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April 16, 2026

As renaissance fairs become big business, can they retain their counterculture roots?

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Katrina Stack, Ph.D. Candidate in Human Geography, University of Tennessee

King Richard’s Faire in Carver, Mass., was inaugurated in 1982 and is the longest-running renaissance fair in New England. Joseph Prezioso/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Within moments of entering the Newport Renaissance Faire, you are ushered to a group of fairies. They pass you a scroll and say, “You must seek out the Bone Man for the first hurdle in your quest.” As you navigate the fair, you find many men dressed in bones, both vendors and fellow attendees. When you find the correct Bone Man – an actor wearing what appears to be a mask made of human skull along with a crown constructed from deer antlers – he stamps your scroll. He then sends you to your next target: the Drunk Viking.

Following the directions of actors in the fair, you meet a variety of performers from many historical eras and fantastic realms, and stumble upon both merchants and merrymakers in your journey. It’s all part of the immersive experience that connects you with the other guests and staff, though many of the costumed staff members, speaking in faux Middle English, are also trying to sell you something.

Renaissance fairs were originally conceived as a creative refuge for artists sidelined by political repression during the Red Scare. Now, they sit at an uneasy crossroads between countercultural expression and commercial spectacle. Having grown into a nationwide industry with tiered tickets, branded merchandise and multimillion dollar valuations, the fairs can easily be seen as an offshoot of a corporate theme park.

As cultural geographers, we wanted to learn more about whether the spirit of the fairs has been changing. So for our recent study, we visited the Tennessee Renaissance Festival, Newport Renaissance Faire, Tennessee Medieval Faire and Tennessee Pirate Fest.

Once upon a time … not so long ago

Although renaissance fairs and festivals recreate the atmosphere of centuries past, the first formally recognized fair took place in May 1963 in Irwindale, California. A public school English and history teacher named Phyllis Patterson was the brains behind the event, which she dubbed the Renaissance Pleasure Faire.

For Patterson, the fair was a chance to celebrate the era’s countercultural values like free expression, experimentation with identity and creative play. It also served as a source of employment for those who had been pushed out of their careers in the film and entertainment industries after being blacklisted or graylisted as suspected communists.

Actors dressed as European royalty from centuries ago perform in front of a crowd of smiling onlookers. — The Renaissance Pleasure Faire in Irwindale, Calif. – pictured here in 1985 – has its origins in the Red Scare.
Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Patterson herself had refused to sign a Cold War–era loyalty oath required to work in California public schools. At the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, actors, educators and set designers could continue their craft, whether that meant designing costumes, creating characters, performing or writing.

From creative refuge to thriving business

Since those first events in Southern California, renaissance fairs have spread across the U.S., with some constructing permanent structures even though they’re only open seasonally, in the spring or fall. Built to resemble small villages, fair operators create towns-within-towns, fantasy lands where visitors can briefly step away from their routines and obligations.

Their popularity continues to grow, and what began partly as a creative refuge has grown into a thriving entertainment business.

The East Tennessee Renaissance Faire recently announced that it would be relocating after deciding that its original venue in Newport could no longer accommodate the swelling crowds: Within three years, the fair had grown from 600 to 6,000 attendees, spurring a move to a larger site in neighboring Sevierville. New fairs are sprouting up as well: The Chattanooga Renaissance Faire will host its inaugural season in spring 2026.

There are almost always entry fees – US$38 at the Tennessee Renaissance Festival and $53 at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, for example – and many offer season passes.

Attendees often arrive in costume, but strict rules about adhering to a specific time period or setting rarely apply.

Some visitors dress as Tolkien-style elves, while others show up as Tudor nobles. Viking-clad participants walk alongside fairies and swashbuckling pirates. Some fairs have also developed their own themed weekends – with names like “Viking Victory,” “Fantasy and Folklore,” “Pirate Plunder” and “Celtic Celebration” – that weave history and fiction with few constraints. And those committed to their role will often address each other in playful faux-medieval speech, with greetings like “my lady” or “my lord.”

Vendors, often dressed in costume themselves, sell everything from cloaks, swords and crowns to contemporary jewelry and shampoos. Booths sell era-adjacent fare like Scotch eggs, ciders, mead and turkey legs, while modern cocktails like “The Shipwreck” and “The Blueberry Faerie” can also be had, with visitors paying the equivalent of stadium and arena concession prices.

Renaissance fairs have even spread to countries like Germany and France, reconnecting with their roots. The expansion into new venues – along with the development of offshoots such as pirate- and steampunk-themed festivals – point to profit margins that would have been unthinkable in the early days of the Renaissance Pleasure Faire.

But as with many ventures, the prospect of cashing in comes with complications.

The 2024 HBO Max series “Ren Faire” introduced viewers to the eccentrics and costume-clad vendors involved in the nation’s largest fair, the Texas Renaissance Festival in Todd Mission. The fight over its future involved lawsuits and, eventually, the court-ordered $60 million sale of the event’s property and assets.

King Richard’s Faire, which takes place in Carver, Massachusetts, and is the largest fair in New England, reportedly generates massive daily revenue while allegedly relying on widespread worker misclassification, leaving many performers earning below minimum wage without benefits. Even volunteer “villagers” work only for free admission, and both workers and attendees receive no compensation or refunds when the fair closes due to rain.

Seeking out a space of whimsy

Despite the creeping influence of profit motives, we concluded that renaissance fairs have always been – and continue to be – mostly about community.

Dressing as a fantastical version of yourself or your favorite character bonds you to others dressed up at the festival. Unlike popular Civil War or World War II reenactments where historical accuracy is paramount, renaissance fairs instead invite people to take part in shared, often mythologized ideas about history through performance, costume and play.

For example, each weekend, the Tennessee Renaissance Festival organizes jousts. Competitors and their horses meet at a permanent jousting pitch located at the back of the property. Each knight represents a noble house, and each section of the bleachers is assigned a knight to root for. Announcers explain the rules of each event, while also leading the crowds in chants and cheers. While the knights might fight under titles tied to historical lineages, they represent a jumble of eras and place. They also reject antiquated social norms by including women and ethnic groups who never would have been seen together on a jousting pitch.

A man rides a horse while holding a jousting lance in front of bleachers full of spectators. — A jouster performs at the Texas Renaissance Festival in Todd Mission, Texas, in October 2023.
Chen Chen/Xinhua via Getty Images

Here, fidelity to the facts is an afterthought; it actually might ruin the fun.

Beyond the jousting pitch, you can find the queen dictating a game of human chess. A rotating cast of performers play music, tell jokes, juggle and blow fire. Elsewhere, you might stumble across pixies teaching children how to make fairy homes or relax in a mermaid’s magical grotto.

There’s also a comforting simplicity in the narratives of this make-believe world. Ladies are almost always gentle and beautiful, while the men are brave and noble. All the villains are easy to spot – they’re always defeated.

In a real world characterized by political upheaval, information overload, invisible surveillance and shadowy villains, perhaps the fair, with its simple prism of good and evil, becomes a space of comfort – a curated cultural experiment that’s also an improvised escape.

In other words, renaissance fairs wield a quiet power: They forge communities that deliberately blur fantasy, history and everyday life with a wink. Vendors, performers and attendees alike can be Tudors, Vikings, hobbits, elves or mermaids for a day. Few actually believe in elves, or imagine their mock-Elizabethan speech is anything more than cheerful, mangled guesswork.

And that’s the point. There’s joy in pretending – just as there’s a universal pleasure in the weird, the whimsical and the absurd.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. As renaissance fairs become big business, can they retain their counterculture roots? – https://theconversation.com/as-renaissance-fairs-become-big-business-can-they-retain-their-counterculture-roots-273757

April 16, 2026

Health information delivered as a video game can bridge the communication gap between patients and providers

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Elena Bertozzi, Professor of Game Design & Development, Quinnipiac University

Video games that convey health information could be a good use of time in doctors’ waiting rooms. kali9/E+ via Getty Images

Imagine you and your partner are sitting in the waiting room of your doctor’s office, waiting for your appointment to get birth control – and instead of calculating how many other people will be called before you, or perusing old magazines, a nurse hands you a digital tablet and encourages you to play a game.

You power it on, and you find yourselves drawn into a story: Can you help Laila and Caleb figure out which contraceptive method will work best for them, given their lifestyles and Laila’s physiology? Their situation, you realize, is a bit similar to your own. Would helping them choose a form of contraception help you and your partner make an informed decision for yourselves?

As a designer and developer of games that promote positive health behavior change, I work with physicians, public health experts, artists and programmers to create games just like these. I focus on topics like vaccine hesitancy, sexuality and reproductive health – sensitive issues that people may have a hard time discussing openly.

Laila and Caleb are characters in a game that my team and I are developing called What’s My Method? We are testing whether playing it helps people choose a birth control method and makes it easier to have a fruitful discussion with their health care provider. And we are finding that this and other games for health-related education are a powerful but underused way of not just conveying information, but also providing people with an arena to learn from the outcomes of their choices.

