2008 most liveable cities

I owe a big apology to all my loyal readers for keeping you in the dark over the last 3 months. Since my last post I travelled to Mexico twice, shared the stage in San Francisco with some of the authorities on the “geoweb”, travelled to Corsica, the French Riviera, Lake Como, St. Moritz; and managed to launch PlanetEye.com where I lead the Technology team. Intense to say the least. But the most recent issue of Monocle has me burning the proverbial midnight oil and finding energy to start posting regularly again. Thanks for your comments while I was away.

The Monocle Global Quality of Life Index may one day graduate to adopt a scientific methodology that considers a larger spectrum of cities around the world, but I’m happy to settle for their current coverage and play the my-city-is-better-than-yours game, using the tidbits of quick facts they’ve compiled. For those who don’t buy the magazine here are the top 10 cities:

Copenhagen, Denmark

Good looks, brains, perfect proportions, a sunny disposition and a sense of humour are always a winning combination…

Munich, Germany

It combines a strong economy with rich cultural offerings. The city’s workforce is highly [...]

July 24th, 2008 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Category: Cities, Statistics | 3 comments

global citizens influencing american politics

Do you think that foreign nations should participate in the election of American presidents?
Writer David Usborne writes Outside Influence – USA in the February 2008 issue of Monocle:

Look beyond the cliché of hidebound insularism and you quickly see that just as the rest of the world is not immune to American influences, America is not immune to the rest of the world, even in its domestic affairs.

I had already explored the cultural influence that the world exercises on the United States, but given the political strength of the super power, it would seem absurd to expect that the United States would open up to the point of allowing foreigners to exercise any kind of influence on the outcome of their elections. Nevertheless the fact is that such influence is not gained in the form of votes (at least not of the popular kind), but through lobbyists that represent the most diverse interests, from foreign countries to global corporations trying to advocate their private causes. Somehow the idea of a few global corporations paying the salaries of lobbyist that work side by side with the most influential politicians of the United States doesn’t seem as crazy as [...]

February 21st, 2008 | Tags: , , | Category: Corporations, Global Citizen, Globalization | 2 comments