English

Wars in the 21^st century are wars against the earth; against natural resources like water, soil, forests, minerals, seeds. The global corporate economy based on the idea of limitless growth has become a war economy and the means it uses are instruments of war. Trade wars. Waters wars. Food wars.

In a compelling and rigorously documented exposition, Vandana Shiva demolishes the myths propagated by corporate globalisation in its pursuit of profit and power, by demonstrating its flawed assumptions and devastating fallouts.
Consumerism lubricates the war against the earth, corporate control violates all ethical and ecological limits. It promotes technologies of production based on genetic engineering, geo-engineering and toxins; industrial development that entails the enforced appropriation of land, rivers, mountains; agribusinesses that deplete nature’s diversity; land-grab in Africa, Asia, South America. Exploitation of this order incurs the kind of ecological and economic debt that is unsustainable, unbailable and unbearable.
Making Peace with the Earth outlines how a paradigm shift to earth-centred politics and economics is our only chance of survival; and how collective resistance to corporate exploitation can open the way to a new environmentalism of interdependence and earth democracy.

Vandana SHIVA is a world-renowned environmental thinker and activist, a leader in the International Forum on Globalisation (IFG) along with Ralph NADER and Jeremy RIFKIN, and of the Slow Food Movement. Director of Navdanya and of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Natural Resource Policy, and a tireless crusader for farmers’, peasants’ and women’s rights, she is the author and editor of a score of influential books.
Vandana Shiva is the recipient of over 20 international awards, among them the Right Livelihood Award (1993); Medal of the Presidency of the Italian Republic (1998); the Horizon 3000 Award (Austria, 2001); Save the World Award (2009); Sydney Peace Prize (2010); Calgary Peace Prize (Canada, 2011); the Thomas Merton Award (2011); and the John Lennon-Yoko Ono Grant for Peace.
Vandana Shiva is currently working on a three-year project with the Government of Bhutan on how to achieve their objective of becoming an organic sovereign country, the first in the world.

Vandana SHIVA received the Fukuoka Grand Prize Laureate, 2012.

Year of publication: 2012; 267 pages; ISBN: 81-88965-75-8 (India) / ISBN: 9781875559275 (Australia)

Couverture version Australie

Australian cover of the co-publishing.

A co-publication of the Alliance’s English-langage network. Two co-publishers : Spinifex (Australia), Women Unlimited (India).

Abstract:

“Palestine-in-exile,” says Rana Barakat, “is an idea, a love, a goal, a movement, a massacre, a march, a parade, a poem, a thesis, a novel and, yes, a commodity, as well as a people scattered, displaced, dispossessed and determined.”
How do Palestinians live, imagine and reflect on home and exile in this period of a stateless and transitory Palestine, a deeply contested and crisis-ridden national project, and a sharp escalation in Israeli state violence and accompanying Palestinian oppression? How can exile and home be written?
In this volume of new writing fifteen innovative and outstanding Palestinian writers—essayists, poets, novelists, critics, artists and memoirists—respond with their reflections, experiences, memories and polemics. What is it like, in the words of Lila Abu-Lughod, to be “drafted into being Palestinian?” What happens when you take your American children, as Sharif Elmusa does, to the refugee camp where you were raised? And how can you convince, as Suad Amiry attempts to do, a weary airport official to continue searching for a code for a country that isn’t recognised?
Contributors probe the past through unconventional memories, reflecting on 1948 when it all began. But they are also deeply interested in beginnings, imagining, in the words of Mischa Hiller, “a Palestine that reflects who we are now and who we hope to become”. Their contributions—poignant, humorous, intimate, reflective, intensely political—make for an offering that is remarkable for the candour and grace with which it explores the many individual and collective experiences of waiting, living for, and seeking Palestine.

