GJIA - 9.1 Charting the Future of Food

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CHARTING the Future of Food also in this issue:

Diplomats in the Vatican jodok troy Indigenous Rights james c. hopkins

Climate Change in Congress tom daschle The Sarkozy Effect j.g. shields

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Winter/Spring 2008, Volume ix, Number 1 1

Editors’ Note

Forum: Charting the Future of Food 3

Indtroduction BY MARC J. COHEN

New technologies are forcing rapid globalization of markets, and the agriculture industry has no choice but to adapt. There is, however, a stark disparity between developed and developing nations: researchers in developed nations are embracing a biotech and GMO revolution, while developing nations are struggling to manage unfavorable intellectual property laws and trade barriers. Biofuel production stretches agricultural resources in the North, famine cripples economies in the South, the Green Revolution saves lives in the East, and the WTO rules against governments in the West.

Though policy experts participating in the current round of trade negotiations in Doha are attempting to address the challenges facing farmers, the outcome is unclear. This forum aims to explore the fate of our farms in the 21st century.

5

The Softest Subsidy Agricultural Subsidy Cuts, New Biotechnologies, Developing Countries, and Cotton KYM ANDERSON AND ERNESTO VALENZUELA

13

Food, Feed, or Fuel?

Examining Linkages Between Biofuels and Agricultural Market Economies SIWA MSANGI AND MANDY EWING

21

Agricultural Trade and Climate Change Can the WTO Promote Resilience in the Face of Uncertainty?

LEE ANN JACKSON

31

The Local Organic Food Paradigm ALEX A. AVERY AND DENNIS T. AVERY

Conflict&Security 47

Averting Catastrophe in the Middle East SUSAN BRADEN

The current conditions in Iraq can only be remedied by peaceful partitioning of the country into three separate entities.

55

Asian Power: Sino-Russian Conflict in Central Asia?

KATHLEEN J. HANCOCK

Future tensions may arise between Russia and China as former Soviet states in Central Asia compete with Russia to export their natural gas and oil to China.

Cover image credits (left to right): iStockphoto/Peter Evans, iStockphoto/Klaas Lingbeek- van Kranen, iStockphoto/Robert Churchill, iStockphoto/Tomas Bercic, iStockphoto/Plamena Koeva

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Culture&Society 63

Substance and Vanity at the Palace: Monarchy and Royalty Beyond the Twentieth Century NEIL BLANE

Royalty supercedes monarchy; the personal and economic importance of royals destroys the significance of any residual constitutional role.

71

The Catholic Church: An Underestimated and Necessary Actor in International Affairs JODOK TROY

As one of the oldest political actors in the international system, the Catholic Church lends its stabilizing capabilities to become once more an “ethical reservoir” and peacemaker in an age of a declared and believed “clash of civilizations.”

Law&Ethics 81

Rights for Indigenous Peoples: The Struggle for Uniformity: the UN Declaration and Beyond JAMES C. HOPKINS

The Colonial Bloc must recognize and adhere to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to ensure a proper legal status for their respective communities.

89

Global Mental Health: Changing Norms, Constant Rights LAWRENCE O. GOSTIN AND LANCE GABLE

The mistreatment of individuals with mental disabilities is a persistent, global issue that must be remedied through direct legal, practical, and economic measures.

Politics&Diplomacy 97

Changing the Political Climate on Climate Change TOM DASCHLE

The United States must act with urgency to lead the international response to the threat of climate change.

107

†

The Sarkozy Effect: France’s New Presidential Dynamic J.G. SHIELDS

President Sarkozy is setting out to undertake much needed reforms in France, but his success will depend on factors both within and beyond his own control.

Business&Economics 115

†

A French Action Figure: Nicolas Sarkozy’s First Months as President ARTHUR GOLDHAMMER

President Nicolas Sarkozy hopes to save the French welfare state with a relatively modest though energetically promoted package of tax, labor-market, and welfare-system reforms.

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Contents

Science&Technology 125

Battling Botnets and Online Mobs: Estonia’s Defense Efforts during the Internet War GADI EVRON

Estonia’s experience shown that Internet war is a real security threat that demands increased global attention and government action.

Books 133

Turkish Hindsight: Muslim Roots, Secular Minds IMAD-AD-DEAN AHMAD

A review of The New Turkish Republic: Turkey as a Pivotal State in the Muslim World.

141

Africa and Anger: Algeria Remembers JAMES JAY CARAFANO

A review of Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed.

View from the Ground 149

Invisible, Insecure, and Inaccessible: The Humanitarian Crisis in Chad STEPHANIE GETSON

The crisis in Darfur cannot be solved until the international community recognizes the crisis in its neighbor, Chad.

153

Perception and the Costs of Waiting: Transition in Cuba JOHN-MICHAEL MCCOLL

The United States must embrace an active approach to restore its relationship with Cuba ultimately to extend democracy and free markets to the Cuban population.

A Look Back 163

Rethinking Victory in the “War on Terror” INTERVIEW WITH PHILIP H. GORDON

The United States cannot win the war on terror through conventional military means, but by upholding its own values until the ideology of terrorism crumbles from within.

†

Special Multi-Section Feature

POLITICS&DIPLOMACY AND BUSINESS & ECONOMICS

These two articles on French president Nicolas Sarkozy present analises of his term in office to date from the two view points of their respective sections.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ i i i ]

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WEB MANAGER TE CHNOLO GY ASS I STANT DES I GN ASS I STANTS ADV I S ORY BOARD

UN I VERS I TY C OUNC I L

Aditya C. Deshmukh, Alfia A. Sadekova Megan Abbot, Dorothy Chou, Jacob Comenetz, Steven Hamilton, Mithuna Sivaraman Tom Carroll, Natalya Skiba Donald F. Burke, III Eric Peter, Eliza Keller Meg Charlton, Sarath Ganji William Allen, Vanda de la Mata Michael Pfeiffer, Hugh Phillips Alisha Bhagat, William Quinn Aaron Beitman, Nabil Hashmi Devin Conley, Jane Yu Nayha Arora, Kelsey Cruise Alex Hart, Brianne Todd Melvin Peralta, Rebecca Rawson Ryan Kaiser, Hailey Woldt Ross Berg, Joseph Hart Scott M. Chessare, William Metzger Vikram Gupta, Julia Kosygina Emily Green, James McBride Kelsey Ryan, John Thornburgh Charlene Van Dijk Joshua Boswell, Emma Htun Alison Crowley, Sohini Sircar Ria Bailey-Galvis, Hadiatou Barry Gregory Burie, Jr. Adam Kostrinsky Velginy Hernandez, Yvonne Meija Nick Bunker Emily Rose Kevin Hartnett Keegan Ferguson, Jennifer Fritz, Alexander Landegger, Andrew Leighton, Mark Loh, Jackie Ryu Ben Turner Kevin Donovan Ellen Clarke, Claudia NaĂ­m, Kyle Sucher david abshire, susan bennett, h.r.h. felipe de borbon, joyce davis, cara dimassa, robert l. gallucci, lee hamilton, peter f. krogh, michael mazarr, fareed zakaria anthony arend, daniel Byman, chester crocker, christopher joyner, charles king, carol lancaster, donald mchenry, daniel porterfield, howard schaffer, george shambaugh, jennifer ward, casimir yost

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Editors’ Note

If man is what he eats, then there is no question that the human race today stands on the verge of radical change as our global food systems begin to confront a struggle against the most significant agro-issues of the day, some of which could not have been anticipated only a few decades ago. It is a veritable global “food fight,” and the future of global policy concerns on agriculture, trade, security, and poverty depends heavily on the outcome of this struggle.

Charting the Future of Food attempts to advance and reconcile the major conflicts, debates, and controversies that punctuate the province of trade and agriculture. The fight for food is a fight at the table between food for humans and food for machines, as eloquently noted in the food vs. fuel debate by Msangi & Ewing. In “The Local Organic Food Paradigm,” Avery & Avery note that it is also a fight between organic and genetically-engineered foods. Anderson discusses the fight for food in trade between the developed and the developing nations, highlighting the matter through the case of cotton. It is also a fight to predict changes in food production against the specter of climate change, as discussed in the Jackson article. Ultimately, this Forum attempts to play its part in the fight against time to eradicate hunger and meet the world’s energy needs in the most sustainable manner.

This Forum elucidates some of the most significant food and agricultural disputes of the twenty-first century, the potential for change, and the consequence of inaction.

It seeks to implore its readers to not merely appreciate the issues at hand, but to strive to consider the prescriptions offered in each article. And through our readers, we hope to bear down on the governments and institutions that are most capable of averting a global food fight.

Of course, reflection and change are not exclusive to the material realm of food. It is as relevant in the normative sphere, as Gostin & Gable argue for global mental health rights and Hopkins argues for the rights of indigenous peoples in our Law & Ethics section. Former U.S. Senator Daschle appeals to the U.S. government for change in U.S. climate policy, and warns of the dire repercussions of neglect. This issue also appraises President Nicholas Sarkozy, as the embodiment of the French declaration for change, evaluating his first months in office in both the economic and political arena. Evron explores the changing nature of security by detailing what may be the world’s first Internet war. On a lighter note, Blain provides a vivid account of change—or the lack of—in the monarchies of the 21st century.

As the world changes around us, we hope to remain a constant and unwavering source of information and perhaps revelation, plunging into not only the significant issues of the day, but also looking forward, anticipating the great forces of change in the future.

Aditya C. Deshmukh

Alfia A. Sadekova

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 ]

Forum GEORGETOWN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

CHARTING the Future of Food

Agriculture has always presented dilemmas. Everyone depends on farming for food, the most basic of life’s necessities, and for most of the past 12,000 years, the vast majority of human beings have tilled the soil.

Nevertheless, most cultures portray agriculture in, at best, an ambivalent light. In the Judaeo-Christian tradition, it is a curse that humanbeings must earn bread for the table by the sweat of their brow. The traditional view of peasants in Japan is that they are like seeds—the harder you squeeze, the more oil you get— and so later Japanese rulers would tax agriculture to acquire the capital to develop industry. In France, “peasant” is a term of both honor and

5

The Softest Subsidy Agricultural Subsidy Cuts, New Biotechnologies, Developing Countries, and Cotton KYM ANDERSON AND ERNESTO VALENZUELA

13 Food, Feed, or Fuel?

Examining Linkages Between Biofuels and Agricultural Market Economies SIWA MSANGI AND MANDY EWING

21 Agricultural Trade and Climate Change Can the WTO Promote Resilience in the Face of Uncertainty?

LEE ANN JACKSON

31 The Local Organic Food Paradigm ALEX A. AVERY AND DENNIS T. AVERY

Winter/Spring 2007 [ 3 ]

INTRODUCTION

opprobrium. Daniel Webster asserted that “farmers are…the founders of civilization,” but his contemporary, Karl Marx, wrote of “the idiocy of rural life.”

Today, farming and farm labor remain the source of livelihood for many hundreds of millions of people.

Three billion people in developing countries—nearly half of the human race—live in rural areas, and most of them (2.5 billion) live in agricultural households. In low-income countries, agriculture accounts for over 20 percent of the economy, compared to a world-wide average of 4 percent and a mere 2 percent in the high-income countries. Agriculture remains significant in a number of wealthier developing countries, with Argentina, Brazil, China, India, and South Africa now among the key players in global agricultural trade and the World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations.

Agriculture is still the source of much controversy as well. International development experts continue to have fierce debates about the role it should play. Agro-optimists see agriculture as crucial to overall economic growth, poverty reduction, and meeting all of the Millennium Development Goals.

Skeptics don’t see much of a future in farming, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. While agriculture seems to be back on the agenda of donor agencies and African governments, aid to agriculture stands at half its level of 25 years ago in real terms, and lowincome-country governments devote less than 5 percent of their budgets to agriculture and broader rural development, compared to 19 percent on the military.

In the industrialized global North, paradoxically, even though farmers [ 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

account for a tiny share of the workforce, agricultural interests still have considerable clout when it comes to shaping public policy. The member countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development spend about a billion dollars each day on farm subsidies, at great expense to their more numerous taxpayers and consumers. Australia, Canada, the EU, and the United States remain dominant in global agricultural markets.

Agriculture also leaves a big environmental footprint. Farm chemical runoff pollutes the water; inappropriate practices can deplete and degrade once fertile soils; toxic pesticides cause human health problems and threaten biodiversity; and agriculture produces greenhouse gases that drive global warming. Also, farming is presently the main user of water globally, but with growing demand for water for industrial, household, and ecosystem services uses, will there be enough for agriculture in the future, especially given current projections of rising demand for food, feed, and fiber? In any event, the longterm viability of agriculture requires sustainable management of natural resources, and the right agricultural practices, such as planting trees and crops together, can sequester carbon and mitigate warming.

The authors of the four articles in this issue of the Journal’s Forum on Agriculture boldly wade into contemporary debates about agriculture, and are not shy about taking strong and contrarian stances on key issues. Where many environmental and development nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) express skepticism about the role of science and

MARC J. COHEN

technology in agriculture, these authors are bullish about technology’s potential to boost yields, protect the environment, move food around the globe, and resolve the tradeoffs among food, feed, fiber, and fuel uses of farm products in ways that do not leave the world’s most vulnerable people poorer, hungrier, and ever more marginalized.

Critics of the WTO point out that whereas its Agreement on Agriculture calls on the wealthiest countries to remove trade barriers and end tradedistorting subsidies at a more rapid pace than developing countries, the reality is that the North has not liberalized agricultural trade much since the conclusion of the Uruguay Round negotiations in 1994. However, because developing countries face pressures outside the WTO from aid donors and the international financial institutions, they often have gone much farther towards free agricultural trade. This has sometimes had disastrous results for their own smallholders, as in the case of Mexico allowing duty-free imports of cheaper U.S. corn. In the view of critics, the WTO provides “special and differential treatment” for the rich rather than for the poor. This is because global trade practices, if not the written rules, reflect power realities.

In contrast to this perspective, the authors of the Forum articles are generally upbeat about the value of trade based on comparative advantage and a system of transparent and uniformly applied rules. Indeed, as Kym Anderson and Ernesto Valenzuela put it in their contribution, the combined effects of trade liberalization and adoption of new agricultural technologies based on genetic engineering would have substantial

Charting the Future of Food

positive effects for the poor, cottonproducing countries of West Africa.

And, as they point out, it is often smallscale producers who grow the bulk of the cotton in these countries. Anderson and Valenzuela also note that even the richest and most powerful WTO members, such as the United States, stand to lose before WTO tribunals when they engage in unfair trading practices, such as annual U.S. cotton subsidies that exceed the income of some of the West African producing states, drive down world prices, and cause increased poverty among developing-country farmers.

Meanwhile, markets for organic food are growing rapidly in the industrialized world, creating new opportunities for developing-country farmers. Many consumers believe that organic food is better for the environment and healthier. Not so, according to Alex and Dennis Avery. They insist that conventional agriculture, using synthetic inputs, and the adoption of agricultural biotechnology are actually better for the environment than the organic approach.

High-tech agriculture permits yield gains on current agricultural land, avoiding expansion into wildlife habitat and forests, thereby preserving biodiversity.

Given the need for manure (from animals or plants) as fertilizer, and limits on productivity gains, organic production to meet growing food demand from population and income growth would require cultivation of new land.

Avery & Avery also endorse reliance on trade to assure access to food, as efforts to achieve self-sufficiency put national food security at great risk in the event of a crop failure. Here, they Winter/Spring 2007 [ 5 ]

INTRODUCTION

challenge those who promote greater reliance on local food systems as more energy efficient and environmentally friendly. In fact, Avery & Avery argue, long-distance sea and rail transport nowadays is extremely efficient. One might argue with them on this score in light of rising energy prices, particularly since they criticize the use of food crops to produce alternatives to fossil fuels. In their view, biofuels, like organic agriculture, threaten biodiversity by adding pressure to bring new land into production.

Siwa Msangi and Mandy Ewing offer a different viewpoint on biofuels. They argue that technological development and investment in more efficient cultivation, processing, storage, and distribution can lead to synergies that allow production for both food and fuels. In other words, just like Thomas Malthus and his contemporary disciples, who think that population growth will inevitably outstrip the earth’s capacity to produce food, those who worry about “food-vs.-fuel” tradeoffs ignore human ingenuity and assume that there will be no further technological or institutional developments to address economic, social, and environmental challenges.

The final contribution, by Lee Ann Jackson, looks at how the WTO can help developing countries grapple with the impact of climate change. Research indicates that climate change may have devastating effects on agriculture in poor countries. Jackson argues that the “special and differential” trade liberalization rules for the poorest countries may help them adapt in the short-run, although, like Anderson and Valenzuela, she argues that free trade is best in the longer term. Jackson also points out that climate change may [ 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

create new pest problems for agriculture, since many pests may no longer die as a result of cold weather.

Pests seldom pass through customs and immigration when they cross international boundaries, so this may lead in turn to trade disputes and suspensions of trading relations. But WTO’s Sanitary and Phytosantiary framework offers cooperative mechanisms for sharing information and addressing such problems. Thus, Jackson argues, although WTO was not created to address environmental challenges facing global agriculture, the existence of a rules-governed trading system may prove very useful to developing countries for managing those challenges. One might ask, however, whether the current impasse in global agricultural trade negotiations threatens the long-term viability of the WTO, thereby undermining its value in this regard.

Because agriculture remains fraught with controversy, and the authors stake out forceful positions in some of the current debates, it is certain that some readers will find much with which to disagree in these articles. Still, the authors offer a rich set of ideas for addressing a range of high-priority contemporary policy issues, and they also push us to look beyond conventional wisdom for solutions to difficult problems. In so doing, they give us much “food for thought.”

Marc J. Cohen is a Research Fellow in the Food

Consumption and Nutrition Division of the International Food Policy Research Institute and a Professorial Lecturer in International Development at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University.

Charting the Future of Food

The Softest Subsidy Agricultural Subsidy Cuts, New Biotechnologies, Developing Countries, and Cotton Kym Anderson and Ernesto Valenzuela When the World Trade Organization (WTO) was created from the existing General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) on 1 January 1995 and the Uruguay Round Agreements were implemented, developing countries initially looked forward to greater access to rich-country markets through reduced agricultural subsidies and lowered trade barriers. The commitments made in the Uruguay Round delivered little reform during the six-year implementation period, but hopes were buoyed by the launch of the WTO’s Doha Development Round (DDA) in 2001.

Six years later, bitter wrangling over agriculture policy has brought the DDA to an impasse, and it may be several years before it is concluded or replaced with a new initiative. This delay, however, does not mean that no progress can be made for agricultural subsidy cuts in the meantime. Unilateral policy reform, encouraged by WTO dispute settlement procedures, could lead to significant subsidy cuts.

Moreover, new agricultural biotechnologies have emerged in the last decade that hold potential income-boosting opportunities for farmers in developing countries. If governments permit their adoption, these new technologies could complement subsidy and trade reforms. A change in technology policy in developing countries would boost the welfare gain from forthcoming agricultural policy reforms.

Kym Anderson is a George Gollin professor of economics at the University of Adelaide in Australia. Prior to August 2007, he was a lead economist with the Development Research Group of the World Bank.

Ernesto Valenzuela is a lecturer of economics at the University of Adelaide in Australia.

Prior to August 2007, he was a consultant with the Development Research Group of the World Bank.

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THE SOFTEST SUBSIDY

Cotton provides a clear example of such an opportunity. For many developing countries, especially in Africa, Central Asia, and Pakistan, it is a vitally important cash crop. It has received attention of late because four poor, cotton-exporting, West African countries— Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Mali (Cotton-4)—have demanded removal of cotton subsidy and import tariffs as part of DDA reforms. Cotton subsidies are primarily provided by governments in high-income countries, for example, the United States. Part of the U.S. cotton subsidy program has been ruled illegal following a WTO dispute settlement case brought by Brazil. Hence, some subsidy reform is expected soon.

This paper will demonstrate the magnitude of the gains that developing countries experience following a removal of all cotton subsidies and tariffs. It will also show how the gains from full reform compare with the gains that could be expected if and when: (a) the United States responds to the WTO’s dispute settlement Panel and Appellate Body reports, and (b) the DDA implements the partial reforms proposed at the Hong Kong Trade Ministerial meeting in December 2005.1 Furthermore, the article will compare the estimated gains from cotton subsidy and tariff reform with the potential gains earned by developing countries if they adopted new varieties of cotton emerging from the biotechnology revolution, specifically genetically modified (GM) cotton. Finally, it will show the dangers of global cotton market distortion created by subsidies and trade taxes.

These empirical results are generated using the so-called Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) model.2 This is a public, fully documented simulation model of the global economy that is widely used for [ 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

quantitative analysis of trade-related policies, including those influencing technological changes. Its database simulates the interactions between the world’s input and product markets as of 2001, subdivided into eighty-six countries and country groups, four sets of primary factors—land, unskilled labor, skilled labor, and capital—and fifty-seven products and product groups. It is often used to analyze the effect of international trade policy changes on national and global economic welfare and on the production and trade of different industries.

The Global Cotton Market. Cotton production is highly concentrated in a few countries. As of 2006, nearly half is produced by China and the United States; the total volume rises to more than two-thirds when India and Pakistan are added, and to more than three-quarters if Brazil and Uzbekistan are included. Exports of cotton lint are also highly concentrated; the United States, Australia, Uzbekistan, and Brazil account for almost two-thirds of the world’s exports.

In addition, many low-income countries depend heavily on cotton for earning foreign exchange.

Cotton usage, on the other hand, is distributed across countries roughly in proportion to their volumes of textile production. Because of high domestic usage by exporters of textiles and clothing in developing Asian countries—and Mexico, due to its preferential access to the U.S. and Canadian markets under NAFTA—even relatively large cotton producers such as China, Pakistan, and India export only a small fraction of their crop. This is in contrast to sub-Saharan Africa, where textile production is relatively minor and thus the cotton industry is heavily export focused (columns 2 and 3 of the table).

ANDERSON & VALENZUELA

Charting the Future of Food

The Global Cost of Cotton Sub- million per year is no less than one-fifth sidies and Tariffs. Using the GTAP of the estimated gain for the region from database and model of the global economy, we estimate that the removal of all cotton subsidies and import tariffs would boost global economic welfare by $283 million per year and would raise the price of cotton in international markets by an average of 13 percent. The price rise ensures that all cotton-exporting countries would benefit while net importers of cotton would be worse off, as shown in the right-hand columns of the table.3

the freeing of all goods markets globally, according to our GTAP model results. It is therefore not surprising that some African trade negotiators had been threatening to walk out of the WTO’s Doha round of talks if substantial reforms to cotton policies were not included in the final Doha agreement.

