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Ending Debt Slavery
Mar 26, 2007
Last week marked the 200th anniversary of the end of the transatlantic slave trade. Two centuries later, it is clear that one of history's most towering evils, the enslavement of human beings, came to an end only when citizens challenged their governments to understand slavery as incompatible with basic laws of God and humanity.
Around the world today, citizen campaigners are leading their governments to understand that deadly poverty and crippling debt, slaveries of our own age, similarly are incompatible with the basic laws of human dignity.
Despite the international community's new commitments to poverty eradication over the past seven years, particularly the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals , the basic inequities that fuel deadly poverty in our world are as pronounced as ever. Every day, 13 percent of the world's population goes to bed hungry and nearly 15,000 people die of AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
The vision of the Jubilee that we find in scripture challenges us to address these realities as part our nation's commitment to building a more prosperous, stable world for all people.
In the Hebrew Scriptures we find a vision of life in community that is liberating and just, governed by Sabbath cycles: the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Year and the Jubilee Year. These cycles are a powerful reminder of God's intent that all creatures enjoy fullness of life and partake in the abundance of God's world. Sabbath Year observance requires that every seven years debts are canceled and those enslaved because of debts are freed, restoring equal relations among community members and preventing a situation of ongoing exploitation.
2007 is the Sabbath year, seven years after the historic Jubilee 2000 campaign for debt relief. The Sabbath year is an opportunity to reflect on the achievements of the Jubilee campaign, and to address the unfinished agenda on international debt and global poverty. 2007 is also the halfway mark to the deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, but we are far from halfway to achieving them.
We should celebrate progress: Thanks to debt relief commitments in 1999 and 2005, now more than 20 countries have seen 100% debt cancellation from the IMF, World Bank and African Development Bank. Resources freed up from debt relief are reaching those who need it in the form of greater access to health care, education and clean water.
But the abolitionists who challenged the inhumanity of the slave trade didn't want to merely abolish slavery for some; they abolished slavery for all. The Sabbath year is a time to act on the unfinished agenda for international debt, to abolish debt slavery once and for all:
- Too many countries--including Liberia, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of Congo--are caught up in the harmful economic strings of the international financial institutions' debt relief program and face deadly delays to receiving desperately needed full cancellation.
- Many other low-income countries--such as Lesotho, Kenya, Nigeria and Sri Lanka--have been excluded from debt relief by the IMF/World Bank. Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom Gordon Brown has suggested that 67 low-income countries should be eligible to receive full debt cancellation to reach the Millennium Development Goals, assuming they meet good governance and other criteria.
- Nations including Indonesia, South Africa and the Philippines clearly have unjust and odious debts which require further analysis and study.
Our faith and our convictions call us to support bold and prophetic measures which address this unfinished agenda to end the crisis of debt and deadly poverty. On March 25, 1807--almost exactly 200 years ago--the British Parliament voted to abolish the transatlantic slave trade. This year the Bush administration and the U.S. Congress have an opportunity to take a step towards the abolition of deadly poverty and crushing debt.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Bob Edgar
Bob Edgar is President and CEO of Common Cause, one of
nation's most effective grassroots advocacy organizations working for
democracy reform, with nearly 400,000 members and supporters, a strong
presence on Capitol Hill, state chapters in 36 states, and four decades
of experience and hard-won victories.
Last week marked the 200th anniversary of the end of the transatlantic slave trade. Two centuries later, it is clear that one of history's most towering evils, the enslavement of human beings, came to an end only when citizens challenged their governments to understand slavery as incompatible with basic laws of God and humanity.
Around the world today, citizen campaigners are leading their governments to understand that deadly poverty and crippling debt, slaveries of our own age, similarly are incompatible with the basic laws of human dignity.
Despite the international community's new commitments to poverty eradication over the past seven years, particularly the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals , the basic inequities that fuel deadly poverty in our world are as pronounced as ever. Every day, 13 percent of the world's population goes to bed hungry and nearly 15,000 people die of AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
The vision of the Jubilee that we find in scripture challenges us to address these realities as part our nation's commitment to building a more prosperous, stable world for all people.
In the Hebrew Scriptures we find a vision of life in community that is liberating and just, governed by Sabbath cycles: the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Year and the Jubilee Year. These cycles are a powerful reminder of God's intent that all creatures enjoy fullness of life and partake in the abundance of God's world. Sabbath Year observance requires that every seven years debts are canceled and those enslaved because of debts are freed, restoring equal relations among community members and preventing a situation of ongoing exploitation.
2007 is the Sabbath year, seven years after the historic Jubilee 2000 campaign for debt relief. The Sabbath year is an opportunity to reflect on the achievements of the Jubilee campaign, and to address the unfinished agenda on international debt and global poverty. 2007 is also the halfway mark to the deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, but we are far from halfway to achieving them.