Editors:
Penny Johnson is an independent researcher who works closely with the Institute of Women’s Studies at Birzeit University, where she edits the Review of Women’s Studies. Recent writing and research on Palestine has focused on weddings and wars, wives of political prisoners, and young Palestinians’ talk about proper and improper marriages. She is an Associate Editor of the Jerusalem Quarterly.
Raja Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and writer who lives in Ramallah. He is the founder of the pioneering non-partisan human rights organisation, Al Haq, an affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists, and the author of several books about international law, human rights and the Middle East. He is also the author of the award-winning Palestinian Walks and A Rift in Time: Travels with My Ottoman Uncle. His new book, Occupation Diaries, is published in August 2012.

Endorsements:
“How can an essentially sad story give such pleasure? The answer is in these narratives: these stories, memoirs, poems are a pleasure and an education; personal, vivid, original, sometimes witty, always accomplished and always honest. They are a testimonial to the human spirit, and to the growing contribution of Palestine to literature.” —Ahdaf Soueif

ISBN: 81-88965-73-1 (Women Unlimited, India), 978-1-74219-823-1 (Spinifex, Australia).

The label “Fair Trade Book” is attributed by the International Alliance of independent publishers to works published in the context of international publishing agreements that respect each other’s particularities: fair co- publishing. These fair copublishings enable the sharing of costs linked to intellectual and physical production of books and therefore ensure an economy of scale; an exchange of professional know-how and a common experience, while respecting the publishers’ cultural contexts and identities; and a distribution of works on a broader scale by adjusting prices for each geographic zone.

15 publishers from 8 countries (Algeria, Argentina, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, France, Morocco, Tunisia, Syria) met in Tunis, from 12 to 15 May 2011, to discuss e-publishing. The meeting was organised by the International Alliance of Independent Publishers, with the support of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie.

The publishers who met in Tunis wished it to be known that these meetings took place in a peaceful and secure environment. The warm welcome we were given, despite the curfew then in place, enabled us to organise meetings of a high standard, from both a professional and a human perspective.

We wished to show our solidarity with our Tunisian partners in this way, by inviting associations, NGOs, organisations and institutions, tourists and the simply curious to rediscover Tunisia – a Tunisia where freedom is in the air.

Following the publication of the study on digital publishing in developing countries carried out by Octavio Kulesz, the Alliance is launching its digital Laboratory, in partnership with the Prins Claus Fund and the International organization of La Francophonie.

Integrated to the resources center of the Alliance, the Lab is a participative platform dedicated to discussions on digital issues for the publishers members of the Alliance.
Apart from a blog and a twitter (@digisouth) about digital innovations in developing countries, the Lab is also offering to the members a private digital space for experimentation and training.

The young Zulu Dumisani Gumede grows up in the pastoral setting of the mountains of South Africa. This irresistible seducer has two obsessions: sex and an utter adoration of Nelson Mandela, the mythical ANC leader then the talk of the country and to this young man the essence of courage and virility. Originally published in 2006, “Mandela’s ego” looks back at South Africa under the apartheid regime. A brave and unusual coming-of-age novel, combining delightful anecdotes about the everyday life of the Zulu community with scenes of violence, family, social and political, in a country in torment. Wisdom and humour rub shoulders in this fable, a homage to the great Mandela.

Lewis NKOSI was born in Durban (South Africa) in 1926. A journalist, he taught literature at various universities. The author of many essays on culture and South African literature, plays and novels, he was awarded numerous literary prizes. He died in Johannesburg in September 2010.

Year of publication of the Pan-African version: 2011, 360 pages, 11,5 X 19 cm

A Fair Trade Book co-publishing.

Zam, a committed political journalist, has been the victim of a theft: his entire valuable collection of jazz records has been stolen. The following day he discovers a dead body in his cupboard. There follows a succession of events during which Zam – more in tune with the simple pleasures of life – slowly realises that a plot is being hatched against him. So he decides to conduct an investigation which rapidly turns into a nightmare, where shady policemen get mixed up with corrupt politicians, where foreign diplomats lurk while the secret services let loose. “Trop de soleil tue l’amour” – the first volume of an incomplete trilogy – belongs to the tradition of literary farce that, through humour, denounces the tragedy of an Africa caught in the snares of its many contradictions and endless meddling.