Turning to the impacts of such reform on cotton farmers’ incomes, we estimate incomes would decline by one-sixth in the United States and by just over half in

Both the U.S. and the EU economies

would be better off without those subsidies, even though their individual cotton farmers would be worse off.

The welfare effects are striking in their distribution among developing countries. Especially noteworthy is the relatively large benefit bestowed on subSaharan Africa—$147 million per year.

About two-fifths of that amount would go to the Cotton-4 and another onefifth to other West African countries.

This is driven by an estimated increase in sub-Saharan African cotton output and net farm income of nearly one-third, and in the real value of the region’s cotton exports by more than 50 percent. By contrast, removal of subsidies and tariffs would cause cotton output and exports to fall by one-quarter in the United States and by one-half in the EU, as shown in the middle columns of the table. This would consequently raise sub-Saharan Africa’s share of global cotton exports from 12 to 17 percent, and the share of all developing countries from 52 to 72 percent. The region’s welfare gain of $147

the EU. In virtually all other regions, however, they are estimated to rise. Crucially, they would rise by a massive 30 percent in sub-Saharan Africa and around 40 percent in West Africa in particular—more than three-quarters of which is due to cuts in domestic support programs.

Both the U.S. and the EU economies would be better off without those subsidies, even though their individual cotton farmers would be worse off. The net gain to the EU is very small, reflecting the tiny size of this primary industry in Western European agriculture. For the United States, however, the estimated annual gain in net economic welfare from removing those subsidies is $429 million per year.

Effects of Partial Reform of Cotton Subsidies and Tariffs.

While the full reform results presented Winter/Spring 2008 [ 9 ]

THE SOFTEST SUBSIDY

2001 da ta Table 1: Cotton net farm income and net export positions in 2001, and impact of removing cotton subsidies and tariffsa on cotton output, Net exports b ($ billion): exports, net farm income, and Cotton production economic welfare.

Clothing & (Percent and 2001 U.S. dollars) c specialization index

H i g h-i n c o m e c o un t r i e s Australia United States EU25 Japan Korea-Taiwan D e v e l opi n g c oun tr i e s E . E ur o pe & C . A s i a Turkey Other ECA Ea s t A s ia China S outh A s i a Bangladesh India Pakistan M . E a s t & N o r t h A fr i c a S ub -S a ha r a n A fr i c a South Africa Mozambique Zambia Uganda Other S. & E. Africa Nigeria Other Sub-Sah. Africa La tin A mer ic a & C a r .

Argentina Brazil Mexico Wor l d

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0.3 3.8 0.6 0.1 0 0.1 3 .8 4 .3 11.6 2.1 3 4 1 4 .5 14.2 13.7 29.9 2.5 5 .8 0.3 6.1 11.6 6.8 7.5 2.2 12.6 1 .1 1.1 1.5 0.8 1

Cotton

1 1.1 2.2 -1 -0.4 -0.7 -1 0.3 -0.4 0.7 -1 .4 -0.1 -1 -0.3 -0.6 -0.1 0.4 1 .1 0 0 0 0 0.2 0 0.8 -0.4 0.1 0.1 -0.5 0

Textiles -92 -2.6 -60.7 -28.8 -14.1 22.5 92 7 .4 8.7 -1.3 60.4 41.9 24 .5 3.8 11.9 6.8 -3 .3 -1 .8 -0.2 0 0 0 0.7 -0.7 -1.6 4 .8 -0.4 0 4 0

ANDERSON & VALENZUELA

(a) Removal of those distortions left after the phase-out of the quotas at the end of 2004. (b) Exports minus imports, both valued at f.o.b. prices as in the GTAP database 6.05. (c) Cotton’s national share in GDP relative to cotton’s share of global GDP. In the GTAP database the sector is ‘plant-based fibres’ and so includes such products as flax (important only for Bangladesh in the above countries) Source: Authors’ GTAP model simulation results.

H i g h-i n c o m e c o un t r i e s Australia United States EU25 Japan Korea-Taiwan D e v e l opi n g c o un t r i e s E. Eur ope & C . A s i a Turkey Other ECA Ea s t A s ia China S outh A s i a Bangladesh India Pakistan M . E a s t & N o r t h A fr i c a S ub -S a ha r a n A fr i c a South Africa Mozambique Zambia Uganda Other S. & E. Africa Nigeria Other Sub-Sah. Africa La tin A m er ic a & C a r .

Argentina Brazil Mexico Wor l d

Charting the Future of Food

GT A P m ode l s i m ul a ti on r e s ul ts Welfare change Change in (%): ($ million): Net cotton Cotton Due to Cotton farm export trade terms output income value TOTAL change -20 -1 5 -1 8 4 65 27 5 25 22 38 137 125 -25 -18 -29 429 443 -54 -53 -49 14 -109 1 2 62 -24 -49 12 7 34 -61 -84 6 4 46 -1 82 -27 5 7 3 36 -1 4 -3 6 2 2 37 -86 -80 10 9 35 72 44 2 2 72 -83 -1 27 2 2 76 50 45 2 1 55 -96 -99 8 5 68 -11 -21 -1 0 31 -85 -79 5 3 61 -7 -5 6 6 37 19 26 32 31 55 14 7 113 19 21 47 -1 -2 19 18 29 2 1 4 4 11 0 0 27 26 45 4 3 21 20 46 17 14 23 21 47 -1 0 39 37 60 126 97 11 9 54 -1 5 5 -1 5 2 14 11 66 7 6 10 10 58 13 12 13 11 42 -128 -136 -1 -2 8 283 0

Summer/Fall 2002 [ 1 1 ]

THE SOFTEST SUBSIDY

above are not likely to materialize in the immediate future, they provide a useful benchmark against which to compare the estimated effects of partial reforms.

Consider two partial reform scenarios: liberalization in the United States alone, as a possible response to the outcome of the WTO dispute settlement case brought against it by Brazil; and a broader liberalization consistent with what was agreed at the Hong Kong Trade Ministerial in December 2005 as part of the Doha Development Agenda (see endnote 1); namely, a multilateral reduction in all agricultural subsidies and in tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods and services.

Will the results of the WTO’s dispute settlement Panel and Appellate Body’s noncompliance with the United States’s WTO obligations bring forth significant cotton reform in the United States? The WTO ruled that the U.S. policies of export credit guarantees and the Step 2 program, which is effectively a subsidy to domestic textile producers, were types of subsidies prohibited by organization membership. In response, the U.S. Congress agreed in February to repeal its Step 2 program. If U.S. expenditure on cotton support is reduced by the full amount of the Step 2 payments, this would be equivalent to a one-seventh reduction in the aggregate subsidy to U.S. cotton production.

The complaining country (Brazil) may also expect a reduction in U.S. cotton farm subsidies, which in 2000-2002 averaged $3 billion per year, while in 1992 they were just $2 billion.4 To simulate a U.S. reform that could be interpreted as full compliance with the WTO rulings, we ran a scenario in which not only the Step 2 program is removed, but also domestic cotton subsidies are cut by [ 1 2 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

one-third, from $3 billion to $2 billion.5 The WTO’s Hong Kong Trade Ministerial meeting of the DDA in December 2005 went even further. The members came to a number of agreements: all cotton export subsidies will be eliminated during 2006; least-developed countries will get duty-free access for their cotton exports to high-income countries by the time the DDA conclusions are implemented; and domestic cotton subsidies will be reduced faster and more ambitiously than other agricultural domestic support programs. With the DDA now in limbo, that offer is on hold, but it is still worthy of consideration if the DDA is rejuvenated.

Another partial liberalization scenario demonstrates how far the offer will go for duty-free access for least-developed countries. This scenario would cut domestic cotton supports by one-third in all high-income countries, not just in the United States. The impacts of these partial reform simulations are four-fold. First, the national welfare gains and boost to cotton farmers’ incomes from partial reform are still concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa and Central Asia, although less so than under full reform. Second, subSaharan Africa’s cotton output and exports would rise only one-quarter as much under full reform as under the Doha partial reform scenario. Third, compared with what sub-Saharan Africa can expect from Doha cotton reform, U.S.-only partial reform would generate only around three-fifths of the estimated net welfare and net cotton income effects and just two-fifths of the export effects.

Finally, the average price of cotton in international markets is estimated to rise by 12.9 percent under full reform, but by just 4.4 and 3.2 percent in the Doha and U.S.-only scenarios, respectively.

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Charting the Future of Food

Adoption of GM cotton and would jump $2.3 billion. Asian developGains from Trade. The WTO’s Doha ing economies would gain even if they

Cotton Initiative involves two parts: in addition to trade and subsidy reform, importance has been attached to boosting the international competitiveness of cotton production in low-income countries. One way to do that is for governments of those countries to allow the adoption of new varieties of cotton emerging from the biotechnology revolution, following the example of early adopting countries like the United States, Australia, China, and South Africa. The development of agricultural technology has produced genetically modified cottonseeds, leading to higher yield and stronger natural pest resistance.

Many governments have been cautious about approving the use of such seeds, however, because of uncertainty regarding their environmental and food safety effects. In the case of cotton, the food safety risk is very small due to limited use of cottonseed oil within the food chain.

To simulate the economic effect of global adoption of GM cotton varieties, a complementary study by Anderson, Valenzuela, and Jackson assumes productivity in cotton production would rise. 6 Specifically, it assumes there would be less of all inputs needed to produce one ton of cotton; it cuts the use of inputs by 5 percent in all adopting countries, except India and sub-Saharan Africa, excluding South Africa. For India and sub-Saharan Africa, whose yields have been well below half the global average, the reduction in input use following GM seed adoption is assumed to be 15 percent.

If all countries adopt GM cotton, the value of cotton output in the four earlyadopting countries would fall in response to the output expansion in newly adopting regions. Global welfare, however,

grow little or no cotton, because the international price would be lower by an average of 4.1 percent. The economic welfare gains to Central Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Asia are estimated to be, respectively, ten, thirteen and twenty-three times greater than the global welfare gains when expressed as a percentage of regional income. South Asia’s gains are especially large because it is a large producer and user of cotton.

The estimate of the global benefits of full GM cotton adoption for developing countries is eight times larger than the above estimate of the global economic welfare gain from complete removal of all cotton subsidies and tariffs, and twelve times larger than the global gain from the Doha partial cotton reform simulation.

The differences are less marked for subSaharan Africa; even so, the estimated welfare gain to sub-Saharan Africa from adopting GM cotton varieties is well above the gain from full removal of all trade-distorting cotton policies. Additionally, this gain is nearly six times that from the Doha partial reform simulation considered above.

The gains to developing countries from GM adoption would be slightly greater in the absence of distortionary cotton policies—12 percent greater, in the case of sub-Saharan Africa. But if these two reforms—GM catch-up and subsidy removal—were to occur simultaneously in sub-Saharan Africa, they would each expand the region’s cotton production and exports and thus reinforce each other to create an even larger net gain. The gain to sub-Saharan Africa alone would be $370 million.

Furthermore, while some cottonimporting developing countries lose Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 ]

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from subsidy reform alone, they gain when they combine that reform with the spread of productivity-enhancing GM cotton varieties. This example clearly illustrates the symbiosis between the subsidy and trade policies on the one hand and technology policies on the other for developing countries.

Adaptation and adoption of new genetically modified cotton varieties are within the powers of developing countries themselves. Unlike the Cotton Initiative in the WTO’s Doha Development Agenda, governments in sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere do not need to wait until the round concludes to boost the incomes of their cotton farmers. Those developing countries with well-developed public agricultural research and extension systems are well positioned to benefit from new biotechnology by working in partnership or in parallel with private biotech and seed companies.

Approving investments in those activities by the private sector will allow the process of adaptation and adoption to move forward. The experiences in China, India, and South Africa all indicate

this new biotechnology will make such expenditure even more affordable.

Moreover, the fear of adverse environmental or food safety issues has not yet been justified, in part because scientists and regulators have found ways to manage those risks. Embracing GM cotton could help developing country governments streamline the process of approving the release of GM food, because of the steady flow of scientific reports concluding that there is no evidence that GM foods are harmful either to the environment or to human or animal health.8 These economies could potentially multiply the existing $2 billion gain from GM cotton adoption.9

Conclusion. The extent to which unilateral reforms will generate the benefits of full liberalization hinges heavily on U.S. and EU commitments; those governments must be willing to cut their applied domestic subsidies. Partial reforms, of the sort discussed in Hong Kong, could deliver roughly twice the gains to cotton-exporting developing countries as the current WTO reforms,

Embracing GM cotton could help

developing country governments streamline the process of approving the release of GM food. that rapid and widespread adoption is possible, even by small farmers—despite poorly developed public agricultural research and unattractive investment climates.7 As those systems and associated intellectual property rights are improved, however, the payoff from research and development spending will be enhanced to adapt appropriate local crop varieties.

The potential benefits shown above from [ 1 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

which were imposed on the United States as a result of the Brazilian WTO dispute.

Even excluding Doha Round results, there are other policies that may increase the incomes of cotton farmers in developing countries. Adaptation and adoption of new genetically modified cotton varieties are one clear contribution. This is within the powers of developing countries to regulate themselves. Freeing up

ANDERSON & VALENZUELA

that investment opportunity is not dependent on a Doha round conclusion.

The above results suggest that GM cotton adoption would enhance the economy of a developing country more substantially than would the removal of all cotton subsidies and tariffs. Cotton subsidy reductions by developed countries like the United States and those of the EU would actually enhance the capacity of poor farmers in low-income countries, encouraging the purchase of more expensive GM cottonseeds. Such com-

Charting the Future of Food

mitment is necessary for the global cotton economy to reach its full potential, and governments of developing and developed countries alike must work together to achieve it.

DISCLAIMER : The views expressed are the authors' alone and not necessarily those of the World Bank and its Executive Directors, or the countries they represent, nor of the British and Dutch Governments that provided the trust funds for the research projects on which this paper draws.

NOTES

1 The Panel’s findings in the case Brazil brought against the United States are in WTO, “United States - Subsidies on Upland Cotton: Report of the Panel,” WT/DS267/R, Geneva: World Trade Organization, 8 September 2004. The United States appealed, and the Appellate Body’s findings are reported in WTO, “United States - Subsidies on Upland Cotton: Report of the Appellate Body,” WT/DS267/AB/R, Geneva: World Trade Organization, 3 March 2005. At the end of the WTO Trade Ministerial meeting in Hong Kong in late 2005, the cotton initiative was emphasized yet again, see WTO, ’Ministerial Declaration: Doha Work Programme’, WT/MIN(05)/DEC, Geneva: World Trade Organization, 22 December 2005, www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/minist_e/min05_e/fin al_text_e.htm. The original response to the West African demand for a cotton initiative as part of the DDA is reported in WTO, ‘Agriculture: The Cotton Sub-Committee’, Geneva: World Trade Organization, 19 November 2004, www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/cotton_subcommittee_e.htm.

2 For details see www.gtap.org, T.W. Hertel, Global Trade Analysis: Modeling and Applications, New York: Cambridge University Press (1997) and B.V. Dimaranan, “Global Trade, Assistance, and Protection: The GTAP 6 Data Base,” Center for Global Trade Analysis, Purdue University, West Lafayette (2006).

3 For more on the global modeling methodology used and details of the empirical results, see K. Anderson and E. Valenzuela, “The World Trade Organization’s Doha Cotton Initiative: A Tale of Two Issues”, The World Economy 30(8): 1281-1304, August

2007.

4 That $3.0 billion is equivalent to a 40 percent production subsidy to cotton farmers. By way of comparison, the subsidy in the EU is 39 percent, but because the industry is so much smaller in the EU than the United States, the value of that subsidy is ‘just’ $430 million.

5 The WTO’s compliance panel in this case ruled in October 2007 that indeed the United States had not reformed enough to comply with its WTO obligations.

6 Anderson, K., E. Valenzuela and L.A. Jackson, “GM Cotton Adoption, Recent and Prospective: A Global CGE Analysis of Economic Impacts,” Economic Development and Cultural Change 56(2), January 2008 (forthcoming).

7 Sithole-Niang, I., J.I. Cohen and P. Zambrano, “Putting GM Technologies to Work: Public Research Pipelines in Selected African Countries”, African Journal of Biotechnology 3(11): 564-71, 2004 and Cohen, J.I., “Poorer Nations Turn to Publicly Developed GM Crops”, Nature Biotechnology 23(1): 27-33, 2005.

8 King, D.K., GM Science Review: First Report, Prepared by the GM Science Review Panel under the chairmanship of Sir David King for the UK Government, London, 2003.

9 Anderson, K. and L.A. Jackson, “Some Implications of GM Food Technology Policies for SubSaharan Africa”, Journal of African Economies 14(3): 385410, 2005, and Anderson, K., L.A. Jackson and C.P. Nielsen, “GM Rice Adoption: Implications for Welfare and Poverty Alleviation”, Journal of Economic Integration 20(4): 771-88, 2005.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 5 ]

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Food, Feed, or Fuel?

Examining Linkages Between Biofuels and Agricultural Market Economies Siwa Msangi and Mandy Ewing As global energy resources become increasingly scarce in the face of growing energy demand for transport fuel and other productive uses, many countries have begun to turn to the possibilities that biofuels from renewable resources could offer to supplement their domestic energy portfolio. While much of the recent literature has focused on the growth of biofuels in the developed world—mostly in ethanol, a substitute for gasoline made from sugar- or starch-based crops, and biodiesel, a substitute for diesel made from oil-based crops—developing nations have expressed growing interest in biofuel production as well.1 Although Brazil and the United States currently represent nearly 90 percent of ethanol production, and the European Union represents 90 percent of biodiesel production, China and India are expected to capture a growing share of production in these biofuels categories in the coming decades.2 While a number of other developing countries find the prospect of biofuels attractive, the degree to which they invest in building capacity for their own domestic production remains uncertain, given the fluctuating price of fossil-based energy and the inevitable long-term commitment of governments to support fledgling biofuel-producing industries through subsidies, tax credits, and other producer and consumer incentives. There are a number of countries in subSaharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and Latin America

Siwa Msangi is a research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and leads the global modeling program within the Environment and Production Technology Division, focusing on agricultural production, nutrition, poverty, and the environment.

Mandy Ewing is a senior research assistant within the Environment and Production Technology Division at IFPRI.

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that have suitable climates, agro-ecological conditions, land areas, and water resources for growing the crops required for biofuel production, also known as feedstock.3 However, the degree of infrastructure development in these countries varies widely, and many nations are incapable of competing against those which are able to facilitate the large-scale production of biofuels. Furthermore, the extent to which some developing countries would need to divert scarce resources away from other important development projects and, in general, a broader agenda for growth, serves as an argument against the adoption of biofuel technologies in the immediate future.

In their recent agricultural outlook to 2016, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) suggest that biofuel production is the principal driver of long-term commodity price trends.4 These price effects may be strong enough to shift consumption patterns for the world’s poor, rendering more people food insecure. As a result, policymakers have examined the effects of increased biofuel production on commodity prices. While elucidating producer price incentives, these studies do not develop a full picture of how energy, growth, and consumption are interrelated. Although some countries are viewed less as “developing” nations—like China, which seems well on its way to meet such important Millennium Development goals as reducing poverty and hunger—there is still concern that developing countries might jeopardize their goals of improving human well-being for the poorest if they aggressively pursue agriculturally-based production of biofuels. For example, rapid economic growth in India coin[ 1 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

cides with high levels of poverty and food insecurity.

We address the body of literature that looks at the rapidly increasing biofuels production and demand within both the developed and developing world, and the potential for adverse impacts on global food economies. Energy-driven economic growth illustrates the linkages between agricultural production, consumption, and the productivity of capital and energy in meeting the needs of the economy. This approach highlights the tradeoffs in land use, and the implications that arise for food growing capacity. Moreover, we can observe how the dynamics of “food-versus-fuel” play out under alternative growth paths and their resulting policy implications. Ultimately, policymakers and researchers should better understand the complexities of biofuel production in order to synergize investment and development strategies that strengthen the function of food systems.

Overview of Current Literature.

Much of the current literature focuses on the impacts of increased biofuel production on crop prices and land use. For major food exporters in Latin America, a paper prepared for the American Association of Agricultural Economics annual meeting determines that producers have enough excess land to produce for food and fuel.5 For OECD countries, between 30 and 70 percent of current cropland would have to be dedicated to biofuel production to offset a 10 percent domestic demand for transport fuel.6 Concerning prices, OECD also predicts that the additional demand for ethanol could increase the world price of sugar by 60 percent before 2014.7 Msangi et al., however, demonstrate that the strong

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increases in feedstock commodity prices are lessened as second generation technologies go on-line.8 Other studies note the difficulty in determining whether increasing producer price incentives will be substantial enough to overcome escalating production costs as a result of higher oil prices.9 The price effects of biofuel production have also been found to differ by feedstock commodity. Such is the case even

Charting the Future of Food

while net importers have to decide whether to import food and produce bioenergy or vice versa.13 Conversely, countries that have strong export markets in non-food-related sectors, such as tourism, may be able to absorb higher import costs.14 Similarly, urban households that purchase both food and fuel may have a considerable disadvantage in adjusting to increases in food prices, compared to rural residents who are able

Urban households that purchase both food

and fuel may have a considerable disadvantage in adjusting to increases in food prices. though the causal linkages tend to be similar and stem from the increased demand of feedstock, leading to tighter market conditions and higher prices for the commodity. In Latin America, for example, differing price effects are projected for bioenergy crops, traditional crops, and bioenergy production by-products such as soy meal.10 Indeed, strong downward price effects have been observed for protein rich feedstocks, including soybeans and cereals, which have proteinrich by-products.11 In addition, other studies have found strong downward impacts on world cereal and oilseed markets by changing baseline growth rates for major agricultural markets.12 While the underlying mechanisms dictating commodity price effects have yet to be fully explored, there remains strong interest in determining how biofuels may affect food security. Countries that import both food and fuel tend to have the least secure food supplies because net food exporters have the potential to produce both food and fuel,

to produce food or fuel for their own consumption.

Higher agricultural prices may give rural producers access to world energy markets, but few studies investigate their impacts on food consumption and nutrition. For example, sugarcane and cassava provide the most viable feedstocks for ethanol production in Latin America.15 Rosegrant et al., however, predict that a rise in production of cassavaderived bioethanol may cause a near tripling of its world price by 2020, posing a serious threat to the many rural poor who depend on cassava as a staple crop.16

Interactions between Energy and Food Markets. In this section we

discuss the linkages between energy and agricultural markets, the implications that growth in energy and food demand have on land, and the need for technological improvements. These linkages show the role that technology plays in improving both the conversion efficienWinter/Spring 2008 [ 1 9 ]

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cy of crop-based biomass into energy, as well as the productivity of agricultural crops themselves. Both of these factors underlie the relationship between growth in biofuel production and its impact on agricultural economies, revealing tradeoffs with food availability and consumer welfare.

