Race Against Time

"I have spent the last four years watching people die." With that sentence, Stephen Lewis starts his book/ a series of lectures. This book shows us the difference between vision and reality. He talks about the eight Millennium Development Goals, which focus on educations, especially, and cutting poverty in half by 2015. Yet, Stephen Lewis admits to him not believing that these goals will happen do to countries not living up to their promises. He explains how everyone falls short of donating the amount of foreign aid they promised to the united nations. This even applies the eight top countries in the world. This is a very emotional book, full of truth about what life is like in a third world country and how we take everyday things for granted!

'Race Against Time' is a Massey Lecture series, a compilation of 5 lectures of Stephen Lewis as he discusses the plight of Africa in the face of HIV/AIDS, poverty, the status of women and the lack of education for children.

Stephen Lewis having spent the past 20 years working for different factions of the UN including his current post as the UN Secretary-General for HIV/AIDS in Africa has seen the devastation the disease has inflicted on the African people.

This book opened my eyes to the disappointing reaction from the international community to the problems affecting the African nations. Stephen Lewis succinctly describes his personal experiences visiting many African countries, and details the few positive steps being made as well as the social atrocities the countries face due to poor government response both locally and internationally. I feel disappointed that the international community doesn't seem to pay full attention to a very real problem. Whole generations of Africans are growing up orphans due to AIDS and sub-Saharan Africa is slipping further into poverty, yet the world does almost nothing to help.

This is an eye-opening book which will expand your view of the world and the international community. Each lecture is best read in one reading, as they are quite dense with information.

Although I haven't quite finish this book yet, I have learned so much about the AIDS pandemic that I know I wouldn't have found elsewhere. As I read the book, it is so vivid and brilliant that I feel as though Stephen Lewis himself is speaking to me, educating me about this issue in which so many are unaware. He speaks honestly and openly about his experiences and how he has witness our world do very little to lessen its effects. Also, he includes how our world can help bring an end to the pandemic. Truly a great read that will make you more aware globally of what is going on in Africa.

How to move from inspired to action? I recommend you follow this book with Elizabeth's May's book entitled "How to Save the World in Your Spare Time". It's not enough to be aware of a situation in need, or to consider your obligation fulfilled by the mere reading of a book. They should sell the two as a package.

I recently finished this book and can say in all honesty that it has changed the way I view the world. It makes you think twice about how much food we waste and how fortunate we are to have free health care. I am a Sociology student and was required to read this book in one of my courses. I have passed it on to fellow friends and family, simply because I think it's important for us all to know what is going on in the poverty stricken areas of South Africa and that we need to attempt to make a change.
This is a must-read for any university student...it will broaden your perspectives on world politics and also make you want to volunteer abroad!

I loved this book! I found it extremely informative and really broadened my perspective on a lot of world issues. It explores the AIDS pandemic and its effect on Africa, the status and importance of women, and the poverty of Africa. Lewis shares information and experiences that he has experienced personally. I found it easy to read and there were points when I found it hard to put down. I would recomment this book to anyone with an interest in world or African issues, or those who just want to expand their view of the world and experience a different perspective.

...while antiretroviral, preventative care, and medicinal treatments for HIV/AIDS receive less than a paltry fifty billion.

A trillion for weapons.

Fifty billion for HIV/AIDS.

The most astonishing thing about reading Stephen Lewis' book is not from the mass of appropriate statistics he presents on the scourge of the pandemic (as part of a Massey Lecture Series).

It's not in his eloquently- and convincingly-presented fulminations on the absolute futility of the global community to do anything of substance and efficacy in the face of the spread of HIV and AIDS.

It's not even in the cogent manner in which Lewis presents his views as part of his convincingly stepwise dialectic how to - at the very least! - make a small but significant dent in the growing cataclysm of HIV/AIDS.

No.

It's by way of a reveal from his recent last trip to Africa, to Zambia. In his own words, as he sat in front of a group of young women suckling their young, backed by a gathering of grandmothers, now co-opted into taking care of their young grandchildren and the children of others orphaned by HIV/AIDS.

As he describes it, he asks them where have their young men gone?

