Movements overcome injustices not just by bearing witness to the wrongs of the time, but by enabling people to envision a better future. Martin Luther King...
Ben Phillips
Ben Phillips is an advisor to the United Nations, governments and civil society organisations, was Campaigns Director for Oxfam and for ActionAid, and co-founded the Fight Inequality Alliance. He tweets at benphillips76
The struggle over inequality: What to expect as world leaders meet in New York this week
If you're in New York this week, you're in good company, as world leaders congregate at the United Nations to mark the end of the old Millennium Development...
The powerful have shown a really nasty side this month. That’s great news.
In the Addis talks over tackling tax dodging, and in the EU-IMF talks on Euro-austerity, the powerful have shown a really nasty side this month. That's great...
NGOs get their courage back on inequality and climate (thanks to the Pope)
"I'm off to the most radical country in the Western world," I told my colleagues, "the Vatican." There was a time when NGO radicalism would have made our...
The end of the defence of widening inequality, and the beginnings of a coalition to address it
Were it not for the amusing stunts mocking the G7 leaders, the world might not even know the G7 was happening. (What they most fear, I reckon, is that people...
BRICS in Africa – challenging the old order or consolidating it?
Arriving in Maputo last week I came across what has become a familiar sight in African airports: I don't mean the big groups of Chinese businesspeople and...
“Organizadas Somos Fortes” – Organised we are powerful. Reflections from the landless movement in Brazil.
"This dance is not mine alone, this dance is by us all” – they move as one circle, hand in hand. Then, still as one circle, they put their arms around each...
How can we take on the power of the few? Three lessons from Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights Movement in advancing a society that works for all
Development is about power, and the biggest threat to development today is the excessive power of the few. As five major NGO leaders set out in their recent...
What’s mined is yours
They call it an "indaba" - a word in several African languages for a gathering where a community gets together to resolve the problems that affect them all....
Joburg’s Unfinished Journey
In Joburg’s old Prison Number 4 stands a flogging frame. Here political prisoners would be instructed to step on to it and be beaten with leather, wood, or...
Who will defend tax dodging?
2015 has started off as a tough year for tax dodgers. In Zambia, the new President appears to have confirmed the fears that multinational mining corporations...
It’s time for development experts to admit that poverty is a #firstworldproblem too
“Starbucks wifi not working on my iPhone #firstworldproblems” – if your twitter timeline is full of such stories, you are probably following a few too many...
New Boy: What they said to me on my first day at ActionAid
“So how do you think we should use EAGLES to apply the HRBA and SO2 to IHART?” “That’s the one sentence version. And here is the 265 page version. Hey, you’ve...
From exclusion and inequality to humanity and Francisconomics? My personal reflections before a meeting in Rome
This month I'll be joining a meeting convened by the Vatican on overcoming social and economic exclusion, and was asked in advance to share my personal...
Development as love – what I learnt from my Dad
In International Development circles you are supposed to say that your ideas about Development come from Sen or Ul Huq or Cardoso. You are not supposed to say...
Inequality and the dangerous radicals
As is well-known, critiquing the market can lead to dangerous radicalism, and I've recently come across some particularly troubling examples of such radicals....
With Glasgow Govan’s gentle hard men
In Govan, one of Glasgow's toughest post-industrial neighbourhoods, a big burly man with a tattoo, a history of drug abuse, huge arms and a large hammer,...
The Unquiet: Challenging Inequality in Pakistan
They were brought up to be quiet. But they insist upon raising their voice. At a gathering in Lahore of women grassroots activists from different parts of...
Because I am their neighbour. A day at the Kingston Food Bank.
In Kingston, South-West London, amongst leafy streets and upmarket cafes, a group of volunteers meets in a church to welcome locals who have been referred by...
Climate Change is not a debate: It is a struggle that pits survivors against fossil fuel profiteers
Climate change is not a debate. The scientists couldn’t be clearer about how real and how harmful it is. But governments are still not basing their...
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Justice is missing the boat
The year 2020 will go down in history as the year when much changed. One thing seems to remain constant: the fact that the justice sector is slow to change. As a consequence, it seems to be missing a rather big boat. Good things often come out of bad things. It is no...
An emerging ministers of justice movement
Since April, we have been calling for justice leaders of the world to get out of their national cubby holes and come together to share fears, failures, successes, and strategies, just like public health ministers are doing. The COVID-19 crisis is too big and too...
Un mouvement émergent des Ministres de la Justice
Depuis le mois d'avril, nous appelons les leaders de la justice du monde entier à sortir de leur cagibi national et à se réunir afin de partager leurs craintes, leurs échecs, leurs succès ainsi que leurs stratégies, comme le font les ministres de la santé publique. La...