Agricultural production in the developed world is highly mechanized, maximizing yield with manufactured inputs like fertilizers and improved seed varieties. Each of these factors requires energy directly for fueling farm equipment and indirectly as inputs to manufacture fertilizers and machinery. Even though modern agriculture depends on energybased inputs, food prices remain low through a combination of low input costs and high yields. High energy prices, however, are increasing the costs of production. Consider, for example, the linkage between energy markets and the market for fertilizer. Since energy poses a significant input cost for producing fertilizer, a change in energy price has a direct effect on the price of fertilizer. An increase in fertilizer price will cause a decrease in the amount of fertilizer demanded at the farm level. As a result, the quantity of food available on the market will decrease, forcing consumers to pay higher prices. Similar linkages can be drawn for other energy intensive farm inputs, such as machinery and other equipment, which would have significant impacts on agrarian households when considered together.

Land is another main factor of agricultural production. The decision to dedicate land to the production of biofuels depends heavily on available conversion technologies, or the processes that transform crops into fuels. Current technologies can efficiently convert [ 2 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

grains and sugars—such as corn and sugar cane—into ethanol, and oils—such as those derived from soybeans—into biodiesel. The efficiency of these technologies depends on the yield, in bushels per acre, of the feedstock to the energy content per gallon processed. In the United States, corn is transformed into ethanol at a rate of 2.5 gallons of ethanol per bushel, with an average yield of 139.34 bushels per acre.17 This means that the average producer can generate 350 gallons of ethanol per acre of corn cultivation.

To further illustrate how biofuel production is linked to land use, and ultimately crop production and productivity, consider the effects of two simultaneous technological improvements: one in fuel conversion technologies, and another in agricultural productivity. The shift in fuel conversion efficiency allows a greater amount of energy to be produced for the same amount of land—or, conversely, the same amount of energy with a lesser amount of land. As conversion technologies become more efficient, a decreasing amount of land will be necessary for energy production and, in turn, more will be available for food crops.

Additionally, as agricultural productivity improvements are made in improved seed varieties or mechanization, increased yields will result from the same amount of land. Under this scenario, more land can be dedicated for energy production without affecting food production yields.

From this example, we see that the concurrence of increasing food production— to meet the needs of growing, wealthier populations—and increasing energy demands places steeper requirements on the improvement of both energy and crop technologies in order to keep up. Other-

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wise, a constant or decreasing food supply from the decreased availability of land for food production and static yields would cause the “food-versus-fuel” trade-off that is of much concern to policymakers and analysts. When formulating policy, it will be important to consider how simultaneous improvements in both fuel conversion and crop productivity influence the evolution of energy production and yield levels over time in relation to the quantity of total agricultural land available for food or energy uses.

Extensification, an increase in total agricultural land, could relieve some of the constraints that might be placed on yield growth and might be an option where there is non-agricultural land that could easily be converted. Of course, care has to be taken to ensure that expansion into non-agricultural land would not entail losing important habitats for species or propelling fragile lands toward rapid declines in quality. Several such instances occurred in tropical and semi-tropical environments, where clearing for agriculture disrupted the delicate ecologies of forested areas—its result, the rapid loss of soil, organic matter, and fertility, and a subsequent degradation of livelihoods dependent upon those lands. These kinds of dynamics illustrated the differences between North American soil ecologies and those of tropical South America and Africa—the latter rarely appreciated by early aid efforts, which promoted largescale, prairie-style modes of grain production.18 In the past, the livelihoods of non-agricultural, indigenous communities were also overlooked when considering options for expanding production into low-density areas, leading to social disruption and the subsequent loss of tradition-based livelihoods.19 There might also be concerns about

Charting the Future of Food

animal habitat preservation that could arise if large-scale extensification were considered an option for increasing cultivated areas for energy crops. Together with possible disruption and loss of important eco-system functions, habitats could be destroyed if environmental considerations were not weighed and valued accordingly in the larger cost-benefit calculations driving investment decisions. These shortcomings could be partially addressed by involving key stakeholders in the evaluation process, strengthening the regulation and enforcement of land use, where such mechanisms exist, or creating them where they do not.

But most heavily populated regions have already reached the limits of their cultivable land due to the pressures of urbanization and human settlement— especially if one wants to farm on land that has access to water and market infrastructure as opposed to low-quality and highly degraded lands. This would make the intensification of production on existing land—leading to higher productivity levels—the only viable option for some regions to increase their output of food, feed, and biofuel feedstock, while maintaining the ecological integrity of the surrounding landscape.

Implications for Food Security and Policy. Many of these country-

level investments coincide with those that we might consider generally necessary for the improvement of food production, distribution, and delivery systems in developing agricultural economies. A multitude of the environmental stresses that could stand in the way of crop production for biofuel feedstocks, in terms of soil quality or other critical resource endowments such as water, are the same Winter/Spring 2008 [ 2 1 ]

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socio-economic development, and human welfare. We describe the key linkages between agriculture and energy to illustrate the important technological factors affecting the long-term prospects for the biofuels industry and its impact on the economy. Development and long-term economic growth will inevitably lead to more capital- and energy-intensive patterns of production over time, and it remains the role of technological efficiency improvements in both industry and agriculture to relieve the pressures that this growth will place on the natural resource base and the landscape. A food-focused economy would need much more agricultural land, barring any productivity improvements, than one that is more capital- and energy-intensive. However, the linkages between growth, consumption, and energy needs will inevitably put greater pressure on production systems, and on the natural resources and ecosystems that support them.

Therefore, maintaining a focus on agricultural productivity and technological innovation in agricultural and other sectors can help avoid the “food-versusfuel” trade-off. The duality of biofuel capacity growth and agricultural development allows for a synergy between these goals, such that more efficient and productive agricultural production, processing, storage, and distribution processes can lead to better outcomes in food security and the productive capacity of the biofuels industry. By examining biofuel capacity, agricultural development, and economic growth in this way, we can achieve a multitude of important human Conclusions. Devoting resources to development goals with a common set of biofuel production affects agricultural technologies, policy instruments, and production, economic growth, overall interventions.

stresses that put pressure on the production of food for domestic consumption and export. Indeed, many of the preconditions for establishing an efficient and well-functioning domestic biofuel program, such as reliable agricultural storage, processing, distribution systems, and high-yielding agricultural production systems, are the same ones that policymakers and researchers consider when trying to define the necessary conditions for food security and the reliable delivery of food-based services to developing country populations.

In light of this coincidence, it would appear that the “food-for-fuel” tradeoff, that some policy analysts argue would result from the large-scale expansion of biofuel production, need not occur.

Indeed, the very investments that might enhance food security through the strengthening of food production and delivery systems—such as higher-yielding, input-intensive cropping where production and processing take place within a vertically integrated and capital-intensive system—could be the very ones that ensure the healthy operation of a nascent biofuel industry and prevent the kind of sharp trade-off that some predict.

Undoubtedly, there will be market-level price effects when there is a large-scale expansion of production from feedstock commodities that also has sizeable food and feed use value, and surely those who are most vulnerable to price increases could be adversely affected. However, the need for continued policy analysis in this area is clearly evident and should remain a research priority.

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Charting the Future of Food

NOTES

1 Worldwatch Institute, “Biofuels for Transportation: Global Potential and Implications for Sustainable Agriculture and Energy in the 21st Century,” Extended Summary of Report for the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agricultural and Consumer Protection (BMELV), Washington DC, 2006.

2 Lew Fulton, Tom Howes, and Jeffrey Hardy, Biofuels for Transport: An International Perspective (Paris: International Energy Agency, 2004).

3 World Bank Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP), Potential for Biofuels for Transport in Developing Countries. Report 312/05 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2005).

4 “Agricultural Outlook 2007-2016,” Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development/Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN, 2007.

5 Carlos E. Ludena, Carlos Razo, and Alberto Saucedo, “Biofuels in Latin America and the Caribbean: Quantitative Considerations and Policy Implications for the Agricultural Sector,” Paper prepared for the American Association of Agricultural Economics Annual Meeting, Portland, Oregon, 29 July-1 August 2007.

6 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, “Agricultural Market Impacts of Future Growth in the Production of Biofuels, 2006,” http://www.oecd.org/home (date accessed:10 August 2007).

7 Ibid.

8 Siwa Msangi, Timothy Sulser, Mark Rosegrant, and Rowena Valmonte-Santos, “Global Scenarios for Biofuels: Impacts and Implications,” Farm Policy Journal vol .4, no. 2 (2007).

9 Josef Schmidhuber, “Impact of an Increased Biomass Use on Agricultural Markets, Prices, and Food Security: A Longer-Term Perspective,” Paper prepared for the International Symposium of Notre Europe, Paris, 27-29 November 2006.

10 Ludena et al., “Biofuels in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

11 Schmidhuber, “Increased Biomass Use.” 12 Catherine Benjamin and Magalie Houee-Bigot, “Measuring Competition Between Non-Food and Food Demand on World Grain Markets: Is Biofuel Production Compatible With Pressure for Food Production?” Paper prepared for the American Association of Agricultural Economics Annual Meeting, Portland, Oregon,29 July- 1 August 2007.

13 Ludena et al., “Biofuels in Latin America and the Caribbean;” Schmidhuber, “Increased Biomass Use;” C. Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer, “How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor,” Foreign Affairs 86, no.

3 (2007): 41-53.

14 Schmidhuber, “Increased Biomass Use.” 15 Ludena et al., “Biofuels in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

16 Mark Rosegrant, Siwa Msangi, Timothy Sulser, and Rowena Valmonte-Santos, “Biofuels and the Global Food Balance,” 2020 Focus 14—Bioenergy and Agriculture: Promises and Challenges, eds. Peter Hazell and R. K. Pachauri (Washington: International Food Policy Research Institute, 2006).

17 Ben Harden “Improving Ethanol Yield From Corn,” Agricultural Research, October (1996), Internet, http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/oct96/ethanol1096.htm (Date accessed: 10 October 2007); Shapouri, Hosein, and Andrew McAloon, “The 2001 Net Energy Balance of Corn-Ethanol,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2001, http://www.usda.gov/oce/reports/energy/net_energy_balance.pdf (date accessed: 15 October 2007).

18 S.A.Vosti, J. Witcover, and C.L. Carpentier.

2002. “Agriculture Intensification by Smallholders in the Western Brazilian Amazon: From Deforestation to Sustainable Land Use,” Research Report 130, (International Food Policy Research Institute: Washington, D.C.).

19 Charles R. Lane, and Jules N. Pretty. 1991. Displaced Pastoralists and Transferred Wheat Technology in Tanzania.

Gatekeeper series, no. 20.(London: Sustainable Agriculture Programme of the International Institute for Environment and Development).

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 2 3 ]

Charting the Future of Food

Agricultural Trade and Climate Change Can the WTO Promote Resilience in the Face of Uncertainty?

Lee Ann Jackson The focus of the climate change debate has recently shifted away from simple cost-benefit analysis toward identifying the efforts that must be made to ensure that the least advantaged members of society do not face disproportionate costs. Recent economic models have concluded that a country’s capacity to adjust to these physical changes will determine ultimate economic impacts, and thus developing countries that are less resilient and flexible may suffer disproportionately. The uncertainty surrounding the issue and the ability of developing countries to adjust to potential shifts on agricultural production have important consequences for global trade and, by extension, for the multilateral debates within the World Trade Organization (WTO).

What are the institutional implications for the WTO in the face of future shifting patterns of agri-food production and trade, in the short-, medium-, and long-term? After briefly describing recent research insights into distributional impacts of climate change, the article first considers current negotiations and how the architecture of various proposals may address the need for flexibility in developing countries. The WTO dispute system may address the possibility of an escalating conflict spurred by climate changes during the transition to new social and environmental equilibria, but it remains to be seen whether countries participating in the current Doha Round are focusing on goals that anticipate the eventual long-

Lee Ann Jackson is an economist at the World Trade Organizatoin’s Agriculture and Commodities Division in Geneva, Switzerland.

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explain these sharp discrepancies; most of these nations are near the equator and therefore will be significantly affected by higher temperature levels and consequent declines in agricultural productivity. In addition, many of these countries have low capacities to respond flexibly to rapidly changing conditions. The CGD study also notes that because agriculture contributes a larger percentage of national GDP for developing nations, the decline in agricultural productivity Climate Change and Agricultur- will disproportionately affect these al Trade Patterns. Climate change nations over their industrialized counmodeling has provided insights into the terparts. The primary areas of concern potential distribution of physical impacts are sub-Saharan Africa and other comof climate change, particularly in the area modities-based economies, where cliof agricultural production. 1 On a glob- mate shifts could place millions of people al scale, agriculture will be directly hit by at a greater risk of poverty and hunger.

The impact of climate change and shifts in temperature and precipitation patterns and will be forced to absorb declining agricultural productivity on some of the costs associated with climate trade patterns will be varied and will change and declining levels of freshwater depend heavily on how well a nation is available for crop irrigation. Scientists integrated into the global agricultural predict that while the interiors of major trade system. Currently, five wealthy, continents will warm more quickly than non-equatorial regions account for the oceans, the weather extremes are like- more than 80 percent of the world’s exports of wheat, corn, soybeans, beef, ly to be exacerbated in the long run.

But how will the impact of climate pork, and poultry: Argentina and Brazil, change on agricultural production differ Russia and the former Soviet Republics, between the developed and developing the EU, Australia and New Zealand, and world? A recent study by the Center for the United States and Canada.3 Global Development (CGD), based on Although most of these regions will expedetailed modeling of the distribution of rience the negative results of climate impacts of climate change on agricultur- change, they are not the most vulnerable. al productivity, indicates that the develOther researchers highlight the fact oping world is likely to experience, on that unique geophysical characteristics of average, a greater decrease in agricultural particular regions will determine their productivity.2 For example, the CGD physical vulnerability to changing climodel estimates that by 2080 wealthy mates. In a recent Scientific American article, countries could experience a 6 percent Jeffrey Sachs notes that while global decrease in agricultural output, whereas impacts will vary widely, four primary developing countries could experience a zones of concern should be monitored: 21 percent decrease. The geophysical low-lying coastal settlements, farm aspects of developing countries largely regions that depend upon rivers fed by run outcome of climate change.

The question for the WTO is twofold. First, it is worthwhile to take a look at how shifts in production patterns will affect trade relationships and current WTO negotiations. Second, the extent to which the WTO can provide a system that will encourage resilience and flexibility for WTO members against the distributional consequences of climate change must be considered.

[ 2 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

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glacier melt, arid regions which are likely to experience greater drought frequency, and humid areas in Southeast Asia, which are vulnerable to shifts in monsoon patterns.4 The effects of climate change, of course, will not be confined to a particular area. Rather, environmental productivity and socio-economic impacts may spill over political boundaries. Sachs points out that some areas have the means and the resources to shift their production to new economic activities in case of

Charting the Future of Food

Canada have encouraged a Mountain Pine Beetle epidemic that caused widespread mortality in lodgepole pine forests, the province’s most abundant commercial tree species. At the current rate of growth, 50 percent of the mature pine will be gone by 2008, and 80 percent by 2013. The consequences will alter ecosystems and the forestry industry in British Columbia for decades.5 Ultimately, there is an alleged dangerous compounding risk associated with climate change. At a potential threshold

There is an alleged dangerous

compounding risk associated with climate change. an agricultural production crisis. Other regions will be unable to adjust and will be more likely to move to new areas in search of economically viable alternatives to their traditional agricultural roles.

New migration movements will undoubtedly constrain various governments and economies. These changes will alter agricultural productivity and competitiveness in the global trade system.

Most current modeling scenarios consider changing weather patterns, temperatures and water availability, and their respective impacts on overall agricultural productivity. Climate change will, however, also have important effects on the distribution of agricultural production by altering habitats, behavioral patterns, and the relative competitiveness of pests and diseases. Increasing temperatures may allow populations of pests, which usually do not survive the winters in certain colder regions, to disrupt certain ecological and agricultural patterns. For example, milder winters in northwest

level, a species can become altogether extinct and hence lead to other irreversible ecological changes. At the same time, specific changes will be very difficult to predict. Most models have not incorporated these types of uncertainties into their projections.

Providing Flexibility for Vulnerable Groups. The current round of

trade negotiations at the WTO seeks to reduce market distortions in the area of agricultural trade, in part through the reduction of bound agricultural duties.

WTO members agreed at the end of the Uruguay Round to bind their agricultural duties so that tariffs on individual items would not exceed a specified level.

Nevertheless, many countries still have substantial room between the duties that they apply and those defined by their WTO commitments. Depending upon the ambition and resilience of the Doha Round, the reduction in bound tariff rates may not imply a reduction in a Winter/Spring 2008 [ 2 7 ]

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country’s applied duties. A reduction in bound duties, however, would offer exporting countries some predictability with respect to future market access conditions. In addition, the room between bound and applied tariff rates provides some flexibility, or "policy space," for importing countries concerned about the uncertain, future socio-economic conditions.

Thirteen negotiating groups are actively engaged within the current WTO negotiations on agriculture. Recent negotiations have specifically identified three categories—least developed countries (LDCs), small and vulnerable economies (SVEs), and recently acceded members (RAMs)—that may warrant more flexible treatment, particularly under the market access negotiations in agriculture.6 Current negotiation proposals include a set of flexibilities for these groups of countries that will address their diverse concerns with respect to market access. For example, LDCs would not be required to undertake reductions in bound duties, and both RAMs and SVEs would, under certain conditions, be able to moderate cuts to agricultural bound tariffs. One component of this set of flexibilities for developing countries, the Special Safeguard Mechanism, could be particularly useful to developing countries dealing with import surges or price declines that might result from unexpected and extreme climatic events.

There is an overlap between the groups of countries targeted for more flexible treatment under the current WTO negotiations and the groups that climate change models have identified as likely to bear disproportionate costs from climate change. For example, 25 out of 32 LDCs who are WTO members are African countries and, as noted above, [ 2 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

may be more susceptible to negative productivity impacts of climate change. The flexible treatment of LDCs would exempt them from undertaking potentially burdensome policy changes, such as tariff reductions that could likely decrease tariff revenue and public expenditures.

The potential "flexibilities" given to the group of SVEs would arm these small island states—that are vulnerable to be particularly damaged by the impacts of climate change—with additional policy space. These provisions, which allow developing countries to adjust their policies in the face of shifting productivity and economic competitiveness, may ultimately provide the short-term political solution that is necessary for developing countries to accept negotiated outcomes in agriculture. Since market access policies, however, create market rigidity and influence the distribution of resources within economies, there is the concern that avoiding disciplines in this area could inhibit resilience in the long run.

Managing Conflict During Transition. Arguably, conflicts are more

likely to result in situations where rapid change leads to the erosion of underlying common interests and disintegration of existing allegiances. Agricultural policies, such as tariffs and subsidies, represent policymakers' responses to domestic interests and historical trade relationships. For example, trade relationships between African countries and Europe have been fundamentally influenced by colonialism and its legacy. Existing agricultural production patterns continue to reflect trade arrangements that provide preferential access to European markets for African exporters. Although preferential arrangements shift over time, producer groups reluctant to lose this type of

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competitive advantage will invest resources in order to buffer against potential economic costs. These types of agricultural policies, therefore, are less likely to shift abruptly as a result of climate change. While producers that experience deterioration of their competitive position may increase their demand for protectionist policies, one would not expect a sharp increase in new protectionist policies justified by climate change in the medium term.

On the other hand, shifts in climate may very well lead to increased conflict in the area of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures, which are used by countries to address potential food safety and animal and plant health risks. These measurements are important in light of the ecological impacts associated with insects and pests. Consider, for example, an African country in which many poor farmers cultivate cassava and depend upon the crop for as much as 50 percent of their calorie intake.7 In the past, many African countries suffered declines in cassava production due to the inadvertent introduction of the cassava mealybug from Latin America. Fortunately, the infestation was ultimately brought under control through the introduction of an insect predator.

Climate change could destabilize this predator-prey equilibrium in two main ways. First, climate change may create conditions that allow species to thrive in places where previously they could not survive. Second, through its direct impact on predator-prey relationships, climate change could permanently alter the ecosystem. If, for example, current predators of the cassava mealybug are less able to withstand increasing temperatures and water scarcity than their prey could, the consequent explosion in the cassava

Charting the Future of Food

mealybug population growth will have a direct, detrimental impact on agricultural productivity. In response, African countries that have already suffered production losses due to the influx of invasive species may be more inclined to implement immediate measures to address the potential risks of pests.

Under the WTO's Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Agreement, WTO members can implement emergency measures as a temporary response to a disease or pest outbreak within an exporting country. Since this type of urgent response is typically not subject to a lengthy comment or consultation period, these activities can be an effective mechanism to quickly block trade in the face of an increased risk. Furthermore, in light of risks and uncertainty about a pest threat, countries could become temporarily more risk-averse and inadvertently increase the frequency of emergency trade restrictions. If trade partners disagree over the extent to which risk has increased and exporting countries suspect a protectionist motivation for these blunt trade restrictions, countries will need additional mechanisms to solve and address these concerns. The WTO must provide such mechanisms to deter potential conflicts between trade nations.

Since pursuing formal dispute proceedings requires significant resource investment, developing countries may benefit from alternative approaches to resolve their trade conflicts. Informal processes to address trade concerns are typically more cost-effective in terms of both time and financial resources. The WTO has many routine monitoring, surveillance, and enforcement mechanisms. Within the SPS committee, members’ SPS measures are subject to peer review. These peer review mechanisms Winter/Spring 2008 [ 2 9 ]

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contribute to improved adherence by all members to rules, disciplines, and commitments made under the WTO agreements. The delays between data provision and measure implementation could be directly relevant to how well transparency works. Further efforts to strengthen monitoring and surveillance mechanisms—for example, through the development of tools for efficiently screening and prioritizing information— are important to ensure countries can manage the increasing volume of available information.

Moving Forward While Looking Backwards. Given that 151 countries

participate in the WTO negotiations, it is not surprising that overall efficacy and the process of achieving consensus has been slow. From an individual country’s perspective, it is important to procure additional information about the future, particularly the prognoses on how agricultural trade patterns may shift before the country commits to a particular offensive

tions. For developing countries, maintaining access to accurate and up-to-date national data is a chronic problem. In many of the analyses that need to take place to inform negotiating positions, the relevant data can be five to ten years old. The use of older data in the context of shifting global agricultural trade and production causes negotiating positions to be outdated by the time the Round’s conclusions are implemented.

Second, while climate changeinduced shifts in agricultural production will alter interest group pressures and create new types of protectionist incentives at the national level, in many cases, entrenched domestic political interests will still control parts of the domestic policy agenda. Those groups that have benefited from public support in the form of subsidies in the past will have a greater ability to lobby for continued public support. Thus, although shifting productivity associated with climate change should re-shape countries’ defensive and offensive interests within

Climate change will shift agricultural production, consequently creating new dynamics in international trade. or defensive position. However, from the point of view of the system as a whole and the changing climate, there are at least two reasons why countries’ positions in the long-term are likely to be mismatched with the economic conditions.

