The Bowdoin Globalist – Issue 6 – March 2014

The Struggles of Hosting the World Cup Volume III, Issue 3, March 2013

The Struggles of Hosting the World Cup Why Brazilians have taken to the streets to protest the very sport they worship 1

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CONTENTS

Volume III, Issue 3, March 2014

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Ghost of the Caucasus: Doku Umarov and the Russian Jihad

by Nick Tonckens Is Chilean Education For Sale?

by Kaylee Schwitzer Striking Against Legacies of Apartheid

by Kate Herman Scotland and Catalonia: Europe’s Ballot Box Revolutions

by Dylan Devenyi Cosmic Bombs: Defending Earth from the Asteroid Threat

by Haleigh Collins Joga Bonito? The Struggles of Hosting a World Cup

by Chase Savage Tobacco and the Environment in China

by John Branch Ukraine In Flames

by Drew Van Kuiken No Home For Defectors

by Adam Hunt Spray Paint Beijing

by Minnie Kim The Trouble In Istanbul: Not Just Another Arab Spring

by Camille Wasinger There’s Something About Burma

by Aaron Ng Fighting the Cure

by Katherine Churchill Jobbik: Hungary’s Fearsome Party

by Madeline Cole Inglorious Enterprise: Illicit Trade and Human Trafficking

by Jin Niu 3

Letter from the Editors

Editors In Chief Dylan Hammer Mark Pizzi Christiana Whitcomb Associate Editors Evan Gershkovich Kate Herman Jin Niu Nick Tonckens Photography Editor Hannah Rafkin Layout Mark Pizzi Staff Writers John Branch Daniel Castro Madeline Cole Haleigh Collins Katherine Churchill Dylan Devenyi Adam Hunt Minnie Kim Aaron Ng Chase Savage Kaylee Schwitzer Serena Taj Drew Van Kuiken Camille Wasinger Christopher Wedeman

Dear Reader, In this issue of the Globalist we cover several social movements taking place right now. We strive to offer a reflection on the world today, and we believe that the prominence of so many of these movements is a significant statement on the current global climate. In writing these articles our authors strive to deepen our knowledge and understanding of foreign uprisings – to go beyond the daily news-bites we receive on our Facebook and Twitter feeds. They pierce the veil of superficial narrative to examine the roots giving life to these campaigns.

The most significant popular uprisings are based on much deeper foundations than the immediate shape they take.

The catalyst that pushes these protests into the international spotlight is still important to understand, however. Through an investigation of what ideas and forms resonate with people around the world or attract the spotlight, we gain important insight into which protests will stick and which will ultimately fail. As we see in Chase Savage’s article on the Brazilian FIFA protests, the hosting of major international events can often garner important international attention to form a rallying point for broader social grievances. This issue’s two articles on Russia and Ukraine illustrate the role that the Olympics played in boosting the Euro Maiden Protests to the highest levels of international awareness. While the protests seem locked in this moment in time, we can’t help but wonder, why now?

As always, we look forward to hearing your thoughts, questions and concerns.

Dylan, Mark and Christiana Editors in Chief Special Thanks to the Office of the President of Bowdoin College and photographer Jez Coulson for use of his photograph of South African Miners.

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Ghost of the Caucasus: Doku Umarov and the Russian Jihad

by Nick Tonckens

President Vladimir Putin lost control over the narrative in Sochi long before the athletes arrived. The Winter Olympics, originally intended to showcase the power and prosperity of Putin’s Russia, were shadowed by controversy over the recent Russian anti-homosexuality laws, endless chatter about Edward Snowden, and above all, concerns about impending terrorist attacks.

In the run-up to the games, furious explosions and glowering clouds of smoke drowned out the gentle glow of the Olympic Flame. Once in October and twice in December, radical Islamist suicide bombers targeted Volgograd, formerly Stalingrad, a city only four hundred miles north of Sochi and one of Russia’s major transportation hubs. Because Putin had already turned the Sochi region into a heavily fortified “ring of steel,” this was the next-best target.

Who are these terrorists, and what do they want? The bombers belonged to a militant group from Dagestan, a rebellious province 350 miles to the east. Dagestan and its immediate neighbor, Chechnya, share a painful recent history. These Muslim majority regions attempted to separate from Russia in a series of brutal conflicts during the 1990s. After losing to Russian forces on the battlefield in the early 2000s, the remaining rebels took up a guerilla struggle.

The influx of foreign jihadists into the conflict helped to radicalize the various independence movements. The potent mix of separatist and Islamist ideologies spawned a series of al-Qaedastyle networks throughout the North Caucasus. With brutal tenacity, these networks have targeted Russian civilians, public transportation, schools, and hospitals on a yearly basis.

Amidst this shadowy world of the North Caucasus jihad, one man stands above all others: Doku Umarov, self-proclaimed Emir of the Caucasus and known in the media as “Russia’s bin Laden.”

Among his long list of successes are such spectacular atrocities as the 2002 Moscow theater bombing, the 2004 Beslan school sieges, the 2009-2010 train bombings near Moscow, the 2011 bombing of a Moscow airport, and the 2013-2014 attacks on Volgograd’s buses and train stations. His lethal trademark? The renowned “black widow” suicide bombers—women who lost their jihadist husbands to the Russian security forces.

Like bin Laden, Umarov is both a tactical leader and a symbol: his brutal reputation has made him a legend among the Chechnya and Dagestan jihadist camps. His online videos, such as the July 2013 exhortation rallying the faithful to disrupt the Sochi Olympics, are reminiscent of bin Laden’s old epistles.

It is difficult to tell just how active Umarov was in plotting against the Olympics. Although he apparently directed earlier attacks, his current role is unclear. Experts believe that Umarov’s role has become increasingly symbolic, and that most tactical responsibilities are now left to lieutenants, associates, and allies. Indeed, Umarov may be unable to control a movement as loose-knit as the North Caucasus jihad. Therefore, one can interpret Umarov’s exhortation to attack the Olympic as a mission statement rather than

a campaign order.

There is another reason to doubt Umarov’s role in directing attacks: he might be dead.

President Ramzan Kadyrov of Chechnya, an eccentric Putin puppet, claimed in January (via Instagram, oddly) that Russian security forces had killed Umarov in a recent operation. Both Umarov’s failure to publically deny this claim and the Russian security forces’ silence over the issue look like evidence. Yet, no body has been presented. Kadyrov and others have made similar claims before. In fact, such claims only enhance Umarov’s reputation and allow him to ‘rise from the dead’ again and again.

That no one can confirm nor deny Kadyrov’s assertion further adds to Umarov’s mystique. Whether his failure to emerge is a calculated bid for charisma or proof that he is finally gone, his legend will continue to inspire a movement that will not die.

In the short run, his apparent death has little impact. It came too late to prevent him from potentially hatching any new plans to sabotage the Olympics: those attacks would already have been in the pipeline Furthermore, his operational position can easily be filled by someone else. Russian security expert Andrei Soldatov estimates that, although Russian security forces kill a top insurgent leader every eight months, these strikes do little damage to the movement’s structural integrity.

In the long run, it is difficult to estimate the tangible impact of Umarov’s possible death. It depends on whether Umarov has consolidated significant operational power within the loose-knit North Caucasus jihadist movement and the structural resilience of his groups.

Furthermore, Umarov’s moral influence distinguishes him from other commanders. Legendary reputations like his take time to build and are difficult to replace. Only time will tell if Umarov is really dead, and if so, what the repercussions will be.

Though it failed to disrupt the Olympics, Russia’s Islamic insurgency will continue to remind the world that the struggles for independence continue. Moscow did not settle things when it pounded standing armies into the dirt. In Chechnya and Dagestan, old wounds bleed as freely as ever. If people like Umarov have their way, Putin and his subjects will bleed as well. ■

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Is Chilean Education for Sale? by Kaylee Schwitzer

In the largest series of political demonstrations in Chile since the call for a return to democracy in 1990, the current student-led education reform movement has been dominating the Chilean political scene. Thousands of Chilean students have taken to the streets demanding large-scale systematic educational reforms, ranging from calls for free public education, increased state support for higher education, more equitable admissions processes, the end of for-profit education and freedom from the neoliberal

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education policies employed by authoritarian leader Augusto Pinochet. Both violent and non-violent protests have occurred in cities including Valparaíso, Concepción, Temuco, Valdivia and Santiago.

Since the democratic transition over two decades ago, Chile has stood out in Latin America for its rapid growth, social progress and political stability. Growth, however, has not come without costs. Increased productivity in Chilean society has caused a dramatic spike in demand for higher education. That being said, the accessibility to quality education, as well as other state-subsidized benefits, varies tremendously between socioeconomic strata.

Many Chileans point to the prevailing neoliberal policies imposed during Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship as poignant facilitators of social inequalities. Large-scale privatization of the Chilean education system is a practical way to neutralize and meet the increase in demand without major financial strain on the state. However, neoliberal education has resulted in institutional segmentation, exclusion, and discrimination.

The student education movement recently gained momentum during the conservative presidency of Sebastián Piñera. A highly succesful businessman, President Piñera, whose presidential term began in January 2010 and ended in December 2013, was the first billionaire to be elected President of Chile. Accused of running the country like a corporation instead of a state, Piñera’s right wing policies have driven many youth activists even further left and doused fuel on the growing student movement. In late 2011, the Piñera administration made a meager attempt to squash the student movement by ordering a military draft, calling 57,000 18-year-olds to immediate obligatory military service. By the end of his term in December, he had the lowest popularity ratings of any Chilean president since the demise of Pinochet’s dictatorship roughly 21 years ago.

