(Photo: Etica e Coragem/Ethics and Courage, Cf.)
As I finish up my work in Manaus and thereabouts, some last thoughts on current flashpoints of conflict, the resolution of which may point the way to the Amazon’s future—for better or worse.
In an area this vast, there, of course, are many disputes simmering at once: the drug-running that [...]

[Photo: Digging for scraps of metal ore in a mountain of mining waste, Daily Mail Online]
More from the China-Africa symposium at IU: The general outlook of most speakers is reservedly optimistic about the prospects of China’s engagements in Africa. If the last fifty years of Western-sponsored development on the continent have borne so little fruit—and [...]

(Photo: Chinese boss hollerin’ at his ditch diggers in Kabwe, Zambia)
Presently at Indiana University in Bloomington, attending an academic symposium on China’s rapidly expanding investments in Africa, and the implications it will have for the continent’s long-term development.
I am also buying buckets of fireworks. Or seriously considering it. Indiana has some of the laxest fireworks [...]

[Photo: XO Laptop, One Laptop Per Child]
While on the subject of technology and development, I should direct your attentions to a recent post by Jon Evans at his World Fast Forward blog. One of the debates currently raging in development circles has been the relative merits of mobile phones vs. laptops in advancing the economic [...]

[Photo: Christopher Frey]
Technological interventions have often been held up as an almost panacea for meeting development challenges in poor countries. I have two magazine articles now nearing publication, both of them dealing with West Africa’s food security and how it’s being addressed by various competing development strategies. The material also figures in the book, especially [...]

My article on chieftaincy-related conflicts in Ghana appears today at the Globe and Mail online, coinciding with national elections there scheduled for tomorrow. The piece was assigned and written months ago, while I was in West Africa and the town of Bawku was still under a 6pm-6am curfew in the wake of some brutal attacks. [...]

Demographers have been avidly waiting for this moment—when a majority of the human species had finally traded in its farm implements for pocket protectors, its grubby overalls for fine slacks. According to the United Nations, May 23, 2007, marked the day when the earth’s population became predominantly urban.