CADTM | In July 2024, the World Bank and the IMF will be 80 years old. 80 years of financial neo-colonialism and the imposition of austerity policies in the name of debt repayment. 80 years is enough! The Bretton Woods institutions must be abolished and replaced by democratic institutions serving an ecological, feminist and anti-racist bifurcation. To mark these 80 years, we are republishing a series of articles every Wednesday until July, looking in detail at the history and damage caused by these two institutions.

CADTM | In the first 17 years of its existence, the projects supported by the World Bank focussed on improvement of communication infrastructures and the production of power. The money lent by the World Bank was to be spent essentially in industrialized countries. Projects approved by the Bank were designed to improve the South’s export capacities to the North, thereby meeting the needs of Northern countries and enriching a handful of transnational companies in the relevant sectors. During this period, no projects were undertaken in the areas of education, health, drinking water supply and waste water treatment.

What did the WEF Risks Report conclude from its survey of Davos participants? “As we enter 2024, we highlight a predominantly negative outlook for the world over the next two years that is expected to worsen over the next decade. … The outlook is markedly more negative over the 10-year time horizon, with nearly two-thirds of respondents expecting a stormy or turbulent outlook.” Not good for capital and even worse for working people.

There is something ironic about the National Post lecturing anyone about media bias, as it did recently with a front-page story titled “A more damaging media bias.” As Marc Edge shows, the opposite is true: the extreme level of ownership concentration in Canada has since resulted in a correspondingly extreme conservative media bias.

People's World | The British Labour Party will recognize a Palestinian state when it gets permission from Israel to do so, party leader Sir Keir Starmer has announced in his latest abandonment of progressive international commitments.

The Maple | In December, New Brunswick’s government rammed through legislation to end the defined benefit pension plans of roughly 16,000 workers.

The fact that Canada has soldiers stationed overseas, in countries including Iraq and Niger, almost never comes up in domestic political discourse. It is rarely covered in Canadian media. It isn’t a topic at debates. No major political party runs on bringing Canadian soldiers home. As Owen Schalk argues, Canadians should start asking why that is.

The Israeli state is rightly concerned about the possibility of large-scale attacks from the Lebanese militia group Hezbollah. Much is made of the group’s links to Iran, Israel’s former ally and current Middle East competitor. In the subjective world of realpolitik, good and evil are defined by whether or not a given state supports the actions of another.

Jacobin | In Monfalcone, in northeastern Italy, the far-right mayor has banned public Muslim prayer. Home to Europe’s largest shipyard, the town is a crucible of Italy’s rising migrant workforce — and the racist backlash against it.