India's positive image
As someone who first went to India in 1964, I feel India's "positive" image in the foreign media only started showing up, let alone dominating, very, very recently. (For those interested in a pre-1964 study, see Harold Isaacs's book SCRATCHES ON OUR MIND (later reprinted as IMAGES OF ASIA).) I certainly don't think the image had turned positive when we held our "Reporting on India and Pakistan [in the fifty years since independence]" conference at ... Read More

Research conference on ethnicity
Our Fifth Graduate Research Conference in Ethnicity, held last Thursday and Friday at the Munk School of Global Affairs, was an enjoyable event, quite successful, and continues what is becoming a very fine tradition promoting professional development for graduate students studying topics related to ethnicity at the University of Toronto. The conference program, posted at
http://www.utoronto.ca/ethnicstudies/recentevents.html#studentconference5

shows that the topics and disciplines represented are diverse, and interest also was enhanced by participation from other universities ... Read More

A new threat to the net
A new global treaty could allow corporations to police everything that we do on the Internet. Last week 3 million of us successfully pushed back the US censorship bills -- if we act now, we can get the EU Parliament to bury this new threat to all of us:

Last week, 3 million of us beat back America's attack on our Internet! -- but there is an even bigger threat out there, and our ... Read More

Invite Pranab Mukherjee to Canada
I need my distant relative, the Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee from Hooghly, West Bengal to come to Canada to balance my domestic budget. We Mukherjees must stand by each other in these difficult finacial times. We should invite the India Finance Minister to Canada to gives us clues as to how we can maximize in sound trade relations.
If a Bengali-English interrpeter is needed, I will voluntarily offer my service, once my home budget is cleared. ... Read More

Save the free Internet
Today could be the day we save the free Internet.

The US Congress was poised to pass a law allowing officials to censor access to any website around the world. But after we delivered our 1.25 million strong petition to the White House, it came out against the bill and with public pressure at a boiling point even some bill backers are switching sides. Now, the Wikipedia - led blackout protest has rocketed the public ... Read More

Why is it a problem to have Department of Homeland Security keep an eye on social media?
People, business, and governments alike have been spying on one another, gathering data and collecting intelligence on their rivals and threats
since the birth of first person. I know many people subscribe to tons of groups just to know where things are heading. I know one Lister who once mentioned that he used this forum to do some research for his PhD thesis.
Still surprised?

Ratnendra Pandey
... Read More

Conference coming up
I am writing on behalf of the Letter of Peace addressed to the UN Foundation (http://letterofpeace.org/), an organization focused on promoting reflection, research and the dissemination of peace which has links to Peace Institutes in various cities across Europe, Asia and America.

Since 1993 we have worked in cities in more than 80 countries across 5 continents. Ours has always been practical, “artisan” work; adapted to each group and program and contributing, as far as possible, ... Read More

Privatising Jasper Park
In days, the Harper Government could privatise a section of Jasper National Park and let an American-owned company blast a 300m metal walkway into our World Heritage mountains -- but Jasper's superintendent has the power to stop them.

The plan would not only spur development, but would give an American company the right to charge each of us for entry into parts of Jasper park. Greg Fenton, a local Jasperite, has the ability to stop the ... Read More

The drums of war being beaten against Iran
All winter long the drums of war have been beating. At first it was reports, taken seriously by even hardened observers of the Middle East scene, that Israel was planning to use the Christmas holiday period to launch an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. Then Iran in its turn ratcheted up the tensions as the New Year approached with a threat to close the Straits of Hormuz to oil shipping in the event of further ... Read More

Stabilization and Peacebuilding Initiative
International Stabilization and Peacebuilding Initiative's
Stabilization and Peacebuilding Community of Practice (SP-CoP) and the UN Peacebuilding Support Office Peacebuilding Community of Practice (PB CoP) will conduct a joint six-week long thematic e-Discussion on the “2011 World Bank Development Report (WDR).” Sarah Cliffe, Special Representative/Director of the WDR 2011 and Special Adviser and Assistant Secretary-General, Civilian Capacities Review Project (United Nations), will guest facilitate the discussion.

The aim of this e-Discussion is to apply lessons from the ... Read More