Inequality and Discontent

Poverty feeds the discontent.

The Cycles of Economic Discontent

This will generally deepen discontent and hasten conflict.

Particularly important is the growing discontent of economics students with the university curriculum. Undergraduates discontent matters, because economics has long been the West s political lodestar.

Most residents said they had not received any support from officials, displaying some discontent in this regard.

I mean, the 20 percent of the car drivers that disappeared, surely they must be discontent in a way.

In several Arab countries, most notably Saudi Arabia, rulers have sought to quell popular discontent by providing a combination of cash, subsidies, guaranteed jobs, and free goods and services. Such largesse betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the causes of today s discontent, because it assumes that these causes are purely material.

However, protracted delays in payments of salaries of FARDC personnel are causing discontent and increasing desertions and the risk of mutinies within the force.

The lack of meaningful development feeds the discontent of the tribal Mee, Moni, Dani, and Damal peoples, who live sprawled across Papua's verdant central highlands.

The 2004 elections for the European Parliament had already shown that the level of discontent with the Union was high. Voters heavily punished almost all national governments.

Moreover, globalization and instantaneous communication technologies have made it impossible to contain conflict within national borders. Domestic economic and political grievances can now buttress discontent across regions and continents.

The same is true of many other issues. A winter of discontent awaits Merkel, followed by a European election campaign that is likely to bring the CDU back down to earth.

Only long term, market oriented, economically viable, and sustainable energy options can ensure economic growth in both producing and consuming countries. Isolationist policies, by contrast, always lead to shortages and discontent.

And it was also the beginning of our discontent, because if you wanted to distill all of our experience since the Paleolithic, it would come down to two words how and why.

Many of the assessment mission's interlocutors indicated that growing public discontent over corruption in the management of State revenues was a serious problem which needed to be urgently addressed by the Government.

Tony Benn, a Labour cabinet minister in the 1970 s, later revealed that the winter of discontent, which ushered in a Tory government at the end of the decade, had been caused by the severe cuts in public expenditure demanded by the IMF Why did we have the winter of discontent? Because in 1976, the IMF said to the cabinet, You cut four billion pounds off your public expenditure or we will destroy the value of the pound sterling.

That situation not only encouraged emigration but also bred discontent, laying the foundation for fundamentalism, as evidenced by the attacks on 11 September in New York and 11 March in Madrid and the attacks in Bali.

The word stagnation suggests a swamp, implying a breeding ground for virulent dangers. In the late 1930s, people were also worrying about discontent in Europe, which had already powered the rise of Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini.

Popular discontent over food prices has fueled political instability in some countries, most notably in Egypt and Tunisia. Even agricultural producers would prefer some price stability over the wild ups and downs of the last five years.

They are right. It would be imprudent to assume that the French and Dutch no votes were not about discontent with Union policies but that anger was directed against the French and Dutch governments, not Europe itself.

Discontent at the grass roots level is reportedly evident at the continued involvement of ceasefire groups in the National Convention process, which to date has yielded them little benefit and has not furthered progress towards national reconciliation.

But, despite the pains my father had taken, the other designers expressed growing discontent about Korolev getting all the publicity, even if anonymously. In their secret world, it wasn t any secret who was behind the title Chief Designer.

Simultaneous revolutions swept Europe in 1848, in the aftermath of crop failures whose most notorious manifestation was the Irish famine. Price rises have been a major trigger of the discontent this year in the Middle East and North Africa.

In reality, Israel can track Iranian missile activity from several sites other than Malatya. Iran s threat, therefore, is an expression more of discontent with Turkey than of genuine concern that the Malatya facility will adversely affect its deterrent capacity.

Discontent with President Kurmanbek Bakiyev s rule is rising. A leadership change or increased Russian and Chinese pressure on Kyrgyz leaders could precipitate calls for a renegotiation of the agreement regarding access to Manas or even demands for its termination altogether.

