As Colombia prepares for elections that have the potential to shift the country’s direction significantly, a look back at the country’s 2021 general strike provides a useful window into the forces that have led the country to this point. In particular, a critical analysis of establishment media coverage of the strike reveals the continuing role of dominant institutions in seeking to extend the status quo and undermine the people’s desire for peace and justice after decades of structural violence, dislocation, and corruption.

As the presidential elections and a glimpse of change approach, Colombians keep rising to disclose the numerous human rights violations and other abusive realities that the current administration has caused. In order to make sense of what is happening on the ground at the moment, however, we need to look back at the national strike that shook the country in 2021.

Every Sunday, a warming atmosphere spreads out in Victoria Park, a green spot in the centre of Hong Kong where groups of foreign domestic workers (FDWs) spend their one day off. Since in Hong Kong, domestic workers are forced by law to live in their employers’ houses, they often find themselves trapped in their workplace. For this reason, on Sunday, they gather in Victoria Park to share their skills and celebrate life in all its forms.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro created the National Strategic Development Zone of the Orinoco Mining Arc in 2016. Commonly known as the Arco Minero, it comprises an area of 111,843.70 km², larger than Cuba, adjacent to the Orinoco river, and is designated for unlawful mineral extraction. The Arco represents 12% of the country’s territory and is a severe environmental problem for the region.

“The younger generation is often framed as the ‘procrastinator.’ We are the ‘kids’ who only care about social media. Yet, in the face of the Climate Crisis, our generation is mobilizing to demand change. Here in the Haudenosaunee territory (the North Country), people of all ages believe in the ideas that the concept of Rights of Nature encompasses. We believe nature deserves further legal protection in the form of recognition as a living entity with legal standing. We want to preserve and prosper with our Mother Earth. This is why young people from the St. Lawrence River watershed are working together to organize an international symposium which will take place on March 22, International Water Day. During the North Country Rights of Nature Symposium, community members will join to discuss how best to protect the region’s waterways.”

Gaia Guatri reports from Hong Kong, where several NGOs have called for the government to implement measures to check and provide acceptable living standards of foreign domestic workers (FDWs) during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Four members of the Weave News team presented their work at the 2021 Critical Media Literacy Conference of the Americas (CMLCA), held virtually from October 15-17, 2021. With sessions in English, Portuguese, and Spanish, the conference celebrated the life and work of the Brazilian scholar-activist Paulo Freire (1921-1997), widely considered the “father of critical pedagogy.”

As ordinary people in Eswatini/Swaziland take to the streets to protest in favor of human rights and democracy, digital activism is playing an important role. Weave News contributor Phiwa T. argues that instead of dismissing such efforts, we should recognize that forms of digital protest can work hand in hand with traditional forms of street-level activism.

In response to the ongoing Israeli violence against Palestinians in Sheikh Jarrah, Gaza, and elsewhere, several dozen St. Lawrence University students, faculty and alumni gathered on May 15 for a Vigil in Solidarity With Palestinians.

Resources to help educate on how to be a better ally to the Asian and AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) community and educate about anti-Asian bias, hate crimes, and violence. 

As students continue to play a key role in mass protests in Haiti against the current government of Jovenel Moïse, Jesús G. Ruiz argues that it is time we look to Haiti once again, not just for inspiration but also for lessons on how to engage politically and fight for one’s freedoms and rights.

In a follow up to “Coatepec: The Fight for the Cloud Forest”, a Forest Guardian from Movimiento por la Defensa de la Sierra describes the impact of art on their movement. The artists in question are children, and the young Earth Guardians are inspiring their community to rise up and protect their forests.

The deep consequences of interconnected globalized systems paired with destructive localized human actions is on full display in the La Guajira peninsula of Northeastern Colombia. Daniel Henryk Rasolt reports on the dire situation facing the Wayuu Indigenous Peoples.

On January 20, 2015, the PUCARL Collective (United Communities of the Antigua Watershed for Free Rivers) blocked the entrance to the Río Pescados (River of Fishes), halting the construction of a dam that was threatening the entire region. The 43 communities along the Rio Pescados are the first to defeat Odebrecht, thus protecting their waterways for the generations to come.

A new gold mine in Veracruz, Mexico, will be the first one in the world to be opened only two miles away from a nuclear reactor and from many pipelines - all in the middle of a densely populated, touristic area that is also the most important migratory route in North America. These are some of the main reasons why local activists are strongly opposing the project.

As his and other Palestinian families are threatened with eviction in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, Mohammed El-Kurd issues a call for international support against Israeli colonization.

5,000 acres of cloud forest are currently being threatened in Coatepec, Veracruz, Mexico - but local forest protectors are standing up to defend the ecosystem.

St. Lawrence University students, like students everywhere, have faced a range of issues connected to the global pandemic. Weave contributor and editor Nicole Roché reached out to former students from all over the country—and all over the world—asking them to share their experiences from this difficult summer.

Here are their stories.

A statement released on June 11, 2020, by members of the local AAUP chapter at St. Lawrence University (Canton, NY) and other St. Lawrence faculty members in response to systemic racism and the nationwide and worldwide protests against following the police killing of George Floyd.

The effects of the coronavirus pandemic intersect with the effects of other social, political, and environmental problems throughout the world. Reporting from Bolivia, Gabriela Paz Ferreyra Barrientos explores how Bolivian society finds itself caught between ongoing political instability and a public health emergency: “Violence and confrontation in Bolivia require an urgent democratic election, yet the health of Bolivians is crying out for them to stay home and take care of themselves.”