The Economist (US) back issues from February 1999:
What you read is what you are?(Canada May make advertising in split-run editions of American magazines a criminal offense)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... OTTAWA THE cold war is over, Russia's nuclear armoury rusting in its silos or submarine bases. So where today is the nastiest threat on Canada's horizon? To some Canadians, right next-door, in the United States. And the weapon? Magazines. There has been skirmishing ...
Putting the Caribbean in orbit.(Beal Aerospace's plan to launch rockets from island)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BOOBIES, Gumbs and space rockets are ruffling feathers on the isle of Sombrero, on the eastern fringes of the Caribbean. An American firm plans to launch satellites from it within a couple of years, and the locals aren't happy. Locals? Sombrero is uninhabited, except by a few ...
Blaming the pilot.(analysis of the Brazilian economy)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... RIO DE JANEIRO IN THE past decade, Brazil has consumed a dozen or so central-bank presidents. Francisco Lopes, appointed only on January 13th, got the chop this week. Who cared? The lone hero on the national stage had always been President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, author of ...
A new broom in Venezuela.(inauguration of President Hugo Chavez)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... CARACAS President Hugo Chavez has promised much. Now to deliver it MORE than a dozen heads of state were there, from Cuba's Fidel Castro to Argentina's Carlos Menem, a firm ally of the United States. The inauguration on February 2nd of President Hugo Chavez was ...
Separatists and warlords.(fighting between government troops and Muslim extremists in Philippines)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MANILA IT IS sometimes difficult to tell the difference between war and peace in the southern Philippine region of Mindanao. There is supposed to be a ceasefire between the government's forces and the Muslim separatist rebels of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), but a ...
Enter the children.(laws which allow Chinese born to unite with family in Hong Kong)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... HONG KONG IN THE very first days after Hong Kong's handover to China on July 1st 1997, the territory's new government gave notice that it intended to treat the Basic Law-China's mini-constitution for the former British colony-with a cavalier hand. In particular, it rushed ...
In search of friends.(analysis of the Japanese economy)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... TOKYO ONE thing Keizo Obuchi, Japan's prime minister, is not short of is advice, especially from America. Cut taxes, he is told, so that the Japanese will spend more money stoking up the economy and importing goods. Mr Obuchi knows all that. But his Liberal Democratic Party ...
New year bombs.(deadly explosions in China)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BEIJING IT IS the custom in China to greet the lunar new year by setting off loud fireworks to frighten evil spirits. But even before the biggest holiday of the year begins on February 16th, plenty of explosions have been heard in China. They were not traditional firecrackers, ...
Singapore's speech-maker.(Singapore fines Chee Soon Juan for making speech in public without a permit)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... CHEE SOON JUAN is a determined man. On February 2nd, a Singapore court found the outspoken opposition politician guilty of making a speech in public without a permit. He was fined S$1,400 ($830). Mr Chee, as if to underline his defiance, refused to pay and was sent to jail for seven days. ...
Defusing.(nuclear weapon treaty for India and Pakistan)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... DELHI AND ISLAMABAD THE United States has not learnt to love the nuclear bombs so dear to India and Pakistan, but it is beginning to learn tolerance. Strobe Talbott, the American deputy secretary of state, visited the capitals of both countries this week to continue the ...
The Taliban's strategy for recognition.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... NEW YORK Diplomacy takes over in the fight for Afghanistan FLUSHING, one of New York's more remote districts, is home to the Taliban's mission to the United Nations. Manhattan might be more convenient, but Abdul Hakeem Mujahid, the head of the mission, says money is ...
How dare he think?(former English soccer coach Glenn Hoddle)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BAGEHOT may know a political football when he sees one, but is otherwise ignorant_utterly, wilfully, pig-headedly, egregiously, proudly, I-couldn't- give-a-tossly ignorant_of the game of soccer. Glenn Hoddle's mind is evidently more open. The man who until this week was ...
Expensive: Britain's reputation for high prices is an indication of just how uncompetitive parts of the economy still are.
Feb 06, 1999 ... WHEN he first arrived at 11 Downing Street, one of the first questions Gordon Brown asked his Treasury officials was: Why are prices so high in Britain? British travellers often discover that internationally traded goods_from groceries to computers and jeans_are much cheaper abroad. They ...
On the defensive.(Scotland government)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... EDINBURGH Scottish devolution was meant to have no implications for the defence of England or Scotland. Think again DEPENDING on who you believe, the brave new Scotland could either be a modest but morally-pure contributor to global peace_or a backward, isolated ...
Islam in Britain.(bombing threat in Yemen)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Angry in Aden JUST as Americans got a shock when the bombing of New York's World Trade Centre revealed the existence of an extremist Islamic sect in New Jersey, so events in Yemen have suddenly put hitherto obscure British mosques and Muslim movements in the news. Five Britons ...