We should celebrate progress: Thanks to debt relief commitments in 1999 and 2005, now more than 20 countries have seen 100% debt cancellation from the IMF, World Bank and African Development Bank. Resources freed up from debt relief are reaching those who need it in the form of greater access to health care, education and clean water.
But the abolitionists who challenged the inhumanity of the slave trade didn't want to merely abolish slavery for some; they abolished slavery for all. The Sabbath year is a time to act on the unfinished agenda for international debt, to abolish debt slavery once and for all:
- Too many countries--including Liberia, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of Congo--are caught up in the harmful economic strings of the international financial institutions' debt relief program and face deadly delays to receiving desperately needed full cancellation.
- Many other low-income countries--such as Lesotho, Kenya, Nigeria and Sri Lanka--have been excluded from debt relief by the IMF/World Bank. Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom Gordon Brown has suggested that 67 low-income countries should be eligible to receive full debt cancellation to reach the Millennium Development Goals, assuming they meet good governance and other criteria.
- Nations including Indonesia, South Africa and the Philippines clearly have unjust and odious debts which require further analysis and study.
Our faith and our convictions call us to support bold and prophetic measures which address this unfinished agenda to end the crisis of debt and deadly poverty. On March 25, 1807--almost exactly 200 years ago--the British Parliament voted to abolish the transatlantic slave trade. This year the Bush administration and the U.S. Congress have an opportunity to take a step towards the abolition of deadly poverty and crushing debt.
Bob Edgar
Bob Edgar is President and CEO of Common Cause, one of
nation's most effective grassroots advocacy organizations working for
democracy reform, with nearly 400,000 members and supporters, a strong
presence on Capitol Hill, state chapters in 36 states, and four decades
of experience and hard-won victories.
Last week marked the 200th anniversary of the end of the transatlantic slave trade. Two centuries later, it is clear that one of history's most towering evils, the enslavement of human beings, came to an end only when citizens challenged their governments to understand slavery as incompatible with basic laws of God and humanity.
Around the world today, citizen campaigners are leading their governments to understand that deadly poverty and crippling debt, slaveries of our own age, similarly are incompatible with the basic laws of human dignity.
Despite the international community's new commitments to poverty eradication over the past seven years, particularly the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals , the basic inequities that fuel deadly poverty in our world are as pronounced as ever. Every day, 13 percent of the world's population goes to bed hungry and nearly 15,000 people die of AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
The vision of the Jubilee that we find in scripture challenges us to address these realities as part our nation's commitment to building a more prosperous, stable world for all people.
In the Hebrew Scriptures we find a vision of life in community that is liberating and just, governed by Sabbath cycles: the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Year and the Jubilee Year. These cycles are a powerful reminder of God's intent that all creatures enjoy fullness of life and partake in the abundance of God's world. Sabbath Year observance requires that every seven years debts are canceled and those enslaved because of debts are freed, restoring equal relations among community members and preventing a situation of ongoing exploitation.
2007 is the Sabbath year, seven years after the historic Jubilee 2000 campaign for debt relief. The Sabbath year is an opportunity to reflect on the achievements of the Jubilee campaign, and to address the unfinished agenda on international debt and global poverty. 2007 is also the halfway mark to the deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, but we are far from halfway to achieving them.
We should celebrate progress: Thanks to debt relief commitments in 1999 and 2005, now more than 20 countries have seen 100% debt cancellation from the IMF, World Bank and African Development Bank. Resources freed up from debt relief are reaching those who need it in the form of greater access to health care, education and clean water.
But the abolitionists who challenged the inhumanity of the slave trade didn't want to merely abolish slavery for some; they abolished slavery for all. The Sabbath year is a time to act on the unfinished agenda for international debt, to abolish debt slavery once and for all:
- Too many countries--including Liberia, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of Congo--are caught up in the harmful economic strings of the international financial institutions' debt relief program and face deadly delays to receiving desperately needed full cancellation.
- Many other low-income countries--such as Lesotho, Kenya, Nigeria and Sri Lanka--have been excluded from debt relief by the IMF/World Bank. Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom Gordon Brown has suggested that 67 low-income countries should be eligible to receive full debt cancellation to reach the Millennium Development Goals, assuming they meet good governance and other criteria.
- Nations including Indonesia, South Africa and the Philippines clearly have unjust and odious debts which require further analysis and study.
Our faith and our convictions call us to support bold and prophetic measures which address this unfinished agenda to end the crisis of debt and deadly poverty. On March 25, 1807--almost exactly 200 years ago--the British Parliament voted to abolish the transatlantic slave trade. This year the Bush administration and the U.S. Congress have an opportunity to take a step towards the abolition of deadly poverty and crushing debt.
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