A still from a video game showing illustrations of a man and a woman with thought bubbles above their heads thinking through whether a vaginal ring could work for them as birth control. — Laila and Caleb are characters in What’s My Method? – a digital game designed to teach people about different contraceptive methods.
Elena Bertozzi/SolitonZ Games, CC BY

The power of play

When I tell people I make health-related video games for a living, they’re often surprised that this is a viable career choice. Many adults still see video games as trivial at best – and destructive at worst. For example, games that involve guns and shootings are widely blamed for gun violence in real life, even though there’s no causal evidence supporting the connection.

Play is how intelligent and curious beings make sense of the constantly changing world and ensure they keep learning. It is an early factor in children’s cognitive development. Peek-a-boo, for example, helps babies learn about object permanence – meaning that even if a person disappears for a short time, they aren’t gone forever. Digital play can support many types of learning. Games like Minecraft teach resource management, planning and spatial reasoning, among other skills.

The game industry is also an increasingly large part of the world economy. Given the size and reach of the international video game market – US$300 billion in 2025 – games are often the way technological innovations are introduced to a mass audience.

Take motion capture technology, which enables a device to track a person’s movement. Microsoft introduced it to the general public in 2010 through its Kinect console, in which two players can box or play tennis virtually by actually performing the movements with their bodies.

Augmented reality – the ability to use a smartphone to see a virtual world overlaid on the “real” world – entered the mainstream in 2016 when people began playing and watching others play Pokemon Go. Games are also how many people first experience virtual reality – a full immersion in an entirely virtual world – by wearing headsets like Oculus (now called Meta Quest) and Apple Vision Pro.

Gaming also has a powerful social dimension. Massively multiplayer online games like Animal Crossing, Fortnite and World of Warcraft provide a means for socialization and togetherness for billions of people worldwide. This became especially powerful during the COVID-19 pandemic when people were social-distancing – people’s use of such games soared during lockdowns, and they helped players maintain social connections.

In my own experience as the director of a university program in game design and development, I find that students who grew up playing complex digital games are better prepared to engage with technology and navigate an increasingly digital world.

Reading informational leaflets describing a health condition may not be the best way for patients to take charge of their health.

Gaming for health

Early in my game design career, I realized that games don’t just provide compelling entertainment, but they can also equip players with the knowledge and the agency to solve hard problems in real life.

That’s especially valuable in health. Information for patients is usually conveyed through pamphlets or links to websites that often provide too much information in formats patients find difficult to decipher. These formats don’t effectively address gaps in health literacy. Games, on the other hand, provide targeted information in a specific context that players don’t just understand, but also, in some ways, inhabit. Such games allow players to try out different behaviors through avatars to see how they turn out. Conveying information through relatable avatars also triggers empathy, which further cements learning.

Since 2010, my team has been testing how to deploy digital games in the U.S., India, Barbados and Ghana to communicate complex health-related information through animated graphics, audio and interactive experiences.

In 2012, we worked with doctors at a hospital on Long Island, New York, to encourage families of critically ill children to get a flu vaccination. We found that family members who played a game we jointly developed called Flu Busters! were 40% more likely to get a flu vaccination than those who didn’t.

In the game, players help an avatar navigate a school filled with children sneezing and blowing their noses in order to enjoy social interactions such as sharing a cookie without getting sick. Rather than telling people how they should behave, the game allows players to experience how difficult it is to avoid being exposed to the flu virus in everyday life and how the vaccine can help children stay healthy, equipping players to make informed decisions about their own health.

In our first international project, we collaborated with public health physicians in India on a game we developed to gather data about how teenagers there make decisions about family planning. In addition to determining that a game was a very effective tool for anonymized data collection, we found that giving young people access to information about reproductive anatomy gave them the vocabulary and tools to understand and discuss their future reproductive choices..

Two girls in a school uniform sit on the floor playing a game on a digital tablet. — Girls at a school in Karnataka, India, test a game about family planning.
Elena Bertozzi/SolitonZ Games, CC BY

Responding to rising vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 epidemic, my team developed Activate My Shield! The game demonstrates how vaccines protect against different diseases using the metaphor of armor that only works against specific types of attacks. To address misinformation that was widespread at the time – that COVID-19 vaccines contained injectable microchips – the game asks players to try putting a microchip in a vaccine needle and administering it to a person. Experiencing how impossible it is to do this helps players understand that it’s not a legitimate concern.

Reaching digital natives

Our games are available to all for free, but in order to be able to widely distribute them on the app stores, my team and I founded SolitonZ Games.

Several other research groups are developing similar games. They address an enormous range of health issues – for example, encouraging people with HIV to adhere to their treatment, helping teens avoid vaping and teaching children with asthma to manage their disease. A video game called EndeavorRx was authorized by the Food and Drug Administration in 2020 as a prescription-based therapy to improve attention in children who have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

Overall, our research and that of other groups show that digital games can be easily integrated into health care, and that play is an effective way of delivering health information. Simply put, people find the games fun and engaging.

Even as these efforts gain ground, however, health campaigns and patient education efforts have been slow to embrace game-based patient education. That’s perhaps partly because decision-makers such as hospital and clinic administrators are often unfamiliar with gaming and may be slow to buy into the idea of delivering health education through play-based technology. Plus, it’s difficult to make changes in busy environments with a lot of moving parts, like health care.

But I’m optimistic that by working together with public health experts and health care providers, game designers like me can help fit gaming into the industry and culture of health care. After all, it makes sense to try to reach digital natives on the technologies they are already holding in their hands.

Elena Bertozzi is co-Founder of SolitonZ Games which produced two of the games mentioned. She has been funded by the Gates Foundation and Connecticut Innovations.

– ref. Health information delivered as a video game can bridge the communication gap between patients and providers – https://theconversation.com/health-information-delivered-as-a-video-game-can-bridge-the-communication-gap-between-patients-and-providers-280222

April 16, 2026

Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas not only recorded an anthem for the civil rights era – they fought for fair pay and proudly called themselves divas

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Austin McCoy, Assistant Professor of History, West Virginia University

Motown’s Martha and the Vandellas inspired future generations of girl groups in pop music, including En Vogue, SWV and Destiny’s Child. Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

The CBS television show “It’s What’s Happening Baby” aired a music video featuring Martha and the Vandellas performing their hit song “Nowhere to Run” to kick off its national broadcast dedicated to Detroit on June 28, 1965.

In the video, the Detroit-based trio sang about how they could not escape missing an ex-lover after a breakup while sitting in a white Mustang moving slowly down the assembly line in the Ford Motor Co.’s River Rouge plant.

In 1965, CBS aired Martha and the Vandellas’ music video for their song “Nowhere to Run” set inside a Ford assembly plant.

As a cultural and labor historian, I see the “Nowhere to Run” video as an iconic testament to Detroit’s reputation as the “Motor City” and the role of the autoworker in the American imagination.

Motown founder and CEO Berry Gordy, Jr. worked on the Ford assembly line and used it as inspiration for Hitsville U.S.A., the famed headquarters and music recording studio that served as a space to train performers and perfect the “Motown sound” for the masses.

Martha and the Vandellas were part of Motown’s illustrious roster of artists in the 1960s. Initially comprised of Martha Reeves, Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard, and with members changing over the next three decades, they helped establish the Black “girl group.” They presented themselves as working class in videos like “Nowhere to Run.”

Their classic anthem “Dancing in the Street” reflected the revolutionary mood of civil rights protesters, especially Black Americans in the 1960s. As lead singer, Reeves also emerged as a pioneering R&B “diva,” helping pave the way for Black female solo vocalists like Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson, Mary J. Blige and Beyoncé.

A patient path to stardom

Martha Reeves was born in Eufaula, Alabama, on July 18, 1941. Soon after, her family moved to Detroit’s east side. Music occupied a central place in her life from childhood.

Reeves writes in her 1994 memoir, “Dancing in the Street: Confessions of a Motown Diva,” about her father serenading her mother with his guitar while she was pregnant with Martha. Her mother, Ruby, also sang. Reeves’ parents passed their love for music to her, and she sang in her church choir and aspired to a life of performance.

“At that young age I was already hooked on pleasing the crowd with my singing,” Reeves wrote.

Reeves graduated from Northeastern High School. As a teenager, she used fake IDs to get into night clubs to watch singers perform, and she sang in open mics and talent shows. She scored her first break after earning a three-night performance at the 20 Grand, a popular Detroit night club located on 14th Street and Warren Avenue.

It was after one of those performances when she met William Stevenson, Motown Records’ executive for discovering new talent. Stevenson invited Reeves to the label’s headquarters.

Reeves came to the studio, but she didn’t audition for reasons that aren’t entirely clear today. Instead, Stevenson told her she could answer the phones. That’s how she got a job in the A&R Department and began working with other Motown artists.

A solidly build residence has a sign reading 'Hitsville USA' across the facade. — Motown’s lauded recording studio and headquarters located at 2648 W. Grand Blvd. in Detroit.
Leni Sinclair/Getty Images

In 1957, Reeves joined her first group, the Del-Phis. Formed by Edward “Pops” Larkins, the Del-Phis also included leader Gloria Jean Williamson, Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard.

Reeves soon caught another break. In September 1962, Stevenson called for her to fill in for Mary Wells in a Marvin Gaye studio session. Reeves enlisted the other Del-Phis, and they performed so well that they became the supporting vocal group for Gaye.