Local elections : Let battle commence.(United Kingdom local elections)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... More than the control of councils is at stake in the local elections THIS weekend will hear the first election battle-cries of 1999. In Manchester, on February 4th and 6th, John Prescott and Tony Blair will be geeing up Labour candidates for the May local elections. ...
Tough luck, Rosie.(English sparking cider industry)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... KINGSBURY EPISCOPI, WILTSHIRE THE budget, due on March 9th, always produces winners and losers. But it seldom wipes out small industries at one stroke. And yet it looks as if changes in duty rates on a specific range of alcoholic drinks could spell the end of one of the glories ...
Nurses and teachers.(pay increases needed for nurses and teachers in United Kingdom)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... More than money THERE are two obvious solutions to the problems of hospitals and schools in finding enough nurses and teachers. Increase their pay and train more people to do these jobs. This week the government did the former, announcing rises of 4.7-12% for nurses and 3.5-9.5% ...
The Commonwealth Games : Expensive pursuits.(2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MANCHESTER Manchester's ambitious plans for the Commonwealth Games are running into financial problems ON THE road out to the devastated wasteland of flattened houses and factories where Manchester's civic leaders want to build a big, swanky sports stadium, the lamp ...
The economy: Recession,what recession?(English economy)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... IN RECENT months the news about the British economy has been almost unremittingly bad. Just about the only thing growing, it seems, has been the number of economists forecasting a recession. So economic soothsayers were confident that dole queues had lengthened in December by perhaps ...
Reviving Robbie.(recording career of Robbie Williams)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... ROBBIE WILLIAMS has a better claim to the title "comeback kid" than Bill Clinton. After quitting Take That, a hugely successful teenage heart-throb band, in 1995, the singer's initial try at a solo career flopped. His record sales plunged and his waistline bulged. He began to hit the ...
Welfare: Onwards and upwards.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... EVER since the dawn of the welfare state, public spending has remorselessly outstripped the projections of government planners. Can this continue? A new research study, "Private Welfare and Public Policy", published by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation on January 13th, doubts that this ...
The government's record.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... So far, so-so Ministers made a series of policy statements this week, pleading to be judged on "real issues", not recent scandals. Much of what they are doing sounds promising, but the results will be a long time coming FORGET all that froth and tittle-tattle about ...
Tax and save.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... President Clinton presented his budget for 2000. This foresaw $1.88 trillion in taxes, promised $1.77 trillion in spending, and therefore predicted a surplus of $117 billion, much of it to be reserved for "saving" the Social Security (pensions) system. Republican managers of ...
A liaison.(business news from Europe, Japan and Brazil)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Long after the rest of Europe, France's crowded banking sector began thinning itself out. Societe Generale, the country's biggest bank, made an agreed all- share bid for Paribas, the fifth-biggest, to create SG Paribas, with <679 billion ($770 billion) in assets, second only to UBS in ...
Leon Brittan, Europe's trade warrior.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... THE baroque wrangling of international trade disputes can baffle the untutored eye. The system seems to work only by testing itself constantly to the point of destruction. For the past three months or so it has been the turn of the United States and the European Union to bang their ...
Boozy Bavarians v prim Prussians?(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MUNICH IMAGINE Bavaria without its beer gardens and its Wagner festival at Bayreuth. You can't? Neither can hordes of its sturdily independent citizens. Hence their ire over what they see as a twin-pronged attack on both from the "free state's" traditional foes-Prussians and ...
Take it to the people.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... ROME WHERE Italy's politicians have failed, let the people do better. That, at any rate, is the hope of those who wish to change the country's electoral law, so that the small parties that so often exert disproportionate influence on the big ones-and quite frequently topple the ...
Is anyone running Russia?(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MOSCOW Yevgeny Primakov, Russia's prime minister, is more in charge than the president, Boris Yeltsin. But neither is up to much JUDGED by his own standards, Yevgeny Primakov has done remarkably well. Unimaginable though it seemed when he took office in the chaotic ...
Selling the Spanish siesta.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MADRID CHARLES V, the Holy Roman Emperor, is said to have perfected the siesta. Now, nearly 500 years later, another Spaniard has decided to market it. According to Charles, a truly refreshing siesta required you to curl up on your throne (never in bed) with a heavy ...
Ukraine's unmended northern fence.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MOSCOW ONE thing that would help anchor Russia more safely in its post-communist place in the world would be settled borders. Most have now been negotiated. But getting agreements signed and sealed is another matter. The latest casualty is a treaty which the governments of ...
Lining them up.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BELGRADE SOME seem like other-worldly intellectuals, more at home discussing semantics than haggling over their homeland's future. Others have been hardened by long years of jail, under communism or after it. Few, if any, of the ethnic Albanians or Serbs summoned to Rambouillet ...