BEIRUT Revolution across the Arab world has forced the region s peoples and governments to grapple with the need for change. Years of sclerosis have given way to a frantic push for reforms to match the aspirations and discontent of millions.

Since the twenty first century began, skyrocketing housing prices in China, except for a short respite during the global financial crisis, have caused serious social discontent. After years of half hearted effort, China s government has finally clamped down on housing speculation.

ONUB also documented at least 30 cases of mob justice, in which suspects were beaten to death, burnt alive and their houses burnt down or destroyed, indicating the extent of discontent with and mistrust of the justice system within the population.

Despite the current favourable security environment in the country, serious challenges remain, which include the limited progress in addressing the root causes of the conflict such as corruption, governance, widespread poverty, including massive youth unemployment, and the resulting public discontent.

Poverty, including massive youth unemployment, and public discontent over slow progress made by the Government in the fight against corruption and the improvement of management of State revenues are issues that urgently need to be addressed in order to sustain stability.

But it is becoming increasingly easy to rouse their sympathy for their fellow citizens through Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. By stimulating daily public debate about local human rights violations, they spread the message of discontent more efficiently than traditional parties ever have.

In the advanced countries, dissatisfaction with government stems from its inability to deliver effective economic policies for growth and inclusion. In the newer democracies of the developing world, failure to safeguard civil liberties and political freedom is an additional source of discontent.

For those in developing and emerging market countries who harbor grievances against the advanced countries, there is now one more reason for discontent with a brand of globalization that has been managed to serve rich countries interests (especially their financial sectors interests).

European authorities must come to understand that the next act of the Greek tragedy will not be confined to Greece. If relief fails to materialize, political discontent will spread, extremist forces will gain strength, and the survival of the European Union itself could be endangered.

On the contrary, in the Sunni arc today, it means a vicious cycle of expanding extremism, rapid population growth, rising unemployment, worsening water shortages, and popular discontent. Political fissures and tribal and ethnic sectarianism add fuel to this lethal mix of volatility and violence.

Doing everything possible to avoid a repeat of the 1989 scenario may well be the Communist Party leadership s top priority in 2009. And, given the economic slowdown, widening income disparity, rising unemployment, and growing popular discontent over corruption, China s leaders will have their hands full.

Needless to say, government mishandling of such disturbances, or a decision to repress them with force, would only fuel further social discontent. In fact, the government s success in clamping down on corruption, especially at sub national levels, will be a litmus test of its legitimacy.

The coming years or even months are likely to see new forms of these domino effects. As in 1848, the struggle for affordable food is producing discontent that transcends national frontiers, threatens established regimes, and fuels popular demand for a more just political order.

For decades, most Arabs, however unhappy, kept their political grievances private, for fear of persecution if they turned against their leaders publicly. Through private discussions with trusted friends, everyone sensed that discontent was common, yet no one knew, or could know, the extent of it.

With policymaking fully nontransparent and reduced to a very closed circle, and implementation delegated to an unaccountable bureaucracy, the inevitable result of Putin s political model was pervasive corruption. The desire to avoid public discontent and ensure social stability led to a suspension of reform.

At the same time, selective repression can contain social frustrations and discontent only temporarily. As long as much of Chinese society views the current political system as unjust, unresponsive, and corrupt, there will always be a large reservoir of ill will toward the ruling elites.

This discontent was born in the post autistic economics movement, which started in Paris in 2000, and spread to the United States, Australia, and New Zealand. Its adherents main complaint was that the mainstream economics taught to students had become a branch of mathematics, disconnected from reality.

By some accounts, Chinese officials currently negotiate upwards of 50,000 major incidents annually. Widespread corruption has bred deep discontent workers protest the Enron like bilking of their life savings, townspeople fight against illegal land seizures, and villagers battle injustices small and large on a daily basis.

We are equally concerned that discontent will continue to be bred and fuelled in societies in which the benefits of global economic growth do not reach the majority, and in a world where cultures and civilizations are marginalized on the basis of differences in world view.