After the Del-Phis toured with Gaye and recorded “I’ll Have to Let Him Go,” Gordy offered Reeves, Beard and Ashford a recording contract. The group also took on a new name, Martha and the Vandellas.

Martha and the Vandellas enjoyed commercial success soon after, with songs like “Come and Get These Memories,” “Quicksand” and “Heatwave.”

An anthem for revolution set to a groove

“Dancing in the Street,” written by Gaye, Stevenson and Ivy Jo Hunter, was released in the summer of 1964 and became a signature hit for Martha and the Vandellas.

Reeves wrote in her autobiography that she did not like “Dancing in the Street.”

However, she made it her own, and Reeves later acknowledged that the song embodied the spirit of civil rights protests.

“It became the anthem of the decade,” Reeves wrote.

She was right.

At the time of the song’s release, the Civil Rights Movement was in full swing. Black Americans in Harlem took to the streets to protest the killing of 15-year-old James Powell by an off-duty New York Police Department officer.

The 1960s set off a string of “long, hot summers” as racial tensions intensified. Black folks in the Watts neighborhood in Los Angeles in 1965 protested in the streets in response to police violence.

More than 100 protests were organized in response to Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in 1968, from Chicago to Washington and Baltimore.

People marching in a civil rights protest — ‘Dancing in the Street’ rose to pop culture prominence during the Civil Rights Movement.
Bettman/Getty Images

Detroit erupted a year earlier, in July 1967, after Detroit police officers raided a “blind pig,” or an unlicensed bar, on 12th Street.

The iconic opening lines of “Dancing in the Street” announced a new attitude among Black folks: “Calling out around the world/ Are you ready for a brand new beat?”

The high-octane, optimistic song is laced with slogans interpreted as invitations to take action. Martha and the Vandellas’ declaration that “Summer is here and the time is right for dancing in the street” reflected Black Americans’ willingness to not only march, but to take measures in their own hands and fight for equality and justice.

Battle for fair pay and recognition

The late 1960s and early 1970s were a time of transition for Reeves and the Vandellas. The Supremes were on the rise and threatened to displace them as the most prominent girl group on the Motown label. Reeves also experienced creative differences with Motown executives and struggled with drug addiction. Then, in 1972, Gordy moved Motown to Los Angeles so he could try his hand at filmmaking.

Martha and the Vandellas broke up later that year after the release of their album, “Black Magic.” However, Reeves continued as a solo artist, releasing five albums, including her self-titled debut “Martha Reeves” in 1974, “The Rest of My Life” in 1976 and “We Meet Again” in 1978, among others.

Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, along with many Motown artists, experienced a resurgence in popularity during the 1980s. Motown Records’ 25th anniversary show in Pasadena, California, in 1983 launched them back into the mainstream. The group reunited and started performing again in 1989.

Also, Reeves and the group sought to resolve their old conflicts with Motown Records. Reeves and various members of the Vandellas sued Gordy and Motown in 1989 for unpaid royalties. Motown Records settled the suit in 1991 for an undisclosed amount.

Four years later, the B-52s inducted Reeves and the Vandellas into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Woman singing into microphone. — Martha Reeves released five albums as a solo artist.
David Redfern/Redferns

The diva archetype

Martha and the Vandellas played a vital role in laying the foundation for future all-Black female groups like En Vogue, TLC, SWV and Destiny’s Child.

They helped set the standard for turning songs about the trappings of love and heartbreak into anthems. Reeves embraced being an “R&B Diva” long before music critics applied the persona to singers like Mary J. Blige and Beyoncé. Reeves was not just a larger-than-life vocal presence; she showed future generations of Black female vocalists that, to be a diva, one must have control of one’s own career.

“We became the Vandellas and with me being the only lead singer, my name was put out there because I did all the work,” Reeves said in a 2020 interview. “I did all the singing … I managed to just come up with my own destiny, with my own future in show business.”

Austin McCoy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas not only recorded an anthem for the civil rights era – they fought for fair pay and proudly called themselves divas – https://theconversation.com/motown-girl-group-martha-and-the-vandellas-not-only-recorded-an-anthem-for-the-civil-rights-era-they-fought-for-fair-pay-and-proudly-called-themselves-divas-278383

April 16, 2026

The Lewis dynasty makes a third bid to shape democratic socialism in Canada

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Roberta Lexier, Associate Professor, Departments of General Education and Humanities, Mount Royal University

Avi Lewis and his father, Stephen Lewis, when the new NDP leader was a child.
(Avi Lewis/Facebook)

Democratic socialism, David Lewis reportedly told his son, Stephen, may not triumph in his lifetime, but perhaps for his children. “Recently,” said grandson Avi Lewis, “my Dad told me the same thing: not in my lifetime, maybe in yours.”

But the newly elected leader of the federal New Democratic Party added in his victory speech that he refuses to tell his own child the same thing: “We can’t wait another generation. We’ve got to start winning now.”

Stephen Lewis died just two days after his son’s historic, first-ballot win. Lewis joked that his father’s timing provided him with one news cycle before the inevitable flood of tributes for his father shifted the spotlight from a campaign that promoted a wealth tax, public investments in the economy and a Green New Deal.

I’m an expert on the left in Canada, currently writing a book on the Lewis family.

Almost exactly 55 years prior to Avi Lewis’s recent win — on April 24, 1971 — David Lewis, Lewis’s grandfather, assumed the same position in the party he had forged, a decade prior, as an alliance between the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) and the struggling Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF). He required four ballots to defeat the Waffle candidate, James Laxer.

Stephen Lewis ultimately claimed full responsibility for the 1972 expulsion of the insurgent Waffle group. His father, Stephen Lewis insisted, “was anti-Waffle, but he would never have agreed to expulsion. In fact, he called me and begged me not to do it. It was one of our infrequent tussles.”

David Lewis

The eldest Lewis, a Bundist Jewish immigrant from Eastern Europe and a Rhodes Scholar, was a controversial figure: he feared and intimidated those unable to match his intellect and persuasiveness; he was viewed with suspicion by groups seeking to radicalize the electoral left; and he was respected by both peers and opponents for his lifelong dedication to the fight for justice and equality.

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Lewis criss-crossed the country, almost single-handedly building the CCF, and his 1943 best-seller, Make This Your Canada, co-written with poet and intellectual, Frank R. Scott, popularized the socialist platform and contributed to electoral success in Ontario and Saskatchewan

Liberals and Conservatives countered growing CCF support by accepting government intervention in the economy and an expanded social safety net. Later, the 1972 Corporate Welfare Bums campaign earned the NDP their highest seat total to date and gave the party the balance of power in a minority government.

Stephen Lewis

Stephen Lewis, too, was committed to electoral politics. In 1963, at just 25, he was elected to the Ontario legislature. In 1970, he was chosen leader of the Ontario NDP which, in 1975, became the Official Opposition and forced rent control, mental health supports and occupational health and safety regulations.

But Stephen Lewis reportedly found Canadian politics boring, parochial and frustrating due to its technocratic pettiness; he wanted to focus on broader issues. The NDP, hamstrung by a de-radicalized labour movement and, ironically, the success of their co-opted programs, could not contain his ambitions.

He happily accepted an appointment as ambassador to the United Nations where he aided the struggle against South African apartheid and, as special envoy, raised awareness about the HIV/AIDS epidemic ravaging Africa, though he later said “the death gets to you.”

Others in the Lewis family

Avi Lewis’s campaign for the federal leadership marks the long-anticipated return of the family to electoral politics, though the journalist, documentary filmmaker and activist promotes policies more closely aligned with the socialist CCF than the moderate, centre-left NDP.

But it’s not only these high-profile members of the family who contribute to the Lewis legacy.

Stephen Lewis’s wife for more than 60 years, Lewis’s mother, is path-breaking feminist journalist Michele Landsberg.

His brother, Michael Lewis, organized dozens of successful election campaigns across the country and transformed political action efforts within the labour movement. His sister, Janet Solberg, held almost every possible position within the NDP, including president of the Ontario wing, and participated in nearly every election in her lifetime.

Stephen Lewis’s eldest daughter, Ilana, ran the Stephen Lewis Foundation for nearly 20 years, and his youngest, Jenny, was the casting director for the smash hit Heated Rivalry. Often overlooked, Stephen Lewis wrote in a 2024 email to me: “She is far and away the most politically astute of our three kids.”

Avi Lewis is married to author and activist Naomi Klein.

As I researched my book, Stephen Lewis told me his was “a family that took positions … believed in them, fought them through. They were tenacious, they were indefatigable, they were uncompromising.”

Avi Lewis agreed. He told me in a recent interview: “The job … was to fight. Win occasionally, lose a lot and never stop fighting.”

Roberta Lexier receives funding from SSHRC. She is affiliated with the New Democratic Party.

