In her novel “Clean”, Chilean writer Alia Trabucco Zerán gives a maid named Estela a voice. In telling her story, she reveals insights into the reality faced by those who keep daily life running like clockwork for their employers, while they themselves are typically marginalised.

International law is under severe attack from various sides at present, with Russia’s war against Ukraine and the war being waged by the US against Iran being just two examples. Furthermore, the US has openly attacked one of the most important institutions in the field of international law, the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. Yet international law is by no means obsolete, argues Kai Ambos, a professor of criminal and international law and a judge. In our interview, he explains how it can be strengthened at the domestic and international levels.

Every morning before dawn, Sarah is already carrying into Bujumbura cassava leaves she can process and sell. Her small business shows how informal work provides women with not only income they can control themselves, but also greater independence.

The UN system has opened up opportunities for Algerian environmental activist Selma Bichbich to engage in politics. But she’s increasingly concerned that some fundamental principles of international law are hardly being respected at all these days. She is convinced the next generation will do politics differently.

Our writer, Shakira Wafula, is a face of the Gen Z protest movement in Kenya. Writing from Nairobi, she captures what many young people in the Global South feel: that the “rules-based world order” functions less like a universal legal system and more like a hierarchy in which power determines whose rights are protected, whose violations of the law are punished, and whose sovereignty is negotiable.

Zimbabwe has introduced regulations designed to make carbon trading more transparent. At a local level, the new system is raising hopes of generating income through climate projects.

For centuries, the Tuareg have managed scarce water and grazing resources through mobility, cooperation and customary law. Governments and international donors should recognise them and other Indigenous groups as partners in climate adaptation.

Bitcoin has a problematic reputation, particularly amongst people who oppose the use of technology for excessive personal gain, as well as those who believe that cryptocurrencies cannot do any good. But is this judgement justified?

The two pieces of good news this month are about Chile being the first country in the Americas to eliminate leprosy and about Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, reporting significant progress in the fight against malaria.

“Kanaval” is a powerful film about migration, being foreign and the search for a new beginning, told from a child’s perspective. Its emotional impact is deepened by the life story of its young lead.

In the Sahel, ongoing conflicts between governments and terrorist groups are undermining people’s ability to adapt to climate change and forcing them to abandon traditional coping strategies. At the same time, climate change is sometimes misused as a convenient explanation, while political failures are fuelling conflict. To break this vicious circle, states must address the crucial issues of land, security and mobility to regain the trust of populations in peripheral areas, says political geographer Kamal Donko.

For centuries, the Tuareg have managed scarce water and grazing resources through mobility, cooperation and customary law. Governments and international donors should recognise them and other Indigenous groups as partners in climate adaptation.

Cuts in foreign aid are forcing clinics to close across Malawi, disrupting HIV care and family planning services. Health experts warn that years of progress could quickly be reversed.

There is one question that doesn’t get asked often enough in discussions about anti-corruption reforms in Africa: where does the information about malpractice come from – and what about those who provide it?

Regimes around the world agree with China’s ideas about how the internet should be controlled. Chinese firms export digital technologies that enable states to control online content, and China is lobbying internationally for more state sovereignty when it comes to regulating the internet.

Over the past four decades, China has emerged as one of the biggest players on the world stage and has significantly extended its influence across the Global South. Here are nine facts and figures that map that ascent.

For centuries, the Tuareg have managed scarce water and grazing resources through mobility, cooperation and customary law. Governments and international donors should recognise them and other Indigenous groups as partners in climate adaptation.

China’s economic policy relies on industrial overproduction and is flooding the world market with cheap exports. Developing and emerging market countries may profit in the short term, but China’s actions increase the risk that they will find it harder to establish local industries and create productive jobs.

Thousands of Kenyans leave the country every year in search of work abroad. New reforms target rogue recruiters, but many migrants remain exposed to exploitation.

Clean water is becoming increasingly scarce worldwide, which heightens the risk of supply crises and conflicts over its distribution. How German development cooperation is helping to improve water security in countries such as Iraq and Jordan.

Since the early 1980s, China has risen from a very poor, low-income country to a higher-middle income country which leads the world in terms of exports. That was neither brought about by Communist dogmatism nor by free-market orthodoxy, but by the regime’s pragmatism, as Stefan Dercon of Oxford University argues.

What will happen to the UN Sustainable Development Goals beyond 2030? Given how increasingly fragmented and geopolitically fraught the world is just now, negotiations at next year’s SDG Summit are likely to be difficult – and various outcomes are conceivable. Research conducted by GIZ sheds light on the most contentious issues, the role various actors could play and why forging alliances is more important than ever.

Users worldwide are increasingly getting most of their news via platforms operated by a small number of major tech companies. How can journalism become less dependent on Big Tech infrastructure?

A too-weak president can be a threat to democracy, too

Malawi’s chronic foreign-currency shortage is no longer just a problem for banks and businesses. Delayed payments and struggling telecom networks increasingly affect everyday life.

Critics have warned that Chinese projects could chip away at democracy in Latin America. Our research suggests the opposite may be happening.