Promising major educational reforms and the establishment of free public universities, socialist Michelle Bachelet dominated the presidential election in December, running away with 62.5 percent of votes. Elected for her first term in 2006, Bachelet is Chile’s first female president. She served from 2006-2010 and is now returning to office for her second, non-consecutive term as president. Despite failing to achieve any major reform during her first term, she still managed to leave office with a superbly high approval rating of 84 percent. Many Chileans are excited that President Bachelet is back in office.

Before infamous Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet, rose to power in the early seventies, public universities in Chile were entirely controlled and subsidized by the state. Pinochet, however, debunked the entire education system and slashed central control and funding of public schools. Hiding under the guise of “neoliberalism,” Pinochet declared that achievement at the university level was low because there was no competition between schools. Thus, he created a large system of private universities that were accompanied by vouchers and subsidies. The idea was to create an educational model based on the neoliberal ideals of free market competition, minimal government intervention and individuals acting as rational economic actors.

However, instead of advancing achievement like Pinochet had hoped, the only competition that was realized between these private universities was the competition for potential tuition payers, also known as students. Universities began advertising directly to students on television, on subways, on billboards, etc. The decrease of federal spending on schools increased the emphasis placed on revenue generation, making Chilean universities sig-

nificantly more dependent on private investments. This extensive commodification of higher education reserved the best educations for those who could afford steep tuitions.

The notoriously poor quality of higher education in Chile has also not improved. Inadequate funding has forced universities to increase interest rates on student loans and cut costs by hiring more adjunct and part-time professors as well as increasing class size. In 2013, Chile only had two universities on the Academic Ranking of World Universities’ “Top 500 Universities” list. The United States had 163 universities on the same list.

The combination of poor education quality, colossal social inequality and limited state intervention has incited opposition in other parts of Latin America as well. In March 2011, for example, the Santos administration in Colombia tried to pass neoliberal education reform. However, the proposed legislation was met with opposition similar in magnitude to concurrent student demonstrations in Chile. The Colombian administration was forced to withdraw the proposal and little has been accomplished in the past two years since the proposal was shut down. Unequal access to quality education in Colombia remains the status quo.

Meanwhile, other states in the region have increased federal support for public education. Argentina, for instance, increased spending on education from 12 percent of total state expenditure in 2003 to 14 percent in 2009. Public universities in Argentina are tuition free, open to anyone and considered more prestigious than their private competitors. That being said, Argentina also has a 73 percent dropout rate—one of the highest dropout rates in the world.

Brazil has also increased public spending on education from 10.5 percent of the state’s total public expenditure in 2000 to 16.8 percent in 2009. Interestingly, private investment in Brazilian higher education has increased in tandem with public spending. Largely due to the foundation of new private universities, the number of post-secondary students in Brazil has risen from 1.8 million in 2000 to nearly 6.5 million in 2011. Founded at the same time as a significant surge in funding for public education, the establishment of these new private universities encourages competition between private and public universities while simultaneously holding private universities accountable for rising tuitions.

Critics of universal and free higher education argue that a free system can create a surplus of educated workers that, in some fields, can surpass labor demands. This ideology, which aligns with neoliberalism, suggests that some degree of exclusion is necessary in order to encourage constructive competition between universities to increase the overall level of excellence at any given university. Furthermore, students who do not pay tuition, as in the case of Argentina, could potentially place a lower value on higher education.

But despite Pinochet’s ostensible goal of equalizing the quality of education across economic lines, the privatization of Chilean universities has done little more than institutionalize social inequality. As the Bachelet administration works to develop new education reform, it is likely that the relationship between private and public universities will change. Other regional examples, such as Brazil, suggest that it will be important to establish a codependent relationship between the public and private universities in order to drive competition and increase accessibility. However, with growing frustration after a long history of authoritarian rule and stark socioeconomic inequalities, Chile and its increasingly leftist youth may not heed this advice. ■

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Striking Against Legacies of Apartheid

By Kate Herman

Continuous waves of strikes from South African miners have made headlines for years now, most notably the 2012 strikes that left 34 dead, as well as the current platinum miners’ strikes which continue to escalate and saw their first fatality on February 7 of this year. Both in their increasing incidence and the escalating militancy of the miners, it is clear that the miners’ strikes in South Africa are not merely an issue of raising wages by a few percentage points. As strikes turn to massacres and calls for wages turn to calls for open agitation, these demonstrations cannot be considered only in terms of collective bargaining. To understand the significance of the latest spate of strikes in the gold mines, it is first necessary to look at the origins and development of similar strikes as they were intertwined in South African politics under apartheid.

The origins of such politically motivated strikes are rooted in South African’s apartheid past wherein the black population

was not only socially, economically, and politically oppressed, but wholly externalized from the country in which they lived. In a system of differentiated citizenship based on race and the accompanying differentiated rights derived thereof, labor conditions embodied one of the most striking examples of such externalization. Mine workers were by law migrants, concretizing their position outside the stability and security granted by full citizenship, as well as summarily delimiting bargaining rights with multinational mining corporations. A massive system of exploitation was developed around managing mine workers as transposable and disposable factors in production, a cycle only exacerbated by the depressed economic conditions of the neighboring states.

However, in the decades nearing the end of apartheid, structural reform allowed the black population to move from semi and non-skilled labor into skilled labor positions. Key among these reforms was the removal of the “Colour Bar,” which had actively

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limited all non-Europeans from positions higher than unskilled labor since its imposition by legislation in the early 20th century.

Although the dismantling of this system was meant to be a small concession to salvage an economy crumbling under the external condemnation of an escalating international boycott, it in effect became a foothold from which the black community gained political agency—even while still under an apartheid regime. Labor itself, especially within the unique context of the mining industry, became a key arena in which race dynamics in South Africa were contested.

With entry into the skilled labor industry came integration into the national economy and the bargaining power that accompanies it. In 1978, black unions were legalized and formal strikes began under the auspices of demanding percentage increases in wages. However, given entrenched economic division between the industry elite and the miners, mining strikes became known for accepting marginal increases in wages often at the cost of life and limb. While the small difference in wages were often critical for miners (as they continue to be today), the strikes themselves demonstrated a far more significant shift in South African politics—the demonstration of political agency and solidarity among a community previously compelled to compliance under the migrant labor system.

Miners remain a socially and economically marginalized population. The migrant labor system has only been partially reformed following the fall of apartheid. Over the years, the growth and entrenchment of the miners’ unions and their respective bureaucracies in the South African political sphere have ironically resulted in a growing gulf between the miners and those that represent them. In April of this past year, it was discovered that prominent unionists were on the payroll of these multinational mining operations. With the African National Congress increasingly resistant to shift its platform in support of a working population already marginalized, the miners have once again turned to strikes to voice their demands.

In separating themselves from the unions, the miners now operate largely through “wildcat strikes,” a term used to emphasize that these demonstrations once again represent the miners as an autonomous political voice, circumventing a political system that continues to suppress or distort their voice through third parties.

Miners’ calls for a living wage are part and parcel of other calls to give more control of the mining industry to the workers through the nationalization of the mines or the creation of a new labor party disentangled from South Africa’s current political system. These strikes have become the new means to voice the political agency of a group still deliberately held apart from the national political sphere. When one such wildcat strike in Marikana turned into a massacre of 34 miners in August 2012, the tone of such gatherings overtly shifted from strikes to rallies. The reciprocation of increased militancy by the miners indicates that these strikes have become sites of open contention between the miners and the state.

Just as union strikes became a locus for political agency in the years nearing the fall of the apartheid system, miners today are using strikes to demonstrate growing frustration with the lack of reforms directed at facilitating an equitable national economy.

Now as much of a demonstration of political resistance as a call for higher wages, the use of labor strikes continues to represent a form of politics both historically specific to South Africa and constantly straining against the realities of its system. ■

Scotland and Catalonia: Europe’s Ballot Box Revolutions

by Dylan Devenyi

There are 193 member states of the United Nations, and probably a few more countries in the world depending on who you ask. Although this is no meager sum, the global political landscape has changed significantly, considering a few centuries ago there were as many as 1,000 countries in modern day Germany. However, the trajectory of history may be about to reverse: the world may gain two new independent states.

The most recent new state, South Sudan, became independent after a period of fierce warfare in an intensely impoverished environment. These two potential new states, however, are both in Europe: Scotland, currently part of the United Kingdom, and Catalonia, currently part of Spain. Both of these potential states have scheduled referenda to answer the question of independence, but they have little else in common.

The government of Spain has stated that the Catalonian referendum is illegal, with Prime Minister Rajoy saying “any discussion or debate on this is out of the question.” Even though the referendum is non-binding, the showdown between Catalan and Spanish politicians continues. As the date set for the referendum, November 9th, 2014, approaches, both sides refuse to back down.

According to some polls, over 50 percent of Catalans support independence. As recently as a decade ago, however, an independent Catalan republic seemed only a little more likely than an independent Vermont. Even though the Catalan people speak a different language than the Castilian that dominates most of the country, and the region has its own unique culture and history, talk of independence has not become serious until quite recently.

Protests erupted in 2010 when the Spanish Constitutional Court made significant changes to the Statute of Autonomy in Catalonia, removing all mention of Catalonia as a nation and eliminating key protections for Catalan self-government, including control over finances and the judiciary, as well as protections for the Catalan language. As many as 1.5 million people marched in Barcelona in protest of the decision, an event Barcelona’s Mayor called “unprecedented.” Pro-independence parties gained a majority in the Catalonian parliament in elections the following month. With the pro-unity People’s Party in control of the Spanish Parliament, the stage has been set for a confrontation.