– ref. The Lewis dynasty makes a third bid to shape democratic socialism in Canada – https://theconversation.com/the-lewis-dynasty-makes-a-third-bid-to-shape-democratic-socialism-in-canada-280197

April 16, 2026

‘I’m not a politician’: why the clash with Pope Leo could prove dangerous for Donald Trump

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Massimo D’Angelo, Research Associate in the Institute for Diplomacy and International Affairs, Loughborough University

“I am not a politician; I speak of the Gospel.” Pope Leo XIV’s recent remarks, made during his apostolic journey to Africa, immediately suggest that his clash with Donald Trump operates on a different level to the US president’s usual political spats.

This is not the classic kind of confrontation that Trump has often had with foreign heads of state and government in the past, such as in recent months with the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, whose refusal to fully back the US and Israel in their war against Iran attracted Trump’s ire. Rather, it is a clash rooted in fundamentally different moral and political visions: between a president who treats power in transactional terms and a pope who frames war, migration and human dignity as matters of moral principle.

When Cardinal Robert Prevost was named as Pope Leo in May 2025, Trump and his administration initially appeared to welcome the new pontiff warmly. In fact, in a post to his Truth Social platform the US president appeared to take credit for his election as pope, writing that Prevost “was only put there by the Church because he was an American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J. Trump”.

But the war in the Middle East launched by the US and Israel has made the differences between their positions clearer – further heightening tensions between them. On Palm Sunday, the week before Easter, it became clear that Leo had decided to take a firm line against the war in Iran, saying that Jesus “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: ‘Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen: your hands are full of blood’”.

His Easter message was equally clear: “Let those who have weapons lay them down! Let those who have the power to unleash wars choose peace! Not a peace imposed by force, but through dialogue! Not with the desire to dominate others, but to encounter them.”

Day’s later the pope denounced the US president’s apparent threat to destroy the whole of the Iranian civilisation as “truly unacceptable” in comments which roundly criticised the war and called for a “return to dialogue, negotiations”.

Trump responded in harsh terms, describing the pope in a Truth Social post as “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy”. He went on to say that he did not want a pope “who thinks it is OK for Iran to have nuclear weapons”, adding that “Leo should use common sense, stop doing the bidding of the radical left, and focus on being a great pope rather than a politician”.

Returning to Washington from Florida, Trump also told reporters: “I don’t think he’s doing a good job. I’m not a fan of Pope Leo.” The pope replied on Monday by saying that he was not afraid of the Trump administration and would continue to speak out against war.

Trump did not stop there. He went so far as to publish an image portraying himself as Jesus Christ, a move that appeared to go too far even for many of his conservative supporters. The reaction was strong enough to force him to delete the post and backtrack.

This could hurt the US president

Trump has clashed with the Vatican before, but this confrontation unfolds in a very different setting. Pope Francis, the first Argentine pope and the first pontiff from the global south, was often openly critical of Trump, particularly on migration. In 2016, he famously suggested that a leader who thinks only of building walls rather than bridges is “not Christian”, crystallising the tension between them.

Pope Leo XiV calls for an end to war, March 29 2026.

The key difference was that Francis was also a divisive figure within sections of the American Catholic Church. He was frequently targeted by conservative Catholic commentators and church networks in the US, and in 2019 he remarked that “it’s an honour that the Americans attack me”.

Leo, by contrast, is the first US pope – and that changes the political equation. His voice is likely to carry different authority among Catholic voters, who are an important part of Trump’s electoral base.

In the last presidential election, 55% of Catholic voters supported Trump, including 62% of white Catholics. Senior Catholics also occupy prominent positions in his administration, including Vance and Trump’s secretary of state Marco Rubio.

That is why Leo’s criticism may prove more politically consequential. It does not come from an external moral voice alone, as was often the case with Francis, but from an American pontiff speaking into a church and an electorate that Trump cannot afford to ignore.

Early reactions suggest that many Catholic voices in the US have rallied behind Leo, making this not only a diplomatic clash, but a potentially significant domestic one too. (This could also really hurt J.D. Vance. As the likely contender to succeed Trump on the Repulican ticket, he is deeply invested in his Catholic faith and is about to publish a book devoted to his conversion.)

From an international perspective, the break with the pope has also had visible repercussions. Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, long regarded as Trump’s closest ally in Europe, went publicly in defence of Pope Leo, the bishop of Rome, drawing criticism from Trump himself, who defined the Italian prime minister’s behaviour as “unacceptable”.

To conclude, this is not a political confrontation like the many others the world has become used to with this US president. The stakes are higher at home and on the world stage. At home, it risks alienating many Catholic voters whose support will matter not only in the midterm elections but also in the next presidential race. Internationally, it may complicate Trump’s relationship with European conservative parties, many of which have long sought close association with the Vatican.

The pope, as the leader of a vast global community, cannot be treated as though he were just another political opponent.

Massimo D’Angelo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. ‘I’m not a politician’: why the clash with Pope Leo could prove dangerous for Donald Trump – https://theconversation.com/im-not-a-politician-why-the-clash-with-pope-leo-could-prove-dangerous-for-donald-trump-280742

April 16, 2026

Is mouthwash bad for the heart? Here’s what the research actually says

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Joanna L’Heureux, Postdoctoral Researcher, Public Health and Sport Sciences, University of Exeter

Don’t give up your mouthwash just yet. years44/ Shutterstock

Social media videos are claiming that mouthwash can raise risk of blood pressure – and potentially damage heart health.

According to some of these videos, this is caused by mouthwash wiping out “good” oral bacteria that are important for the cardiovascular system. While it’s a striking message, don’t throw your mouthwash away just yet. The reality is far more complex.

Our mouths contain a wide variety of bacteria. Together, these bacteria form a balanced and diverse microbiome which helps prevent the overgrowth of other bacteria linked to disease, supports normal metabolic functions and contributes to both good oral and overall health.

One of the important roles these oral bacteria have is converting the nitrate in our food (typically from sources such as leafy greens) into nitrite. When we swallow nitrite, the body turns it into nitric oxide. This happens via the nitrate-nitrite-nitric oxide pathway, also called the enterosalivary pathway. It’s one example of how bacteria contribute to keeping the body healthy.

Nitric oxide plays an essential part in regulating blood pressure and supporting brain function and muscle function.

But according to some online influencers, the reason mouthwash harms heart health is because it affects the “healthy” bacteria – the ones that produce nitric oxide.

Mouthwash and heart health link

Several small studies have actually found that giving people mouthwash can change the balance of bacteria in the mouth. This may reduce the bacteria’s ability to turn nitrate from vegetables into nitrite, which the body needs to make nitric oxide.

One study of 19 healthy volunteers found that the adults who used chlorhexidine mouthwash for seven days saw a small increase in blood pressure and reduced levels of nitrite.

An intervention study also reported that rinsing with 0.12% chlorhexidine gluconate mouthwash twice daily for one week significantly increased blood pressure in 27 healthy adults.

In another trial of 15 adults who already had high blood pressure, three days of chlorhexidine use further increased blood pressure.

The key detail that may be missed out of some of these online social media videos is the type of mouthwash used in these studies.

Many of the studies which have found a link between mouthwash use and blood pressure gave participants chlorhexidine. This is a strong, over-the-counter antiseptic mouthwash only recommended for short-term use in people with gum disease or after dental procedures where its antimicrobial effects are beneficial.

A woman smiles with her teeth. A magnifying glass is held in front of her teeth, depicting the many small microbes and bacteria that may be living inside her mouth.. — Mouthwash might disrupt important oral microbes.
sruilk/ Shutterstock

Chlorhexidine disrupts oral bacteria to help with infection control – including the bacteria that convert nitrate into nitrite. This makes it an ideal mouthwash to use for researchers wanting to study the nitrate-nitrite-nitric oxide pathway. However, it also means the findings may not reflect what happens with milder, everyday mouthwashes.

A trial with 12 healthy adults investigated the effect of three different mouthwashes (and gargling water, which acted as a control) on oral bacteria.

After drinking a nitrate-rich juice, researchers measured how much nitrate was converted to nitrite by oral bacteria. Water and the mild mouthwash (which didn’t contain harsh ingredients such as chlorhexidine) caused a typical response, where nitrate was converted into nitrite.

But the cetylpyridinium chloride mouthwash (which also has strong, anti-bacterial effects) partially blocked the conversion of nitrate to nitrite. The strongest chlorhexidine mouthwash almost completely stopped this process. This is consistent with their stronger antibacterial effects. The stronger types of mouthwash were also linked to higher systolic blood pressure.

Alcohol (ethanol) is another common ingredient in many mouthwashes, although formulations usually also include other active ingredients – such as essential oils. This makes it difficult to isolate the specific effects of alcohol.

As an antimicrobial, alcohol may influence the oral microbiome. Some studies have even suggested a possible association between mouthwashes containing alcohol and increased oral cancer risk. However, there are currently no studies that have specifically examined the effects of ethanol-only mouth rinses on the oral microbiome or cardiovascular health.

Overall, the body of evidence suggests that a mild, over-the-counter mouthwash, like the kind most people buy at stores, may be less likely to significantly interfere with nitrate-to-nitrite conversion or affect blood pressure.

In a long-term study of 354 adults, better routine oral hygiene, such as brushing and flossing, was linked to a lower risk of cardiovascular death over nearly 19 years. Regular mouthwash use did not appear to have any influence on heart health outcomes. This was true for milder mouthwashes containing flouride and alcohol, as well as stronger, anti-bacterial mouthwashes such as chlorhexidine and cetylpyridinium chloride.