First, countries base their negotiating positions on analysis of domestic data and the available information about their trade partners. Some countries have current and thorough national data sources from which they can inform their posi[ 3 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

WTO negotiations, there is likely to be policy inertia during trade negotiations.

To what extent does this policy inertia create a shortsightedness in member countries regarding the full package of the negotiations? Debates concerning agriculture and non-agriculture market access have dominated the current round of negotiations, while other important areas have had less focus. Given the uncertainty related to future global agricultural markets, policymakers, particu-

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larly in developing countries, need to develop a broader vision of the ways in which other areas under negotiation might become increasingly relevant.

In the face of an uncertain climate, a focus on protecting particular sectors— or, the alternative, a focus on enhancing market access for particular exports—may benefit particular groups in the short run. This emphasis on short-term goals, however, ignores the need for strategies that could enhance adaptability to changing conditions. Policies related to transport services and infrastructure are more likely to create positive economic dynamics. Consider again a sub-Saharan African country faced with the question of how to best create policies that can mediate anticipated climate change.

Exporters in this country must cope with limited infrastructure and logistical capacity that generate costs, increase prices of export products, and ultimately decrease competitiveness. Investments in infrastructure and transport services could improve the efficiency of getting products to market. Since these improvements are not product specific, but rather could benefit multiple exporters, they create conditions for flexibility.

Within the context of particular negotiating areas, given the dynamic effects of investments in services, countries seeking to promote adaptability and resilience should consider the implications of outcomes in the WTO services negotiations on their ability to buffer climate change impacts. A broader view of the range of issues in the negotiations relevant to climate change is important, but within this context, countries will need to seek efficient mechanisms for allocating their limited resources. The Aid for Trade agenda, in particular, stresses the impor-

Charting the Future of Food

tance of coordinating supply-side investments among national governmental ministries, and, where appropriate, implementing and financing investments at the regional level. The challenge for many countries is to select two or three objectives of strategic importance to their long-term trade growth, taking into account potential impacts of climate change.

Conclusion. The WTO was never

intended to function as a multilateral institution to provide climate change rules. Rather, negotiated commitments under the WTO agreements provide predictability to the current trade system.

This institutional predictability can be a useful tool for developing countries, which are confronted with increased physical uncertainty, to seek strategies for economic growth. In the context of current negotiations, many small countries and LDCs can gain market access opportunities without providing equivalent reciprocal access to their own markets.

While this may provide a temporary economic buffer, delaying economic adjustment and maintaining market inflexibility would, in the long run, constrain developing countries' ability to respond dynamically to unexpected physical and economic conditions.

Developing countries can also benefit from engaging in the multilateral trade system to the extent that it provides them with mechanisms for stabilizing their relationships with other countries. Alternatives to the formal dispute settlement system provide less resource-intensive means of raising the political profile of particular concerns. These approaches may become particularly relevant if, as argued above, countries increasingly implement short-term trade restrictive Winter/Spring 2008 [ 3 1 ]

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measures to address emerging SPS risks.

Clearly, pests, such as the cassava mealybug, move unrestrictedly across sociopolitical and geographic boundaries. In addition to the specific institutional mechanisms for handling conflict, an integrated multilateral trade system can facilitate cross-country management of increased SPS risks by creating conditions enabling countries to share information regarding the prevalence of pests and policies to monitor their population growth.

What other approaches could the WTO take as an institution to enhance transparency in the area of trade policies? Given the looming uncertainty, it becomes imperative that the trade policy community develop and maintain up-to-date, accessible public data for decisionmakers.

If climate change indeed increases weather volatility and hence the volatility of agricultural output, current data, including economic parameters and productivity levels, is even more crucial.

As new data products become available, the need for tools and frameworks for synthesizing and analyzing data also increases. Inter-disciplinary tools that capture spatial relationships become increasingly relevant in approaching this

challenge. While the WTO will not be the lead international institution with respect to climate change, the trade community would benefit from the WTO’s involvement. The WTO can leverage its own position to develop and maintain links with relevant international institutions to ensure that information about food and agricultural production is accurate, unbiased, and easily accessible.

Climate change will shift agricultural production, consequently creating new dynamics in international trade. The primary danger for many resource-poor countries will be that, in response to crisis situations, emergency policy decisions will be implemented that will ultimately divert their economies from their strategic growth options. The challenge for the WTO, both the institution and its members, will be to promote trade policy frameworks that provide transparency and predictability without losing flexibility to adapt to unanticipated changes associated with the climate patterns. In this way, the WTO could create an additional buffer against the long-term economic impacts of climate change, thereby enhancing the resiliency of nations in the face of increased risk in agricultural trade.

NOTES

1 Food and Agriculture Organization, Adaptation to Climate Change in Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries: Perspective, Framework and Priorities (Rome: FAO, 2007).

2 William Cline, "Global warming and agriculture: New country estimates show developing countries face declines in agricultural productivity. CGD Brief September 2007," (Washington, DC: Center for Global Development, 2007).

3 UN Commodity Trade Statistics Database, 2007.

4 Jeffrey Sachs, "Climate change refugees," Scientific American, (1 June 2007).

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5 "Mountain Pine Beetle Program." Natural Resources Canada, http://www.mpb.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/index_e.html (date accessed: 24 September 24 2007).

6 "Revised draft modalities for agriculture," World Trade Organization, http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/agchairt xt_1aug07_e.doc (date accessed:25 September 2007).

7 “Biological control of Crop pests in the fields of Africa,” http://idrinfo.idrc.ca/archive/ReportsINTRA/pdfs/v13n3e/110878.pdf. (date accessed: 25 September 2007).

Summer/Fall 2007 [ 3 2 ]

Charting the Future of Food

The Local Organic Food Paradigm Alex A. Avery and Dennis T. Avery Over the next fifty years, human society and plant science will face the greatest conservation and humanitarian challenge in history: provide the means and the resources to support 9 billion members of the world population without imposing severe infringements on the environment and the climate. Yet, today, farmers are often told they should produce this abundance organically and locally, with half the system yields per acre of conventional farming, and despite the limitations of regional climate, soils, institutions, and infrastructure. Farmers are asked to grow energy crops that add massive and unnecessary burdens to farmland and other natural resources.

Together, these are impossible demands based on a touching faith in the past successes of plant science. As in all things human, hard choices must now be made. We cannot produce meaningful amounts of biofuels and still have a relatively lowcost food supply. We cannot have a food supply that is abundant and cheap on the one hand and organic on the other.

Moreover, we cannot have a predominantly local food system while simultaneously maintaining meaningful food security.

Biofuels add a significant burden to the global farm resource base. In particular, an increase in biofuels production will affect food prices and could result in habitat destruction. This paper will investigate the patterns in local and organic food agriculture and will specifically delve into the understated and sometimes neglected limitations of this pro-

Alex A. Avery is director of research at the Hudson Institute’s Center for Global Food Issues.

Dennis T. Avery is director of Global Food Issues for the Hudson Institute of Washington, D.C. He was formerly the senior agricultural analyst at the U.S. State Department, where he won the National Intelligence Medal of Achievement. His latest book, co-authored with climate scientist S. Fred Singer, is Unstoppable Global Warming—Every 1,500 Years.

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duction paradigm.

The world will more than double its demand for food and feed in the next fifty years due to two factors.1 The first increase in demand will be from the expected 50 percent increase in global population. The world population will rise from today’s 6.5 billion to a peak population of 9 to 10 billion by the middle of the century, entering a slow decline in growth toward the latter half of the twenty-first century. Second, rising personal incomes in developing economies are gradually leading to a shift from subsistence diets comprised mainly of cereals to more affluent diets higher in

food systems rather than the increasingly global, integrated system that dominates trade today. Perhaps it is a natural inclination for those living in turbulent times to yearn for the simplicity and seeming security of the days of yore. Such advocacy is based on two fundamental viewpoints. First, many believe that foods produced locally are more resource and energy efficient because they do not require long-distance transportation and are hence more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Second, it is commonly advocated that a local food system provides greater food security for a population, promoting self-sufficiency by

A predominantly local food system is a recipe for failure and possible famine.

retaining control over production and supply chains. Both beliefs are suspect. A predominantly local food system is a recipe for failure and possible famine.

Local food production is not an efficient use of land inputs. When compared with globally integrated food systems that specialize on producing foods depending on where they grow best, local farmers do not have the same flexibility and require more land and energy to produce the same amount of food. Sugar and potato cultivation set a good example. Europe and the United States both produce significant amounts of sugar (sucrose) by growing sugar beets in cooler climates, such as the Northern Midwest. However, growing sugar cane in the tropics, by benefiting from multi-cropping and higher gross sugar yields from cane, proLocal Vs. Global Food Systems. duces about twice as much sugar per acre Given this major food challenge, many than the method of cultivating sugar reactionaries advocate a return to “local” beets. In contrast, potatoes grow best in

animal protein. Instead of supporting today’s 1.5 billion affluent consumers, the world of 2050 will have to satisfy approximately 5 to 7 billion. Producing one calorie of animal protein requires more farm resources—land, water, and crop nutrients—than a calorie of cereals, such as corn, wheat, rice. This phenomenon already exists in China, where the per capita consumption of meat doubled between 1990 and 2000 because personal incomes more than doubled.2 Demand for clothing fiber and pet food will also increase as populations amass wealth. If China alone reaches the United States’ pet ownership density, the world will have to feed an additional 500 million additional cats and dogs each day.3

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AVERY & AVERY

the cooler, temperate regions of North America and Europe. It makes the most environmental and economic sense to produce the world’s sugar in the tropics and the world’s potatoes in the temperate areas, and then to trade. Both regions would end up more “food rich” from trade and will also exhaust fewer land and farm resources required to produce a given amount of sugar and potatoes.

Opponents of global food trade often believe that the energy used to transport foods over long distances is high, but modern, long-distance transport networks are actually extremely efficient.

Crops and commodities are mostly moved by rail and container or by bulk shipping, various transportation means that are very efficient per unit of food moved. Only the highest-value crops and farm products are transported by air. A recent analysis by Manchester Business School in the United Kingdom observed food lifecycle analyses and found no clear evidence in environmental terms to support locally-sourced rather than globally-sourced shopping. In fact, local food systems sometimes have a greater environmental impact than global food production and distribution by failing to exploit the benefits of comparative advantage and by using smaller and partially loaded trucks that are less energy efficient per unit of product transported, despite the long distances involved.4 The low prices on long-distance rail and sea transport show that these methods have become increasingly efficient.

In regards to food security, a local farm project is a lot more susceptible to various risks associated with the climate and the environment. Reliance on an individual region ultimately makes the producer and the consumer vulnerable to local pest and disease outbreaks and

Charting the Future of Food

regional climate extremes such as drought or flooding. In contrast, a global food system that sources its product range from various locations is much more stable and secure. When one area experiences a devastating drought, others harvest a bumper crop. A global, integrated food system increases food supply security and distributes production risks globally by exploiting comparative advantages in climate, land, labor, and infrastructure inputs. This leads to a final benefit of a globally integrated food system: democratic societies that are interdependent on one another for basic foodstuffs are less likely to engage in conflict.

The Organic Straightjacket.

Another popular belief is that organic farming is more environmentally friendly than farming with chemicals. But here too, the reality is not as it seems. By far, agriculture is responsible for humanity’s most dramatic impact on the planet and its ecosystems. Including pastures, 42 percent of the earth’s land is already used for agriculture. We are farming half of the earth’s land surface not covered with ice or desert, while more than two-thirds of human water use is used for farming.5 Unfortunately, developed countries are undergoing an anti-science campaign spearheaded by relatively small— but loud and effective—groups ranging from anti-technology activists, population growth opponents, and global warming alarmists to organic food proponents. We have all watched the demand for organic foods increase dramatically over recent decades, stemming from unsupported marketing assertions that organic foods are “safer” and “more nutritious.” Not one of these claims has been empirically proven in the seventy-

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five year history of the organic movement, and every professional food safety and nutrition organization has dismissed such claims. In the United Kingdom, for example, the Advertising Standards Authority prohibits organic marketers from claiming that organics offer increased safety or nutritional value, since the industry has yet to produce credible supporting evidence.

Without converting nearly all of the world’s remaining wildlife habitat into farmland, organic farming methods simply cannot stock affluent consumers’ demand for 9 billion protein-rich diets.

In the context of the entire farm market, total yields from organic fields are little more than half as high as those from comparable high-yield farms. The measured yields per acre are typically 15 to 40 percent lower than from conventional farms, depending on the crop. However, organic farmers suffer the biggest productivity penalty when they refuse to use synthetic nitrogen fertilizer.

The invention of synthetic nitrogen fertilizer, in fact, spawned the organic food movement at the end of World War I. As the world’s population grew in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the lack of nitrogen fertilizer became a significant limiting factor in food production.

In 1909, Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch invented a process to compress atmospheric air, which is 78 percent di-nitrogen, under heat and pressure to sustainably develop ammonia (NH4) and nitrate (NO3) for fertilizer. Both Haber and Bosch were eventually awarded separate Nobel Prizes for their invention, which is considered one of the most important technological advances in history. Without synthetic “fixed” nitrogen, far more land would need to be devoted to growing livestock forage, to produce manure in

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abundance, or nitrogen-fixing “green manure” legume crops. Green manure is the term for a legume crop that is grown and then plowed into the soil to fertilize a subsequent non-legume crop, rather than to be harvested.6 This inherent limit to organic productivity can be seen in the conclusions of a high-level Danish government report on the impacts of producing 100 percent organic crops. The Bichel Committee reported in 1998 that an allorganic farming mandate for Denmark would cut human food production by 47 percent, a task requiring the conversion of large portions of farmland presently used to grow food crops into areas for cattle foraging—to produce organic fertilizer from manure.7 Professor Vaclav Smil, author of Enriching the Earth, estimates that giving up synthetic nitrogen fertilizer would require the manure from 5–7 billion additional cattle, or more than 5 times the current global cattle population.8 The world simply does not have the extra land to “go organic” unless we convince billions of consumers to switch to an austere vegan diet or starve hundreds of millions of people.

A recent report from a group of environmental researchers at the University of Michigan garnered significant media attention by claiming that the world could increase its food production by “going organic.”9 Yet a detailed examination of their paper reveals that the authors claimed as “organic” the yield increases from studies using synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and geneticallymodified crops. In addition, they included yield increases from studies of highly dubious quality, conducted by organic activist groups, many of which compared “organic” yields to unrepresentatively low “conventional” crop yields

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rejected U.S. food aid, stating that the corn was “poison” because of testimonials by European and North American biotech NGO critics. One pundit told a delegation from Zambia that biotech corn was fit only for livestock feed and that regulatory authorities “would never have approved” biotech corn if the authorities “felt that a sizeable portion of the populations of people consuming [it] would eat it directly. . . [or if] the corn might make up as much as half or twothirds of daily caloric intake.”12 In fact, all biotech food crops pronounced fit for human consumption by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and other food safety authorities have been approved under an assumption of high direct consumer consumption. Five years after the events in Zambia, no credible incident of biotech crops harming either humans or the environment has surfaced anywhere in the world.

There are numerous biotech virusresistant crops that are available but yet sit completely unutilized on the shelves of universities and private companies due to the souring of public opinion affected by Can Humanity Afford to Reject anti-biotech NGOs. Golden Rice, engiHigh-Tech? The Green Revolution is neered to produce beta-carotene to prethe antithesis of organic farming. Pio- vent blindness and death in millions of neered by plant breeding and supported children from vitamin A deficiency, is by increased use of synthetic nitrogen already in field trials at the International fertilizer, pesticides, and irrigation, the Rice Research Institute in the Philiprevolution and its strategies have been pines. When the product reaches farmopposed by a range of professional envi- ers’ fields, tentatively after 2009, it will ronmental activists and non-govern- help improve the nutrition of millions mental organizations (NGOs), including and prevent the needless deaths of tens of Greenpeace and the Sierra Club. More thousands each year. recently, activists have led a campaign Herbicide tolerant crops drastically against genetically modified crops that reduce soil erosion from plowing by has been highly successful in well-fed allowing farmers to control weeds withEurope, an initiative that has influenced out disturbing the soil. This practice, regulatory policies in developing coun- “no tillage” or “no-till” farming, is the tries. most significant advance in agricultural In 2002, the government of Zambia

from extremely resource-poor farmers.

This creates an illusion of organic yield increases that the majority of farmers cannot achieve.10 In an editorial response published in the same issue of the journal, University of Nebraska agronomist Kenneth Cassman stated bluntly, “Their analyses do not meet the minimum scientific requirements for comparing food production capacity in different crop production systems.”

Additionally, the analysis glosses over the fundamental lack of organic nitrogen fertilizer to grow these crops, stating that enough nitrogen could theoretically be fixed by growing legume crops in between food crops. But as Craig Meisner of Cornell University summarized in a recent article, “For such a crop to be used in Bangladesh, it would have to take the place of a food crop, effectively halving the amount of food the land can provide.” 11 He also cites a recent study showing that the biochemical makeup of plants grown in purely organic conditions is no different from those cultivated with fertilizers.

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sustainability over the past seventy-five years. While there are some legitimate safety concerns about the misuse of herbicides, they have been used without major incident for more than fifty years.

Moreover, biotechnology is influencing farmers to use the safest, most ecofriendly herbicide. For example, glyphosate, commonly known as Roundup, has such a strong safety profile that environmental agencies routinely use it to combat harmful, non-native invasive weeds emerging in sensitive wet-

lions of small-holder farmers in Africa.

With a natural tolerance for the herbicide imazapyr, corn has been shown to dramatically reduce the threat of the endemic African crop parasite witchweed called Striga. This scourge lurks in 40 million hectares of African cropland, infects plants via their roots, and can reduce harvestable grain yields to zero.

Pioneer Hi-bred International discovered the herbicide-tolerant corn variety and made it available to the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center

Not only did the Green Revolution save lives, it also saved an estimated 16 million square miles of global forests from being cut down and converted into farm fields. land environments.

Moreover, glyphosate is half as toxic as table salt and rapidly breaks down into harmless byproducts.

The Conservation Tillage Information Center reports that no-till fields gained 590 pounds of soil carbon per acre, increased their earthworm numbers by three- to six-fold, and provided improved habitat for birds.13 In the United States today, conservation and reduced tillage systems encouraged by genetically engineered, herbicide-tolerant crops account for more than 60 percent of corn and full-season soybean acres, as well as more than three-quarters of double-cropped soybean acres. 14 Combined, these account for more than 160 million acres and represent a significant advance in sustainability.

Far from helping only developed country farmers, as is often claimed, herbicide-tolerant crops can directly help improve the food security of mil-

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in Kenya for crossbreeding into African farmers’ corn varieties. Treating the seeds with the herbicide confers protection against Striga, killing it upon infection of the newly sprouted corn plant.

Yields have increased up to four-fold during field trials in Striga-plagued areas of Africa. Claims that African farmers lack the knowledge and financial resources to utilize these crops are unfounded.15

Science, Regulation, and Solving Real Problems. Though free

trade will increase the challenges to plant health, the land use efficiency advantages of globalization are too great to ignore.

The ongoing trend for increased global trade in food and fiber requires an equally advanced and adept global system for regulating and facilitating trade in farm products, especially with regard to the rapidly expanding portfolio of genetically modified crop varieties. Yet, the

AVERY & AVERY

current regulatory system under the WTO is proving cumbersome and susceptible to political manipulation.

The Green Revolution of the 1960s achieved a near-miraculous tripling of crop yields on much of the world’s highquality land, with its plant breeders leading the effort. Thanks to the momentum from the world’s past investments in education and agricultural research, farm productivity has continued to increase significantly in the years since 1970. Plant science overcame the 1960s specter of a billion starving Asians thanks to the Green Revolution, the intensive effort to breed higher-yielding crop varieties and the increased use of pesticides and synthetic nitrogen fertilizers. Not only did the Green Revolution save lives, it also saved an estimated 16 million square miles of global forests from being cut down and converted into farm fields.

The challenge today is to repeat the success of the Green Revolution.

Anti-biotech propaganda does not cause Americans much inconvenience, but what about the tens of millions of children suffering blindness from severe Vitamin A deficiency that could easily be

Charting the Future of Food

remedied by eating Golden Rice? Overregulation of this single innovation has already delayed the rice’s planting by at least five years, contributing to the needless death each year of an estimated 40,000 in India alone.16 The only strategies available to meet the real and unavoidable challenge of soaring food and fiber demand are the following: first, to increase free world trade in farm products so that each country can produce the goods in which it has the greatest comparative advantage, thereby allowing the densely populated regions to import food products they are unable to grow at home; second, to apply even more science and technology to create higher-yield farming. Though neither of the two is actively embraced and implemented by the developing or the developed nations, these policies have a vast potential to create food sustainability and security. Given the current population growth, consumption patterns, and the depletion rates of natural resources, the twenty-first century food challenge is quickly approaching. The stakes for humanity and the planet have never been higher.

NOTES

1 Robert Thompson, “Overcoming Supply Side Constraints: Making the Agricultural Sector a Priority,” presentation to the International Food and Agricultural Trade Council, June 2006.

2 “China Livestock Sector Brief, 2005” Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN, http://www.fao.org/ag/againfo/resources/en/publications/sector_briefs/lsb_CHN.pdf.

3 “Pet Food and Pet Care Products in the United States.,” Euromonitor International, 2005.

4 Foster, Chris, K. Green, M. Bleda, P. Dewick, B. Evans, A. Flynn, and J. Mylan. “Environmental Impacts of Food Production and Consumption: A Report to the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs,” Manchester Business School, 2007.

5 “World Agriculture: Towards 2015/2030,” UN Food and Agriculture Organization, 2002.

6 Mäder, Paul, Andreas Fließbach, David Dubois,

Lucie Gunst, Padruot Fried, and Urs Niggli, “Soil Fertility and Biodiversity in Organic Farming,” Science 296 (2002): 1694-1697.

7 Alex Avery, The Truth About Organic Foods (Chesterfield, MO: Henderson Communications, 2006).

8 “The Bichel Committee Report,” Miljøstyrelsen, http://mst.dk/udgiv/publications/2001/87-7944-622-1/pdf/87-7944-624-8.pdf.

9 Vaclav Smil, in discussion with the author.

10 Badgley, Catherine, Jeremy Moghtader, Eileen Quintero, Emily Zakem, M. Jahi Chappell, Katia AvilésVázquez, Andrea Samulon and Ivette Perfecto, “Organic Agriculture and the Global Food Supply,” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems 22 (June 2007): 86-108.