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Separatist Catalan politicians have many reasons to argue for Independence. They say Catalonia, wealthier in general than the rest of Spain, has been unfairly forced to support the rest of the country through the recent economic crisis. They cite nations such as Denmark and the Netherlands as examples, believing that they have the potential to join the ranks of other small, wealthy, and efficient European nations, far surpassing the relatively stagnant Spain. Furthermore, many Catalans believe that Catalonia’s independent culture deserves an independent nation-state. Threatened

by Franco’s Fascist regime, which banned their language, they have seen a resurgence in nationalism and pride that keeps their identity strong and independent.

In 2013, the Catalan parliament declared Catalonia “sovereign” and organized a referendum to assess opinion on independence. With the declaration suspended by a Spanish court and the referendum declared illegal, a political crisis may be looming in the southern European nation. The rhetoric continues to escalate, with a Catalan organizer even saying that the Spanish “wouldn’t have enough tanks” to control Barcelona. Going into November, Catalonia’s future is uncertain.

Scotland faces a radically different situation as they approach their own independence referendum, scheduled for September 18th, 2014. This peaceful, democratic vote is a far cry from the Battle of Bannockburn and the Scottish independence wars 700 years ago. Rather than on the fields of Galloway and Northumbria, the war for Scottish independence now takes place in the hearts and minds of Scottish citizens. Unlike in Catalonia, the Parliament of the United Kingdom has agreed to respect the results of the referendum.

The events leading to this state of affairs have been considerably less tumultuous than those in Catalonia. Scotland’s devolved Parliament was established in 1998 when a successful referendum in Scotland led to the passage of the Scotland Act by the Labour government in London. The Scottish National Party (SNP) achieved success in the 2007 election by running on a platform supporting a new independence referendum, but was not able to garner enough support until their second government in 2011. After a long period of negotiations and questions regarding legality (constitutional law in the United Kingdom is notoriously nebulous), the Edinburgh agreement between British Prime Minister David Cameron and

Scottish Prime Minister Alex Salmond was signed, and the referendum scheduled for 2014.

The motivating factors for Scottish independence are less nationalistic than those in Catalonia. Unlike Catalonia, Scotland shares a language with the larger country (notwithstanding small minorities of Scottish Gaelic and Scots speakers), and the fact that the UK parliament has agreed to Scottish autonomy means that Scottish people generally don’t feel that English culture is a threat to their own. Some Scots simply believe the small country could do better as an independent state, able to dictate their own policies on education, finance, and energy. Many believe that the UK Parliament has treated them as an afterthought, citing extremely low life expectancy and high rates of poverty in Glasgow, Scotland’s largest city, relative to the rest of the UK. In addition, economic growth in the UK has been centered around London, and some Scottish politicians argue that complete control over Scotland’s considerable oil resources will help focus that growth within the small northern country, rather than without.

Numerous questions continue to arise around Scottish independence, such as whether the country will be able to use the Pound, switch to the Euro, or create their own currency. Overall, support for Scottish independence is not currently high enough to lead to an affirmative vote, but the independence movement (known as the “Yes” campaign) has seen polls move in their favor over recent months, and the undecided currently make up more than 25 percent of possible voters. The fate of the vote is still uncertain, and debate grows more intense as the September 9 vote approaches.

An independent Scotland and Catalonia would both enter the world alone, needing to reapply to the European Union. Their places within other organizations, such as the council of Europe or NATO, is also uncertain. How the two countries might fare is a subject of constant debate throughout the European Union and the World, and whether they will emerge as independent nations in the near future is unclear. Even more uncertain is whether other nations will follow suit. Support seems to be growing for nationalist groups in the Basque country, the Canary Islands, and Veneto.

Whether this system becomes a new norm will determine whether the new “shot heard ‘round the world” is instead a vote cast at the ballot box. ■

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Cosmic Bombs: Defending the Earth from the Asteroid Threat

by Haleigh Collins

Last February, a meteor exploded 28 miles above the city of Chelyabinsk, Russia, producing a devastating shockwave that knocked people off their feet and shattered windows throughout the city. Traveling at 12 miles per second, the 20-meter wide space rock exploded with the energy of around 500 kilotons. At its peak, the streaking fireball glowed 30 times brighter than the sun and caused 1,210 cited injuries, mostly from falling building debris, flying glass, and extreme burns.

The unforeseen catastrophe sparked an international outcry for protection against asteroids. NASA has long urged government officials to implement an asteroid-fighting group, and the incident in Chelyabisnk prompted the United Nations General Assembly to approve the creation of an International Asteroid Warning Group, which will collaborate with the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOUS), formed in 1959 shortly after the launch of Sputnik to organize international negotiation on the peaceful uses of outer space. Under the plan, nations will discuss and share information about hazardous space rocks. If they detect a dangerous asteroid within earth’s vicinity, COPUOUS will help the International Asteroid Warning group coordinate missions to deflect the asteroid.

While the United Nations has successfully orchestrated the political collaborations to form a plan of detection and deflection, the components still require research funding and delegation until they can be implemented. Perhaps the most incomplete portion of the plan is the preparation stage, which calls on individual countries to conduct research pertaining to asteroid detection and develop backup plans in case the International Asteroid Warning Group fails to detect an asteroid. At present, however, no country has delegated the task of planetary defense to a particular agency, and NASA’s duties do not include the deflection of asteroids.

COPUOUS, for its part, has organized a plan of its own to conduct research and delegate tasks to nations, but lacks the capacity to enforce this strategy. Additionally, the Association of Space Explorers is pressuring the United Nations to set up deflection missions to test the technologies for pushing hazardous rocks off course.

While governments have yet to prioritize the threat of asteroids enough to organize committees and fund resources to preventing galactic threats, astronauts and scientists have long contemplated methods of detection and deflection. The world’s first asteroid-fighting nonprofit, B612, founded by former astronaut Ed Lu, has offered to privately finance an asteroid-detecting infrared telescope, the Sentinel Space Telescope, which is expected to be completed by 2017 and launched the following year. The Sentinel Space Telescope allows scientists to view and track 90 percent of the asteroids larger than 140 meters in Earth’s region of the solar system. The Sentinel will be launched into a Venus-like orbit around the sun, and will operate for five and a half years, during which the

telescope will create a map of the solar system around Earth.

After detecting the asteroid, deflection is the last, and possibly most complicated component of defending Earth. If spotted five or ten years away, slight alterations to an asteroid’s pathway can sufficiently derail its movement toward the Earth. COPUOS has developed multiple potential methods to detect the asteroid, such as using a nuclear explosive device to deflect the space-rock.

This plan would not aim to destroy it through a nuclear explosion, which would cause chunks of debris to head towards the earth. Instead, scientists believe that a blast’s intense radiation could steer the asteroid in different direction.

A slightly simpler solution would be to shoot a kinetic interceptor towards the asteroid in order to nudge it off course. According to Space.com a one mile-per-hour(AP Style?) impact would be enough to divert an asteroid by 170,000 miles if it were hit 20 years before its predicted collision.

A slightly more unconventional approach suggests painting the asteroid different colors. Because black is known to absorb solar radiation and white to reflect it, painting part of an asteroid white would create a push from solar radiation in the direction of the black section. Paint alone could cause the asteroid to veer off its original path, and save earth from a catastrophe. An alternative method involving the radiation of the Sun involves attaching a solar sail to the surface of the asteroid. The structure, once unfurled, would reflect solar radiation and gently push an asteroid out of its original path. While we’ve landed unmanned vessels on asteroids before, experts question our ability to get close enough to an asteroid to paint it or attach something as complex as a solar sail.

If none of these work, NASA could shoot a large probe into the atmosphere in the vicinity of the asteroid. The probe would not crash into it, rather, it would move to a “station-keeping position” near the space rock, pulling it into orbit using its own gravity. This probe would have to be shot directly into the path of the asteroid in order to push against the asteroid enough to counter any towing action by gravitational pull.

With all these potential solutions in mind, Lu remains on guard. “There are 100 times more asteroids out there than we have found,” he warns. “There are about one million asteroids large enough to destroy New York City or larger.” The implementation of the International Asteroid Warning group is a step in the right direction. While the International Asteroid Warning Group, COPUOUS and the Association of Space Explorers is encouraging authorities and countries to begin to take action through funding research and creating committees, leaders are skeptical of investing money in preventing a threat that is deemed unimportant compared to other security issues. Thorough research is necessary to implement any of these strategies, and the time is now to begin protecting earth from galactic dangers. ■

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Joga Bonito?

The Struggles of Hosting a World Cup

by Chase Savage

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The eyes of the world will be on Brazil starting June 12 as the 2014 FIFA World Cup commences in São Paolo. The mecca of soccer will be hosting its first World Cup since 1950 and is expected to field one of the strongest teams in the world.

Led by one of the rising stars of soccer, Neymar, this year Brazil secured a victory in the Confederations Cup, a tournament held the year prior to the World Cup in an effort to gauge the overall preparedness of the host nation, for the first time since its 2002 win in South Korea and Japan. For one of the most fervent fan bases in the world, this should be a time for celebration in Brazil. Instead, the nation has been ravaged by popular protests and disdain for the Rousseff presidency in the past year. As the World Cup approaches, Brazilians have taken to the streets to protest the hosting of the very sporting event that they worship.

As the Brazilian government praised its team’s most recent effort and victory, the public sent a strong message by openly challenging the regime. Instead of Brazil appearing ready to host the World Cup with the spotlight of the sporting world upon it, it looked ill-prepared and severely out of touch with its people.

Over 1.5 million Brazilians took to the streets while the Confederations Cup took place, enjoying wide-ranging support.