The type of mouthwash matters

Together, these studies suggest that some types of mouthwash (such as chlorhexidine) disrupt beneficial oral bacteria and the nitrate-nitrite-nitric oxide pathway when used long term. But more research needs to be done to truly understand the long-term effects of other types of mouthwash on cardiovascular health – including mild everyday mouthwash brands and those containing alcohol.

Mouthwash comes in different types for different purposes, so it’s important to check the active ingredient on the back of the packaging. Alcohol-free and milder mouthwashes appear to have less effect on the heart-healthy bacteria than stronger types.

However, be aware to check the ingredients as even alcohol-free options can contain antibacterial agents such as cetylpyridinium chloride. As such, it’s best to choose one that fits your needs and use it in moderation. Strong mouthwashes containing chlorhexidine are best reserved for helping gum disease or oral infections.

It’s also worth noting that oral health and untreated infections can also contribute to heart disease more broadly. For example, a systematic review of 82 studies concluded that chronic oral disease and tooth loss was associated with risk of heart problems. This is why maintaining a healthy balance of mouth bacteria matters beyond your teeth.

Take care of your oral and overall health by keeping up with brushing, flossing, visiting your dentist and choosing a mouthwash that works for you.

Joanna L’Heureux does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Is mouthwash bad for the heart? Here’s what the research actually says – https://theconversation.com/is-mouthwash-bad-for-the-heart-heres-what-the-research-actually-says-277299

April 16, 2026

Departures: this stylish gay love story deftly balances darkness and whimsy

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Benedict Morrison, Senior lecturer in Film, Television, Literature, and Queer Studies, University of Exeter

In her 1998 essay What’s a Good Gay Film?, film critic B. Ruby Rich considered what queer audiences were looking for.

She wrote that queer cinema-goers were seeking “films of validation and a culture of affirmation: work that can reinforce identity, visualise respectability, combat injustice and bolster social status”. They were tired, she argued, of stereotypes of queer suffering and trauma. Instead, they required “nothing downbeat or too revelatory; and happy endings, of course”.

But if a straightforward happy ending is what you are after, Departures is not the film for you. This miraculously self-financed and stylish debut feature is not purely affirmative. At times, the screen shimmers with sadness. And yet, wryly and playfully, the film also resists becoming gloomy. Tonally sophisticated, it combines the bleak with the whimsical, ultimately sidestepping the crude dichotomy of happy or unhappy endings altogether.

The film opens with a love-scarred Benji (played by the film’s writer and co-director Lloyd Eyre-Morgan) recalling a recent relationship. In flashback, he remembers meeting handsome Jake (David Tag) in the airport as they both wait for a flight to Amsterdam. Jake bewilders Benji: his flirtation is suggestive but always deniable, never quite declaring itself. Charismatic and assertive, Jake engineers it so that they sit together on the flight, telling the air steward that he is Benji’s carer – a description which quickly becomes grimly ironic.

The trailer for Departures.

Later, Jake rejects the suggestion that he is gay but demands that Benji give him a blowjob regardless. Monthly trips to Amsterdam follow and the two men develop a form of intimacy, but one which affords the softer, more pliable Benji little power.

In such a brief synopsis, the scenario risks sounding cliched. Familiar narrative devices pile up: the physically asymmetrical gay relationship in which the self-consciousness of one man makes them susceptible to the coercive manipulations of the more assured partner in a whirlwind of sex and drugs and emotional control. A comparable dynamic played out in another recent queer film, Pillion.

Benji, longing for this to be more than a once-monthly dose of overseas sex, withstands put-downs and disappointments. His quiet, emotional expressions of desire (played movingly by Eyre-Morgan) contrast with Jake’s struggle to accept his attraction to men. Tag is excellent and his portrayal of Jake is sometimes harsh and defensive, but also shows vulnerability, which prevents him from becoming a one-dimensional monster. Because of these tensions, the relationship’s unhappy ending feels like a dead cert.

Lessons from Heartstopper

Departures takes familiar cliches and gives them new life, turning them into something unexpectedly revealing. Its understated story recalls many films about gay suffering – from A Single Man to All of Us Strangers – but it refuses to stay within that familiar emotional frame.

Instead, the film disrupts expectations through bold, stylised touches that feel borrowed, perhaps improbably, from the Heartstopper playbook. The result is a work that plays with recognisable influences while twisting them into something more strange, lively and original.

Heartstopper, the popular Netflix queer teen drama, deliberately avoids the more difficult or painful stories often told about queer life. Instead, it offers the kind of wish-fulfilling, happy endings that Rich suggested many queer viewers have long desired. Every glance, touch and kiss between its characters is punctuated with playful on-screen doodles — bursts of electricity, fluttering butterflies and swirling text that insist we are watching Love with a capital L.

Departures borrows these same twee, saccharine stylistic gestures, but uses them in a very different context. Applied to a darker, sometimes even sordid story about control and sadness, they take on a mischievous, unsettling edge.

As Benji’s voiceover details his suffering, scratchy lettering and illustrations dance around the screen. When he first sees Jake and his weary voiceover acknowledges the pain to come, doodled hearts burst around the handsome stranger to the music of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. As Benji submissively performs oral sex for Jake, the Hallelujah Chorus plays and animated fireworks fill the screen. And as Jake prepares to get into a fight with Benji’s friends, the needle of a Toxic Masculinity Meter shoots up to maximum. Here is a version of Heartstopper for an audience which knows that happy endings are often only the stuff of comic books.

In Departures, the collision of the sombre, unsettling narrative with the comic stylings of those twitching onscreen graphics suggests a more complex emotional situation in which neither cynicism nor romanticism is left unchecked. Instead, they synthesise in a complex portrait of Benji, who can neither maintain nor give up his romantic belief that Jake might love him.

Colliding styles

One of the film’s most striking ways of expressing this tension comes in a series of non-narrative sequences. Here, the characters dance – or perhaps merely convulse – under harsh strobe lights, their bodies flickering in and out of view, shifting into new poses and even seeming to become different selves between flashes.

It’s a simple but powerful device, inspired by the club scenes the men encounter on their trips to Amsterdam. Yet it opens up something more unsettling: brief glimpses of gay men caught between pleasure and pain, ecstasy and distress, moving to the uncertain rhythm of a contemporary queer world where nothing quite feels stable or fixed.

In the 1990s, Rich rejected the idea of easy affirmation, describing herself instead as an “old-time outlaw girl” who craved films “that push the edge, upset convention, defy expectation, speak the unspeakable, grab me by the throat and surprise me with something I’ve never seen before”.

Departures may work with familiar characters and a recognisable story, but its force lies in how it collides styles and tones in unexpected ways. It’s the kind of film that, in Rich’s terms, grabs you by the throat. What stays with me most is its sardonic yet romantic energy and the strangely undefeated presence of Benji at its centre.

This film deserves to find an audience who want more than easy viewing. It deserves viewers who will dance along to its tonal shifts and cherish the funny, sad, ironic almost-happy ending it serves up in its closing credits.

Benedict Morrison does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Departures: this stylish gay love story deftly balances darkness and whimsy – https://theconversation.com/departures-this-stylish-gay-love-story-deftly-balances-darkness-and-whimsy-280497

April 16, 2026

L’Afrique perd ses professionnels de santé au pire moment : les racines coloniales d’une crise

Source: The Conversation – in French – By Danica Sims, Senior lecturer in Medical Education, University of Oxford

L’Afrique a du mal à relever le défi de retenir les professionnels de santé dont elle a besoin.

L’Organisation mondiale de la santé estime à 11 millions le déficit mondial en professionnels de santé d’ici 2030. L’Afrique doit faire face à une pénurie comprise entre cinq et six millions de professionnels. Ce déficit est calculé en fonction de la charge de morbidité et des besoins de santé de la population. Il s’agit de la taille et de la structure de la population, ainsi que de la prévalence des maladies et des facteurs de risque. Il tient aussi compte du type et de la fréquence des interventions sanitaires prévues ou nécessaires pour traiter les maladies, affections et facteurs de risque identifiés.

Cette pénurie est très inégale. Bon nombre des 83 pays qui se situent déjà en dessous du seuil minimum recommandé en matière de main-d’œuvre se trouvent en Afrique. En 2022, seuls quatre pays (Seychelles, Namibie, Maurice et Afrique du Sud) dépassaient le ratio recommandé de 4,45 médecins, infirmiers et sages-femmes pour 1 000 habitants.

Madagascar, le Malawi, le Togo, le Bénin, le Soudan du Sud, le Tchad, la République centrafricaine et le Niger ont déclaré moins de 0,5 médecin, infirmier et sage-femme pour 1 000 habitants en 2018. Dans de nombreux pays africains, il est difficile de fournir des services de base, de réduire les décès évitables et de parvenir à une couverture sanitaire universelle.

En revanche, l’Europe fait état d’un ratio compris entre 5,43 et 20,0 médecins, infirmiers et sages-femmes pour 1 000 habitants.