11 Alex Avery, “Organic Abundance Report Fatally Flawed,” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems (December 2007).

12 Craig Meisner, “Why Organic Food Can’t Feed the World,” Cosmos Magazine, 24 September 2007.

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13 Charles Benbrook, in discussion with Zambian delegates, 2002. xivDan Towery, “Conservation Tillage and New Technology,” Conservation Tillage Information Center, 2002.

15 “National Crop Residue Management Survey,” Conservation Technology Information Center, in discussion with author,

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http://www.ctic.purdue.edu/ctic/CRM2004/1990 -2004data.pdf.

16 De Groote, Hugo, Lucy Wangare, and Fred Kanampiu, “Evaluating the Use of Herbicide-Coated Imidazolinone-Resistant (IR) Maize Seeds to Control Striga in Farmers’ Fields in Kenya,” Crop Protection 26, no. 10 (October 2007): 1496-1506.

17 Ingo Potrykus, in discussion with author, 2007.

Conflict&Security Averting Catastrophe in the Middle East Susan Braden There are three seemingly independent forces brewing in the Middle East today whose confluence, if mismanaged, could have devastating consequences for the people in the region and U.S. security interests. They are the failure of the U.S. military invasion of Iraq to stabilize the country, the breakdown of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and growing fissures between Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza, and the mushrooming of radical groups across the region that claim to have links to al-Qaeda.

Individually, each of these developments presents its own set of serious challenges. Together, they have the potential to create a humanitarian catastrophe that destabilizes the region for years to come. Rather than relying on coincidence and good luck to weather the storm, it would be wiser for the United States to avert potential disaster by changing course.

Susan Braden is a foreign policy specialist and consultant in Washington,DC. For two decades, she served in the U.S. government at the National Security Council and in the Office of the Secretary of Defense on Central Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

The Iraqi Displacement Crisis. Iraq is all but a failed state. Foreign Policy magazine (July/August 2007) ranks Iraq next to Sudan as the second most unstable country in the world.1 The UN estimates that, out of a total population of nearly thirty million people, more than two million are displaced within Iraq and another two million have fled to neighboring countries. This population migration is the largest in the Middle East since the displacement of the Palestinians in 1948 and is likely to grow. The flight has already significantly changed the demographic landscape of Iraq.

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The principle reason for the displacement is the ongoing violence and insecurity inside Iraq. According to a joint study by the Brookings Institution and Bern University, the violence in Iraq is fracturing the nation beyond the central government’s control. Southern Iraq is turning into Shi’a fiefdoms, while the west is becoming a Sunni mini-state, and the Kurds are establishing their de facto independence in the north. The Bush administration’s military surge is also becoming a factor in the displacement, according to a variety of studies. These studies show that while the troop buildup has improved security in certain areas, it has brought new fighting to other areas, and sectarian violence continues to drive Iraqis from their homes.2 Along with seeking security, migration data suggests that millions of people are leaving their homes in search of water, electricity, schooling, and jobs. According to an Oxfam study published in July 2007, Iraqis are suffering from a growing lack of food, shelter, water and sanitation, healthcare, education, and employment.

The study notes that 43 percent of Iraq’s population is living in absolute poverty, earning less than $1 a day, and over half the population is now without work.

While 70 percent of the country lacks access to adequate supplies of water, 90 percent of the country’s hospitals are without basic medical or surgical supplies, and child malnutrition rates have risen from 19 percent before the U.S. intervention in 2003 to 28 percent currently.3 There is also evidence that a cholera epidemic in northern Iraq is spreading. Cases are appearing in Baghdad because much of the city’s water supply is no longer chlorinated. The country’s ability to import chlorine dried up after insurgents began using it in bomb attacks.

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To date, the U.S. government has been slow to recognize the significance of the humanitarian crisis. When the U.S. Congress established benchmarks for gauging the success or failure of the U.S. military surge, for example, it did not include measurements of displacement and voluntary returns, even though they are strong indicators of a country’s relative security. The U.S. government also has never used its influence over the government of Iraq to insist that it use some of its estimated $37 billion dollar national income to confront the growing humanitarian crisis in Iraq and provide financial assistance to other governments in the region who are addressing the issue when Iraqis cross their borders.4 In so far as the U.S. government has sought to manage the displacement issue, it has done so by seeking to reduce the violence in Iraq, and by providing money—$153 million in 2007—for Iraqi refugee assistance and resettling Iraqis in the United States.5 There are several problems with this strategy. First, the U.S. military cannot reduce the violence enough to either keep people from fleeing or get them to return in significant numbers. As a September 2007 report by the General Accountability Office noted, while there have been fewer attacks against U.S. forces since the surge, the number of attacks against Iraqi civilians remains unchanged and the capability of the Iraqi security services has not improved.6 Another problem with the current plan is that the countries neighboring Iraq cannot take in all the refugees without risking instability for themselves. Of the estimated 2.3 million people who have left Iraq, approximately 1.2 million are allegedly in Syria, 350,000750,000 in Jordan, 40,000 in

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Lebanon, 100,000 in Egypt, 54,000 in Iran, and 200,000 in the Gulf States.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that an additional 50,000 people are fleeing the country every month.7 If the UN numbers are correct, this means that Iraqis now make up 8 percent of Syria’s population and as much as 10 percent of Jordan’s population. They are concentrated in poor, urban communities within Amman and Damascus that are already suffering from inadequate infrastructure, education, health, and social services. While the initial influx of Iraqis in 2006 had enough resources to cover their needs, new arrivals are poorer, and spend their scarce financial resources on food and rent over health care and edu-

Conflict & Security

community is increasingly concerned that Iraqi refugees who do not have valid residency papers are being systematically arrested and jailed. They are not being treated as people escaping violence and trying to save their lives, but as illegal immigrants trying to find a job.

Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria are not party to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention and do not view the Iraqis as refugees. They have allowed the Iraqis across their borders on temporary visitor visas that do not provide them access to basic services or the right to work. As a result, many Iraqi families are in legal limbo, with visas that have already expired or are set to do so soon. In addition, women and children are being pushed into unsafe and dangerous work, includ-

From the Gazans’ perspective, Abbas

is now a “collaborator” and the United States and Israel, not Hamas, are responsible for their plight. cation. The result is that the prices of food, oil, and rent have increased dramatically within Jordan and Syria, while the Iraqi refugees’ needs for healthcare, schooling, and employment are largely unmet. As a consequence, many displaced Iraqis feel disenfranchised and marginalized, while host government populations are resentful of the burden they have been made to carry.

Less is known about the situation for Iraqis in Lebanon. The Lebanese government and humanitarian groups have been more preoccupied with the fallout from the bombing of the Palestinian refugee camp and the consequent displacement of 30,000 Palestinians last summer. However, the humanitarian

ing the sex trade, because they cannot work legally, have run out of resources, and are less likely to be caught by authorities than the male heads of household.

The governments of Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria have closed their borders to additional Iraqis and are reluctant to grant those already within their borders legal protection for a variety of reasons.

First, they are concerned about rising demographic tensions created by such a huge influx of people intermixing with local populations who also lack adequate basic services. Syria, for example, does not have enough schools to accommodate all the displaced Iraqi children and Jordan is already double shifting with morning and afternoon shifts to accommodate

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Jordan school kids. Second, they worry that Iraqi sectarian tensions will spill into their countries as Sunnis and Shiites settle old scores and Iraq’s sectarian organizations move into host country capitol cities.8 Finally, the host governments are concerned that any Iraqi allowed across their borders will stay forever. Like the millions of Palestinian refugees who came decades ago and have yet to return because the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remains unresolved, so the host governments fear that Iraq will never be stabilized enough for this new influx of refugees to return home.

It was a step in the right direction to send the Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration, Ellen Sauerbrey, to Jordan and Syria in March 2007 to review the efforts of international agencies and non-governmental organizations working to help the refugees. The provision of $153 million in humanitarian assistance to displaced Iraqis in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon was also a significant gesture. The scale of the crisis nevertheless continues to dwarf the response. A lot more attention and funding are needed to meet the critical needs of the growing number of displaced Iraqis and ease the rising tensions in the countries hosting them.9 A robust resettlement program outside the region would help, though it is hard for the United States to encourage other countries to open their borders to Iraqi refugees when it has taken in so few.

While the United States pledged to admit 7,000 refugees in 2007, it has only admitted 1,135 thus far.

If a political solution for Iraq is not found soon and the refugee flow continues without new places for fleeing Iraqis to go, the most logical next development will be the establishment of camps inside

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Iraq at huge expense to the international community and risk to the Iraqi people.

A political solution to the conflict must be found in order to relieve the destabilizing pressure that the inflow of desperate Iraqis is imposing on Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. New measures are also needed to avoid the establishment of internal displacement protection camps in Iraq on the scale of those in Darfur, Sudan.

Managing the Breakup of Iraq.

The United States cannot prevent the breakup of Iraq along religious and ethnic lines anymore than it could have prevented the partition of the former Yugoslavia after 1991. In Iraq’s case, there is likely to be a Sunni-dominated state in the western part of the country, a Kurdish state in the north, and a Shiitedominated state in the south. As the joint Brookings-Bern University study indicates, ethnic self-segregation is already occurring.

The Yugoslav civil wars were extremely bloody, more so than any other conflict in Europe since the end of World War II. Iraq’s partition is likely to be as difficult.

However, had the conflicts that allowed for the creation of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia not been contained within the recognized borders of an existing state (Yugoslavia), they could have been more violent. At the same time, the breakup of the former Yugoslavia may have been less violent had the international community accepted the inevitable at the outset and sought to manage the country’s demise under mandated international supervision.

With the Yugoslav example in mind, the Bush administration should cease seeking to reconcile the irreconcilable

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and begin preparing for the breakup of Iraq by negotiating a role for the UN in overseeing the split up as well as engaging in careful consultations with the countries bordering Iraq. Recent efforts by the administration to give the UN a mediation role in Iraq and develop a regional forum for discussion with the countries bordering Iraq are a positive sign. However, the talks should not focus on how to unite Iraq’s rival factions or convince Iraq’s neighbors to withdraw support from their preferred religious and ethnic groups through the back door.10 Rather, they should focus on dividing Iraq into three separate entities as peacefully as possible, an initiative that would likely involve a continued U.S. military presence possibly folded into a UN peacekeeping force. As was true of Yugoslavia after Tito, the current Iraqi central government cannot function because the forces dividing the country are stronger than the forces that held it together during the dictatorial reign of Saddam Hussein. Free of Saddam’s grip, Iraqi politicians are now more loyal to their sect, clan, tribe, and region than they are to the idea of Iraq as a nationstate.11

Radicalism in Iraq and Middle East Interconnectedness. The

prospects for a negotiated settlement of the Iraqi conflict are linked to the status of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the growth of Islamic militancy. While America’s major allies in the region— Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan—are sympathetic with it’s plight in Iraq, they are not inclined to become active participants in a negotiated solution so long as the United States shows so little interest in the plight of the Palestinians, which is of greater concern to their citizens and

Conflict & Security

an issue around which extremist groups can rally. Current U.S.-Israeli policy has turned Gaza into a prison for the 1.2 million people who live there, and into a potential haven for terrorist groups, including the al-Qaeda-affiliated Army of Islam, which kidnapped BBC journalist Alan Johnston last summer in Gaza.

After Israel pulled its settlements out of the Gaza Strip in 2005 and Hamas won the parliamentary elections in January 2006, both Israel and the United States chose not to test Hamas’s ability to transform itself from a terrorist group into a ruling body capable of responsible governance. Instead, they have tried to squeeze the Palestinians into revolting against Hamas by shutting Gaza off almost entirely from normal trade and travel with the world. Israel and the United States also inadvertently promoted the breakup of West Bank/Gaza by arming Fatah against Hamas in the hopes that it would win a military showdown.12 When the opposite occurred in June 2007 and Hamas took over Gaza militarily, Israel and the Bush administration did not abandon the strategy. They continue to squeeze Gaza’s civilian population and Hamas, while bolstering President Abbas and Fatah in the West Bank with increased assistance and promises of putting the peace process back on track.13 This was a risky strategy with a huge potential to backfire.

The paradox facing the current administration is that the more the United States and Israel seek to isolate Hamas and bolster Abbas, the more they risk strengthening Hamas and weakening Abbas as the leader of the Palestinian people and symbol of the Palestinian nation. They also increase the potential for an all out civil war breaking out

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amongst the Palestinians that could spill over into neighboring countries and allow for increased terrorist activity with the breakdown of law and order. From the Gazans’ perspective, Abbas is now a “collaborator” and the United States and Israel, not Hamas, are responsible for their plight. Because of the border closings, Gaza is losing $1 million a day and 75,000 private sector employees have lost their jobs as factories cannot import raw materials or export final goods.

Meanwhile, in the West Bank, even with U.S. assistance, Abbas is likely to have trouble delivering what Palestinians want most: more security, less corruption, and better governance.14

tion in the West Bank and Gaza to deliver on the terms of an agreement.

The four-month long confrontation last summer between the Lebanese military and Fatah al-Islam in the Palestinian refugee camp illustrates best how three issues—the conflict in Iraq, the lack of a meaningful Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and the growth of radical groups—could come together into a “perfect storm.” From May through August 2007, the Lebanese army bombed the camp in an effort to dislodge Fatah al-Islam, a group of Islamic militants of various Arab nationalities, some of whom fought in Iraq and had ties to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former

The United States cannot prevent the

breakup of Iraq along religious and ethnic lines anymore than it could have prevented the partition of the former Yugoslavia after 1991.

The United States needs to pursue a more robust diplomatic effort to get the peace process back on track and secure a comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire in the West Bank and Gaza. The lack of a meaningful peace process undermines the stability of not only West Bank/Gaza and Israel, but of the entire region. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to occur during the Bush administration’s remaining time in office. With record low approval ratings, Israeli Prime Minister Olmert cannot offer meaningful concessions to the Palestinians. Similarly, President Bush is in no position to pressure him, given his rising unpopularity. Even if the Israelis were able to make meaningful concessions, it is unclear whether President Abbas represents enough of the Palestinian popula-

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leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq. While the Lebanese army ultimately put down the insurgents, there was initial concern that Fatah al-Islam would succeed in taking advantage of the Palestinians’ plight and a weak Lebanese government to reignite the Lebanese civil war. Had the Palestinians in all of Lebanon’s eleven refugee camps risen up in support of Fatah alIslam, it is unlikely that the government would have been able to put the uprising down and it could have spread to West Bank/Gaza, Syria and Jordan, one-half of whose population is Palestinian. Fatah al-Islam failed because it miscalculated by thinking that it had the support of the Palestinians in Lebanon’s refugee camps. What happened instead is that the Palestinians and the usually divided Lebanese electorate supported the

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Lebanese military’s handling of the situation.

On the one hand, the camp confrontation demonstrated how a radical group can potentially take advantage of the Palestinian or Iraqi refugee crisis to foster a larger conflict in a region populated by relatively weak governments.

According to a report by the UN Secretary General issued on 24 October 2007, “the threat from al-Qaeda-inspired militias in Palestinian refugee camps remains undiminished” despite the Lebanese military’s successful defeat of Fatah al-Islam.

On the other hand, the incident demonstrated how catastrophe can be averted when a government gains the support of the affected population before its cause becomes linked to that of al-Qaeda or other radical groups.17

Avoiding Catastrophe by Changing Course. A “perfect storm” in the

Middle East could well involve a situation where Iraq, West Bank/Gaza, and Lebanon all simultaneously descend into full scale civil war with hugely destabilizing consequences for the region. The spark setting events in motion might be a non-state actor—for example, Fatah alIslam, Hamas, Hezbollah or the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party)—that may or may not be supported by a state actor such as Syria or Iran. This non-state actor could stimulate an uprising in one country that evolves into a civil war and causes other countries to become engaged. Israel might, for example, launch a military attack against Hamas in Gaza or Hezbollah in Lebanon, who are indirectly supported by Syria and Iran.

The result might well be that Lebanon and or West Bank/Gaza slip into a civil war with ramifications for Jordan and the potential that Israel could find itself

Conflict & Security

simultaneously engaged militarily in Gaza, Lebanon, and possibly even Syria because of that country’s activities in Lebanon. Depending on how Jordan played the situation, moreover, it could find itself facing significant domestic unrest by its Palestinian refugee population and possibly even its Iraqi one.

Likewise, if the PKK were to foster a major Turkish incursion into Northern Iraq, the result might be a full scale war between Turkey and Iraq’s Kurdish population in northern Iraq, the only place in the country where there is currently a modicum of stability, while Iraqi Sunnis and Shiites continue to fight amongst each other in the rest of the country with material assistance and advice from Iran and Saudi Arabia.

If Iraq were to descend into full-scale civil war, several possibilities arise, all of which would cause enormous population dislocation within and outside Iraq.

According to one scenario, the war is contained within Iraq’s existing borders but continues for years, ending only after the immediate parties become too warweary and decide to settle. In the second scenario, a protracted civil war spills over to Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon, causing one or all of their governments to fall.

Still, a third scenario predicts that one of the immediate parties to the conflict wins a conclusive military victory and thereby presents one or more of Iraq’s neighbors with its least preferred alternative. Iran fears a permanent U.S. military presence in Iraq and the establishment of an anti-Iran, Sunni-dominated regime in Baghdad that causes the country’s Shia population to flee en masse. Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf States fear the creation of a “Shiite crescent” stretching from Lebanon and Syria through Iraq and Iran that would in turn cause the

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country’s Sunni population to flee.

Whatever the scenario, the violence, instability, and population dislocation created by the combination of these circumstances have the potential to permanently alter the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East. The United States and the UN, therefore, must draft a comprehensive strategy to secure the immediate break up of Iraq under the supervision of the international community. The strategy should be negotiated with Iraq and the bordering countries. It should take

into account the fact that there are fifty thousand people fleeing Iraq every month and direct significantly more money to helping Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon accommodate the refugees they have taken in while seeking commitment from other countries to take in Iraqi refugees. Finally, the United States and Israel must realize that the best way to promote a negotiated settlement of the Iraq conflict and to assuage the growing radicalism in the region is by settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

NOTES

1 “The Failed States Index 2007,” The Fund for Peace and Foreign Policy, July/August 2007, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id= 3865&page=0.

2 Elizabeth Ferris and Matthew Hall, “Update on Humanitarian Issues and Politics in Iraq,” BrookingsBern Project on Internal Displacement, July 6, 2007.

James Glanz and Stephen Farrell, “More Iraqis Said to Flee Since Troop Increase’” New York Times, 24 August 2007, Sec. A. 3 Oxfam International, “Rising to the humanitarian challenge in Iraq,” Briefing Paper, July 2007, 3-4.

James Glanz and Alissa J. Rubin, “Migration Complicates the Future Look of Iraq,” New York Times, 19 September 2007, Section A. 4 At a UNHCR sponsored conference held in Geneva in April 2007, the Government of Iraq pledged $25 million for Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan, but as of November 2007 has yet to disburse the funds.

5 http://amman.usembassy.gov/User/NewsDetail.aspx?NewsId=1304.

6 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/09/20070914.html http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/07/20070712.html GAO -07-1195, Securing, Stabilizing, and Rebuilding Iraq, September 2007, http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d071195.pdf.

7 Sabrina Tavernise, “Jordan Yields Poverty and Pain For the Well-Off Fleeing Iraq,” New York Times, August 10, 2007, Sec. A 8 Ibid.

Hugh Nylor, “1.4 Million Iraqis Push Syria to Edge,” San Francisco Chronicle, 8 August 2007, Sec. A, p.10.

9 Due to complicated relations with the Govern-

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ment of Syria, it has been difficult for Western governments to give money directly to Syria. As of November 2007, the only contributions to the Government of Syria have come from the EU and have totaled only $4 million.

10 Collum Lynch and Robin Wright, “US Seeks UN Help With Talks on Iraq,” The Washington Post, August 10, 2007, Sec A, p 1,8.

11 The primary arguments against a three state solution are that it would not work in Baghdad, home to about one-fourth of Iraq’s population because it is not religiously or ethnically homogeneous. In addition, the Sunnis would oppose a three-state solution because they might be denied access to Iraq’s oil riches, which are concentrated in the north and south.

12 See transcript of former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel interview with NPR’s Morning Edition (16 June, 2007) on U.S. support for the arming and training of Fatah through Jordan and Egypt. http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.p hp?storyId=11103540.

13 See Special Briefing by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, June 18, 2007. http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2007/06/86750.h tm.

14 Robin Wright, “US Bet on Abbas for Middle East Peace Meets Skepticism,” The Washington Post, July 16, 2007. p. A11.

15 Colum Lynch, “UN Report Suggests Syrian Role in Arming of Hezbollah, Other Groups,” The Washington Post, 25 October 2007, p. A21.

16 Alia Ibrahim and Ellen Knickmeyer, “Lebanese Military Threatens to Renew Assault on Camp,” The Washington Post, May 24, 2007, Sec. A, p.17.

17 Bill Marsh, “What Surrounds the Iraqi Tinderbox,” New York Times.

Conflict & Security

Asian Power:

Sino-Russian Conflict in Central Asia?

Kathleen J. Hancock Russian President Vladimir Putin and the state-owned gas monopoly, Gazprom, made front-page news when they ceased exporting natural gas to Ukraine in the winter of 2006, leaving Europe both irate and fearful due to its dependency on Russian energy.1 What many failed to notice was that Russia’s actions were consistent with a fifteen year-old policy of playing hardball with former Soviet members using gas and oil pipelines as carrots and sticks to force policies and actions favorable to Moscow.Three of the states most affected by this pipeline diplomacy and least discussed in the Western press are the resource-rich Central Asian states of Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. While energy-importing European states are vulnerable to Russia cutting supplies, exporting Central Asian states worry about Moscow shutting down pipeline access, without which they have few export options. The relationship between these states and Russia is further complicated by China’s interest in Central Asia. Although Beijing and Moscow have recently patched up their rivalry, the increasing economic strength of both states plus jockeying between Russia and Central Asian states to serve as China’s energy supplier may push Russia and China back into an antagonistic, and potentially dangerous, relationship.

The first part of this article elaborates on the energy wealth of the three Central Asian states and their dependence on Russian pipelines. The second part discusses China’s increas-

Kathleen J. Hancock is a professor in the Department of Political Science and Geography, University of Texas, San Antonio.

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ing energy demands and the states from which it expects to import the necessary fuels to meet its industrialization goals.

The third section focuses on current cooperation between Russia and China, and potential causes of future antagonism. I conclude by recommending continued Western engagement with Central Asian states by assisting them in building pipelines that will ease their reliance on Russian export routes. At the same time, the West should work more closely with Russia on economic issues while engaging the Sino-Russian alliance on issues in which all parties have a mutual concern, including drug trafficking and anti-terrorism, in order to avoid potential regional conflict.