Significantly, many members of the national team, including Neymar, stood in support of the protests, galvanizing the public even further. The members of the Brazilian national soccer team are heroes in Brazil, representing the hopes and dreams of the country, and helping to inspire a national fervor for the sport, unparalleled in almost any other country. The national team’s support for the protests, therefore, served as an early sign that these protests would not die off easily. The demonstration increasingly overshadowed Brazilian team victories, and the players’ continued support helped launch the protests to where they are today: violent, wide ranging, and most of all, on the precipice of open revolt.

Meanwhile, the country continues the race against the clock to complete construction. Due to poor planning, as well as little to no regulation or technical training for workers, the World Cup stadiums have been hampered by workers’ deaths, injuries, and stadium collapses. These issues, as well as issues of workers’ rights and pay, have led to labor strikes, one of the main contributing factors for the slowed stadium construction. And yet, for all of the struggles with the stadiums, the spending still must continue. Five of the twelve stadiums are behind schedule.

One of the stadiums, located in Curitiba, stands on the precipice of being dropped from hosting its scheduled matches because it is so far from completion. FIFA is scurrying to find possible last minute replacements if necessary, as the deadlines for stadium preparations near. The country is spending an estimated 8 billion reais, or approximately 3.3 billion dollars, on building brand new stadiums, according to September 2013 estimates, and billions more to refurbish current stadiums. ESPN reported in December that Brazil was already $1 billion over its budget, and this number is expected to rise. Bloomberg reported as early as May 2013 that the realistic cost of the World Cup would amount

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to approximately $15 billion, well above the proposed limits. Many of these stadiums will have little to no use after the World Cup and will become a drain on Brazilian public funds, according to a special report by The Economist on the World Cup. The Brazilian people have expressed overwhelming frustration about the preparations, from the violation of workers rights to the massive spending on the building and renovating of Brazilian stadiums. The protests aim to expose the misguided and poor decision-making of the government, with frustration that the funds are not being spent on improving the every day lives of the common Brazilian. Brazil’s infrastructure is notoriously weak: according to The World Economic Forum, it ranks 114th out of 148 countries.

The government spends far less than most countries on such projects, and when completed, they bring little money to the Brazilian economy. The Economist reported only 1.5 percent of Brazil’s total GDP is spent on infrastructure and that its total value of 16 percent of GDP falls well below the 71 percent average for other big economies. While President Rousseff is attempting to privatize construction projects, especially in the lead up to the World Cup, lack of adequate infrastructure remains a major issue for the country at large. Its people generally feel that the millions that should be spent on long-term plans are instead being spent on vanity projects.

The violent and anarchist nature of the protests is striking.

Led by the Black Blocs, an anti-capitalist activist group bent on overthrowing the Brazilian government, the populist uprising has become far more violent than previously anticipated. NPR’s Lourdes Garcia-Navarro reported in October 2013 that the Black Blocs’ violent undertone has cast a negative light over the protests at large. Many protestors are furious that their attempts to negotiate with the government have been sabotaged by violent acts committed by Black Bloc members. But the Black Bloc will not change their stance. An unidentified member said to Ms. Garcia-Navarro, “Protestors who don’t like the Blocs’ tactics should just stay home.”

This schism within the ranks has made the protests more violent and dangerous. With the World Cup fast approaching, it is clear that the Black Bloc will have something to say on the world’s stage, and it seems unlikely that it will be a peaceful demonstration.

Reporting on the ground has revealed similar scenes to those described by NPR. Wright Thompson, a journalist for ESPN the Magazine, wrote a piece about his month-long experience with the protestors in Brazil. Exploring the history of social unrest in Brazil, he compared the situation to revolutionary periods, including France in 1789 and Cuba in 1957. He reported that the protests, beginning last June, were, “against political parties, and something even more elemental: a protest against the way things work.” This is not simply about excess spending on the World Cup, Mr. Thompson reports, but rather a condemnation of years and years of government corruption and hoarding money from public projects and the people. The people may be chanting, “There will be no World Cup,” but their focus is much broader. Mr. Thompson sees a country filled with idealistic protestors who are inspired by many of the same theories as revolutionaries before them. These are a people who want significant change and believe that they will help usher in a new Brazil.

But as Mr. Thompson’s story reports, the Brazilian protestors’ idealism is at risk of being swept up in its country’s own violent history. It was just under 50 years ago that João Goulart deposed of the Brazilian regime in a military coup. Leaders of modern Brazil are connected to the coup, from President Lula’s advisors to even President Lula himself. The protestors carry the same zeal that

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many of their parents had in 1968, when the Brazilian youth took to the streets to protest the military’s repressive tactics, highlighted by the cold-blooded murder of protestor Edson Luis by the police, and the ensuing military oppression. “Brazil is a spark away,” Mr. Thompson states, a spark away from a nationwide movement that could bring the country to its knees.”

2014 is not the only year Brazil will be in the world spotlight, however. 2016 will see the Olympics in Rio, and the preparations for the Olympic Games are suffering from similar problems. In both cases, the stadiums’ infrastructures are well behind schedule.

Furthermore, forced evictions have gained the attention of mainstream media, as thousands of poor Brazilians face eviction from their homes with almost no notice. Direct connections through political contributions between the real estate companies responsible for resettling evictees and the Rio municipal government have drawn questions of political corruption. While authorities insist that compensation and alternative housing options are being provided, little evidence has been shown to prove the authorities’ statements. Connectas Human Rights Report estimates 200,000 evictions due to construction for the World Cup and Olympics.

Christopher Gaffney, a professor at Rio’s Fluminense Federal University told the New York Times, “We’re seeing an insidious pattern of trampling on the rights of the poor and cost overruns that are a nightmare.” He further stated to the Washington Post: “Brazil is by far and away the champion of forced removals.”

Come June 2014, with the eyes of the world upon it, Brazil may be a powder keg, and the protestors may be further unified.

But it seems just as plausible that when their favorite sport comes to their homeland for its biggest moment, the protests may cease.

Mr. Thompson’s concluding remarks highlight this reality. He discusses the burial of Edson Luis, the most famous student martyr who sparked the mass protests. Mr. Thompson writes, “…the cemetery wanted more money. Nobody came forward…so the cemetery removed his bones. They took them to an oven, incinerating Brazil’s most famous student martyr, whose death changed a country, or maybe didn’t change anything at all.” We do not know what will come of the protests, but one thing is for certain. When the World Cup comes to Brazil in just a few short months, the world will be anxiously watching and hoping that the country will be unified by soccer. ■

Tobacco and the Environment in China

by John Branch

Fifty years ago, the United States Surgeon General, Luther Terry, linked tobacco use to adverse health effects for the first time. To commemorate the anniversary, researchers at Yale published a study in January arguing that subsequent anti-smoking regulations and campaigns have saved eight million lives in the United States alone.

Indeed, tobacco use is still a large public-health issue in the U.S., but the number of smokers has been declining steadily. Since 1965, the percentage of adult smokers in the U.S. has declined by more than half, to 18.1 percent, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention. In many ways, however, the rest of the world is trending in the other direction. According to a 2010 World Health Organization (WHO) report, 80 percent of tobacco smokers live in developing countries.

China, in particular, has a massive tobacco culture; it is the largest consumer of tobacco in the world, with over 300 million smokers. While tobacco use is slowly declining, China lags behind the U.S. and other countries in knowledge about the effects of tobacco. According to the WHO, less than half of Chinese smokers recognize a link between tobacco use and lung cancer or other serious diseases. As a result, few people intend to quit: 15.8 percent of Chinese smokers have tried quitting, compared with 45.3 percent of American smokers, according to the WHO. Over the past year, the Chinese government has made concerted efforts to regulate smoking more heavily. Plans were announced last month to prohibit smoking in public, indoor areas by the end of this year. A separate plan, also announced last month, intends to end smoking inside public schools.

Meanwhile, as China attempts to increase its regulation of tobacco use, it also wants to lessen its environmental impact. While China’s economic prowess has grown, its environmental record has deteriorated in equal measure. The country’s pollution problems have long been well chronicled. Smog and air pollution became a key issue during the 2008 Olympics, as athletes worried about their ability to perform in the polluted air, and the government invested millions of dollars in controversial cloud-seeding technology.

After he was elected as China’s new president in 2012, Xi Jinping made waves by declaring environmental protection a priority. “We should be fully aware of the urgency and difficulty of protecting the environment and reducing pollution as well as the significance and necessity of improving the environment,” he said at the time.

Can China enact reforms that will lessen its environmental impact and improve the health of its citizens? While air pollution caused by vehicle emissions and the construction of massive infrastructure projects is the most visible from a distance, the country

is struggling with other environmental problems, too – climate change issues that will ultimately have a far greater effect on the world than air pollution.

Starting with Chairman Mao’s Great Leap Forward, writes historian Xun Zhou, massive tracts of forest were cleared – perhaps as high as one third of all forested land – in a few years. Tobacco production is a major factor in deforestation, which causes nearly a third of greenhouse gas emission worldwide. Since it is a versatile crop with a reliable market, the economic incentive to clear forest for tobacco production is clear. In doing so, though, tobacco growers are not only emitting greenhouse gases; they are also, essentially, using crop space that could be used for food for a crop that has adverse effects on public health.

There are other environmental concerns, too. Tobacco is a pesticide-intensive crop, which damages the ecosystems where it is grown, creates health problems for the workers who grow it, and contributes to climate change itself. The transportation from farm to city center creates vehicle emissions, and the waste created by cigarettes pollutes water with several toxins.

This would suggest that stricter tobacco laws and curbing its production could be an obvious move. However, even when regulations are passed, many have serious doubts about the Chinese government’s ability—or even desire—to enforce them. “In China, anti-smoking policies have historically been little more than window-dressing due to lax enforcement,” writes Shannon Tiezzi in The Diplomat.

