World Philosophy day - see our favourite resources

17th November is world philosophy day. nominated by UNESCO to encourage individuals to think about
the values of self development which philosophy can bring.
Here are some favourite free resources.
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has many free articles from experts
Philpapers index and bibliography of websites, papers and indsexes covering all aspects of philosophy
PhilArchive. PhilArchive is the largest open access e-print archive in philosophy

There are also many sites which offer fre aces to the digitised papers of individual philosophers.
Some great examples are:
The Bentham Project, UCL which is working to transcribe the works of Jeremey Bentham. It has links to  has many online papers
Internet classics archive - which has works by Greek and Roman writers
Early Modern Texts prepared by Hertford College Oxford University
it includes an audiofile of
Mary Wollstonecraft, 1759-1797- A Vindication of the Rights of Woman,
 View images of a rare copy from the LSE Library digital library

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Today is world Kindness day - view our academic research on altruism and kindness!

World Kindness Day is an international observance on 13 November. It was introduced in 1998 by the World Kindness Movement a coalition of nations kindness, civil society/  NGOS.

 for references to recent academic research on altruism see

Stanford University Center for Alturism and Compassion research.

this has a compassion database.which has reference and links to recent articles. Some are in full text.

Also related to kindness is charity. Here are some academic resources related to reasons, nature and extent of charitable giving.

The Catalog of Nonprofit Literature 2.0  maintained by the US based foundation center contains more than 33,000 records, the majority of which include descriptive abstracts.It includes books, articles and reports added to their collections.

PRO: Philanthropy Resources Online from the IUPUI University Library. PRO is a digital library of primary and secondary sources that supports teaching and learning about philanthropy and the nonprofit sector.  it provides free access to over 500 journals and books (focussing on historic materials) relating to the activities of charitable organisations in the USA.

Who gives and why?

The Charities Aid Foundation conducts recent research into charitable giving.This includes the World Giving Index which traces global trends and UK Giving which traces donor motivations and giving trends. Its charities hub has monthly news letters and reports which you can sign up to.

TSRC - University of Birmingham researches third sector organisations and volunterring. It publishes reports on participation and the role of charities. Explore these recent working papers.

The Institute for Volunteering research publishes some free papers online

Which  charities are effective?

The Charities Register is  maintained by the Charities commission. It gives names, addresses, purposes and details of the financesof UK based charities. It is also possible to browse charities by income sources, expenditure

Giving what we can is a UK based organisation/ charity which examines what it believes to be the most effective. Consult the site for further details.

Charity Watch is a USA based charity watchdog which conducts regular asessments. Read news and reports on its website.It has charity ratings on its website

Charity Navigator  has ranking s and ratings of USA charities. Charity Navigator's rating system examines two broad areas of a charity's performance; their Financial Health and their Accountability & Transparency.

Equal Pay day 2017 - why the struggle goes on

Equal Pay day 2017

Equal pay day 2017 is the 10^th November this is the date after which effectively pay becomes unequal with men earning more than women.

See more about the campaign on the Fawcett society website

The society has also published some interesting report on the gender pay gap by ethnicity.

Test your knowledge on the Gender pay gap in the Uk and find out what it is for your job.

Get the data tables from the Office of National Statistics.

Find out about the historical struggle for Equal Pay in the Uk using the original source documents, and oral histories on the TUC Union Makes Us Strong website

On a global scale the latest gender gap report from the World Economic Forum released last week that it would take 217 years to close the gender pay gap worldwide

Paradise papers - get some academic research facts

In the news this week. the paradise papers - a scandal involving off shore tax havens used by the rich and famous.

See the special investigation from the Guardian and other international media partners

Offshore tax centers research

OECD Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes - the web site has full text report on tax standards and reporting 


IMF – Offshore Banking and Financial Centers a series of staff papers published before 2014.
Global Financial Integrity is a USA based think tank which examines illicit finance and the developing world see its report on tax havens from 2016.
The Financial Transparency Coalition also highlights this aspect.
U4 anti-corruption center has a range of reports on tax havens. the site  'assists donor practitioners in more effectively addressing corruption challenges through their development support'. These include DFID

The Tax Justice Network has a Financial security Index which ranks jurisdictions according to their secrecyand scale of offshore activities.

for a different perspective

International Financial Centres Forum (IFC Forum) membership  organisation of the IFC justifying their existence

Stop violence against journalists on International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists.

The United Nations has designated 2 November as International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists.This event calls on nations to condemn attacks on journalists and to bring the alleged perpetrators to justice. 

Here are some free resources

On 26th 2016 September an important new resolution was passed by the Human Rights committee condemning violence against journalists.

Other resources on this topic include:

• The Committee to Protect Journalists which has data on journalists killed since 1992 as well as annual reports on the nature and extent of attacks on the press. Its 2017 impunity Index gives facts and figures on murders and violence against journalists

• International Press Institute death watch data has statistics from 1997 onwards. Its website also has reports on press censorship and attacks on freedom worldwide.

• The Inter-American Press Association has regional news and other publications

• These organisations have news headlines and reports:

: International Federation of Journalists- campaign

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