Resource Rich And Dependent: The Central Asian States. The

Soviet Union’s collapse opened a longclosed door for Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. These states had fossil fuels reserves that would have placed them in the world’s top twenty, yet their fields were under-explored by the Soviets who preferred to focus on extraction from Russian land. In particular, the Caspian Sea—whose eastern shore is shared by Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan—is considered to have significant unrealized potential. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that Kazakhstan has 30-40 billion barrels of proven oil reserves and 67-106 trillion cubic feet of natural gas as of 2007.

While insignificant oil suppliers, both Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have significant natural gas reserves, estimated at 100-102 trillion cubic feet and 65 trillion cubic feet, respectively.2 To fully realize the wealth implied by their endowments, these states must use export pipelines to reach cash-paying

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customers. For Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, the Soviet Union’s collapse left all export routes within Russian territory, making these states especially vulnerable to Russian policies. Initially, Russia allowed the Central Asian states to export their fuel unhindered. However, after the first year of independence, it restricted Turkmenistan to selling only to cashpoor post-Soviet states, including Russia itself. This enabled Russia to free up its own gas for export to the West, leaving Turkmenistan essentially subsidizing Russia’s aggressive pipeline diplomacy.

On the other hand, Uzbekistan is able to export to bordering states and therefore does not rely on pipelines that cross Russian land. However, in order to maximize its energy exports, Uzbekistan requires new pipelines to previously untapped buyers.

The Central Asian states have had varying success in obtaining foreign direct investment for exploration, development, production, and export. Kazakhstan has been the most successful. Even before independence, President Nursultan Nazarbayev implemented a multivector policy under which he began cultivating energy ties with a variety of states.

With over twenty-seven major oil and natural gas deals underway, Kazakhstan has signed lucrative agreements with the United States, several European states, Japan, Oman, South Korea, Russia, and China, among others.3 Of the fifteen former Soviet states, Kazakhstan has received more FDI annually since independence than any state has done, except Russia, averaging $1.65 billion per year between 1992 and 2005.4 Kazakhstan’s small population—only 15 million people—makes its investment achievement even more impressive.

Kazakhstan has also been the most

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successful of the trio in securing new pipeline partners. It has accomplished this in part by including Russia as one of several partners in its oil and gas deals. As a result, Nazarbayev has secured numerous new pipelines, some short and some over one thousand miles long. A prime

Conflict & Security

successor, Berdymukhammedov, has tentatively pursued a multi-partner strategy in his first months in office, not unlike that of Kazakhstan.

Though less eccentric than his Central Asian neighbor, Uzbekistan’s President Islom Karimov has obtained even less

There are reasons to fear the emerging partnership between Russia and China. example of Kazakhstan’s approach toward Russia is the important Caspian Pipeline Consortium, which became operational in 2001. Eleven entities jointly own the Consortium: Russian state-owned Transneft (24 percent), Kazakhstan (19 percent), and Oman (7 percent) collectively own 50 percent; eight private oil and gas companies own the remaining half.5 Although the pipeline runs through Russian territory, it expanded export volume, thus alleviating the need for Kazakhstan to compete with Russia for room in existing pipelines.

Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have not faired nearly as well. Turkmenistan’s cultish president, Saparmurat Niyazov— who died in December 2006—focused foreign investment hopes not on the former Soviet region or the West, but on Muslim states to the south, particularly Iran. This policy failed due to active U.S. opposition to anything related to Iran.6 Despite Turkmenistan’s significant proven natural gas reserves, Niyazov garnered a mere $105 million annual FDI between 1992 and 2005. Without U.S. support, Iran and Turkmenistan could not afford to build new export routes of any significance.7 However, Niyazov’s

FDI for his state. Uzbekistan’s primary natural gas purchasers are the small, cash-strapped states of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, as well as southern Kazakhstan. Since these customers share borders with Uzbekistan, it has not directly relied on pipelines passing through Russian territory. Nevertheless, if it wants to expand export volume, particularly to states that can afford to pay in hard currency, Uzbekistan needs foreign investment. Karimov toyed with U.S. support, but then rejected the West after it sanctioned his state for massacring an estimated seven hundred citizens in what the government characterized as a necessary response to terrorists and other “poisonous snakes” trying to overthrow it.8 In January 2006, Uzbekistan signed the Russian-designed Eurasian Economic Community accords and immediately received a pledge for $1.5 billion in investments and a role in a new pipeline deal from Russia.9 The three Central Asian states have pursued different strategies to improve their export options. Kazakhstan has consistently focused on multiple partners, including Russia, while Turkmenistan has rejected both Russia and the West. With a new president, however,

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outside of Asia: 46 percent of imported crude comes from the Middle East and an additional 32 percent from Africa.16 Given China’s rising demands and desire to diversify, the former Soviet republics have recently won a seat at the supply table. In 2006 and 2007, all three Central Asian states signed or completed major deals with China, the most imporEnergy Demands in China. With tant being a crude oil pipeline connectan economy rapidly developing under a ing Kazakhstan to China, which went concentrated growth plan and an insuffi- operational in 2006. The project is cient domestic energy supply to fuel that notable not only for its length—it will growth, China is the future energy mar- eventually run 1,864 miles—but also for ket.10 Analysts expect the state’s natural gas being China’s first import pipeline.

Although the new pipeline does not consumption to increase by an average annual rate of 5.4 percent between 2002 cross Russian territory, it does connect to and 2030 and oil consumption during Russian pipelines, and as part of the deal, the same period at a rate of 3.4 percent China buys not only Kazakh, but also annually.11 While U.S. oil consumption Russian oil. Though most of Russia’s between 2005 and 2006 decreased by 1.3 exports are currently destined for percent, China’s consumption increased Europe, this could begin to shift as by 6.7 percent.12 China now uses only 9 Europeans—wary of Russian threats to cut percent of the world’s oil, but its portion gas supplies—seek alternative suppliers will undoubtedly increase, given its rapid and as Russia actively pursues the Asian industrialization and sheer size. Much of market. With China interested in both this consumption will be driven by a new- Central Asia and Russia as importers ly motorized population; by 2010, China capable of connecting via pipelines, a is predicted to have 90 times more cars clash of interests could alter the relative calm between Russia and China. than it had 20 years before.13 Energy imports will have to increase.

China currently brings in about 3.4 mil- Current Cooperation, Future lion barrels of oil a day, a figure predicted Antagonism? Much has been written to jump to 10.9 million barrels by 2030. recently about the strategic partnership To meet this demand, China is developing that has emerged between China and relations with numerous states: its major Russia since the end of the Cold War. petroleum company has exploration and After forty years of border disputes, the production interests in twenty-one states two states resolved their differences in and plans to invest $18 billion more favor of working together on economic between 2005 and 2020.14 China’s most and security issues.17 Their cooperation is significant energy growth will be in natur- an overt response to U.S. hegemony, the al gas; analysts predict a nearly 1,000 per- dominance of Western values in internacent increase in natural gas consumption tional organizations, and separatist between 1997 and 2020.15 demands from Muslims and others: Most of China’s energy partners are Chechnya for Russia; Taiwan and the Turkmenistan has begun following a path similar to Kazakhstan’s. Uzbekistan at first remained aloof, then tried the United States as a partner, and has finally focused on Russia. China offers yet another option, one in which the three states are increasingly looking to for partnership.

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Uyghur people bordering Central Asia for China. The formal framework for Russian-Chinese relations is the 2001 Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which focuses on strengthening political, military, and economic ties. Since 2005, Russia and China have gone so far as to hold joint military exercises, an unprecedented level of collaboration for these two rising powers.

It is tempting to see the Sino-Russian alliance as a frightening, long-term collusion that could harm Western interests.

The support these two states have provided to rogue regimes in North Korea and Iran demonstrates the power of this partnership to undermine Western objectives, or at least American ones. Though alliances can be long-lived, they are always mortal, eventually ending when interests invariably shift. The three Central Asian states could become an important locus for conflict among the two rising powers. Just as Central European states can be pulled East or West, Central Asian states are not clearly situated in either the Russian or Chinese sphere of influence. History, culture, geography, and economic and security interests suggest different possible allegiances for Central Asia.

Conflict & Security

by Russia to give it significant decisionmaking authority over trade and monetary policy in the region. They also have Russian military bases on their territories and have engaged in joint military exercises. Even the previously isolationist Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have recently made overtures to Russia.

While Russia has worked hard to keep the Central Asian states in its sphere of influence, China cannot be ruled out as a potential alliance leader, particularly given its interest in securing natural gas and oil from the trio discussed here. In Peter Brookes’ colorful words, “China will soon stand before us like a teenage Goliath, anxious to flex its political, economic, and, perhaps, even military muscle.”19 China is unquestionably expanding its economy and military. During its initial moves toward capitalism between 1983 and 2005, China’s GDP skyrocketed from $227 billion to $2,229 billion.20 China’s rulers are making good on a long-held promise to significantly revamp the military. A new, highly survivable, road-mobile, intercontinental ballistic missile is ultimately destined to achieve operational status. The U.S. Department of Defense predicts that a new, longer-range missile will become

If Russia and China can bolster each other’s economies through energy sales and purchases, they may become even more resistant toWestern demands.

At the moment, Russia has significant sway over the region, as the Muslim former Soviet republics, particularly Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, are among the most loyal to the Kremlin.18 These states have signed most of the eight economic integration accords designed

operational in 2007. New nuclear submarines, guided missile destroyers, antiair warfare ships, and upgraded fighters and helicopters are among other additions. China also recently asserted its interest in building an aircraft carrier.

Furthermore, China is moving from

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ests: lucrative energy deals and a reliable energy supply for Europe. Given the new Turkmeni president’s interest in a multivector policy resembling that of Kazakhstan, the West has an opportunity it should not squander.

At the same time, the West should consider emulating the strategy of Kazakhstan’s president. Rather than shutting out Russia, Nazarbayev has enmeshed his great neighbor in a sophisticated network of energy deals in which Russia’s influence is balanced by other states. This approach gives Russia an economic interest in more export pipelines, including ones that will bring fuel to Europe. The Russian people and their leaders are sensitive to Western policies that appear bent on suppressing Russian ambitions. While some of these policies should not be abandoned, such as the U.S. stance on Iran, the West should work more closely with Russia on ecoPolicy Recommendations. West- nomic issues; pipeline partnerships are ern governments, corporations, and cit- an attractive option for increased izens have a variety of concerns in Cen- engagement with a resurgent Russia.

The second broad goal—avoiding tral Asia. These myriad interests include lucrative energy deals for oil and gas regional conflict—is far more challenging companies, reliable energy supplies for to attain and constitutes a more longEurope, the promotion of human rights term concern. There are reasons to fear for individuals living under authoritari- the emerging partnership between Russia an Central Asian regimes, and campaigns and China. The presidents of both states against militant Islam. On a more strate- share a respect for authoritarian methods gic scale, the West has an interest in weak- and a similar willingness to challenge ening dependence on Russian Western definitions of democracy, pipelines—by promoting truly indepen- human rights, and other norms. They dent states as a buffer to rising Russian have strong relationships with other power—and ensuring regional stability authoritarian and rogue states. If Russia and China can bolster each other’s and security.

With a focus on these two goals, the economies through energy sales and purWest should continue to promote alter- chases, they may become even more resisnative pipeline routes for the Central tant to Western demands.

Nevertheless, Western policy makers Asian states, particularly those that would bring fuel to Europe. This policy has the should not make too much of this new advantage of supporting two other inter- alliance. While China and Russia are cur-

buyer to builder, having completed its first domestically produced attack helicopter and defensive missile system.21 Many Asian specialists argue that this type of power projection is meant to be played out on a massive scale.

As the Chinese government noted in its National Defense in 2006 report, “Never before has China been so closely bound up with the rest of the world as it is today.”22 A more assertive China could decide to challenge Russia in its own backyard. Specifically, if China opts to build more pipelines that deliver oil and gas from Central Asia directly to itself, thereby bypassing Russia, it would seriously undercut Russia’s primary point of leverage. Without control over pipelines, Russia loses much of its economic power over the Central Asian states and the cheap Central Asian gas that has fueled Russian exports to Europe.23

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rently engaging in joint military exercises, it is unlikely that either state would endorse more aggressive anti-Western policies if they were acting alone rather than in concert. Moreover, all alliances eventually reconfigure themselves; as both states see themselves as emerging or reemerging great powers, they will soon find plenty of divisive issues. If China’s efforts to foster a Central Asian-Chinese energy market and Russia’s drive for regional hegemony end in a military clash, Western

Conflict & Security

interests will hardly be served. As a result, the West should pursue policies that allow both states to feel secure enough to not resort to armed conflict. Finally, the United States and the European Union should encourage and perhaps provide financial and technological support to those areas of Sino-Russian cooperation that also serve Western interests, for example, initiatives to curtail terrorist activities that present a threat to the West and other democracies.24

NOTES

1 Keith Smith, "Gaz Promises: Russian Energy's Challenge for the West," Georgetown Journal of International Affairs (Winter/Spring 2007). For a discussion of actions against Belarus, see Kathleen J. Hancock, "The Semi-Sovereign State: Belarus and the Russian Neo-Empire," Foreign Policy Analysis 2, no. 2 (2006).

2 Energy Information Administration, "World Proved Reserves of Oil and Natural Gas, Most Recent Estimates," U.S. Department of Energy, http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/international/reserves. html. The report uses estimates from BP Statistical Review, Oil and Gas Journal, World Oil, and CEDIGAZ’s Natural Gas in the World. Estimates of proved reserves change over time, as the price of fuel alters the economic viability of retrieving the oil or gas.

3 Energy Information Administration, "Kazakhstan: Major Oil and Natural Gas Projects," U.S. Department of Energy, http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/Kazakhstan/kazaproj.html.

4 World Bank, "WDI Online: World Development Indicators,” http://devdata.worldbank.org/dataonline/.

5 Anna Shiryaevskaya, "Russia Transfers 24 percent CPC Stake to Transneft; Move Set to Increase Role of Pipeline Operator over Regional Infrastructure," Platts Oilgram News, 3 May 2007.

6 In 1995, President Bill Clinton issued an executive order, which President George W. Bush extended in March 2004, prohibiting U.S. companies and their foreign subsidiaries from conducting business with Iran. Furthermore, the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act of 1996 imposed mandatory sanctions on foreign companies that invested more than $20 million per year in Iranian oil and natural gas sectors. U.S. Energy Information Administration, “Iran: Background,” U.S. Department of Energy, http://eia.doe.gov/cabs/Iran/Background.html (3 February 2006).

7 Kathleen J. Hancock, "Escaping Russia, Looking to China: Turkmenistan Pins Hopes on China’s Thirst for Natural Gas," China and Eurasia Forum Quarterly (August 2006).

8 UzReport.com, “Great Powers Want to Control Central Asia—Uzbek Leader,” December 16, 2005, http://web.lexis-nexis.com/universe (13 June 2006).

9 "Russian Deputy Premiers Told to Involve Uzbekistan in Caspian Coastal Pipeline," ITAR-TASS. BBC Worldwide Monitoring July 9 2007, Igor Torbakov, "Russia Welcomes Uzbekistan into Its Eurasian Energy Empire," The Jamestown Foundation, 25 January 2006.

10 Although not yet keeping pace with China, India is another significant market.

11 International Energy Agency, "World Energy Outlook," (2004), 264.

12 BP, "BP Statistical Review of World Energy June 2007,” www.bp.com/statisticalreview.

13 Gal Luft, "Fueling the Dragon: China's Race into the Oil Market," Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, http://www.iags.org/china.htm.

14 Energy Information Administration, "Country Analysis Briefs, China," U.S. Department of Energy, http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/China/Oil.html.

15 In 2002, the Chinese government anticipated a demand of 96 billion cubic feet in 2010. By fall 2004, the government had already increased this estimate to 120 billion cubic meters (see Su, p.2 and Yamaguchi and Cho, “Natural Gas in China,” p. 4).

Thus, the 2020 estimate maybe too low as well.

16 U.S. Department of Energy, "Country Analysis Briefs, China."

17 Valery Matyayev, "Russia-China: Forty Years of Border Negotiations," International Affairs (Moscow) 50, no. 6 (2004).

18 Belarus in Europe has been singularly the most loyal.

19 Peter Brookes, "The China Challenge: Beijing's Military Buildup," Military.com.

20 Peter Ferdinand, "Russia and China: Converging Responses to Globalization," International Affairs 83, no. 4 (2007).

21 Office of the Secretary of Defense U.S. Department of Defense, "Military Power of the People's Republic of China," (2007), 1-4.

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22 Quoted in Ibid. 1.

23 For a similar perspective on this, see Andrew Neff, "China Competing with Russia for Central Asian Investments," Oil & Gas Journal, March 6 2006, Andrew Neff, "Russian-Chinese Competition May Marginalize US, European Influence," Oil & Gas Jour-

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nal, March 13 2006.

24 The West should still be suspicious of anti-terrorist claims. Governments around the world have labeled political opponents terrorists as a means of validating their aggressive actions. The government used this justification when it massacred 700 civilians.

Culture&Society Substance and Vanity at the Palace Monarchy and Royalty Beyond the Twentieth Century Neil Blain Do the British Really Lose Sleep over Camilla?

A true story: a woman has a hair appointment in Glasgow, Scotland on the day of Diana’s funeral in 1997. Upon stepping out of the car on an empty street, she finds the salon closed and curtained. There is a six by four feet black and white photo of Diana in the window, flanked by lilies in funeral urns. She tries the door.

After a pause, several locks are disengaged from within, the door opens and an elderly lady in black appears and quickly ushers her inside. The door is closed and locked behind her. Customers are having their hair styled or colored. Three televisions, draped in black cloth and surmounted by black candles, are showing the funeral: Elton John is performing in Westminster Abbey. Her stylist appears, dressed in scarlet to signify her disapproval of all this hypocritical kitsch. They both listen silently to Elton.

Neil Blain is the head of Department of Film & Media Studies at University of Stirling, in Scotland, UK.

In the summer of 2007, there was a debate in the United Kingdom about whether it would be appropriate for Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall and the second wife of Prince Charles, to attend a church service marking the tenth anniversary of the death of his first wife, Princess Diana. The “Camilla debate” ultimately prompted a series of other discussions on the role of the monarchy and royalty in the face of a changing British society. A response to these issues is hardly a simple task and requires a thorough analysis of the matter at hand.

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For those who wish to participate in public discourse about Britain’s quintessential royal case, it is often easiest to uphold the myth that British subjects, as a social, cultural and psychological collective, are deeply interested in their monarchy, and that they begin the day by exchanging opinions on the domestic activities of the royal family. Moreover, they do this in an equally mythical space dubbed by the BBC as the “the breakfast tables of the nation,” despite the fact that much of Britain no longer eats breakfast.

Rather, Britain has shown many signs of social and cultural disintegration, and both the breakfast table and the notion of a unified nation have become nostalgic tropes. These facades, then, are buttressed against signs that today Britain indeed consists of a complex, unstable, and increasingly rancorous brew of constituents, only partially comprehensible to one another. Even the idea of a stable past often invoked is illusory; national broadcasters have their own stake in reassuring themselves that there exists still some residuum of a collective which can be addressed.

In a summer when the London press published statistics showing that over half the mothers of babies born in greater London were born outside the UK—over a fifth in England as a whole—news broadcasts broodingly monitored the numbers of east Europeans entering the UK. Along with the issue of British Muslim populations placed at the fore of media coverage and the completion of Scotland’s nationalist First Minister’s initial one hundred days in power, the United Kingdom, that lies at the heart of royal mythology, appears more than ever to be nothing but a mythic convenience.

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royal family, objectivity constantly seeps away in the struggle to establish simple facts about both parties. Most of what we imagine about the British public opinion on royal matters results from superficial polling, which offers few revelations.

Social psychologist Michael Billig gave a significant number of the British population the opportunity to discuss their thoughts and feelings concerning the British royal family at the end of the 1980s.1 Robert Turnock created a field study of emotional responses to Princess Diana’s death in 1997. Billig’s findings challenged the conception that Britons are incessantly preoccupied with royal matters. In one exchange, a confirmed royal admirer attempted to get her dissenting son to admit that he has watched royal weddings. He replied, “I can’t remember my feelings at the time, but I remember watching it on television.”

The mother refused to accept that he could not remember how he felt.

During Diana’s funeral, the media in Britain seemed to take on a maternal role, cajoling the audience to admit that they truly cared. This sentiment was repeated after the deaths of Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother. When a reporter found himself on the empty streets of Windsor watching the Queen Mother’s funeral, he felt compelled to invest his audience with imminent engagement: “At the moment Windsor is quiet, really exceptionally quiet. There’s hardly anybody about…I think people are preparing to watch [the funeral] on television rather than come out onto the streets at the moment.”2 In simple terms, the reporter merely speculated that the absence of people at the funeral must not have anything to do with an apathetic population. At many moments such as this one in royal “reporting,” fiction

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replaces reportage: “But in general you can see if you look around the streets here…[that] they are empty.”3 Many citizens do care about Britain’s royal affairs, even if it is the case that public engagement with royalty in the United Kingdom may as likely be a media phenomenon as much as a truly cultural one. Questionnaires distributed in Britain within two and a half days of Diana’s funeral in 1997 elicited interesting evidence concerning the specific media attribution of widespread “grief,” leading the research—which noted that “previous knowledge and experience of Diana had been “mediated”—to speculate the extent to which “people are perhaps becoming more dependent on media images, characters, and depictions to provide the resources to help establish identities and trust.”4 The study did not find evidence of “an outpouring of grief”—to use the phrase deployed universally by the media after the car crash in Paris.

In this perspective, strong reactions to the death of Princess Diana might be related to the forms of distress evident when familiar television characters are killed, not at all to be confused—except in a very few pathological cases—with the grief that occurs in response to the death of family, or close friends. What passes for engagement with royal events is often no more than a dimension of consumer behavior in which participants are perpetually exploring aesthetic possibilities for entertainment.

Before returning to the relationship between monarchy and media in Britain, it is important to widen the horizon for the forthcoming discussion. First, there is a stark difference between “royal families” and “monarchies.” And secondly, it is instructive to place the British case

Culture & Society

alongside a number of others.

Monarchy vs. Royalty. Pre-modern, Modern, Postmodern? Since

enhanced consumption has diluted political engagement in certain countries over the last thirty or more years, rarely does one encounter the older argument in the United Kingdom that monarchy can be justified through its guarantee of political stability. This notion that British monarchy guarantees, even in small part, the distribution of power— which in the United States is embedded variously in state and federal institutions and in Europan republics, across ministerial, presidential, and devolved functions—now appears anomalous. In the British constitutional manner, the idea that the monarchy serves as a buttress for political stability was a conventional argument, which has now become almost defunct as a counter-argument in any debate about the antiquated system, despite the fact that the British monarch does actually retain some powers, even if they express themselves only formally.