But aside from the predictable difficulty in enforcing laws that aim to change common behaviors, anti-smoking advocates in China must also contend with a significant conflict of interest: their regulations aim to curb behaviors that bring the state-owned tobacco monopoly billions in profits every year. According to a 2012 Bloomberg article, China National Tobacco Corporation’s profits in 2010 exceeded those of the top three independent tobacco companies combined, and taxes bring in additional dozens of billions of dollars annually.

Xi Jinping and the Chinese government have made their intentions to curb tobacco consumption and increase environmental regulations clear, but so far have made little progress on either front. Tobacco is, understandably, usually framed as a public health issue. Human societies see the most direct and harmful effects of smoking in the health problems it causes in smokers and the people around them. But, evidently, it can also be seen as an environmental issue. Perhaps, by tying one to the other, they can increase the pressure on regulatory agencies to enforce tobacco restrictions and work tougher regulations on deforestation through China’s complex government. ■

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Ukraine in Flames

by Drew Van Kuiken

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The Olympics

ly violent levels. Early estimates claim that as many as 100 people have died, with likely hundreds more injured. The violence seemingly clued Mr. Yanukovich in on his likely demise, as he fled his palace not long after the escalation. Since Yanukovich’s deposition, the Ukrainian Parliament has unanimously instated popular opposition leader Arseniy P. Yatsenyuk as temporary Prime Minister.

He will remain in this position until scheduled May Presidential elections. He faces pressure from newly-freed former Prime Minister Yulia V. Tymoshenko, a notoriously clever firebrand responsible for the 2004 Orange Revolution, which was also designed to modernize and reform Ukraine.

Ukraine faces an incredibly uncertain future. But a few priorities must be set in order for the beleaguered country to emerge as the successful country it wants to be. The most important clearly lies in its future with Russia. Putin’s Eurasian Union is far from dead, although it should be. The Eurasian Union can only promise more of the corruption and economic woes that Ukraine has been trying to escape. The 2004 Orange Revolution faltered due to Ukraine’s incredible corruption. Any governmental policy collapsed under heavy favoritism and the political system routinely dished out favors before even attempting to help Ukraine’s needy.

The problem came to a head under Mr. Yanukovich. He should be roundly criticized for the excesses of his rule, but his corruption will not fade away if Ukraine accepts the Eurasian deal.

However, polls show the country only slightly prefers increased cooperation with the EU over the Eurasian Union, and this comes from the still starkly pro-Russian Crimean portion of Ukraine. The rest of the country, however, passionately supports increased EU cooperation. Recent media reports suggesting a possible civil war brewing over the divide are entirely overblown, but Russia’s interest in the division may not be.

Russia has good reason to want Ukraine well within its sphere of influence. As the second biggest economy in the region, Ukraine plays a big role in Russia’s economy. Perhaps more importantly, Mr. Putin also knows that he controls a huge part of Ukraine’s economy.

With the new government struggling to respond to the hyperinfla-

regularly goes to great pains to celebrate the togetherness of the world. Sochi was no different: both the opening and closing ceremonies proudly displayed all 2,873 athletes participating. The athletes came from 88 countries in total, hailing from everywhere from Russia to Timor-Leste.

Yet for skier Bohdana Matsotska, the Olympics’ togetherness could only feel disingenuous. While countries all over the world celebrated the good feeling, Matsotska retired from all her alpine skiing events, in favor of returning home to her troubled country, Ukraine. Ukraine had experienced increasingly passionate protests in recent months, but the day before her event, the violence exploded into a bloody fiasco, with death tolls rising by the hour.

Two weeks later, the situation has improved, albeit marginally. Ukraine’s corrupt and incompetent leader has been deposed—he left his palace without notice and is now wanted for mass murder— and the country’s future now lies in an increasingly fragmented oppositional party. In order to avoid the political disasters that have plagued places like Egypt or Libya, the US, the EU, and Russia must work together to ensure Ukraine stays on stable footing.

The strife began in November of 2013, when Ukraine’s former President, Viktor Yanukovich, rejected a long-awaited deal promising increased trade and political cooperation with the European Union. He did so under heavy pressure from Vladimir Putin, who had designs of creating a Eurasian Alliance in eastern Europe to rival the EU. The alliance, named the Eurasian Economic Union, intends to unite many post-Soviet states currently working in close economic cooperation and already counts Belarus and Kazakhstan among its members. But for Mr. Putin, the alliance’s success hinges on the inclusion of Ukraine, one of the biggest economies in the region.

Mr. Yanukovich’s rejection of the EU treaty signified a tacit approval of Mr. Putin’s plans. The Ukranian President tried to blame much of his rejection on the International Monetary Fund’s proposed economic sanctions, but he almost immediately faced massive protests calling for him to accept the EU’s deal. The protests began slowly, but by February quickly escalated to horrifying-

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tion that the unrest has brought about, the $15 billion loan Russia promised to Mr. Yanukovich in exchange for his rejection of the EU deal becomes more and more appealing every day. And even if the country decides to look at further westernizing, they likely will need Russia’s help in the process. Given the International Monetary Fund’s hesitance to supply Ukraine with any aid—the fund currently plans on implementing tough austerity measures and long-delayed economic changes in exchange for any help—and the EU’s more general hesitance to commit concrete funds to Ukraine, Russia may hold an even more powerful hand in any negotiations.

This cannot be the case. The EU has spent the last few years finally emerging from a prolonged recession, and things appear to be more stable for now. Ukraine’s oil and gas commodities should be seen as an opportunity to modernize and improve a potentially valuable economy currently mired in political depression. And from a political standpoint, the West’s experience in the Middle East should serve as a keen reminder for any future action. The EU cannot become Ukraine’s enemy or be seen as blameworthy in what could have been a revolutionary turn for the country. If these deadly protests ultimately amount to nothing because the EU refused to donate temporary monetary aid to a struggling country, one can hardly expect Ukraine to remain pro-West in the future.

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Instead, the EU must work with Russia to develop a trade agreement that benefits the EU, Ukraine and Russia; further interaction between each party only helps those involved. Furthermore, the IMF must take steps to mitigate the economic distress that increased cooperation with the EU would currently entail. Between private investment from the EU’s more stable member states and temporarily favorable treatment from the IMF, Ukraine should be able to stay afloat, even in a difficult economic situation.

While the West will continue to celebrate the international brotherhood of nations in the 2016 Olympics and beyond, the development of crises across the world tells a far different story. The crisis in Ukraine must be considered a serious foreign policy undertaking because a positive impact can be made. The Ukrainian people truly want a better state—whether they side with the Russians or not—and any steps towards reducing the corruption that characterized Mr. Yanukovich’s regime can only be seen as positive.

Yet the West should also realize the importance of the opportunity presented before it. A rising tide should lift all boats and thus any deal agreed upon by Ukraine and the EU should also help Russia.

Mr. Putin owes it to himself to recognize this. The US and EU owe it to themselves to act upon it. ■

No Home for Defectors

by Adam Hunt

Immigration, especially when it increases significantly in a short time span, tends to alter a host country’s social and political climate. A conservative backlash, both cultural and political, usually develops in response to the introduction of otherness.

Take, for example, the Scandinavian countries: Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Previously the go-to examples of social responsibility and generosity, an influx of Middle Eastern immigrants into these previously homogenous societies has led to national shifts toward conservative policies and a ttitudes.

One of the most interesting ongoing examples of this dynamic is taking place in South Korea, which is experiencing a growing influx of North Korean refugees. In many ways, South Koreans do not see North Koreans as “others” in the same way Scandinavians do Middle Easterners. While the South Korean government does not explicitly encourage North Korean immigration for political reasons, the country’s constitution states that both countries should be seen as a unified nation. For this reason, the South Korean government historically welcomed Northerners.

However, as the number of defectors swelled in the late 90’s and 00’s, the government hardened its stance. When only a handful of North Koreans immigrated to South Korea each year, they were treated much better by the South Korean government, which saw them as political leverage rather than a socioeconomic challenge. It gave each defector $32,000 as an initial stipend, with additional stipends conditional on their completion of various levels of education. In 2005, the South Korean government reduced this initial sum to $9,000, and cut back on other economic incentive programs.

The steep increase in North Korean immigration—from nine immigrants in 1990 to 1,578 in 2006—has quickly created an underclass of “others” in South Korea. While in the earlier days of North Korean immigration those few who made it tended to be of a higher economic class, there has been a significant increase in poorer migrants. This shift, compounded with South Korea’s rollback of economic incentive programs, has increased the rate at which North Koreans are falling behind in South Korea, visible in their lower graduation and higher unemployment rates.

North Korean defectors face multiple, compounding prob-

lems. They often suffer depression, anger, and other effects of post-traumatic stress as a result of their time in North Korea and their escape. They rarely have the same level of education as their South Korean peers, and so they generally arrive in the South without any transferable skills or knowledge. As a result, they quickly fall behind in school or at work. In many South Korean universities, North Koreans drop out at rates of over 50 percent (the national rate is 4.5 precent).

To make matters worst, a vast cultural difference puts North Koreans at a major disadvantage in adapting to life in the South, distinguishing them as outsiders and separating them from the rest of society. The distinctive North Korean accent exemplifies this dynamic. While considered no “worse” than that spoken in South Korea, the dialect sets defectors apart. It allows South Koreans to quickly identify and enforce the divide between the two cultures.

Furthermore, South Koreans simply distrust the immigrants.

They are often unable to separate feelings towards the North from feelings towards Northerners. Many also see struggling North Koreans as a destructive social and political burden in a fast-paced and competitive society recovering from years of civil strife. Feeling unappreciated and unwelcomed by South Korean society makes it even harder for North Koreans to rise above their other disadvantages.

