1999 IRTF Report

The SRRT International Responsibilities Task Force had a successful program at the 1999 Annual Conference on "Searching for the Enemy: Alternative Sources for US Foreign Policy." It was co-sponsored by the SRRT Alternatives in Print Task Force. Chuck D'Adamo presented a selected bibliography on the best books for US foreign policy and analyzed the content of articles in the Alternative Press Index. He was therefore able to give us a table of authors and where they publish their articles, the number of articles on US foreign policy in the journals indexed, the subjects covered, and the institutions and key subject terms. He also provided a quick printout of broad articles published from 1991 to 1998. Send requests for copies of this research to cdadamo@charm.net.

Erik Leaver from the Institute for Policy Studies described the work of the Institute and provided information packets including samples of their short policy briefings titled, Foreign Policy in Focus. These publications are a joint effort of the IPS and the Interhemispheric Resource Center. He also talked about US policy towards Iraq and Yugoslavia. See their website at http://www.foreignpolicy-infocus.org or contact Eirk at leaverpif@igc.org.

Tom Fenton from WorldViews talked about how he identifies friendly organizations and prints the information in their quarterly bibliography (with same title). He talked about the work of WorldViews, and noted that their Third World Resource Directory and their Africa World Press Guide are available free online. For more information, see their website at http://www.igc.org/worldviews/awpguide/ or e-mail to worldviews@igc.org.

Ann Sparanese distributed a short handout bibliography on Cuba and Latin America. For copies, contact her at SPARANESE@bccls.org. Elaine Harger provided a short annotated bibliography on works for middle or high school students. For copies, contact her at eharger@tao.agoron.com.

We also organized the protest against the appearance of General Powell as ALA's keynote speaker focusing on the implications of this militarization of ALA and his outrageous fee of $70,000 especially in light of his focus on volunteerism. Even though a vendor paid $50,000 of the fee, there are many better ways to spend the remaining $20,000 of our dues money. And perhaps the vendor's $50,000 could have also gone to something worthwhile. Finally, we note the passage of the SRRT resolution calling for a new policy towards Iraq including the lifting of sanctions, promotion of a weapons free zone in the Middle East, and balancing our collections.