Writer, essayist, bookseller, editor, militant citizen, Mongo BETI – born in 1932 in Cameroon – has for half a century been at the heart of the struggle for an Africa free from the tragedies of colonisation and independence confiscated. Author of an important body of work and considered one of Africa’s major writers, Mongo BETI died in October 2001.

Year of publication of the Pan-African version: 2011, 372 pages, 11,5 X 19 cm

A Fair Trade Book co-publishing.

Read the conclusions and proposals formulated by publishers from Francophone Africa following the workshop organised by the Alliance on “Digital tools and African languages”, held in Conakry, in November 2017, thanks the support of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie and the partnership with the house publishing Ganndal.

New edition published in 2017 by la marca editora (Argentina), co-published with EDINAR (Argentina) and CERLALC.
Book initially published by CERLALC.

ISBN: 978-950-889-299-7
264 pages / 20 X 25 cm

More information.

See also below the Peruvian publication of the Manual de edición, published by La Travesía Editora, Peruvian publisher, member of the collective EIP in Peru.

Publishing professionals charter and code of ethics, produced by the Organisation malienne des éditeurs de livre (OMEL), Mali, 2017.

This charter was produced by OMEL (Organisation malienne des éditeurs de livre) in April 2017, which authorized the Alliance to publish it on its website.

Re|Shaping Cultural Policies 2018 (UNESCO 2005 Convention Global Report)
Creativity at the Heart of Development
Excerpt from the foreword:
“This new UNESCO Global Report ‘Re|Shaping Cultural Policies’ is an invaluable tool for the implementation of the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. This Convention, now ratified by 146 Parties, including the European Union, is leading UNESCO’s efforts to strengthen capacities for the creation, production, and dissemination of cultural goods, services, and activities. States are supported in their sovereign right to implement public policies for the development of strong and dynamic cultural and creative industry sectors. UNESCO is committed to developing more effective and sustainable public policies in these areas.
Our roadmap is clear and requires the cooperation of governments and non-governmental actors in four key areas: strengthening governance for culture, improving the conditions for the mobility of artists, integrating culture in sustainable development strategies, and promoting human rights and fundamental freedoms. These four goals are closely linked to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”

Audrey Azoulay
Director-General of UNESCO

Read the report here.

Octavio Kulesz, member of the Digital Lab of the Alliance is the author of Chapter 3 of the report: “Cultural Policies in the Age of Platforms”.

Feasibility study on the establishment of digital printing structures for independent publishers, by Gilles Colleu (November 2017)

Among the 80 recommendations of the International Assembly of independent publishers (2012-2014), independent publishers called on public authorities and international organisations to “contribute and support the establishment of in-country digital printers and printing facilities, on demand (including in sub-Saharan African) to promote access to books”.

The Alliance thus launched a feasibility study in 2016, on the establishment of digital printing facilities in sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar. Above all, the aim was to find out whether digital printing is a relevant alternative, and on what conditions. To do so, the study surveys the needs of local professionals, and discusses the potentials and benefits as well as limitations inherent to digital printing, based on realities and practices of Francophone publishers from sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar. Finally, it discusses the feasibility scenarios for the establishment of a digital printing hub.

By focusing on the technical aspect of digital printing as well as on the development potential in a Francophone African context, this study goes beyond a feasibility study and proposes reflection points on the economic and strategic models of independent publishing.

This study was supported by the International Organisation of Francophonie. A full version of the study is available to members of the Alliance.
For questions or comments, please contact the team of the Alliance.

Gilles COLLEU, author of the study
Former lecturer at the University Institute of Technology “Book Trade” in Aix-en-Provence, former Director of production and digital publishing for Actes Sud, Gilles Colleu established and manages, with Jutta Hepke, Vents d’ailleurs (La Roque d’Anthéron, France), member of the International Alliance of independent publishers. He co manages the digital printing hub Yenooa and incubator Rue des éditeurs and actively participates in the Digital Lab of the Alliance (tutorials, training).