Dans le même temps, les pays plus riches tels que le Royaume-Uni, les États-Unis, le Canada et l’Australie dépendent de plus en plus de personnel formé à l’étranger. En 2023, près de la moitié des nouveaux médecins rejoignant le marché du travail britannique avaient été formés à l’étranger.

Ce phénomène est souvent qualifié de « fuite des cerveaux », qui s’explique par des facteurs répulsifs (faibles salaires, mauvaises conditions de travail) et des facteurs « d’attraction » (meilleurs salaires et opportunités à l’étranger).

Je m’intéresse à ce sujet, en tant que travailleuse internationale : je suis une chercheuse sud-africaine en éducation sanitaire travaillant au Royaume-Uni, où je forme des professionnels de santé et mène des recherches sur les questions liées à la main-d’œuvre.

Dans un article récent, je soutiens que cette explication est incomplète. Le cadre « push-pull » (répulsion-attraction) passe à côté d’un point crucial : les flux de professionnels de santé ne sont pas aléatoires. Ils se déplacent systématiquement des pays les plus pauvres vers les plus riches — une tendance qui suit de près les lignes tracées par l’histoire coloniale.

Le terme « fuite des cerveaux » suggère un flux naturel, presque inévitable, de talents. Mais la migration des professionnels de santé n’est ni neutre ni équitable ; elle est façonnée par l’histoire, l’économie et le pouvoir.

Je soutiens que ce phénomène ne se résume pas à une « fuite des cerveaux » motivée par des choix individuels. Il s’inscrit plutôt dans un système mondial plus profond et inégalitaire, façonné par l’héritage colonial — avec des implications majeures pour les politiques de santé, d’éducation et de main-d’œuvre.

Cela permet de recentrer le débat : il ne s’agit plus de blâmer les médecins et les infirmières qui partent, mais de s’intéresser aux systèmes qui déterminent ces choix en premier lieu.

Les trois facteurs en jeu

Ma recherche s’appuie sur une perspective décoloniale pour repenser la migration des professionnels de santé. Plutôt que de considérer la migration comme une série de décisions individuelles, elle examine les systèmes mondiaux qui structurent ces décisions.

La décolonialité soutient que le colonialisme européen a créé une matrice de pouvoir qui continue d’organiser :

le pouvoir (qui contrôle les ressources et la main-d’œuvre)
la connaissance (quelle expertise est valorisée)
l’être (qui est valorisé).

À travers ce prisme, je soutiens que la migration des professionnels de santé ressemble moins à un marché du travail neutre ou à un malheureux sous-produit de la mondialisation, et davantage à une continuation de l’exploitation historique. En d’autres termes, les mêmes hiérarchies mondiales façonnées pendant le colonialisme influencent toujours qui contrôle et tire profit des ressources et de la main-d’œuvre africaines, quelle expertise est reconnue, et comment les travailleurs internationaux sont perçus et traités.

Pouvoir : Premièrement, les pays plus riches sous-investissent souvent dans la formation de leur propre main-d’œuvre, puis recrutent dans des pays disposant de bien moins de ressources. Cela entraîne un transfert de capital humain du Sud vers le Nord. Les pertes financières sont considérables : une étude a estimé que les pays d’Afrique subsaharienne ont perdu des millions, voire des milliards de dollars, en raison de l’émigration de médecins, tandis que les pays d’accueil ont réalisé des économies sur les coûts de formation.

Connaissances : Deuxièmement, les hiérarchies mondiales du savoir influencent la mobilité professionnelle. La formation médicale en Europe et en Amérique du Nord est souvent considérée comme la référence absolue, tandis que les diplômes délivrés par des établissements africains peuvent être remis en question ou nécessiter une validation supplémentaire. Cela renforce l’idée selon laquelle partir vers le nord est nécessaire pour progresser dans sa carrière et acquérir une légitimité.

Bien-être : Troisièmement, de nombreux professionnels de santé formés à l’étranger sont confrontés à une discrimination qui a un impact négatif sur leur bien-être et leur progression de carrière.
Ils risquent en outre une déprofessionnalisation. Les professionnels de santé internationaux pouvant être employés à des postes d’un niveau inférieur à celui pour lequel ils sont qualifiés, cela peut entraîner une perte de leurs compétences. Cela reflète la déshumanisation et l’exploitation coloniales.

En bref, les systèmes mondiaux favorisent les départs et profitent davantage aux pays d’accueil qu’aux pays d’origine.

Développer un système plus équitable

Si la migration des professionnels de santé est façonnée par des inégalités structurelles, les solutions doivent également agir à ce niveau.

1. Investir dans les professionnels de santé locaux et les retenir

Les gouvernements africains devraient s’attaquer aux facteurs « d’incitation » en développant les possibilités de formation et d’emploi, en améliorant les conditions de travail et en garantissant une rémunération équitable et des perspectives de carrière, afin de faire du maintien sur place une option viable et attrayante. La formation des professionnels de santé devrait être alignée sur les besoins sanitaires locaux, afin de donner aux professionnels de santé les moyens de répondre avant tout aux besoins de santé de la population dans leur propre contexte.

2. Réformer le recrutement mondial et redistribuer les ressources

Les pays à revenu élevé doivent réduire leur dépendance au recrutement international en investissant davantage dans la formation nationale. Des codes de recrutement éthiques existent mais ne sont pas appliqués de manière cohérente. Il existe également de solides arguments en faveur de mesures de réparation – notamment une compensation financière ou des investissements – afin de compenser les pertes subies par les pays qui forment des professionnels de santé qui émigrent ensuite.

Des partenariats plus équilibrés, tels que les programmes de migration circulaire (dans le cadre desquels les professionnels de santé rentrent chez eux après avoir suivi une formation à l’étranger) ou les accords bilatéraux de formation (dans lesquels l’expertise des deux pays est reconnue et les deux contextes en tirent profit), pourraient favoriser l’échange de compétences sans vider de manière permanente les capacités. Mais ceux-ci doivent inclure des parcours clairs pour le retour et des investissements significatifs dans les systèmes de santé des pays d’origine.

3. Reconnaître et valoriser les connaissances et les professionnels du Sud

S’attaquer à la « colonialité du savoir » signifie reconnaître la légitimité de la formation et de l’expertise développées dans les contextes africains. Dans le même temps, s’attaquer à la « colonialité de l’être » nécessite de lutter contre le racisme, les préjugés et la discrimination sur les lieux de travail du secteur de la santé à l’échelle mondiale.

Perspectives

Lorsque les systèmes de santé africains peinent à retenir leur personnel, ce n’est pas uniquement dû à une mauvaise planification nationale. Bon nombre de ces systèmes fonctionnent sous le poids de l’héritage de l’exploitation coloniale.

Reconnaître cette réalité plus profonde ouvre de nouvelles possibilités. Un système de santé mondial plus équitable est possible – mais seulement s’il ne repose plus sur la perte de l’Afrique au profit d’autrui.

Danica Sims bénéficie d’un financement de l’université d’Oxford pour ses travaux de recherche. Elle est rattachée à l’université d’Oxford et à l’université de Johannesburg.

– ref. L’Afrique perd ses professionnels de santé au pire moment : les racines coloniales d’une crise – https://theconversation.com/lafrique-perd-ses-professionnels-de-sante-au-pire-moment-les-racines-coloniales-dune-crise-280471

April 16, 2026

Who is Hungary’s Péter Magyar and how he overturned Viktor Orbán’s illiberal democracy

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gemma Ware, Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation

The day after Péter Magyar ousted Victor Orbán as prime minister of Hungary, he gave a combative press conference. He spoke in Hungarian, but was talking to the world – and particularly to Europe.

“We will do everything to restore the rule of law, plural democracy, and the system of checks and balances,” Magyar said, calling his election a historic moment for Hungary.

During 16 years in power, Orbán and his Fidesz party managed to take control of many of Hungary’s levers of power, from the judiciary to state-owned media, and weakened the institutions that could keep them accountable. Orbán liked to call it an illiberal democracy.

Magyar also urged the Hungarian president to move swiftly to install him as prime minister, before any more damage could be done by Orbán’s loyalists. “We know that people have been destroying documents, just like in the old communist age, that shredders are working full time,” he said.

In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, Zsolt Enyedi, professor of political science at the Central European University and an expert in Hungarian politics, explains how Magyar, a former member of Fidesz, manage to beat Orbán, his former boss.

Magyar’s moment

Enyedi describes Magyar as a centre-right figure with some nationalistic attributes, who is a bit eurosceptic with “some reservations against progressive way of speaking”. However, Enyedi says Magyar changed since first entering politics in 2024, when he gave an explosive interview criticising Orbán’s regime.

Back then he was “clearly someone who reproduced many of the ideological panels of this Orbánist regime, but he was very critical of the corruption that exists in the regime”. He was likened to a clean, young version of Orbán himself.

Since then, Magyar has spent two years travelling around Hungary speaking to people across the country on the campaign trail. “He started to understand better the enormous harm done by the Fidesz regime, and he also became more pro-European in his rhetoric, embracing the democratisation agenda,” says Enyedi.