Shockingly, there are reports of “double-defectors”—North Koreans who, after immigrating to South Korea, are so dismayed by the treatment they receive that they actually return to the North.

The numbers do not lie: of the nearly 25,000 North Koreans who have fled to the South, about 800 are believed to have returned.

Given that North Korea gives its citizens absolutely no rights or protections under the law, and retains the right to kill, detain, or torture in the name of national stability, the idea of returning seems absolutely insane.

It is difficult to identify the future of this dilemma; with disillusionment about living conditions for defectors in South Korea, perhaps immigration will taper. On the other hand, conditions in North Korea show no signs of becoming more tolerable. If the humanitarian situation continues to decline under Kim Jong-Un, his subjects will face increasing pressure to escape. ■

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Spray Paint Beijing

by Minnie Kim Sitting in a quaint café hidden within the ancient courtyards of Beijing, Lance Crayon, producer of the documentary Spray Paint Beijing, cautiously takes a sip of his steaming Americano while looking out the fingerprint-covered window. “My favorite graffiti piece to date is that of a giant rosy pig up on Ji Ming Lu created by ABS Crew. About the inflation of pork prices, it has somewhat of a political meaning, increasing its dimensionality.” Walking around 798, Beijing’s most well known art district, spray-painted works can be seen on almost every wall. Although most of the city’s graffiti is still limited to the roads of 798, slowly but surely, crews are moving out of this confined area and into more central locations within Beijing to produce their work.

Crayon describes to me his interest in Chinese street art. “I started out making videos for China Radio International (CRI)’s website around two and half years ago. I did a report on urban art and there was a graffiti art show in the basement’s parking garage, which sparked my interest. I asked the artists to contact me when they went painting at night so that I could film them. The rest is history.”

Abstracted head shapes formed by ragged lines cover the demolished walls of Beijing’s age-old architecture. Zhang Dali is considered to be the “father of Chinese graffiti art”. At the foundation of his pieces lay his negative view towards the government’s demolition of age-old structures rich with history and culture. In an interview with CNN, Zhang mentions that his early fascination with spray paint dealt with his lack of funds while studying in Europe—this material allowed him to create pieces outside the realm of the studio. He chose “AK-47” as his tag to reflect the violent destruction of Beijing physically and of its local culture throughout the city’s ongoing modernization. By using structures painted with

拆 (“to be demolished”) as his canvas, Zhang highlights the walls’ impending destruction to make way for modern architectural projects.

However, Zhang Dali and his political agenda are exceptions amongst Chinese graffiti artists. Crayon clarifies the disparities between graffiti in the West and in China. “For the most part, artists in Beijing try to stay away from political topics, especially when it comes to public art. The themes of graffiti here in Beijing are more aesthetic. Focusing more on cartoons, abstract images, and vivid colors. The one political piece I have seen is on Ji Ming Lu regarding the inflation of pork prices. That’s the extent of politics in street art here in Beijing.”

Unlike in the States, where graffiti is associated with gangs and the claiming of “territory”, strict government restrictions severely limit street art in China. Crayon observed that “a lot of the work is not dangerous, neither gang nor drug-related. They aren’t painting on government buildings or private property, but rather, on the walls of highways and roads. The punishment for graffiti artists here in Beijing is usually a fine of 100RMB, or a night in jail, which is a slap on the hand compared to the consequences that some graffiti artists can face in the States and in Europe. Therefore, artists in Beijing can take their time in creating their pieces without facing a time limit of 10 to 15 minutes.

According to Luo Zhongli, head of the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, “Graffiti art in China has [gotten] rid of the strong rebelliousness and confrontational attitude in Western graffiti.” Regardless of whether or not their works have a political agenda, artists are faced with the possibility that their piece might be destroyed within a few short hours.

In China, graffiti is actually an upper-middle class activity,

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as people do not have the resources to invest 300RMB into a piece that could potentially be destroyed overnight. In the States, however, graffiti is more prevalent in poverty-stricken areas. It is not really about legalities, but financial issues. Compared to Seattle, which has a population of fewer than one million, but has around 2,000 graffiti artists, Beijing has a minute 30 artists amongst its millions of residents.

Chinese public opinion towards graffiti vastly differs from that of Westerners. “For the most party, street art is considered to be vandalism, whereas here in Beijing, people are more open to this art form as it adds color to the drab highways and roads. Being a pretty recent phenomenon, graffiti has not yet been paired with negative connotations,” Crayon noted. Although there has been heightened attention from both the media and the government to this slowly growing “culture”, the wider Chinese population is still very much unaware of this pastime.

Chinese graffiti culture is becoming increasingly commercialized with crews working for international brands such as Audi and Nike, hired to paint for commercials and advertisements. ABS, which stands for “Active. Brilliant. Significant.” is a graffiti crew established in 2007 based in Beijing that focuses on creating “unique and interesting image formations.” Recently, they have partnered up with Audi, Nike, and other well-known brands, along with having participated in international graffiti competitions. In contrast with US crews that remain very much underground, many crews in China paint out in the open, opening up graffiti stores and entering competitions.

The Chinese government continues to contribute to the increasing commercialization of this “potentially rebellious act.” By organizing publicly staged events such as the Olympic Graffiti Wall

near Renmin University in 2005 or the More Than + Pop Art Festival in Sanlitun Soho in 2010, the government has been eliminating the art’s “rebellious” character. The pieces created for the Olympics exemplify how the state has marshaled graffiti to affirm its authority along with the narrative of nationhood. Artists were required to submit an outline of their piece prior to painting, ensuring that the work would conform to government regulations. By commercializing what some consider to be an act of rebellion, the Chinese government has taken away the “risk,” an element that attracts many artists in the first place.

So what is in store for the future of Chinese graffiti? Looking down to check for any coffee stains on his crisp white button-down, Crayon stated, “Graffiti still needs to grow a lot here in Beijing, but people are starting to not only see the art’s bright aesthetic, but also, commercial appeal. Because Beijing is the political center of the nation, locals are, for the most part, better behaved and more hesitant to break the rules. What street art really needs is a push from the younger generation…I see street art growing gradually, but continuously, depending on whether or not artists begin to develop their own style, setting them apart from their Western counterparts.

Modern works have lost their meaning. Although the number of followers may increase, if the content of their work remains apolitical, Chinese street art will not splash onto the international global stage as did those of Banksy and other Western artists.”

As Lance and I walked out of the aged wooden door of the café and said our goodbyes, I turn a left and see a spray-painted head on the dilapidated wall in front of me. ■

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The Trouble in Istanbul: Not Just Another Arab Spring

by Camille Wasinger

When protests broke out in Istanbul’s Taksim Square in May 2013, the world braced itself for another of the Arab Spring uprisings that exploded across the Middle East’s landscape in 2011. Though technically a secular democracy since 1923, to many a Western eye, Turkey continues to be lumped with its authoritarian-ruled, Islamic Republic neighbors. People taking to the streets and mobbing Istanbul’s central square thus came as little surprise; the very name “Taksim” eerily echoing Cairo’s “Tahrir Square,” which erupted in anti-government protests in January 2011. However, unlike the pre-revolt administrations in nearby Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, Turkey’s Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, was democratically reelected by a large majority in free and fair elections in 2011. So, when 50 Istanbulites set up camp on the edge of Taksim Square in Gezi Park, one of the only green spaces remaining in the city’s sea of concrete, they had no intention of emulating their neighbors and bringing down Erdoğan’s government. They were environmental activists, peacefully protesting the planned construction of a shopping mall on the park’s current area. When the government’s police forces responded with tear gas, water cannons, and fully armed SWAT teams however, the protests expanded, exposing a set of tensions and issues at work in Turkish society that go far beyond the desire to save a few sycamores.

The environmental factors in Istanbul’s protests are the result of contention surrounding Prime Minister Erdoğan’s lofty urban development schemes. Since coming to power in 2003, his administration has sponsored colossal building projects all over Istanbul, time and time again transforming historic neighborhoods or the city’s rare forested hills into ritzy shopping malls and residential skyscrapers. The renovation of Gezi Park is just one of many proposed projects that would further decrease the city’s limited green

space. Mr. Erdoğan’s administration is beginning construction of a third bridge across the Bosphorus, the mile-wide body of water separating Istanbul into its European and Asian halves. Despite relieving some of the city’s severe traffic congestion, the bridge will destroy one third of the 14,000-acre Belgrad Forest on Istanbul’s northern edge, causing immense environmental damage and substantially diminishing one of the few oases in Istanbul’s chaotic cityscape.

This urban development issue also hints at the Turkish urban populations’ religious grievances. In addition to a shopping mall, Erdoğan’s development plan for Gezi Park and Taksim includes the construction of an immense mosque complex. Given Turkey’s majority Muslim population, it is, perhaps, counterintuitive that building a mosque in the center of Turkey’s most treasured metropolis would provoke countrywide protests. However, when viewed alongside Erdoğan’s host of other Islamist-leaning undertakings, the mosque’s construction carries quite a bit of symbolic significance, representing the current administration’s increasingly heavy-handed religious policies.

Though ideologically moderate Islamist, Mr. Erdoğan’s political party, the Justice and Development Party (A.K.P.), is somewhat constrained in its public pursuit of religious endeavors by Turkey’s secular constitution. Behind the scenes however, Mr. Erdoğan has quietly but effectively pursued a far more conservative Islamic agenda than any administration since the Ottomans. In the past 10 years, Turkish urban populations have felt mounting pressure from Ankara to increase their piety and return to more traditional Islamic values. Turkish women are finding it more and more difficult to be seen in public showing skin or without head coverings. Erdoğan’s administration has sponsored conversions all over the country of churches and museums into mosques. And, in an attempt to curb alcohol consumption (prohibited under Islam), he has enacted limits and increased taxes on liquor sales. Erdoğan’s administration’s policies, and the cultural atmosphere they create, have added fire to the Gezi protests, leading to complaints from urban centers around Turkey that the government is trying to impose its religious beliefs on the people.