Young, bored and inclined to crime.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... PARIS The flics aren't where the malaise of the jeunesse needs them YOU do not talk about young criminals in politically correct Socialist France: you blandly refer to les jeunes des banlieues, "suburban youth", since most juvenile crime takes place in the bleak, ...
All very sinister.(strike and political events in Romania)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BUCHAREST WAS last month's violent march on Bucharest, Romania's capital, by 10,000 striking coalminers orchestrated by people trying to overthrow an elected government? If so, why did Romania's intelligence services fail to foretell it? If not, why did some local politicians ...
OUTPUT, DEMAND AND JOBS.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... America's economy defied fears of a slowdown: its GDP growth rose to an annualised 5.6% in the fourth quarter of 1998. Growth reached 4.2% in the year to the fourth quarter, up from 3.5%. Japan's jobless rate dipped to 4.3% in December. Growth in retail sales in the Euro-11 slowed to 0.5% ...
SHARES.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Over the past four years, investors in America's stockmarkets have had good reason to be cheerful. Since the start of 1995, shares on Wall Street have had by far the best performance of the world's leading stockmarkets. Adding together dividends and capital gains, an investment of $100 in ...
EMERGING-MARKET FINANCE.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Net private capital flows to emerging economies plunged by 41% in 1998, to $152 billion, down from $260 billion in 1997, according to the Institute of International Finance (IIF), a bankers' think-tank. Net flows in 1998 were less than half the record level of $327 billion in 1996. Far ...
Working man's burden.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... The idea that "flexible" labour markets promote employment is repeated so often that it has become a clich@e. Evidence to support it has been in poor supply-until now GOVERNMENTS are forever extolling the virtues of labour-market flexibility. Reformed left-of-centre parties, ...
Gigantisme, quand meme.(consolidation of banking industry in France)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... PARIS As European banks rush to consolidate, France jumps on the bandwagon BLAME those steel drummers. Among the parties held by French banks to welcome the euro, the one hosted by Paribas was a particularly exuberant and toe- tapping bash. And as French banks eye ...
Debts to society.(fraud investigation of Mexican bank loans)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MEXICO CITY THIS month a team of investigators led by a Canadian, Michael Mackay, will don its protective gloves and start sifting through a huge, sometimes stinking, sometimes rotten, but mostly just dusty, pile of . . . overdue loans. Mr Mackay's people are auditors. Their ...
Under the AXA.(AXA purchases Guardian Royal Exchange)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... IT WAS supposed to be the climax of a heated bidding war over one of the most venerable names in British insurance. But when Guardian Royal Exchange at last surrendered on February 1st to France's AXA, a powerhouse of European insurance, for K3.4 billion ($5.6 billion) in cash and shares, ...
London and the euro.
Feb 06, 1999 ... The defence of the City After the euro's first month, London is still top dog among Europe's financial centres. But it may not stay that way unless Britain joins the single currency BRIAN WILLIAMSON is enjoying the euphoria of the reprieved man. LIFFE, the London ...
Brazil's slippery slope: DAVOS AND SAO PAULO.(World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Even the majestic snow-capped Alps have failed to inspire a magic cure for ailing emerging economies THE relatively cheerful mood among the politicians, businessmen and financiers who met in the Swiss ski resort of Davos last weekend at the World Economic Forum was in stark ...
Malaysia's defiant surrender.(analysis of economic relations)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... WHEN Malaysia slapped down currency controls last September, many observers were shocked. They signalled the government's refusal to accept any blame for its financial troubles, and its readiness to make foreign investors suffer for the sins of the international markets. That one of those ...
Iraq as it ever was.(UN policy on Iraq)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... BAGHDAD Saddam reigns at home, confusion reigns abroad UNITED NATIONS policy towards Iraq may be more confused than at any time since the Gulf war but, in many ways, the view from the ground looks much as it was. True, a neat black hole in the roof of a government ...
Survival, against the odds.(economy and politics in Iran)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... TEHRAN Political life seems to be maturing in Iran, but the economy is collapsing WHEN Iran's clergy swept to power, proclaiming Islamic rule and people's democracy, many thought they would be lucky if they lasted months. This week, having survived a short civil war, ...
Spreading oil spill.(economic analysis of Yemen)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... SANAA IN YEMEN, as in Iran, oil accounts for more than 80% of total exports-and its falling price is hitting the 16m Yemenis even harder. Their government, which a couple of years ago was getting 70% of its revenue from oil, has seen its income halved. It cannot pump more to ...
Parktown's unpalatable prawn cocktail.(controlling the insect population in Johannesburg)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... JOHANNESBURG AFTER crime, the most popular subject of horror stories at South African dinner parties is the Parktown Prawn, an indestructible 20-centimetre (eight- inch) insect with disgusting habits. These huge orange and black relations of the grasshopper, found only in ...
