It’s UN day! I always forget it. Ban Ki-moon remembered and celebrated by giving a speech to a group of ninth-graders at a school in New York. He got off to a flying start:
I heard the last time you were all here was for Movie Night. I hope I am not quite as scary as “Night of the Living Dead.”
Nobody would accuse the Secretary-General of being scary. But he can do corny:
The UN is 4 U – and you can be 4 the UN.
Indeed.
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Official development assistance (ODA) – or aid – is a small but conspicuous pillar of the international order, and its frailties are being exposed by COVID as surely as those of the other foundations of this order. The assumptions underpinning aid and its management...
Since its onset, one striking feature of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) has been the narrative power of its novelty. This global narrative depicts COVID-19 pushing humanity towards a ‘historical divide’ of BC and AC (before and after COVID-19), where unknown,...