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JINN MAGAZINE

PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE

Issue No. 5.23

11/15/99 - 11/26/99

CONTENTS


* VOICES: First-Person Essays Linking the Private to the Public


* HERESIES: Thinking the Unthinkable About the Future

    "Green Money"--Local Currencies Filling A Niche In the Global Economy
    By Walter Truett Anderson
    Date: 11-22-99
    The buzz among economists is about how money systems are evolving into regional currencies, possibly even one global currency. Yet the more important change may be the emergence of highly localized currency systems -- alternative forms of money --that allow local people to operate independent of the official currencies. PNS associate editor Walter Truett Anderson, author of numerous books on future trends, is a political scientist and co-founder of Meridian Institute.


* VECTORS: A Regular Column on the Ideas and Directions Behind Today's News

    Explosive Struggles Over Who Speaks For Islam
    By Muddassir Rizvi
    Date: 11-16-99
    Rocket attacks on three buildings representing the U.N. and the United States in Islamabad, capital of Pakistan, may very well be attributable to the imposition of sanctions on Afghanistan. The situation is complex, according to PNS commentator Muddassir Rizvi, who spoke to a number of Pakistanis about the attack. Rizvi is a Pakistani journalist specializing in development issues whose work appears in several weekly and monthly publications.

    Super-Cyclone Exposes Pretense Of India's Nationalism
    By Andrew Robinson
    Date: 11-17-99
    A devastating cyclone in India recently killed more than 10,000 and affected millions more in the state of Orissa. Beyond the toll in life and property, however, the response to the storm provides a clear -- and upsetting -- view of life in that country. PNS correspondent Andrew Robinson speaks several Indian languages and has been writing about South Asian affairs for over a decade.

    PBS OMISSION--WHAT SUFFRAGETTES OWED THE IROQUOIS
    By Jacqueline Keeler
    Date: 11-19-99
    Villainized as savages, American Indians nonetheless provided models for female equality that inspired America's first suffragettes. Documentaries like PBS's "Not for Ourselves Alone" unfortunately omit the role of American Indians in the shaping of American democratic ideals. PNS commentator Jacqueline Keeler, a member of the Dineh Nation and the Yankton Dakota Sioux, is a Bay Area writer and filmmaker.

    On Eve of Seattle WTO Protests--Labor Bitterly Divided Over How to Fix Free Trade
    By David Bacon
    Date: 11-23-99
    As unions mobilize members to protest the negotiations of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Seattle on Nov. 30, there is bitter disagreement in labor over what it will take to solve the problem of "free trade," or even who the enemy is. PNS associate editor David Bacon writes widely on issues of labor and immigration. A longer version of this article also appears in the LA Weekly.

    New James Bond Thriller Foreshadows Real Dangers In Caucasus
    By Michael T. Klare
    Date: 11-24-99
    James Bond and Bill Clinton are both eyeing the same remote terrain these days. Whether Clinton's script for the Caspian Sea region will manage to avoid the geopolitical land mines that confront James Bond remains to be seen. But the film highlights the very real dangers lurking in the region. PNS commentator Michael T. Klare is a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., and the author of the forthcoming book, "Resource Wars: Global Geopolitics in the 21st Century."

    Irony In Seattle -- Nothing Globalizes Like Anti-Globalism
    BY Walter Truett Anderson
    Date: 11-30-99
    The Seattle meeting of the World Trade Organization has attracted unprecedented coverage, partly because of the number and variety of planned protests. But it is very much worth noting, writes PNS commentator Walter Truett Anderson, that the opposition forces are themselves a product of the globalism they find so objectionable. Walter Truett Anderson is the author of "The Future of the Self" (Tarcher Putnam, 1997).


* PACIFIC PULSE: The Pacific Century and Its Impact on the Americas

    Vietnamese Returnees -- The First Global Villagers
    By Andrew Lam
    Date: 11-18-99
    Many Vietnamese are like Phuong Anh Nguyen -- born in Vietnam, remade elsewhere. They have turned into the first global villagers. Pacific News Service editor and short-story writer Andrew Lam spoke with the celebrated cosmopolite in Bangkok and found out why she can't stop moving on.

    WTO Meetings Through Asian Media Lens
    By Franz Schurmann, Rene Ciria-Cruz and Hoseung Terry Lee
    Date: 11-26-99
    As nongovernmental organizations and critics of the World Trade Organization demonstrate in Seattle, Asian news media are carrying out a lively debate of their own. Issues range from the impact of China's likely entry on its arch rival Taiwan to just how open the Philippine economy should be as it looks to embrace the world market. Editors of New California Media, a collaboration of ethnic news organizations, monitor, translate and contextualize Chinese, Korean and Filipino reactions to the Seattle WTO meetings. Next week NCM will cover Russian, Arab, Indian and Japanese media. NCM's website is at http://www.ncmonline.com.


* YOUTH OUTLOOK: The World Through Young People's Eyes

    111 Years
    By Russell Morse
    Date: 11-15-99
    Kip Kinkel has been sentenced to 111 years without possibility of parole for murdering both his parents and firing into the school cafeteria, killing two students and wounding many more. This bare statement of facts, according to 18-year-old Russell Morse, conceals more than it reveals. Morse writes for YO! Youth Outlook, a monthly newspaper by and about Bay Area youth produced by Pacific News Service.

    Amber Powers and Stanley Joseph, Without Role Models For Married Life, Young People Still Dream About Marriage
    By Amber Powers and Stanley Joseph
    Date: 11-29-99
    Only 26 percent of American households are made up of married couples with children according to a recent University of Chicago survey -- a steep drop from the 45 percent in the early 1970s. When asked how they viewed marriage, most youth reporters for PNS' YO! newspaper noted that they had no role models for married life in their own childhoods. Nevertheless, most young people we asked still "dare to dream" they will get married. Here are two essays by YO! reporters on how they imagine marriage. Amber Powers is a 16 year old high school student living in Mendon, Mass. Stanley Joseph, a 25 year old Haitian-Afro American, is a founding editor of YO! and a senior at San Francisco State University.

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