Sierra Leone: Nigeria's terms.(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... LAGOS WHAT is to become of Sierra Leone, the small West African state riddled with rebellion? The elected president, Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, having no army of his own, depends for survival on the Nigerians who provide most of the West African force, Ecomog, that is trying to keep ...
Down with the n-word.(words with racial overtones)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... A solemn pledge to our readers JUST possibly, you may have missed the latest scandal to befall the scandal- mired government of Washington, DC. It happened like this: as Marshall Brown, an aide to the mayor, was discussing budget matters with David Howard, the public advocate, ...
Tough love.(wages for public workers in Britain)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... This week's pay-rise for British public servants was either kind or stingy, the government has confirmed BACK when the Tories were in charge, public-sector workers knew where they stood on pay. If you were a teacher, nurse or civil servant, you were in a permanent seething rage ....
After Brazil.(Brazilian economy)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... The turmoil continues in Latin America's biggest economy. What are the lessons? THINGS are bad when financial markets, in a spin over a country's economic plight, draw comfort from the arrival of the third central-bank boss in three weeks. Brazil sank that low on February 2nd ....
Consequences of Kosovo.(peace-seeking in Kosovo, Yugoslavia)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... With luck, and firm transatlantic resolve, the West may be able to bring calm to Kosovo. But come what may, burden-sharing in NATO is back on the agenda FOR the first time since the dispute over Kosovo turned bloody a year ago, it is possible to imagine-though not, ...
Japan's lame-duck support.(Japanese economy)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... The government may be hampering the long-overdue efforts of Japanese firms to restructure THE Japanese government was once much admired for its clear-eyed and effective industrial policies. As America and Europe shovelled subsidies into traditional but dying businesses such as ...
Russia, financial outcast.(Russia looking for financial aid)
Feb 06, 1999 ... THE jar is all but empty, and once again Russia is looking to the West for more honey. Once again, the spectre of bankruptcy looms. Once again, Russia's apologists present the prospect of the bear, once rebuffed, sinking even further into resentful degradation and nerve-racking ...
Good Will Shakespeare.(Review)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Shakespeare is credited with inventing the concept of the human personality. Two books explore how so modest a man achieved such a creative milestone TRUE story: in an obscure village somewhere in present-day Africa, an Englishman attempts to pick up a friend's belongings which ...
Shakespeare on tape.(Shakespeare on audio tape)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Audio-Bard SHAKESPEARE is suddenly big business. With the BBC's videotapes of his work frustratingly unavailable because of a rights dispute, audio-tapes are all the rage, with three different versions of the canon now on offer. The advantage of hearing Shakespeare ...
"Shakespeare in Love".(Review)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Cine-Bard THE people laugh, the professionals boo. The critics, of course, nitpick. No matter. At least everyone's talking about "Shakespeare in Love", and some even say it'll steal an Oscar or two off "Saving Private Ryan", which, until the Bard interfered, seemed to have this ...
Shakespeare on stage.(popularity of William Shakespeare's plays)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... IF YOU want to know which of Shakespeare's 38 plays is the most popular, ask the world's three great Shakespearean theatres-the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon, the Stratford Festival in Canada (North America's largest classical repertory theatre) and a relatively new ...
Sundance Film Festival.(independent film festival)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... Mature at 21 PARK CITY, UTAH Founded in 1978, the Sundance film festival is now the most important venue in North America for new films and fresh young talent LEAN and wry, "American Movie" is a typical Sundance film_a bare-bones documentary that trails a ...
Correction.
Feb 06, 1999 ... The film "Il Postino" featured Pablo Neruda not Jorge Luis Borges as ...
Mick McGahey.(Brief Article)(Obituary)
Feb 06, 1999 ... IT WAS Mick McGahey's misfortune that communism as a popular movement has not been considered much of a threat in Britain. In the United States he would have been seen as a danger to the state; in France (where communists are in government) his ability to rouse a crowd and his lively brain ...
Bearish on debt.(Russia's debts)(Brief Article)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MOSCOW EVERYONE agrees that Russia should concentrate on its most important debts. But there is no agreement on what that means. The chief claimants are: ` Eurobonds. No country has ever defaulted or restructured a sovereign Eurobond. Russia does not want to be the ...
Money can't buy me love.(Russia can't pay back loans)
Feb 06, 1999 ... MOSCOW AND WASHINGTON, DC Russia looks set to become even more of a financial outcast this year. Will it become a political outcast too? THE Russians have long aspired to join the G7, the group of leading industrialised countries. But now membership of another tightly ...
We invite applications for the 1999 Richard Casement internship.
Feb 06, 1999 ... We invite applications for the 1999 Richard Casement internship. This is for a would-be journalist under 25 to spend three months of the summer on the newspaper, writing about science and technology. Our aim is more to discover writing talent in a science student than scientific aptitude ...