Given that the Istanbul protestors’ long list of grievances against the current government quickly provoked similar demonstrations in cities all over Turkey, it may come as a surprise that Erdoğan has won the last three general elections by huge margins, increasing his share of the popular vote with each election cycle.

His support comes primarily from the rural poor and conservative Islamic communities, while the protesters represent the younger, more educated, urban middle class. The protests have thus brought to light a demographic tension within Turkey; one that ultimately hinders the country’s recognition as truly “Western.” While the West has long hailed Turkey as the example for the rest of the Middle East of a successful marriage of Islam and secular democracy, Turkey has still not been granted membership to the European Union. Although Turkey’s urban class predominantly supports secular policy and has, in many ways, come to be very “European,” the rural populations make up the moderate Islamic base thought to be incompatible with the EU system. The Gezi protests thus dig much deeper than their environmental roots, revealing a stark ideological divide in the country that follows along its demographic fault lines. Up to this point, Prime Minister Erdoğan has successfully toed the line between modernization and moderate Islamization. However, in the midst of this tumultuous landscape, his reelection will certainly be no walk in the park. ■

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There’s Something About Burma

by Aaron Ng

Over the past few years, Myanmar, also known as Burma, has repeatedly made international headlines for its transition towards democracy. As opposed to the secretive, mercurial military junta that had been in power from the 1950s until 2011, Burma’s current government has seemingly embraced democratic ideals and cultivated more positive relationships with Western nations, including the US. Under president Thein Sein, the Burmese government has dramatically loosened restrictions on virtually all aspects of political and economic activity over the past three years.

But with all this news coverage about foreign investment, tourism and political reform, how much has Myanmar actually changed?

My impression from my journey through several areas of the country over winter break was that signs of foreign contact and development are much more obvious in Myanmar’s cities; in less-traveled areas it is almost as if nothing has changed.

Yangon, or Rangoon as it was once known during its past as the administrative center during British colonial times, is at the epicenter of the massive changes sweeping the large Southeast Asian nation. Upon landing in the gleaming international terminal at the Yangon airport, it was immediately apparent that the reforms have attracted many foreign companies seeking to expand into the country. “Mastercard—Now serving Myanmar” proclaimed the row of signs which confronted me in the arrival gate. Coca-Cola and Pepsi have begun their battle anew in this foreign land as well—the two soft-drink giants reintroduced their products to the market just over a year ago after six decades without a presence.

Exxon and Shell have partnered with local companies to exploit Myanmar’s rich oil reserves. The most visible indicators of this

change, however, are on the roads. Where once automobile imports were heavily restricted, reforms and new wealth have made cars far more affordable and obtainable. Over the past few years, Yangon’s once empty streets have become clogged with factory-new Toyatas, leading to traffic just as bad as, if not worse than, that of the infamous LA motorways.

Foreign companies have jumped at the opportunity to sell their products to a population of 60 million and exploit the abundant natural resources, but Burma’s attractiveness to foreigners is not limited to multinational corporations. Tourism has exploded, and the government has been actively encouraging it, offering visas-on-arrival to travelers making a spontaneous visit to the beautiful nation. Burma is the new Thailand, a hip destination for travel aficionados. Two million tourists visited Myanmar in 2013, more than doubling the previous year’s figure of one million. The most popular destination is the Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon, an awe-inspiring, towering construction plated in 24-karat gold that is the de-facto symbol of the nation.

Beyond the new products available to them and the blondehaired foreigners wandering their streets, denizens of Yangon have also seen a massive shift in their urban landscape as money flows in from abroad. High rises and shopping centers are springing up at an astonishing pace, replacing many of Yangon’s old colonial buildings. However, all of this real estate development has raised concerns over gentrification and housing for the city’s poor. Yangon’s economic boom has also caused an influx of migrants, which has led to overpopulation and the need modernize Yangon’s antiquated and overburdened infrastructure. The Japanese government’s international aid agency, JICA, is coordinating with the Myanmar government to draft plans to deal with major problems of waste disposal, public transportation, and sanitation.

But as you travel farther from Yangon, the modest development Myanmar has achieved seems to shrink away. Even Mandalay, the second largest city, still greatly resembles a stereotypical Third World metropolis. Motorbikes, not cars, are the preferred method of transportation in this city, and it is almost terrifying how little the people navigating the chaotic streets care about (or perhaps, even know about) basic traffic rules. “Even people from Rangoon are scared to drive here”, my cousin, host, and tour guide Dylan noted. But Mandalay has its own charms—though not feeling the effects of modernization as acutely as the former capital to the south, it is vibrant and still at least recognizable as a semi-modern city. When I journeyed to the remote town of Lashio, it was made clear to me that the changes that were so obvious in Yangon have yet to penetrate very far into the nation.

Upon entering Lashio after a miserable seven-hour drive over winding mountain roads, I was immediately struck by how rustic it was. Despite being a sizeable town of over 100,000, Lashio is stuck in the past. The poorly maintained, dusty roads are lined with stray dogs and mainly traversed by rickshaw, tractor, motorbike, and the occasional ox-drawn cart. An electrical grid is shockingly absent; most businesses and residences each have their own gas-powered generator.

In Lashio and many small towns in Myanmar’s rural regions, it seems, life has continued as before, far removed from any outside influence outside of the occasional Coca-Cola billboard. Or at least for now, that is. As more and more foreign companies and tourists come to the once-isolated nation, it is inevitable that this will change. Perhaps the next time I visit Lashio, I will be able to take some photos and upload them to Instagram. ■

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Fighting the Cure

by Katherine Churchill

Health has been praised as the most successful sector of the development field, with its easy measurability, its poignant visibility, its attainable fix in the form of vaccination and, notably, its removed place from the messiness of politics, at least in comparison to economic or education policy. However, as the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) at last approaches its noble goal of a polio-free world, political unrest and fervor is increasingly thwarting and complicating vaccination efforts in Pakistan. Clearly, the choice to use polio as a political tool is unethical, but the politicization of the fight against polio also seems inevitable when polio eradication exists as a pet project of the United States.

Notably, the GPEI has an inherently American flair. Consider its four founders: WHO, Rotary International, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). Rotary and CDC have specific ties to American interests; CDC is an American institution and Rotary was founded in the United States. In general, the United States struggles to differentiate political agenda and humanitarianism.

Examples of this can be found in the frequent criticism of foreign aid’s centralization in the State Department rather than USAID, or the preference of U.S. allies as aid recipients. Despite its description as “global,” polio eradication has a decidedly American kinship, birthed and nourished by U.S. donors and abused by political leaders on both sides. However, polio eradication is labeled not “American,” but “global,” and the initiative must start to reflect this distinction.

The goal of polio eradication has become increasingly intertwined with U.S. political interests. In 2011, news burst that the CIA had used a fake polio vaccination team to gain access to the Bin Laden compound in order to collect information. Given that the United States and Pakistan wrestle with such a uniquely strained relationship, this act was detrimental to relations between American humanitarians and the Pakistani people. The repercussions of this mission have been drastic, with a marked increase in polio violence since the leak. Furthermore, Taliban leaders have

banned polio vaccinations in certain regions as a protest against U.S. drone strikes. Polio has descended from its humanitarian sacredness to the dredges of political violence, and we have been the ones pulling it down.

This January, as the GPEI geared up to celebrate the declaration of India as polio free, three polio vaccination workers were killed in a shooting in Peshawar, the latest in a series of violent acts toward polio vaccination teams. Perhaps the fault lies with the American approach to polio vaccination and humanitarian efforts in general, not just Pakistani extremists.

This instance of violence is among several others that indicate mounting hostility toward the GPEI—a hostility that initially seems nonsensical given the initiative’s humanitarian mission.

Health workers in Pakistan, one of three countries where polio remains endemic, are struggling to realize the goal of a polio-free world amidst resistance to vaccination and mounting violence against vaccination workers. The stakes for polio in Pakistan are high for the GPEI’s ultimate goal of eradication: progress in Afghanistan will be nearly impossible due to migration if polio in Pakistan remains endemic. Not only do vaccinators struggle with the conventional difficulties of vaccination (resources, lack of visible positive outcome, etc.), but now they also must combat recent rumors of vaccination as a tool to secretly sterilize Muslim children.

Polio eradication’s situation as a project funded principally by American donors, organized by American institutions, and used to the advantage of American interests is currently paralyzing vaccination efforts. While the efforts by U.S. citizens and government organizations are noble, they are American efforts and foremost American efforts; therein lies the problem. Politicization of polio is perhaps symptomatic of the fact that polio eradication is an innately American effort. The consequential political violence is rendering the fight against polio asymptotical, and is even resulting in polio cases cropping up in formerly polio-free Syria. Globalizing the polio eradication effort is essential to the de-politicization of the initiative and the ultimate goal of a polio-free world. ■

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Jobbik: Hungary’s Fearsome Party

by Madeline Cole

On Sunday, January 26th, Britain braced itself to receive

some controversial visitors. Led by Gabor Vona, members of Hungary’s Jobbik Party planned to hold a rally outside of the Holborn tube station. What might have been seen as a standard expression of free speech instead became a highly conflicted event due to Jobbik’s status as the most powerful right-wing (and vocally anti-Semitic) group in Hungary, and its visit being planned for the eve of Britain’s Holocaust Memorial Day. The British government was unresponsive to the demands of many citizens to prevent Vona’s entry into the country, including a Hope Not Hate petition that gathered 14,000 signatures calling for Vona to be prevented from entering the UK. Although officially the event was allowed to go on, protestors from organizations such as Unite Against Fascism prevented the rally from taking place in its originally planned location, blocking the tube station entrance and forcing the police to secure a location for Jobbik’s rally at Hyde Park, where Vona spoke for twenty minutes to a group of about 100 party supporters.

