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Letter from the Director
Dear IRC Friends and Supporters, It’s just over six months since the September 11th terrorist attacks and U.S. foreign policy is going through a dramatic transformation. Not since the 1950s has the political rhetoric about the fight between American good and foreign-bred evil reached such a feverish pitch. As in the 1950s, much of this fear-mongering and saber-rattling is designed to spur American popular support for the military-industrial complex, as well as to quash progressive dissent at home. The scoundrels in Washington are playing on the fear of terrorism to advance their own ideological agenda at home and abroad—dramatic increases in the military budget, assertions of U.S. military supremacy around the globe, reduced public access to government documents, and an outright dismissal of the constraints of international law and multilateralism. The Bush administration picks and chooses when and if it will respect international laws and norms. Its behavior greatly undermines the prospects for successful global governance, further weakens the UN, and actually contributes to a world where outlaws hold sway. The administration’s priorities are crystal clear: the largest expansion of military spending since the Reagan presidency and a corresponding failure to allocate sufficient resources to meet the challenges posed by poverty, inequality, infectious disease, and ecological degradation at home and abroad. The IRC is helping to spearhead a citizen movement determined to challenge the Bush administration’s militarized foreign policy agenda. To that end, the IRC will be co-convening a series of meetings of citizen groups and foreign policy analysts to focus efforts to combat the seemingly ever-expanding war on terrorism, and develop alternatives grounded in internationalism, multilateralism, and a commitment to peace and security based not merely on the absence of war, but on the active presence of justice. Your support enables the IRC to continue to offer its unique mix of cutting edge policy analysis grounded in a principled, passionate commitment to progressive principles of equity, justice, environmental protection, human rights, and demilitarization. A donation to the IRC will help us challenge the militaristic delusions that pass for policy in Washington and strengthen efforts toward an international framework of peace, justice, and security. In Solidarity, Debra Preusch
IRC Goings On
New Americas Program On February 1 IRC officially launched its new Americas Program. Headed by BIOS director George Kourous, the program aims to explore policy options for cooperation on peace, security, and development issues in the Americas. As popular dissatisfaction with the results of neoliberal reform and intolerance of official corruption deepens across the region, the future of hemispheric relations is difficult to project. One thing is clear: U.S. political and economic influence is still a major force shaping both economic and political developments in the region. Especially discouraging is the focus of the current administration on military aid, border control, the war on drugs, and anti-insurgency operations. One hopeful sign is the emergence of new transnational citizen networks—which, with timely support and strategic thinking, can play a key role is shaping the course of North American and hemispheric integration. In addition to generating cutting edge analysis, the program will engage with partners and NGO networks in strategic dialogues aimed at strengthening citizen involvement in policy debates related to hemispheric integration and inter-American affairs. The program will also maintain the IRC’s U.S.-Mexico/Border Information and Outreach Service clearinghouse as a one-stop shop for finding information on U.S.-Mexico relations and U.S.-Mexico border affairs and policy issues. All this work is featured on the Americas Program website, online at www.americaspolicy.org. Material in Use IRC analysis continues to be of use to policymakers, community activists, and academics. For example, in December IRC staff briefed the UN Special Rapporteur on Toxic Waste and Human Rights on these issues on the border and put her in touch with a number of NGOs working in the region. Activists and academics alike are using IRC materials in their work, and the IRC website continues to be a meeting place for those who want to discuss the issues. Political Research Associates is using IRC materials in their forthcoming Activist Resource Kit, “Defending Immigrant Rights.” IRC materials are being used in over 100 college and university courses this academic year alone. IRC is committed to promoting strategic dialogues among and between citizen movements and networks in ways that sharpen the movements’ focus and have greater impact. For example, Americas Program director George Kourous has been appointed to the Executive Committee of the Annual Encuentro on the Border Environment, an annual gathering by and for binational border NGOs working on trade and environmental issues. In January, IRC co-sponsored a forum in Washington that assessed the state of the global justice movement and outlined key strategic debates facing the movement in the year ahead. And in March and April, IRC will be co-convening meetings in Washington and New York that will seek to launch a coordinated effort to combat the current Bush administration’s militarization of foreign policy. IRC in the media Analysis from the IRC’s various programs continues to be featured routinely on a number of websites, including Yahoo.com’s World News Section (story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=index&cid=655), OneWorld (www.oneworld.net), the Electronic Policy Network (www.epn.org), and the website of the Funders’ Network on Trade and Globalization (www.fntg.org). Op-eds by IRC cofounder Tom Barry on the “scoundrels in Washington” and by Global Affairs codirector John Gershman on the Philippines have been picked up and distributed by the Progressive Media Project (www.progressive.org/mediaproj.htm), the Asia Times (www.atimes.com), AlterNet (www.alternet.org), and Common Dreams (www.commondreams.org). Gershman also appeared on over a dozen radio programs in the first two months of the year to discuss the deployment of U.S. troops to the Philippines. During Bush’s trip to Asia in February he debated analysts from the Heritage Foundation on Bush administration policy in Asia on the Voice of America and WBUR’s news show “Here and New.” From late March through early May he will be participating in an effort by the Mainstream Media project to get progressive analysts on radio outlets to discuss the implications of the Bush administration’s widening war on terrorism. IRC’s electronic outreach continues to grow at a respectable clip. As of March 1 there were 6,660 subscribers to the Progressive Response, an 18% increase since December. There are nearly 900 subscribers to Self-Determination Conflict Watch (up over 125% since the inception of the list last year), while subscribers to the Crossborder Updater in English and Spanish are 555 and 166 respectively.
Office Contact Information
Albuquerque Box 4506 Albuquerque, NM 87196-4506 Voice: (505) 842-8288 Fax: (505) 246-1601	Silver City Box 2178 Silver City, NM 88062-2178 Voice: (505) 388-0208 Fax: (505) 388-0619 Email: irc@irc-online.org