heavily criticized even within the development scene for years.