This arrangement is typical of other constitutional monarchies as well, such as those of Sweden and Denmark. The effect of the British monarchy’s extreme personalization is to render its constitutional role generally irrelevant to the British, despite the existence of royal prerogative powers which have in certain imaginable circumstances real force, such as, in principle, the right to choose a prime minister after an inconclusive general election outcome.

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royalty—imaginable in strictly constitutional terms and in the abstract—in practice there has been significant interplay between the concept of monarchy and royalty. Likewise in Spain, it was the King who allegedly guaranteed the transition to a modern state form after decades of dictatorial rule by Franco and who was also consequently seen as the defender of Spain’s fledgling democracy when under attack. Nevertheless, this historical claim remains a myth, not because Juan Carlos failed to appear on television screens to defend Spain’s democratic development as a response to the attempted coup of 1981—a feat he certainly accomplished— but because when the Parliament was stormed by Civil Guards, they failed to overthrow the government for a wide variety of other reasons, most of which are now popularly forgotten.5 Although the role of Juan Carlos may be less central to the salvation of the newly-won Spanish democracy than is popularly supposed, it is still the case that Spain has thenceforth experienced a renewed political significance for its monarchy, a phenomenon that does not apply uniformly elsewhere. The traditional notion of power—a quality that monarchies have been divested of in the modern era—should not be limited to the possession of legal right or the capacity to enforce them through arms. A new species of power resides, and often, more importantly, it is found in imagination, language, ideology, myth, and symbolic form. Symbolically, the Spanish monarchy is capable of operating in a fashion almost entirely contrary from that of the British monarchy.

Juan Carlos is seen mythically as a guarantor of the transition from the Franquist dictatorship, and thereby becomes an actor in the process of polit[ 6 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

ical modernization. The British monarchy, on the other hand, appears to resist modernization, instead representing conservatism, social hierarchy, and tradition. Its heir is a famous defender of traditional forms of culture, which the Queen herself personifies. In Tom Nairn’s late 1980s account, British monarchy has become a central symbol around which a pseudo-modern set of identities coalesces in a British state exemplifying at best “early modern” traits in co-existence with feudal remnants.6 If one can still usefully deploy the concept of post-modernization—in regards to society, culture, the psyche, and the economic world—it should be done in the recognition that the modern world can only be partly superseded, and unevenly at that.7 There is a persuasive sense in which enduring questions about Spain’s political stability as a democracy invested the Spanish monarchy, during the 1980s and beyond, with a political seriousness that was able to keep Spanish royalty from turning into fodder for the gossip pages, unlike other European royalties that have fallen prey to the postmodern consumer landscape. It is likely that Juan Carlos, and not the Spanish monarchy as a whole, benefits from this political investment. However, just as Monaco’s royal house serves as another prime example of premium media commodity—Grace Kelly’s assimilation amplified its value, and her myth, similar to Diana’s, provides significant texture even today— the Spanish royal family in general also functions, like Britain’s, as a highly specialized form of super-celebrity.8 The Low Countries and Scandinavia— despite bouts of attention directed upon royal individuals by the media before and during royal weddings and other events—

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produce distinct alternative myths of their own royal families, which are distinguished quite clearly from the “intrusive” royals of the United Kingdom. The constitutional position of the Dutch Royal House—the House of Orange—has received some ongoing attention in the Netherlands, where it has been impor-

Culture & Society

gian royal family is thought of as open to scrutiny, relatively “ordinary,” and close to the Belgian people.

Norway provides the curious case of a monarchy chosen over a republic by referendum in the early twentieth century, following the country’s secession from union with Sweden. The country pre-

Belgium’s royal family members are expected to justify their existence—as are many of the “modernized” royal houses—by promoting industry, commerce, and international trade. tant for the Dutch to be able to perceive their monarchy as consistent with the requirements of political modernity.

The Belgians, to the extent that they conceive of a political role for their monarchy and their royal family members, account for them as part of Belgium’s modern dispensation. Similar to the Scandinavian monarchies, and notwithstanding moments of enhanced public engagement with individual royals, the monarchies of these smaller European nations have been personalized as “bicycling royalty”—functional, green, not least when compared to Elizabeth II in her Rolls Phantom, and, most importantly, capable of existing with a fraction of the pomp and formality that characterize their Spanish and British counterparts. These royals bear relatively low profiles and low carbon footprints.

Belgium’s royal family members are expected to justify their existence—as are many of the “modernized” royal houses— by promoting industry, commerce, and international trade. So, of course, is the British monarchy, and it does so vigorously. But in most other respects, however, this European model is very different from Britain’s. For example, the Bel-

sents no unified national response to its royal family or to the monarchy. Views in the country range from loyal monarchism to republicanism—which is in fact the European position generally—with various degrees of preference for the former or the latter extreme. This likewise applies in different measure to republics, where post-royalty, such as Germany’s Hohenzollerns, is still very much discernible.

This brief overview of monarchies limits itself to European instances. The tensions between tradition and modernity produced by the Japanese and other non-European monarchies and royal families share characteristics with those that operate in the West, but also require specific attention, functioning in cultural circumstances even less susceptible to generalization.

It is significant, however, that the British monarchy alone does not easily reflect any sort of modernizing development. Within the United Kingdom, public interest in politics has diminished to the point where republicanism is now probably more anachronistic than monarchy itself. In the British form of consumer culture, monarchy and royalty Winter/Spring 2008 [ 6 1 ]

SUBSTANCE AND VANITY AT THE PALACE

can be marketed much more persuasively than any alternative. It is fascinating to speculate whether Britain must first discard its monarchy in order to modernize more successfully, or whether modernization will produce enough apathy in regards to royal matters that such efforts will prove unnecessary, perhaps allowing them to naturally evolve into the “bicycle” monarchies from across the North Sea.

Securing Monarchy in the Twenty-First Century. Although

the young British princes can readily be filmed engaging in charitable works at the behest of Palace public relations specialists, the infamous shot of Prince Harry sporting a Nazi uniform and the publicizing of intimate phone conversations between Diana and Charles and their lovers have offered increasing glimpses into lives normally filtered through strenuous image management systems.9 Of course, nearly all the discussion in Spain about Juan Carlos, or in Britain about the Queen, is almost entirely speculative, guided by ideological fashion, and jour-

Royal families are a prime commodity for both mythic invention and substantive entertainment for media income flows. In this sense, royalty can supersede monarchy; the personal and economic importance of royals destroys the significance of any residual constitutional role.

So, have the British been lying awake worrying about Camilla’s future role in the Palace? Certainly, they are not nearly as interested in the royal family as one might imagine from the coverage in the media, which seems gripped by almost universal editorial caution against minimizing royalty reporting amidst fear of loud complaints from customers. The truth is that the British media cannot forgive Camilla for not being young and glamorous. Regardless, Prince William, since the end of his student days at St. Andrews, has taken up his mother’s role in the public eye, and Harry is his perfect foil. Eventually the Palace and the British media will allow William to marry someone he likes, someone who too is young and glamorous. Assuming Charles reigns until well into this century, William could thereafter be on the throne until at

The truth is that the British media cannot

forgive Camilla for not being young and glamorous. nalistic and editorial imagination. The results can be curiously unpredictable: few imagined Harry’s wearing of the swastika as a sartorial exception for him and his family, whereas many have seemed willing to toy with the idea that Diana was assassinated, presumptively at the wish of other members of the royal family.

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least 2070. This saga has a long way to run, and if the Norwegians, the Belgians, or the Spanish ever develop really serious doubts about monarchy, it will take only a state visit from William and his bride to put their minds at rest. For now, it remains clear that the British know how to put on a royal affair.

BLAIN

Culture & Society

NOTES

1 Michael Billig, Talking of the Royal Family (London: Routledge, 1998).

2 Neil Blain and Hugh O’Donnell, Media, Monarchy and Power (Bristol: Intellect Books, 2003), 196.

3 Ibid.

4 Robert Turnock, Interpreting Diana: Television Audiences and the Death of a Princess (London: British Film Institute, 2000), 53.

5 Neil Blain and Hugh O’Donnell, Media, Monarchy and Power (Bristol: Intellect Books, 2003), 93-119 6 Tom Nairn, The Enchanted Glass (London: Radius, 1988); Prince Charles is a very prominent defender of tradition in cultural domains from food to architecture. This has its positive dimensions, as evidenced by his personally very expensive intervention in the summer of 2007 to save the invaluable contents of a Scottish stately home from dispersal—praise where it is due.

7 Neil Blain and Hugh O’Donnell, Media, Monarchy and Power (Bristol: Intellect Books, 2003),11-35.

8 For a variety of reasons, royals are not mere

celebrities. Their real or invented justification through bloodlines (and the great particularity of their lives, which however much varies) places them in a category which is sui generis. Some, but not all, are invested with what Tom Nairn, in a very specific archaic Scottish sense, calls glamour. ‘”Glamour” is the old Scottish word for magical enchantment, the spell cast upon humans by fairies, or witches’ (Nairn 1988: 214). Glamour can come from a variety of sources.

Neither Grace Kelly nor Diana possessed glamour in this sense through prior association with royal bloodlines (though there is a pattern of trying to search for royal antecedents in consorts where they lack them); but their acquisition of royal status engendered it.

9 In January 2005, the younger of Prince Charles’s sons wore a uniform of Rommel’s Afrika Korps, with swastika, to a fancy-dress party in Wiltshire, and inadvertently appeared thus in full colour on the front page of the UK’s best-selling tabloid, The Sun, under the banner “Harry The Nazi.”

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 6 3 ]

Culture & Society

The Catholic Church

An Underestimated and Necessary Actor in International Affairs Jodok Troy In an attempt to unite faith and reason, among other things, through a quotation of an ancient emperor, Pope Benedict XVI’s lecture on 12 September 2006 in Regensburg, Germany, reverberated around the world in widespread, sometimes violent reactions, notably in the Muslim world.

Later, the Pope stated that he had simply wished to illustrate the connection between faith and reason. The strong reactions to his speech illustrate what great impact a diplomatic faux pas, especially one from a major religious leader, can have in world politics.1 Realists and neorealists, though they tend to disregard the Holy See and the Pope himself as a major political actor in world politics, would argue that such a speech and its reactions have no considerable impact on foreign affairs, at least not on a systemic level. Nonetheless, as this article shows, Papal policy and diplomacy have always had and will continue to have great influence on the world’s political stage.

Papal foreign policy can be described, next to its idealistic approach—for example, concerning normative issues such as the consideration of justice—as also truly realistic. This is one of the major reasons why the Catholic Church, hereafter “the Church,” is an important global actor capable of serving as a peacemaker. Therefore, it is worth analyzing the “Catholic international relations theory.”2

Jodok Troy is a research assistant at the University of Innsbruck and served as a visiting researcher at the Center for Peace and Security Studies at Georgetown University.

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THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Considering that the Church, with regard to its “clientele”—the believers— played an important role in the collapse of communism during the Cold War and during democratic transitions elsewhere in the world, it is important to realize its capability as a peacemaker and “ethical reservoir.” This is of particular interest to many who, especially in the public arena, believe that the world is in an age of a “clash of civilizations,” where the West faces a fundamentalist Islamic threat.

The first part of this article examines the structures and capabilities of Papal foreign policy and diplomacy and deals with its normative values. It demonstrates that Catholic social teaching can have a significant impact on world politics. The second part analyzes possibilities for the Church as a liberation force from political and social oppression as well as its capabilities as a peacemaker. The last part identifies the necessity of the foreign policy of the Holy See, and studies it in terms of theoretical approaches to international relations, especially that of the English School.

ed the entanglement of reason and faith concerning the question of justice: “From God’s standpoint, faith liberates reason from its blind spots and therefore helps it to be ever more fully itself. …Its [ the Catholic social doctrine’s] aim is simply to help purify reason and to contribute, here and now, to the acknowledgment and attainment of what is just.”3

Catholic social doctrine has a grave impact on world politics. Nevertheless, religious issues tend to be particularly marginalized in social studies, especially in the field of political science, mainly due to the secular influence of Western science since the Enlightenment.4 The secular approach is inclined to rely heavily upon the individual as an object of science while religion tends to stress the importance of community. It is due to the general neglect of religious study and religious issues in world politics that the foreign policy of the Holy See tends to be overlooked in international relation studies.5 Before examining Papal foreign poliThe Bishop of Rome and the cy, some general observations must be Holy See in World Politics.

Although it was well established that the made. First, it is difficult to separate the papacy of Pope Benedict XVI would Papal court as a political body from the become a rather conservative one, it government of the Church as a religious actually began in an undisruptive man- organization. Consequently, it is imposner. In fact, the inaugural encyclical of sible to articulate a specific foreign poliBenedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est, was, to some cy of the papacy because “all its activities degree, surprising. Many parts of that are directed toward the religious good first encyclical stand in accordance with and faithful.” The Pope, therefore, the Catholic social tradition. The Pope enters diplomatic dealings as the the Church,” and not emphasized a demand for justice, which “supreme pastor of 6 In that role, he has as head of state. is a political responsibility. The Pope respectable capabilities, culminating in stated the Church’s limitations, but at the foreign policy same time took up the Catholic claim of the recognition of Vatican 7 an “ethical reservoir.” He also highlight- as Papal foreign policy. This is certainly the case because Papal foreign policy and [ 6 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

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its diplomatic activities can be characterized as highly personalized due to the nature of the hierarchical structure of the Church that gives the Pope the highest

Culture & Society

The Vatican is, in fact, a sovereign state; it is the smallest in the world and thus not widely recognized as a state. The Church, on the other hand, is very well recognized

Catholicism is itself a more integrative

and stabilizing force in international relations because it has no revolutionary tendency. authority. Furthermore, spiritual intentions such as the circulation of the Christian origins of Papal foreign policy have to be recognized: “Vatican diplomacy, by its very nature, is basically spiritual and sacerdotal. It does not aim at political power, material advantage, or the defense of the interests of any particular group.”8 Thus, the main political function of the Vatican—as a territorial state and therefore host of multiple domestic institutions—is to be the diplomatic center of the Church and to promote its spiritual interests as a religious institution: “The Vatican, as a religious power, employs the Catholic Church as a religious institution to assist the attainment of its goals on the global level.”9 Four main elements characterize global actors: external recognition, legal authority, autonomy, and a minimum of cohesion among collaborating units. The problem concerning the analysis of the Church as a global actor is that those characteristics are mainly appointed by nation-states, primarily the United States, or international organizations with a tendency toward state-like units, primarily the EU.10 Those characteristics can only apply to the Church if they are seen in interaction and in interdependency with the Vatican as a sovereign state and the Church as a religious institution.

as a religious power. In legal terms, especially due to its diplomatic activities which are also institutionalized through nunciatures, the Church is recognized globally. The characteristics of legal authority as well as autonomy are given because of the domestic, hierarchical structure of the Vatican and the Church.

This feature of minimum cohesion among collaborating units is due to the strict hierarchical structure of the Church, which provides the necessary unity within its institutional framework.

There are several motivations for analyzing the Church in world politics, especially compared to the standards of other actors on the world stage. First, the Vatican is the smallest country in the world, but has diplomatic missions in nearly all other states of the world; as a result, it has its own distinct foreign policy department, which is disproportionately large for a state of this size. Second, unlike other actors, the Vatican and the Holy See have a universal claim—the Christian faith—in a world still separated by nation-states. Third, the position of the Pope is unique: He serves as a bridge builder between the secular and faithbased environments. Furthermore, it must be noted that the Catholic Church is the oldest religious and political actor on a global level; the Pope, as the head of millions of believers worldwide, possess-

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THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

es extraordinary leverage through his authority, which appears by means of his access to political leaders and his power to appoint bishops across the world who in turn have a great political impact in many countries.11 It is worth analyzing the Church in international affairs because of its vision of peace, which consists of four main elements: human rights, development, solidarity, and world order.12 The development of the Church after the Second Vatican Council also shows the Church’s commitment to human rights.

The Church in World Politics: a Considerable Liberation Force.

Although the Holy See and the Pope have no real power in terms of “hard power” or military capabilities, their power can be described as symbolic and subtle in terms of “soft power,” or more descriptively as “expressive.” Consequently, it is reasonable to distinguish between power in terms of influence and in terms of capabilities. Evidently, the Holy See holds “soft power,” mainly in terms of influence, to persuade with nonmilitary means. In light of its lack of “hard power,” globalization, including the growth of the information age, is a rather fortunate development for the Church and even more so for its personalized political constitution. No other Pope besides John Paul II was more aware of this symbolic power and how to wield it, particularly with regard to the media.13 Even though the Holy See’s conception of power is realistic, its application is not precisely because it recognizes the need to harmonize ideals with national interests and imperatives. The Church seeks to empower a world society by using cooperation rather than a balance of power in international relations. It is

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apparent that Pope John Paul II opposed the second Gulf War led by the United States, whose intention can be seen as the preservation of a balance of power. The concept of a law-based international society is an old and well-documented one in Catholic teaching. It can be found in the thoughts of St. Augustine and in the teachings of Francisco de Vitoria, Francisco Suarez, as well as in the newer documents. For example, the pastoral constitution Gaudium et Spes notes: “Peace is not merely the absence of war; nor can it be reduced solely to the maintenance of a balance of power between enemies; nor is it brought about by dictatorship; instead, it is rightly and appropriately called an enterprise of justice.

Peace results from that order structured into human society by its divine Founder, and actualized by men as they thirst after ever greater justice. … [P]eace is never attained once and for all, but must be built up ceaselessly. Moreover, since the human will is unsteady and wounded by sin, the achievement of peace requires a constant mastering of passions and the vigilance of lawful authority.”14 The Church’s emphasis upon justice in international relations demonstrates the extent to which it is bounded by realistic and idealistic concepts. It is aware of the difficulties in achieving peace and makes clear that peace can only be attained by an “enterprise of justice.” At the same time, it recognizes the unsteadiness of the human will, which must lead to a “constant mastering of passions.”

The Holy See seeks to empower global governance, especially through the UN, due to its suspicions against the use of

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armed forces.15 Catholic encyclicals have always been serious and sensitive instruments in analyzing world politics.16 The gravity supporting Catholic social teaching, reflected in the encyclicals, is its aim towards more social justice. Once targeted against the “national security state” and the “consumer society,” the very same insights of encyclicals can address developments in an age of terror.17 This addresses the destructive and inhuman power of religious terrorism just as much

Culture & Society

One practiced and successful method in the Church’s peace-building efforts is third party mediation in conflicts where there is no particular religious dimension present. These faith-based initiatives have been successful primarily because they are altruistic or carried out as a matter of charity, as the lay Catholic community of St. Egidio in Mozambique had demonstrated. Another example is the Pope’s visit to Cuba in 1998, which had both religious and political ramifications.20 In more than one way, the

The Second Vatican Council…marked the Church's turn from a promoter of the status quo to an active liberation force. as the reactions thereupon, such as growing constraints of political freedom motivated by the war against terrorism.

Although the Vatican as a sovereign state has rarely been characterized as a liberal democracy, the Church has developed itself into a respectable promoter of human rights and freedom as a result of its commitment to the preservation of life. John Paul II particularly stressed the importance of religious freedom as the first freedom, because it is rooted in the divine dignity of human free will.18 The twentieth century marks many important shifts in the foreign policies of the Holy See. The Cuban Missile Crisis— when Pope John XXIII played an important role as a back channel—exposed the urgent need for world peace, or, more modestly, defined peaceful coexistence as the primary goal of the Church.19 Moreover, the Second Vatican Council, in the same period, marked the Church’s turn from a promoter of the status quo to an active liberation force.

Catholic Church can be justifiably characterized as a promoter of democracy.21 Samuel Huntington observed that the “third wave” of democratization was overwhelmingly a Catholic one.22 This was mainly due to the political changes made during the Second Vatican Council, which incorporated the ideas of human rights, democracy, economic development, and religious freedom into its teachings. Thus, during the 1960s the Church underwent a fundamental transformation into a major force for change.23 The transformation is especially present in the encyclical Dignitatis Humanae, which reflects a new relationship between the Church and the state.

During the Cold War, the Vatican had already shifted from a de facto alliance with the West to a position of nonalignment that it holds to this day.24 At the end of the Cold War, the encyclical Centesimus Annus addressed a new era and tried to define it while remaining or attempting to remain neutral.

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THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Trends within the current political culture around the world, such as transnational structures, subsidiary, or devolution, are not new phenomena from the perspective of the Church. In Catholic history, they have all long been familiar concepts.25 The strong participation of the Church in international organizations, especially in the UN, and even in lobbying activities, such as within the EU, proves this familiarity.

This article is not about religion itself as a force of change and possible peacemaker; it is about analyzing the institution of the Church as an instrument of nonviolent, sociopolitical change.26 This is possible through its institutional stability and moral authority, its ability to empower individuals to act, and its general commitment to nonviolence. There are several ways in which the Church can become such a force: it can be proactive, as in the Philippines; passive, by providing a forum for political expression; or it can function as a follower of change, such as the example of the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa.27

The Church in World Politics— In Theory and Practice. In light of

Holy See’s support for the UN and the concept of law-based solidaristic international society, the foreign policy of the Holy See can be situated within the diverse tradition of international theory of the English school. The English School stresses the importance of a lawbased international society—the idealistic component—and it is also aware of the realist tradition concerning the reality of power and the “ambiguities inherent of the use of power.”28 Furthermore, the diplomacy of the Holy See can be seen from the perspective of the English School, which characterizes diplomacy as

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a system “incorporating the virtues of charity and self-restraint constituting an element of civilization which made it easier for people to be good in their relations with those whom they saw as others, outside their own society or community of shared rules, understandings, and outlook.”29 This evokes the Catholic conception of a world order which tries to harmonize different interests in a just and thus civilizing manner, working towards a world society.

The Catholic concept of solidarity, which is characterized as “a firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good,” can be seen within the context of the English School theory in its controversial but nevertheless important concept of world society and basis of solidarism with a tendency towards cosmopolitanism in its ethical commitments—“[T]he view that humanity is one, and that the task of diplomacy is to translate this latent or immanent solidarity of interests and values into reality.”30,31,32 As with the English School theory, an early notion about the importance of interdependence and globalization trends, and the emerging outlook towards a more solidarist international society, for example through supporting the UN, can be seen through the actions of the Church.