As the Frankfurt Book Fair (11-15 October 2017) opens in a few weeks’ time, with a special focus on France and French languages, the International Alliance of independent publishers takes the opportunity to revisit some key issues for independent publishers and bibliodiversity, as expressed by 400 publishers from 50 countries, in the International Declaration of independent publishers of 2014.

France wished, in the context of Frankfurt’s invitation, to provide a space for publishers from the South and we are grateful for this opportunity. We hope this openness will contribute towards meaningful networking, discussion, and exchanges among Francophone publishers. These mutual trust and interest, at the heart of the Alliance, have indeed proven themselves over the past 15 years, leading to unprecedented co-publishing and translation projects between continents.

However, other aspects of “Frankfurt in French” are counterintuitive to this dynamic. Book donation initiatives from France to Africa are indeed planned in Frankfurt this year. More specifically, the 30 000 books to be displayed in the French Pavilion will be distributed to foreign countries after Frankfurt – and this while some twenty African publishers are invited to participate in the Fair, in an “African/Haiti” stand. As mentioned in several reports and in the Frankfurt programme (see here), book donations, while underpinned by good intentions, can disrupt the local book economy.

We therefore call on the accountability of each involved — public authorities, associations, and professionals, for these donations to be made in close collaboration with participating African publishers, but also in consultation with local African booksellers. These are the basic conditions for balanced and respectful exchanges in the actors’ respective environments.

It is critical to rethink book donation. Encouraging and supporting sustainable and fair editorial partnerships must be a priority.

We hope that the readiness to showcase Francophonie’s diversity and plurality in Frankfurt will be paralleled with constructive actions by public authorities, both in the North and South. It is indeed essential for political will to accompany a change of perspective and relations among Francophone countries.

In a joint statement published on 15 June 2017, the Association internationale des libraires francophones (AILF) and the Alliance shared their concerns and highlighted the impacts of book donations on a country’s book chain.

The Bibliodiversity Observatory collects studies, analysis, and tools produced by the Alliance, in collaboration with its partners. It is built around issues identified as priorities by independent publishers as a follow-up to the International Conferences of Independent Publishers for the 2015-2021 and 2022-2025 period.
Aimed at professionals and public authorities, the Observatory’s mission includes strengthening bibliodiversity in the various regions of the world.

As an independent, evolving and collaborative space, the Observatory’s role includes:

• a “research and analysis” pillar: resource centre focusing on major issues related to independent publishing;
• an “advocacy” pillar, including awareness and influence strategies.

The International Alliance of independent publishers acknowledges and thanks publishers and their partners (international organisations, Ministries of Culture, unions, etc.…) for their contributions and commitment to the Bibliodiversity Observatory.

Part 2: Raphaël Thierry: “Book donations, but at what price, and in exchange for what? An overview on book donation practice in francophone Africa (in French)”

Pre-print version to appear in African Research & Documentation. Journal of SCOLMA (the UK Libraries and Archives Group on Africa), no.127 (2015) [Release 2017]

Read the article on EditAfrica website!

Part 1: Hans M. Zell: “Book Donation Programmes in English-speaking Africa”

Pre-print version to appear in African Research & Documentation. Journal of SCOLMA (the UK Libraries and Archives Group on Africa), no.127 (2015) [Release 2017]

Extract from the editorial note of the print issue:
«Welcome to this bumper issue of ARD. Scolma is grateful to Hans Zell and Raphaël Thierry for choosing to publish their full length study of Book Donation Programmes in Africa in our pages.
It is as they say “time for a reappraisal” and it is our hope that the ensuing debate will take place in the pages of ARD as well as online. I would therefore invite responses and feedback to this important and provocative study. Feedback from receiving libraries in Africa is particularly welcome.»
Terry Barringer, Editor, African Research & Documentation

Read the article on EditAfrica website!