The Blog — Global

The World Trade Organization (WTO) aims to liberalize international trade by decreasing tariffs, quotas, and bans and encouraging trade agreements amongst its 153 member states. The organization asserts these measures help the environment, improve the economies of the less-developed countries, and ultimately lower costs for the consumer. Critics of the Organization, however, believe that its policies ultimately yield higher profits to the richer, capitalistic countries while exploiting the lower labor costs of their financially weaker counterparts and ignoring the human rights and environmental implications.

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“My Name Is Me” is a campaign for the freedom to "be yourself online". The organizers want people to be able to identify themselves as they wish, rather than being forced to choose names by social networking websites and other online service providers. 

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What’s hot on Twitter in Indonesia today? Support. But for a number of different causes. There are two topics caught the public’s attention today: SUPPORT TIMNAS INDONESIA and #PrayForSouthKorea.

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In the Guardian last week, Carne Ross asks an important question: What can people living outside of countries where movements are struggling to bring down repressive regimes do to help? He asks readers to contribute ideas for “practical suggestions for nonviolent action to help those struggling against repression and dictatorship” in the comment section, which he said he’ll select from for a future column. Ross then suggests a few examples to jump start the conversation:

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Today, Human Rights Watch released their annual report exploring human rights conditions in more than ninety countries and territories around the world. The 2011 World Report, titled “A Facade of Actions," highlights the grave need for increased public pressure on abusive governments. 

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Today, independent watchdog Freedom House released its annual Freedom in the World report for 2011. The report assesses political rights and civil liberties as experienced by citizens on the ground. Using key performance indicators, researchers from Freedom House assigned a freedom status--Free, Partly Free, or Not Free--to 194 countries and 14 territories. 2010 marked the fifth consecutive year that global freedom has been on the decline. Find out more about what countries changed status over the past year, how the economic downturn has impacted democracies, and predictions for the new year. 

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New York Times columnist Nicolas Kristof wrote a lengthy piece for the Sunday magazine about passionate, determined individuals who are "chipping away at global challenges" by working for social change abroad. Kristof describes a number of innovative activists devoted to making changes and empowering the communities they serve, but are there any obstacles to taking on global challenges as an individual that Kristof leaves out? 

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In Nicholas Kristof's New York Times column, he often covers human rights abuses in Africa and Asia. It's not easy to maintain an audience's interest in such difficult topics as human trafficking and forced prostitution, much less to encourage people take action.

So how does Kristof keep his audience engaged and growing? What advice does he have for activists looking to increase the amount of people in the world who care about their cause? And as more people employ digital activism, will it lose its edge? 

We chat with the columnist for this inaugural edition of our "Three Questions" series.

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