Magyar is now able to “provide the lowest common denominator for all pro-democratic forces,” says Enyedi. “In that sense, he’s more than simply representative of one political ideological current.”

As European leaders breathe a sign of relief at Magyar’s victory, Enyedi says although Europe has not gained an “enthusiastic partner”, he will be a much more constructive one. “Partly out of conviction, partly because he needs EU money and he needs that money soon. So he cannot play games. He has to make a deal with the EU leadership.”

Listen to the interview with Zsolt Enyedi on The Conversation Weekly podcast. This episode was written and produced by Gemma Ware, Mend Mariwany and Katie Flood. Mixing by Eleanor Brezzi and theme music by Neeta Sarl.

Newsclips in this episode from CNN, CRM News, euro news and Partizán.

Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feed or find out how else to listen here. A transcript of this episode is available via the Apple Podcasts or Spotify apps.

Zsolt Enyedi has received EU Horizon funding.

– ref. Who is Hungary’s Péter Magyar and how he overturned Viktor Orbán’s illiberal democracy – https://theconversation.com/who-is-hungarys-peter-magyar-and-how-he-overturned-viktor-orbans-illiberal-democracy-280651

April 16, 2026

Embargo à Cuba : l’agroécologie pour éviter l’effondrement alimentaire

Source: The Conversation – France (in French) – By Raphaël Belmin, Chercheur en agronomie, photographe, accueilli à l’Institut sénégalais de recherches agricoles (ISRA, Dakar), Cirad

Entre embargo, polycrise et pénuries, l’île résiste à une crise alimentaire majeure. Par quels mécanismes et pour combien de temps ? R. Belmin/Cirad, CC BY-NC-ND

Comment éviter l’effondrement alimentaire lorsqu’un pays vit sous embargo durable et voit ses alliances se fragiliser ? Une étude récente à Cuba met en évidence la réactivation d’une agroécologie déjà mobilisée lors des crises antérieures, aujourd’hui réinvestie sous des formes plus hybrides et décentralisées.

Depuis la révolution de 1959, nourrir la population est un pilier du projet politique cubain. L’État a fait de l’alimentation un service public : centralisation des importations, planification de la production et rationnement à travers la libreta, un carnet distribué à chaque famille permettant d’accéder à des produits de première nécessité dans des magasins d’État à prix subventionnés.

L’objectif était clair dès l’origine : garantir un accès universel à l’alimentation. Cuba n’a pas dévié de cet objectif, malgré l’embargo durable mis en place par les États-Unis dès 1962. Dans ce contexte, l’alliance cubaine avec l’Union soviétique a longtemps permis de stabiliser ce modèle en assurant énergie, pesticides et engrais agricoles, semences et plants, fournitures vétérinaires et devises.

Un modèle alimentaire étatique sous dépendance extérieure (années 1960-1980)

Le système cubain reposait alors sur un appareil productif fortement centralisé. L’agriculture d’État – le sector estatal – a regroupé les exploitations héritières des grandes entreprises agricoles nationalisées après 1959. Ces fermes publiques, gérées par des entreprises d’État, fonctionnaient avec des salariés agricoles rémunérés par un salaire fixe, des objectifs de production planifiés et des circuits d’approvisionnement centralisés en pesticides, en engrais et en énergie. À leur apogée dans les années 1980, les entreprises agricoles d’État couvraient près de 80 % de la surface agricole nationale, ne laissant que 20 % entre les mains du secteur privé.

Cette architecture institutionnelle et productive a tenu tant que des appuis extérieurs amortissaient les chocs, qu’ils soient internes ou géopolitiques. Mais, au début des années 1990, l’effondrement de l’Union soviétique a provoqué à Cuba une chute brutale des échanges commerciaux, des soutiens financiers ainsi que des approvisionnements en énergie, en engrais et en pesticides. Fragilisé dans ses bases économiques et productives, le pays s’est vu contraint de réinventer son modèle agricole.

Peinture ornant les murs d’une station de recherche agricole cubaine. Dans la pensée révolutionnaire cubaine, l’agriculture d’État incarne la souveraineté nationale : travailler la terre devient un acte politique, garant de l’autonomie alimentaire et de la dignité collective. Crédit photo : R. Belmin/Cirad.
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De l’agroécologie contrainte à l’institutionnalisation politique (années 1990-2010)

Ce contexte de pénurie du début des années 1990, connu sous le nom de « período especial » (« période spéciale »), a entraîné un virage profond du système productif cubain. Diversification des cultures, recyclage de la matière organique, traction animale, production de bio-intrants (produit d’origine biologique utilisé en agriculture pour remplacer ou réduire les intrants chimiques, ndlr) : une agroécologie de survie s’est progressivement installée et diffusée à grande échelle, à la fois dans les campagnes et au cœur des villes.

Ces transformations sont, d’une part, encouragées par une politique agraire consistant à transformer certaines fermes d’État en coopératives et à redistribuer des terres en usufruit à des producteurs. Elles sont, d’autre part, accompagnées par un vaste programme étatique d’agriculture urbaine et suburbaine visant à rapprocher producteurs et consommateurs, sur des bases majoritairement organiques : exploitations maraîchères de petite taille, souvent conduites en planches bio-intensives (voir photo ci-dessous), avec des modes de rémunération réformés pour être davantage incitatifs.

D’abord vécue comme une adaptation pragmatique à la pénurie, cette dynamique a ensuite été institutionnalisée, jusqu’à constituer un référentiel politique et idéologique articulant souveraineté alimentaire, justice sociale et résilience nationale.

Les années 2000 et 2010 ont ensuite été marquées par une forme de normalisation relative. Le soutien vénézuélien, la reprise partielle des importations et le retour d’engrais et de pesticides de synthèse ont relégué l’agroécologie au second plan dans certaines filières, sans toutefois effacer les compétences et les pratiques acquises. Les données nationales indiquent une augmentation sensible de la production agricole, notamment pour les racines et tubercules (manioc, malanga, igname, pomme de terre…), les légumes et les légumineuses, malgré des niveaux d’intrants durablement inférieurs à ceux de la période pré-1990.

Les exploitations agroécologiques cubaines sont le plus souvent de petites fermes familiales diversifiées, peu mécanisées et cherchant l’autonomie en intrants et en énergie. On y trouve des cultures maraîchères diversifiées, des haricots, des racines et tubercules, des bananes plantains, des fruits et des céréales. Dans les zones urbaines et périurbaines, la crise des années 1990 a favorisé l’essor des canteros (photo du haut), des planches de culture surélevées conduites en bio-intensif, permettant de produire davantage sur de très petites surfaces grâce au travail manuel et au recyclage local de la matière organique. Dans un contexte de forte raréfaction des intrants, ces systèmes ont permis d’améliorer l’efficacité d’usage des ressources. Crédit photo : R. Belmin/Cirad.
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Cuba en polycrise : un système alimentaire centralisé devenu vulnérable (années 2020)

Mais au tournant des années 2020, l’accumulation de chocs énergétiques, économiques et géopolitiques révèle la vulnérabilité structurelle du modèle alimentaire centralisé cubain et précipite son entrée en polycrise.

La dégradation de la situation au Venezuela à partir de 2016 entraîne une chute des livraisons pétrolières, tandis que le durcissement de l’embargo américain complique l’accès aux engrais, aux pesticides, à l’énergie et aux financements. À ces contraintes externes, s’ajoutent des fragilités internes : forte dépendance aux importations alimentaires, vétusté des infrastructures et dysfonctionnements logistiques persistants. Si bien que, à partir de 2017, la production agricole nationale recule dans la plupart des filières stratégiques – riz, légumes, légumineuses, racines et tubercules, fruits et agrumes.

En 2020, cette fragilité bascule en crise systémique : la pandémie de Covid-19 interrompt brutalement les recettes touristiques, principale source de devises du pays. Privé de ressources extérieures, l’État cubain voit ses marges de manœuvre financières se contracter fortement, fragilisant le modèle centralisé d’approvisionnement, de distribution et de don. La réunification monétaire engagée en 2021, en générant une forte inflation, accentue encore cette dynamique.

Résultat : Cuba importe aujourd’hui 70 % à 80 % de son alimentation, pour un coût annuel proche de deux milliards de dollars (plus de 1,6 milliard d’euros). Si les produits alimentaires sont partiellement exemptés de l’embargo depuis 2000, ces importations s’effectuent sous fortes contraintes, notamment l’obligation de paiement comptant, sans accès au crédit. À l’inverse, les engrais et pesticides agricoles et l’énergie restent fortement affectés par le durcissement des sanctions.

Dans ce contexte, l’accès économique à l’alimentation se dégrade fortement. Le système de rationnement de la libreta, longtemps pilier de la sécurité alimentaire, ne couvre plus qu’une part limitée des besoins.

Cette situation révèle une tension structurelle : un système fortement centralisé et dépendant d’approvisionnements extérieurs, qui devient particulièrement vulnérable lorsque ces flux se contractent. Pensé comme un dispositif de sécurisation alimentaire universel, le modèle étatique cubain se trouve ainsi confronté à une accumulation de chocs qu’il peine à absorber.

« Cuba : la colère monte contre les pénuries alimentaires » : un reportage de 2024 sur France 24.

