The lack of consistent attention to gender was concerning, as was the failure to tackle the Global South debt crisis – and the blinkered expansion of private finance, despite evidence of its harms. But, says Rachel Noble, as the world turns to implementation of the Financing for Development commitments, there are valuable opportunities to seize and build on, including for the women who do most of the world’s care work.
‘Artivism’, flash mobs and cake: the creative climate action of Mothers Rise Up
Maya Mailer unpacks the theory of change of an innovative climate change group, which uses artistic, eye-catching stunts outside corporate HQs, narratives of hope and the social status of mothers to talk to parts of the private sector that other climate activists often struggle to reach.
‘I have two jobs: one that keeps someone alive – and one that I get paid for.’
Unpaid carers like me save the NHS £119 billion a year, says Laura Barnes of the We Care Campaign – yet our rewards include burnout, poverty, never seeing friends and being pushed out of jobs. In the second blog in our series for Carers Week in the UK, she says it’s time to value what the millions of carers do: and that starts with tailored services, financial support, flexible work and access to respite.
Cities besieged, bakeries bombed, fields set alight: it’s time to end the use of starvation as a weapon of war
The blockade of food, water and relief that has brought so much hunger and suffering to Gaza is the latest example of the growing use of starvation as a weapon of war, say Lawrence Robinson and Desiree Ketabchi. That’s why Oxfam has become a founding member of the Coalition Against Conflict and Hunger – a group of civil society organizations set up last year to end the deliberate use of starvation tactics in conflict and promote the protection of civilians and humanitarian space.
Peru banned child marriage: here are three ways longitudinal research helped to make that happen
What does it take to persuade policy makers to make real progressive change? Kath Ford explains how Oxford University’s Young Lives study found success with a combination of robust longitudinal data, translating research into policy influencing and, crucially, relationships built painstakingly over many years.
The UK’s Chancellor is driving disabled people deeper into poverty: she must think again
Planned cuts to disability benefits will be devastating for people already struggling to pay their bills, with stroke survivors, amputees and people with serious mental health conditions among the groups targeted, says Samuel Thomas of anti-poverty charity Z2K.
Austerity is creating fertile ground for the far-right: instead the UK must invest to fix its social infrastructure
The UK government needs to listen to Iceland’s progressive prime minister when she says robust welfare policies are the antidote to far-right extremism. And what’s more, investing in social infrastructure – in care, in health, in schools – is essential to driving the growth the government wants, says Amy Brooker of the Women’s Budget Group.
How the surge in land seizures and violence by Israel in the West Bank adds up to a brutal new level of oppression
The incursion of Israeli tanks into the West Bank this week is just the latest step in an intensifying and systematic crackdown. Bushra Khalidi on five repressive tactics the Israeli government has been using, including new laws that will accelerate annexation. The strategy, she says, is now clear: make Palestinian life unlivable.
Too many UK workers can’t afford to get ill – but new reforms to sick pay don’t go far enough
The Employment Rights Bill passing through the UK parliament is a once-in-a-generation chance to end the scandal of people being pushed into poverty simply because they get sick. But though it contains some welcome reforms, says Sylvie Pope at The Centre for Progressive Change, it risks leaving many people worse off or still facing hardship.
‘It feels like a more innocent time for Oxfam and for our belief in progress’: looking back on Make Poverty History
Twenty years after he watched Nelson Mandela’s rousing launch speech in Trafalgar Square, Dominic Vickers reflects on the impact of the landmark Make Poverty History campaign for trade justice, debt relief and better aid – and wonders if a new generation can take up the cause again.