Is democratic solidarity in Latin America at risk?

On December 27, 2010, businessmen and entrepreneurs Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev received the maximum sentence, fourteen years, on patently fabricated charges. What is the impact of the sentencing on the Russian economy and foreign investments? How will the democratic opposition proceed in this political climate? And how should US policymakers deal with this new reality?

Solidarity's success was due to the courage, persistence, and sacrifice of the Polish people, and to the discipline of the Solidarity leadership. Despite the regime's policy of provocations, duplicity, and repression--Poland, remember, was under martial law for much of the 1980s--Solidarity eschewed violence and shunned those who advocated street fighting and sabotage.

Competition from Andy Stern might be exactly what the AFL-CIO needs if it wants to survive in theTwenty-first century.

Solidarity was successful in Poland but many societies worldwide are still waiting for democracy, stated the participants in Tuesday's Solidarity 25 Years Laterconference in Gdansk.

Here today, a diverse group of individuals involved with the struggle for democracy throughout the world, have gathered in the spirit of Solidarity. We salute the work of Pedro Pablo Alvarez, secretary general of the United Council of Cuban Workers (CUTC) and demand his release.

Twenty-five years ago, on August 31, 1980, as waves of strikes spread outward from the Lenin shipyard, Polish Communist authorities signed an agreement with the underground opposition movement, giving workers the right to be represented by a democratically elected trade union. Drawing inspiration from Christianity and democratic socialism, Solidarity’s bloodless...

The managing director of the New Atlantic Initiative Radek Sikorski believes that the experience of the Solidarity trade union can build up confidence among opposition activists in undemocratic countries. This will be the aim of the Solidarity 25 Years Later - Lessons in Freedom Struggle conference to be held in Gdansk on Aug.30.