Résister sous contrainte : l’agroécologie comme ressort discret de la résilience cubaine

Cependant, malgré la dégradation marquée de la sécurité alimentaire, certains indicateurs nutritionnels restent étonnamment stables. La prévalence de la sous-alimentation chronique demeure limitée, la mortalité infantile reste basse, et la disponibilité énergétique alimentaire est comparable à la moyenne mondiale, largement au-dessus du seuil critique de 2 100 calories (kcal) par personne et par jour. Ce décalage entre fragilisation du système centralisé et maintien relatif des équilibres alimentaires interroge les ressorts réels de la résilience cubaine.

Des travaux récents expliquent ce paradoxe par un déplacement progressif du centre de gravité du système alimentaire cubain. À mesure que les dispositifs étatiques d’approvisionnement s’affaiblissent, les capacités productives et adaptatives du secteur non étatique prennent le relais. La résilience du système alimentaire cubain ne repose plus sur son architecture centralisée, mais sur un basculement vers des dynamiques décentralisées.

Les fermes du secteur non étatique assurent aujourd’hui l’essentiel de la production alimentaire nationale : avec environ 40 % des terres cultivées, elles contribuent à plus de 80 % de l’offre alimentaire. Dans un contexte de contraintes croissantes, elles constituent également le principal foyer d’innovation agroécologique.

Elles expérimentent de nouvelles techniques culturales, investissent dans les énergies renouvelables, développent des circuits courts, et réhabilitent des techniques de conservation et de transformation, comme la déshydratation de fruits et de plantes aromatiques, la fabrication de coulis de tomate, de fromage de chèvre et de pickles de légumes en saumure. La polycrise agit ainsi comme un catalyseur, accélérant la décentralisation de la production et de l’innovation.

L’agroécologie s’impose à Cuba comme une stratégie d’adaptation à l’incertitude et aux pénuries, sans pour autant relever d’une logique d’autarcie stricte. Les fermes restent hybrides, ajustant en permanence leurs stratégies aux conditions d’accès aux ressources. Les producteurs alternent entre autoproduction de bio-intrants et recours aux engrais importés, et combinent traction animale et mécanisation afin d’assurer la continuité des travaux agricoles malgré les contraintes énergétiques. Les productions alimentent à la fois les circuits étatiques (magasins publics, hôpitaux, libreta) et des marchés locaux informels, devenus essentiels pour l’écoulement des surplus et l’accès à la liquidité.

Face aux pénuries d’énergie et d’intrants, les exploitations agricoles cubaines cherchent à renforcer leur autonomie en mobilisant des ressources locales : petits méthaniseurs produisant du biogaz à partir de déchets organiques, dispositifs de récupération d’eau de pluie ou encore recours à des sources d’énergie éolienne, solaire et hydraulique. Pour autant, il ne s’agit pas d’une recherche d’autonomie totale. Les systèmes restent fondamentalement versatiles, capables d’alterner entre ressources locales et intrants importés selon les contraintes. Ainsi, la traction animale (bœufs pour le labour, chevaux pour le transport) coexiste avec le recours au tracteur et à des circuits informels d’approvisionnement en carburant. Crédit photo : R. Belmin/Cirad.
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Cette capacité à naviguer entre différents régimes techniques et institutionnels, plutôt qu’à s’enfermer dans un modèle unique, constitue un ressort central de la résilience cubaine. Elle s’accompagne toutefois d’une fragilité croissante : l’émigration des jeunes actifs réduit la main-d’œuvre disponible, compromettant la transmission des savoir-faire et limitant les capacités d’innovation dans des systèmes intensifs en travail.

Il n’existe pas de chiffre unique permettant de quantifier précisément le nombre d’exploitations agroécologiques à Cuba. Une étude de référence avance que plus de 200 000 producteurs participent au mouvement agroécologique Campesino a Campesino, couvrant plus d’un million d’hectares et représentant environ de 50 % à 60 % du secteur paysan. Cependant, seule une fraction de ces exploitations – environ 3 600 fermes – disposent d’une certification agroécologique par l’Asociación Nacional de Agricultores Pequeños (ANAP).

Ces chiffres doivent toutefois être interprétés avec prudence : ils agrègent des niveaux d’engagement très hétérogènes et incluent des fermes de démonstration ou expérimentales accompagnées par des programmes publics ou de coopération, dont la représentativité reste à documenter.

Bio-intrants et biofabriques : un révélateur des tensions du modèle cubain

Les bio-intrants offrent un point d’entrée particulièrement révélateur des tensions et des capacités d’adaptation du système alimentaire cubain.

Dans un contexte de pénurie chronique d’engrais de synthèse et de pesticides de synthèse importés, les bio-intrants – notamment à base de microorganismes autochtones bénéfiques – occupent une place stratégique dans la capacité du système agricole cubain à continuer de produire. Cuba dispose à cet égard d’un capital scientifique ancien en microbiologie agricole et d’un réseau historique de biofabriques publiques pensées comme des infrastructures de souveraineté technologique et alimentaire.

La biofabrique IHPLUS de la station Indio Hatuey (province de Matanzas) produit un biofertilisant à base de microorganismes, avec une capacité de 1 million de litres par an. Autrefois largement diffusé, le biofertilisant connaît depuis deux ans une chute drastique de production, inhérente à des difficultés structurelles, au premier rang desquelles les coûts élevés du carburant freinant la distribution. Crédit photo : R. Belmin/Cirad.
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À l’image du secteur agricole dans son ensemble, les biofabriques étatiques voient leur fonctionnement fortement contraint par les pénuries d’énergie et d’intrants. L’augmentation du coût du carburant freine la distribution et a conduit à l’arrêt des services techniques qui assuraient la promotion et la diffusion du produit dans les territoires. Les difficultés de transport limitent également la capacité des agriculteurs à s’approvisionner directement à l’usine, comme ils le faisaient auparavant. À cela s’ajoutent des contraintes d’accès aux substrats, aux milieux de culture, aux emballages et aux pièces détachées, indispensables à la production régulière de bio-intrants.

Il en résulte un décalage croissant entre l’existence d’une infrastructure publique formelle et sa capacité opérationnelle à répondre aux besoins des producteurs.

Face à ces limites, des formes d’innovation paysanne et collective se développent à l’échelle locale : à l’image des fermes Cinco Palmas et de Punta Las Cuevas (photos ci-dessous), où la production artisanale de bio-intrants soutient la production de plantules, alimente d’autres exploitations et s’insère dans des circuits courts. Loin d’émerger ex nihilo, ces dynamiques mobilisent et recomposent des savoirs, des réseaux et des dispositifs hérités, réactivés et adaptés aux contraintes contemporaines. Elles illustrent plus largement un déplacement des capacités d’innovation du système cubain, du secteur étatique vers des formes décentralisées et informelles.

Cependant, cette agroécologie décentralisée reste largement invisible et peu reconnue dans les cadres réglementaires existants, ce qui limite sa diffusion et sa montée en échelle. C’est à cette interface que s’inscrivent différents projets de recherche qui visent à documenter les pratiques émergentes, à en évaluer les performances et à analyser les conditions institutionnelles de leur reconnaissance.

Face aux pénuries d’intrants importés, une dynamique d’innovation décentralisée émerge à Cuba : à la ferme, les producteurs fabriquent leurs propres biopesticides à base d’huiles essentielles, biofertilisants, éliciteurs et microorganismes autochtones bénéfiques (MAB), renforçant l’autonomie productive et la résilience des systèmes agricoles. crédit photo : R. Belmin/Cirad.
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Quand l’agroécologie redéfinit le rôle de l’État

L’expérience cubaine montre qu’un système alimentaire peut encaisser des chocs extrêmes et s’adapter par la transformation de ses structures sans s’effondrer. Sous embargo, crises économiques multiples et recompositions géopolitiques régionales, Cuba évite encore une crise nutritionnelle majeure. Mais cette résilience ne tient plus à la planification centralisée : elle repose désormais sur un basculement vers des formes décentralisées et hybrides d’agroécologie portées par le secteur non étatique.

Paradoxalement, ce mouvement d’autonomisation productive et de décentralisation n’entre pas frontalement en tension avec l’État : il trouve aujourd’hui un écho explicite dans le discours officiel. Le décret-loi 128/2025 sur la promotion de l’agroécologie, entré en vigueur en septembre 2025, inscrit l’agroécologie comme levier stratégique de souveraineté alimentaire, de préservation des écosystèmes et de protection de la santé publique.

Ce texte marque une inflexion importante, puisque l’État ne se présente plus seulement comme planificateur et distributeur, mais aussi comme facilitateur d’une transition visant à renforcer l’autonomie en intrants, la relocalisation productive et la résilience territoriale.

Les auteurs ne travaillent pas, ne conseillent pas, ne possèdent pas de parts, ne reçoivent pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’ont déclaré aucune autre affiliation que leur organisme de recherche.

– ref. Embargo à Cuba : l’agroécologie pour éviter l’effondrement alimentaire – https://theconversation.com/embargo-a-cuba-lagroecologie-pour-eviter-leffondrement-alimentaire-277038