The wariness that many British citizens demonstrated against Jobbik is not unwarranted. This self-proclaimed “Movement for a Better Hungary” enjoys considerable influence. It is the third largest party in Hungary, holding 43 of 386 seats in the national parliament and steady support rates at about 10% - numbers which afford the party a considerable amount of power. British MP Andrew Dismore labeled Jobbik “the most powerful outwardly fascist political party in Europe.” Indeed, Jobbik considers itself to be the foremost advocate for the protection of “Hungarian values and interests.” The party advocates a sweeping and comprehensive nationalist platform that rejects the influence of foreign investors in Hungary, instead calling for the empowerment and defense of Hungarian agriculture and industry against globalization. The party stands in favor of democracy, strong police force to promote public order, and to return Hungary to the “rule of law.” In accordance with their more protectionist views, the party has proposed several bills demanding that Hungarian farmland only be sold to national citizens and to limit the size of individual land holdings, to which the party claims that the Hungarian president has been unresponsive.

The party’s radical nationalist views, however, are not the factor that has lead to the controversy and anxiety surrounding it. Accusations of anti-Semitism, anti-Roma, fascist, and even neo-Nazi ideologies have made the party controversial, feared, and detested by many. Although Jobbik has protested against claims of its anti-Semitism and was even quoted in an Economist article as

welcoming “all Hungarians who stand up for their country,” its actions are, in many cases, speaking louder than its words. This blatant contradiction was made most apparent when, in 2012, Jobbik MP Márton Gyöngyösi called for a national registry of Hungarian Jews in order to “assess…how many people of Jewish origin there are here, and especially in the Hungarian parliament and the Hungarian government, who represent a certain national security risk for Hungary.”

There is much to fear when it comes to Jobbik and the resurgence of anti-Semitism, anti-Roma tendencies and general xenophobia its growing popularity heralds. After watching these strains of hatred culminate in the devastation of World War II, anti-Semitism and the like have since been repugnant and intolerable to a vast majority of Europeans. Since the 2007 economic recession, however, the presence of extreme right-wing groups across the continent has surged, and Jobbik does not stand alone in the farright of Europe’s political scene. From France’s National Front, to the UK’s British National Party, to Greece’s recently violent Golden Dawn, the Guardian claims that some pollsters predict Europe’s far-right parties to take up to one-third of the parliament seats in next May’s election.

The question remains, how can the same group whose leaders have called for a registry of Jewish citizens posing a threat to national security claim that it is not anti-Semitic? Better yet, why do they even care in the first place? What is notable about the recent resurgence of far-right political parties in Europe is not their prejudiced platforms and policies they represent – in fact, frightening comparisons can be drawn between the groups of today and the nationalist groups that heralded WWII. What has made these parties so successful is their conflation of these standard “anti” tenets with the types of welfare policies advocated by many of Europe’s center-left political parties.

Jobbik’s advocacy of anti-Semitism and Roma hatred is derived from their conception of these ideologies as rational and essential means to the greater party ends, namely, nationalism and protectionism, and achieving the type of society for which a substantial number of Hungary’s disillusioned voters are yearning. The leaders of Jobbik and similar groups endorse outwardly anti-Semitic policies that they see as advancing their goal of self-proclaimed “radical patriotism.” However, as demonstrated

by Britain’s outcry against the Jobbik rally, the rest of the world is still haunted by the gruesome spector of WWII and refuses to associate prejudice with progress. ■

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Inglorious Enterprise: Illicit Trade and Human Trafficking

By Jin Niu

Within the realm of international business, transnational crime is becoming particularly lucrative, pervasive, and most importantly, ignored. Illicit firms pocket large margins daily through drug smuggling, human trafficking, counterfeit money laundering, and many other crimes. No longer merchants of the age-old underground “thieves’ market”, illicit businessmen today play a power-transformative role in international politics. Illicit trades’ profitability—estimated to be as high as 10 percent of global GDP—provides these groups with unprecedented political influence. Unless the international world order takes substantial actions to reduce global crime, illicit traders will grow to become a longterm national security menace.

The illicit industry has flourished in the past two decades at an unprecedented scale. Its two largest and fastest-growing sectors—drug smuggling and human trafficking—earn huge margins within a largely ignored and policy-ineffective environment. Drug smuggling alone yields an estimated annual profit of $320 billion.

Although distinct from human smuggling¸ human trafficking involves coercing, threatening, or tricking individuals into physical exploitation, including sex and labor. Trafficked men, women, and children are found across the world, in labor camps in India, brothels in Thailand, and even private American homes. With an estimated 600,000 to 800,000 people “traded” across international borders each year, human trafficking pockets nearly $3.5 billion annually.

The two industries’ profitability offers huge incentives for smugglers and traffickers to develop innovative anti-detection mechanisms. These “international exporters” frequently make transshipment stops in exotic locations along the Ivory Coast or the Caribbean. Along the US-Mexico border, smugglers pioneered creative technologies, ranging from sophisticated underground tunnels with electricity, ventilation, and even an electric rail system, to submarines equipped with night vision periscopes. The United States-led policies have yielded little success in countering illicit crimes. Whether it is directly confronting traffickers in Central America, eradicating poppy fields in Afghanistan, or simply tough prison sentencing around mandatory minimal laws at home, the US-led efforts have been statistically insignificant in the reduction of illicit crime profits.

The increasing international nature of drug smuggling and human trafficking demands an aggressive international response.

Yet critics of international efforts argue that current initiatives are largely ineffective. Many criticize the UN’s efforts by pointing to the ambiguous language in its provisions and failure to take a more active approach. Others argue that interstate cooperation is theoretically impossible: states will always have competing interests.

Finally, others argue that supply depends on demand, and rich countries like the US should stop wasting money on problems that begin with American demands.

These criticisms are well founded, but they ignore some fundamental aspects of illicit trades. On a theoretical level, the nature

of illicit trade, which depends on transnational supply and demand, means that domestic focus will inevitably be insufficient.

Furthermore, illicit trade’s profitability means that countermeasures are extremely expensive. Most source states where drugs are produced and humans are trafficked do not have the infrastructure or resources to confront these issues directly. Neighboring states that genuinely want to tackle the issues face similar financial obstacles. In Southeast Asia, despite strong public rhetoric against illicit crimes, states like Thailand, Cambodia, or Vietnam do not have the resources to implement substantial efforts. These supply regions require international financial support to meet countermeasure expectations.

On a practical level, it may be unfair to criticize the UN without considering its current accomplishments. One of the UN’s most underappreciated roles is its platform for international dialogue on transnational criminal issues. Through this, the UN becomes a legitimacy-conferring institution within both research and policy.

Scholars who criticize the UN nevertheless rely on its statistics to make their arguments. And while the UN multilateral efforts may not yield immediate concrete results, UN conventions do become templates that ultimately encourage national and regional initiatives. On the national level, UN conventions have sped up passages of anti-trafficking laws in countries like Albania and Romania. On the regional level, the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings and the EU Framework Decision on Combating Trafficking in Human Beings are efforts modeled after the UN Convention on Trafficking.

Looking beyond the UN, international efforts can also happen on a regional level. Europe, in particular, has delivered commendable results in establishing a more uniform legal regime to combat illicit crime within its borders. For example, the Council of Europe convention has a monitoring mechanism to enforce provisions. Unlike the UN convention, which only obliges member states to “consider” adopting legislative measures to permit victims to remain in its territory, the Council of Europe convention stipulates that member states “shall issue” renewable residence visas to victims, within necessary conditions. The stronger language and the more detailed provisions do permit greater interstate involvement within the Council of Europe member states.

Clearly, international efforts have the potential to yield results. Critics who stress domestic countermeasures in the US, though not wrong for emphasizing demand-side policies, ignore that the demand is far from exclusive to the US. States do have spaces to cooperate, and the first step is to facilitate international recognition beyond public rhetoric of the rising threat of illicit crimes. It is true that black markets inevitably exist where governments intervene between supply and demand. Yet the solution is not to accept its inevitability and do nothing. If that is the course the international community takes, then perhaps unemployed college students should take advantage of this complacency and enter this high pay, low risk industry. ■

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Photography Credits Front Cover: Photo courtesy of flickr.com user midianinja, Page 5: Photo courtesy of flickr.com user queen yuna, Page 6: Photo courtesy of Ibar Silva, Page 8: Photo courtesy of Jez Coulson/Insight, Page 9: Photo courtesy of The Scottish Government, Page 10: Photo courtesy of flickr.com user DenPics, Page 11: Photo courtesy of Jason Major, Page 12 & 13: Photo courtesy of Fernando H.C. Oliviera, Page 14: Photo courtesy of flickr.com user midianinja, Page 15: Photo courtesy of Shreyans Bhansali, Page 16 & 17: Photo courtesy of Sasha Maksymenko, Page 18: Photo courtesy of Sasha Maksymenko, Page 19: Photo courtesy of Marc Smith, Page 20: Photo courtesy of Dan Morrill, Page 21: Photo courtesy Dan Morrill, Page 22: Photo courtesty of Meghan Rutherford, Page 23: Photo by Aaron Ng, Page 24: Photo courtesy of Sanofi Pasteur, Page 25: Photo courtesy of Leigh Phillips, Page 27: Photo courtesy of Ivan Bandura, Back Cover: Photo by Sasha Maksymenko

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