A hushed murmur descends upon the swelling mass. In this township - or illegal (unincorporated) settlement on the fringe of the capital Lusaka's cityscape, as in many other cities across this once-illustrious continent -- men (males, that is) hardly exist!

They've been murdered by the global community.

That's right, decimated by a global community which spends - to the ludicrous tune of a 20:1 ratio - more than one trillion dollars (!!!) on the international arms trade. Opposing this mighty industrial mass is a global humanitarian attempting to scrounge together (I was going to use the word 'cobble,' but your reaction will require something much sterner than that!) a mere fifty *billion* for Africa's AIDS-ravaged?!

Pathetic! Really.

Lewis sets out to shock, and shock you - dear reader - he mightily does.

As if the book's content weren't reason enough to buy it, I picked up Lewis' book because I respect the whole Lewis family tremendously. Presently comprised of Stephen, his columnist spouse Michelle Landsberg, their various children, including Canadian TV host, filmmaker, and activist Avi Lewis (of counterSpin fame), and his famous writer/activist wife Naomi Klein (of NO LOGO fame), plus their children.

They, as I, are Toronto, Canada natives. Essentially, it means we were all subjected to similar centrifugal forces that had and still swirl about these parts; perhaps from differing generational standpoints, yet all the same. What I'm trying to say is that it's nice to read how the growth of this big city hasn't dulled the sensibilities of my fellow cityfolk to the condition of others in dire need on the planet. Africa has remained at the front and centre of the Lewis agenda, despite the fact that Toronto's "earn/spend" ratrace has spiralled completely out of control in these fair Canadian climes.

I have certain criticisms of the book as well.

For one, I'd have liked Lewis to expand on these appropriately scathing comments to encompass a more detailed treatment of exactly *why* the continent of Africa appeals to him so much.

Okay, he does go into his youthful meanderings to some degree, somewhere around the middle, during the sixties. Heady times for the African continent. I've made a mental note - because of the colourful manner in which Lewis tells about these formerly newly-democratized African colonies - to look up several sources on the theme.

However, I do understand why Lewis' pickings have been slim in this regard. For one, it's his "position paper." This is a speaking series. There's no time for pie-in-the-sky reminiscences, since every minute of what he's on about counts. In the time I've taken to write this, and in the time you've taken read this, something *already* could have been done.

I'm also a little miffed how someone with as much experience as Lewis, how he's not able to supply strategems for the lowly "(wo)man on the street" to come to weigh with their own bodily (and other) contributions.

Again, I don't necessarily fault him for this either - RACE AGAINST TIME is precisely that. Lewis perhaps doesn't have the time - and this *shouldn't* be read with a hint of humour on my part - to waste on supplying the ones without the necessary financial means to come to the rescue. Nevertheless, if he ever considered a sequel to this - or, as Irshad Manji has done with her own site - he might perhaps provide a forum for those of us so inspired to weigh in.

Ideas all...

What frightens the hell out of this here reviewer is what the situation will be like within a mere decade to fifteen years. Lewis yanks down a dark shroud of reality. What is totally assured is that there will be even more deaths. There will be even more suffering. There will even be countless more numbers of orphans living withou

This short and potent book of speeches is both extremely important and immensely engaging. The book provides an insightful look from inside the UN. Lewis describes the ravages of HIV/AIDS and the terrible suffering it has wrought while also providing some glimmers of hope in the programs and people that are trying to stem the monstrous tide. This is a must read for anyone who cares for the health, safety and security of the world today.

These are written as if spoken as Stephen lewis does best. This book delves into many topics which run through the systemic issues of our time. He offers many forward moving ideas and comentary along side a stern look at what the world organizations have and are doing to foster war, aids and povery.

This is a light read and well worth it.

In Race Against Time, a Canadian and UN Special Envoy Stephen Lewish writes about the crisis of HIV/AIDS in Africa. Lewis opens two windows: one into the crisis that is breaking the continent and the other into the workings of the international organizations that have the power to make real difference. The result is a fascination, humbling, distressing, and frustrating education into the reality of the broken world in which we live.

I would do anything Stephen Lewis asked for. He is such a powerful speaker, writer and human being. What would we do without him. I can't say enough positive things about this book, you must read it for yourself!! You will feel inspired to save the world after this book.