Despite the fact that it is nearly impossible to speak of a traditional foreign policy of the Holy See as its activities are directed toward the religious good, it is still possible to detect a pluralism of realistic and idealistic tendencies. It is realistic because of its awareness of the necessity of power and the nature of human fallibility, mainly the St. Augustine tradition, which comes close to Reinhold Niebuhr’s concept of Christian moral realism. It can also be idealistic because of

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its support of a law-based international society based on normative principles, resulting in the support of international organizations.33 Concerning the theoretical localization of the Holy See’s foreign policy decision-making process, the “oligarchic-bureaucratic model,” as described by David Ryall, fits because of the Vatican’s mix of curial administration and monarchical government. It is the nature of the Holy See’s internal system to be very constant and therefore very unhurried regarding internal changes.

As a result, the Catholic challenge to international society is subversive rather than revolutionary; it urges radical changes in world order through consultation. Ultimately, Catholicism is a more integrative and stabilizing force in international relations because it has no revolutionary tendency.34 The Popes and the Holy See did not see the Enlightenment as the end of history, but rather a phase that will be followed by a new era the Church believes to be of more importance; it will play a greater role in political as well as in ethical and social life.35 As we face a global resurgence of religion, the Enlightenment and especially seculariza-

Culture & Society

tion have not stressed basic human needs enough. It is now the Holy See’s turn to use its institutional and moral capabilities to become once more an “ethical reservoir” in an age of a declared and believed “clash of civilizations.”

Pope John Paul II had a sense for geopolitical trends and left well-established and extended diplomatic processes behind.36 Though it seems Benedict XVI’s papacy does not focus much on world politics but on social and ethical issues, it is his role to recognize and address the new political, cultural, and religious trends on the world stage.

Acknowledging the fact that we live in a more complex world that is often framed by religious and cultural circumstances and differences, it can be argued that the current Pope’s focus on ethical and social issues, rather than on “hard” political ones, is the adequate way to address world politics today. As a result, he has the foundation in the Catholic Church as the oldest religious and political global actor to transcend moral dimensions into international affairs to work for the greater good. More than ever, he holds the power and responsibility to demonstrate on the global level that religion is not necessarily violent.

NOTES

This article was written while I was a visiting researcher at the Center for Peace and Security Studies at the Georgetown University in Washington D.C. I would like to thank Franz Kernic and Wolfgang Palaver for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.

1 The most criticized sentence in the lecture was: “Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.” http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/spe eches/2006/september/documents/hf_benxvi_spe_20060912_universityregensburg_en.html. Concerning the Muslim voices criticising the lecture see for example:

http://www.acommonword.com/index.php?lang=e n and http://www.islamicamagazine.com/letter/.

For a concise introduction which is in opposition to the mainstream of the “Pope bashing” concerning the lecture, see: James V. Schall, The Regensburg Lecture (South Bend, Indiana: St. Augustine’s Press, 2007).

2 Georg Weigel, “World Order: What Catholics Forgot,” First Things (May 2004): 31-38.

3 Deus Caritas Est, 28a.

4 See for example Scott Thomas, “Religious resurgence, postmodernism and world politics,” in Religion and Global Order, ed. John L. Esposito and Michael Watson (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2000), 38-65.

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5 Exceptions are the bilateral relations of the Vatican; David Ryall, “How Many Divisions? The modern development of Catholic international relations”, International Relations Vol. XIV, No.2 (August 1998): 21.

6 Eric O. Hanson, The Catholic Church in World Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987), 67-68.

7 It is widely assumed that the Vatican represents the foreign policy of the Catholic Church.

Actually the Vatican is only the sovereign territorial state (since the Lateran treaties 1929) within Rome and of which the Pope is the head of state.

The Holy See (Santa Sede) on the other side represents first of all the organizational centre of the Catholic Church with the bishop of Rome–the Pope as its head.

8 Edward L. Heston, C.S.C, “Papal Diplomacy: Its Organization and Way of Acting,” in The Catholic Church in World Affairs, ed. Waldemar Gurian and M.A. Fitzimons (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1954), 40. Therefore Vatican diplomacy can be described as “diplomacy of conscience.” Celestino Migliore, “The Nature and Methods of Vatican Diplomacy,” Origins, February 23 (2000), 539-541.

9 Avro Manhattan, The Vatican in World Politics (New York: Gaer Associates, 1949), 24-25, 28.

10 Concerning the characteristics of a global actor (regarding the European Union) see especially: Charlotte Bretherton and John Vogler, The European Union as a Global Actor (London and New York: Routledge, 2006).

11 James Kurth, “The Vaticans Foreign Policy,” The National Interest No. 32 (Summer 1993): 41.

12 Drew Christiansen, Catholic Peacemaking. From Pacem in terris to Centesimus annus. A Talk prepared for The United States Institute of Peace (Washington, D.C., 5 February 2001), 3-7; http://www.restorativejustice.org/resources/docs/christiansen.

13 Considering the fact that John Paul II was the first Pope who had such opportunities. Michael Walsh, “Catholicism and International Relations: Papal intervention,” Religion and Global Order, ed.

John L. Esposito and Michael Watson (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2000), 100.

14 Gaudium et Spes, 78.

15 David Ryall, “How Many Divisions? The Modern Development of Catholic International Relations,” International Relations Vol. XIV, No. 2 (August 1998), 28-31.

16 For instance Divini Redemptoris (1937) addressing the challenges of communism long before George Kennan did or Mit brennender Sorge (Ardenti cura/With burning concern, 1937) addressing the evil of Nazism still in an era of appeasement.

17 Kurth, “The Vaticans Foreign Policy,” 4648. Concerning the “consumer society” and “national security regimes” see Centesimus Annus, 19, 47, 48.

18 Allen Hertzke, “Roman Catholicism and the

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faith-based movement for global human rights,” The Review of Faith and International Affairs Vol. 3, No. 3 (Winter 2005/2006): 22.

19 Concerning the Popes role in the Cuban Missile Crisis see Giancarola Zizola, The Utopia of Pope John XXIII (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis, 1978). The encyclical Pacem in Terris, published only a few months after, reflected the experiences of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Hanson, The Catholic Church in World Politics, 352.

20 Douglas Johnston and Brian Cox, “FaithBased Diplomacy and Preventive Engagement,” in Faith-Based Diplomacy. Trumping Realpolitik, ed. Douglas Johnston (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 22.

21 Allen Hertzke, “Roman Catholicism and the faith-based movement for global human rights,” The Review of Faith and International Affairs, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Winter 2005/2006): 19-24.

22 Samuel Huntington, The Third Wave.

Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991) 76-85.

23 Douglas Johnston, “Review of the Findings”, in Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft, ed. Douglas Johnston and Cynthia Sampson (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 260.

24 Bryan Hehir, “Papal Foreign Policy,” Foreign Policy No. 78 (Spring 1990): 46.

25 David Ryall, “The Catholic Church as a transnational actor,” Non-State Actors in World Politics, ed. Daphne Josselin and William Wallace (New York: Palgrave, 2001), 46.

26 Regarding the notion of the Catholic Church towards peace in general see especially Ronald G. Musto, The Catholic Peace Tradition (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1986).

27 Johnston, “Review of the Findings,” 260261.

28 Scott M. Thomas, The Global Resurgence of Religion and the Transformation of International Relations (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 182.

29 Paul Sharp, “Herbert Butterfield, the English School and the Civilizing Virtues of Diplomacy,” International Affairs, Vol. 79, No. 4 (2003): 877.

30 For “A firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good,” see: Sollicitudo rei socialis, 38. Concerning the Catholic concept of solidarity see especially Popolorum progressio, 43-54 and Sollicitudo rei socialis, 38-40.

31 For the English School and its concept of world society see: Barry Buzan, From International to World Society? English School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalisation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 8, 61.

32 For “[T]he view that humanity is one, and that the task of diplomacy is to translate this latent or immanent solidarity of interests and values into reality,” see: James Mayall, World Politics: Progress and its Limits (Cambridge: Polity, 2000), 14.

33 Ryall, “How Many Divisions?,” 32.

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34 Ryall, “How Many Divisions?,” 24-25.

35 Kurth, “The Vaticans Foreign Policy,” 52.

36 Although he tended to ignore that the world of nation states is not one family. Derek S. Jeffreys,

Culture & Society

“John Paul II and Participation in International Politics,” in The Political Papacy. John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and their influence, ed. Chester Gillis (Boulder: Paradigm Publishers, 2006), 98.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 7 3 ]

Law&Ethics Rights for Indigenous Peoples

The Struggle for Uniformity: the UN Declaration and Beyond James C. Hopkins The Declaration and its Origins. On 13 September

2007, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, marking a historic moment in the advancement and protections of the rights of indigenous peoples.1 Dr. Rodolpho Stavenhagen, UN Special Rapporteur for human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, quickly noted its significance within the international human rights system. He issued a statement soon after applauding the Declaration’s adoption by the UN General Assembly: “The Declaration constitutes a fundamental landmark for indigenous peoples, and it represents their important contribution to the construction of the international human rights system.”2 Stavenhagen affirmed the unique role traditional lands play in defining the distinct political and collective nature of the rights of indigenous communities and their connection to cultural identity and the underlying spiritual values of indigenous peoples. He concluded, “The Declaration affirms this close relationship, in the framework of their right, as peoples, to self-determination in the framework of the States in which they live.”3 The Declaration and the struggle for its adoption illustrate two critical aspects regarding the special place indigenous peoples have within the international human rights framework.

James C. Hopkins is associate clinical professor in the Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program at James E. Rogers College of Law, Arizona State University.

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RIGHTS FOR INDIGENOUS PEOPLES

First, the recognition of indigenous rights is anchored to a distinct cultural and political autonomy, both prior and subsequent to European contact. Second, their underlying cultural connection to traditional lands and resources is integral in shaping their political, cultural, and societal identities. Thus, as vital to their survival as distinct peoples, the international human rights system confers protections to this underlying cultural connection.

While the Declaration’s adoption is a watershed achievement for the UN General Assembly, emphasizing the commitment to protect the rights of indigenous peoples, it is significant that four states both objected to and voted against the Declaration in lieu of issuing an abstention as eleven other states have done.4 The status of indigenous peoples within these four objecting states offers important insights into the challenges the international human rights system faces in guaranteeing the protection of and defining the rights of indigenous peoples. Ironically, these countries—Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States— share a common British colonial history and legal foundation, and may be referred to as the Colonial Bloc. As well, indigenous populations in each of these countries form a distinct minority against a backdrop of democratic governance by the majority, coupled with significant wealth accumulation over the development of traditional indigenous lands and resources. Professor Stephen Cornell’s research, which covers comparative census data and governing systems in these countries, makes a similar observation, noting that these are “among the world’s wealthiest nations” and yet indigenous populations “within their borders are in each case among their poorest.”5

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Indigenous Rights: Global Visions, Local Problems and Setbacks. The Colonial Bloc rejected

the Declaration’s substantive content and corresponding duties, which are proclaimed in the preamble “as a standard of achievement to be pursued in a spirit of partnership and mutual respect.” The Declaration’s aspirations and principles are viewed as widely held expressions of customary international law that direct UN member states to take specific measures accordingly. Rejecting the Declaration—a nonbinding document of the UN General Assembly—demonstrates not only a cursory reliance on the states’ respective laws but a resistance toward the growing body of international law on the rights of indigenous peoples. Moreover, the objections strongly suggest that the Colonial Bloc perceived the Declaration as a fetter to their abilities, under their respective laws, to acquire and exploit indigenous lands and connected natural resources. Indeed, the Colonial Bloc shares a history, characterized by findings from international human rights bodies, over their failure to meet international human rights standards in addressing the rights of indigenous peoples and indigenous communities within their territorial boundaries.6 This article will explore the two main factors that explain why the Colonial Bloc rejected the Declaration. First, the Declaration affects the way domestic legal systems define indigenous peoples, placing greater emphasis on their internal capacity to form a distinct collective entity. In contrast, domestic legal systems within the Colonial Bloc narrow the categories of recognized indigenous peoples and subsequently tie this recognition to specific bundles of rights. Secondly, the Declaration clarifies the positive duties of

HOPKINS

states to deal fairly with indigenous peoples. These duties already exist within the international human rights system, but lack the clarity of purpose that is delineated in the Declaration. The institutions needed to oversee and protect these duties are generally non-existent in the Colonial Bloc. Thus, while each state varies in the degree to which it consults with indigenous peoples, the Colonial Bloc’s standards and practices are not uniform with respect to the requirements of the international human rights system as set forth in the Declaration. Moreover, these duties—such as the duty to consult—are interpreted and administered differently throughout the Colonial Bloc and can fail to meet international human rights standards as a consequence. This article will argue that these duties need not create additional bureaucracy for relations among the state

Law & Ethics

Peoples was a central mandate of the UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations. After nearly a decade of extensive participation by numerous representatives of indigenous peoples, governments, and experts, the Draft Declaration moved to the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights. The Sub-Commission subsequently sent the Draft Declaration to the UN Commission on Human Rights. Restructured in 2006, the Commission became the UN Human Rights Council, whose immediate focus was to seek final approval of the Declaration before the General Assembly.

The Declaration’s broad approach to the definition of indigenous peoples and rights is directly derived from the UN Working Group’s lengthy consultation process with states and indigenous groups. It conveys within the preamble a

The federal dealings approach carries an

inherent inequity for indigenous peoples because their legal status depends on a requisite federal undertaking. concern by the General Assembly “that indigenous peoples have suffered from historic injustices as a result of, among other things, the colonization and dispossession of their lands, territories, and resources, thus preventing them from exercising, in particular, their right to development in accordance with their The Colonial Bloc Pursues its own needs and interests.” The DeclaraOwn Agenda. The UN General tion goes on to recognize the “urgent Assembly’s adoption of the Declaration need to respect and promote the inherwas by no means a surprise to the Colo- ent rights of indigenous peoples, which nial Bloc given the lengthy drafting derive from their political, economic, process. Beginning in 1983, the Draft and social structures, and from their culDeclaration on the Rights of Indigenous tures, spiritual traditions, histories, and and indigenous peoples but can inform the goals toward which new institutions should aspire. Cooperation will improve the outcome of land and natural resource disputes by addressing issues of fairness and equity—foundational policies of the Declaration itself.

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U.S. Supreme Court affirmed federal jurisdiction over indigenous peoples and their lands and conferred the status of a “domestic dependent nation” upon tribal governments. Beginning in 1823, the Supreme Court’s Marshall Trilogy affirmed federal control over Indian affairs and lands. These decisions gave Congress the unilateral authority over subsequent cases that addressed the scope and content of tribal sovereignty over Indian lands and resources.9 Congress can unilaterally sever or terminate recognition of indigenous peoples and extinguish their rights to self-government, lands, and resources. Indeed, this was the express policy of Congress during the termination era that lasted from 1945 to 1961 wherein legislative acts specifically removed federal recognition of numerThe North American Perspec- ous tribal governments. Similarly, Contive: the United States and gress’s passage of the Alaska Native Canada. British policy toward indige- Claims Settlement Act in 1971 was held by nous peoples in North America originat- the U.S. Supreme Court in the 1998 ed in the Royal Proclamation of 1763, Venetie decision to have revoked federal wherein King George asserted the exclu- superintendence over Alaskan native vilsive authority of the British Crown to lages, thereby severing federal recognideal with Indian lands and governments. tion and tribal relations.10 U.S. legal Additionally, the Proclamation expressed treatment of indigenous peoples diverges the Crown’s intention to be the exclusive from the norms stated in the Declaraarbiter in acquiring titles to indigenous tion. lands. This role applied specifically to Canada’s approach to federal-indigeland that indigenous people held in nous dealings reflects a similar pattern to reserve—lands that had not been pur- the United States in that it, too, followed chased or subject to treaty. The Procla- the British colonial custom. Canada was mation stated, in part, that the Crown confederated in 1867 pursuant to the required that no state or private person British North America Act (BNA Act). “presume to make any purchase from the Under the BNA Act, Canada’s Parliasaid Indians of any Lands reserved to the ment had exclusive authority over Indisaid Indians.” However, the Proclama- ans and lands held in reserve for Indians. tion also stated, “If at any Time any of the In 1982, Canada’s Constitution was Said Indians should be inclined to dis- repatriated and included specific protecpose of the said Lands, the same shall be tions for aboriginal peoples, delineating Purchased only for Us, in our Name.”8 three categories: Indian, Inuit, and Following the British tradition, the Metis. Each category carries with it a disphilosophies, especially their rights to their lands, territories, and resources.”

While the Declaration does not contain an express provision that defines an indigenous person, its approach relies upon a shared history of colonization and dispossession as defining attributes of indigenous identity. This approach is consistent with the broad parameters found within the international human rights system, and contrasts with the Colonial Bloc members’ approach.7 Following British custom, the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia have consistently emphasized the supremacy of federal, or Crown, jurisdiction in defining and dealing with indigenous populations, lands, and resources.

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HOPKINS

tinct set of rights and a unique federal relationship. For instance, Indians are typically defined by their exclusive governance under the federal Indian Act, which includes a federally recognized Band Council and individual membership within an Indian Registry system.

This definition requires a history of federal dealings based on treaty-making, establishing a reserve with a recognized Band Council, and membership within the Canadian Indian Registry. By contrast, the Declaration promotes selfidentification by collective groups of indigenous peoples. In Canada, the constitutional protections for all three groups extend to rights and freedoms “that have been recognized by the Royal Proclamation of 7 October 1763” and include notable references to the Inuit of northern Canada and the Metis.11 The Metis are a group typically associated with the pre-Confederation era and include distinct self-governing groups that emerged from the inter-mixing of European fur traders and indigenous populations.

The federal dealings approach carries an inherent inequity for indigenous peoples because their legal status depends on a requisite federal undertaking. In Canada, this has resulted in entrenched and systemic infringement on the rights of indigenous peoples who failed to federalize. Such was the case of the Lubicon Cree—a group of indigenous people located in the resource-rich province of Alberta who were initially overlooked and subsequently excluded from the early treaty-making process but continued to live on their traditional territory. Parliament failed to provide any measure of redress for the oil lease concessions granted on the Lubicon Cree’s traditional lands. This inaction led the UN

Law & Ethics

Human Rights Committee to determine in the 1990 Omniyak case that Canada’s actions threatened “the way of life and culture of the Lubicon Cree” in violation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In this regard, Canada’s argument that the Lubicon Cree did not constitute a “peoples” for lack of federal recognition failed when the Committee determined that it was not valid under international law.12

New Zealand and the Fate of the Maori Community. In New Zealand,

the rights of Maori peoples are recognized under the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, which limits its scope to the treaty signatories.13 While the Treaty recognized Maori self-government and lands, its provisions were often viewed as “paper rights,” as the Treaty gave way to frequent and often violent incursions by settlers.

In this particular Colonial Bloc state, Crown recognition was used as a device to exclude and assimilate well into the 1870s. Following the adoption of the New Zealand Constitution Act of 1852, which established a Parliament—an institution not privy to the Treaty—a divisive history began that saw enormous tracts of communally-held Maori lands sold off.14 The New Zealand Settlements Act of 1863, which allowed for the sale of proclaimed or designated areas, exacerbated the exclusion and assimilation of the Maori.15 This situation continues to exist in New Zealand today. Dr. Rodolpho Stavenhagen, the UN Special Rapporteur and expert on indigenous peoples’ rights, views Parliament’s inability to recognize customary Maori rights as a step backward. He notes that recent legislation ignores the Maori people’s customary rights.16 This continuation of British colonial policy toward indigenous peo-

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ples further explains New Zealand’s participation by indigenous peoples in the drafting of these restrictive legislative rejection of the Declaration. amendments.18 This behavior, similar to Australia’s Aboriginal Peoples. that of other Colonial Bloc countries, Australia has neither a treaty nor consti- violates the spirit of the Declaration and tutional provision that recognizes or explains their opposition to the growing protects indigenous peoples. Australia body of customary international law.

The Colonial Bloc’s rejection of the

Declaration comes at a time when they each must navigate the contours of cultural difference in a global world. was colonized by the British Crown under the common law doctrine of terra nullus, where the conqueror assumes that conquered land is unoccupied and is therefore the possession of the conquering power. Even after the presence of aboriginal peoples had become recognized as an established fact, the terra nullus doctrine was used to claim that all aboriginal titles had been extinguished. Following the recognition of the rights of aboriginal peoples to aboriginal title under the High Court's 1992 ruling in Mabo v.

Queensland, Australia has implemented a system of adjudicating native title. In the decision, the Court acknowledged the prior existence of aboriginal peoples on Australian territory and recognized their residual land rights.17 Cases and legislative amendments following Mabo, however, have dramatically limited the degree to which aboriginal identity can attach to native title. For example, in 1999 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) held that amendments to Australia’s Native Title Act discriminated against indigenous peoples by extinguishing native title and restricting their right to negotiate.

Moreover, CERD observed the lack of

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Conclusion. The Declaration unques-

tionably forms a significant building block within the international human rights system, affirming norms and principles that ultimately shape the course of customary international law. Yet, it is not a legally binding instrument within the UN General Assembly system.

Rather, as human rights scholars S. James Anaya and Siegfried Wiessner observe, the long-term implication of the Declaration is its “reflective or generative” nature.19 That the Declaration can inform both customary and domestic law is readily apparent in the landmark decision by Abdulai Conteh, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Belize. On 18 October 2007, the Court held that the Government of Belize was obligated to protect the customary property rights and traditional practices of the Mayan villages of Conejo and Santa Cruz in a manner consistent with domestic constitutional and customary international law as expressed in the Declaration.20 This type of outcome is what Colonial Bloc states had hoped to avoid by rejecting the Declaration.

The Declaration makes two important

HOPKINS

additions to the domestic legal status of indigenous peoples within the Colonial Bloc. First, it casts a broader definition of indigenous peoples—looking more toward the common history of colonialism—compared to the narrower definition domestic law may prescribe. This aspect allows for self-identification by indigenous groups in a contemporary legal environment that may not otherwise allow for this recognition. Furthermore, it requires states to adopt positive laws that respond to the concerns of indigenous peoples as distinct, autonomous, and self-governing entities.

The foregoing analysis by no means encompasses the entirety of considerations given by Colonial Bloc countries in rejecting the Declaration; a risk inherent to any comparative analysis is the generalization of a single act. And yet, the analysis illustrates tensions common to all Colonial Bloc countries. Moreover, aside from substantive issues concerning legislative conformity, the spectre of national politics played a significant role.

For instance, despite Canada’s active and long-term engagement in the development of the Declaration within the Working Group setting, a recently elected Conservative minority government with transparent policies limiting indigenous rights played a significant role in its decision to reject the Declaration. This decision that did not escape direct criti-

Law & Ethics

cism and profound disappointment by fellow Canadian Lousie Arbor, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and former Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada: “I am very worried that this very romantic view that we have of ourselves is not being sufficiently nourished and preserved to allow us to continue to occupy a place much larger than the one that our single voice among 192 member states of the UN would otherwise allow for.”21 The estimate of the global benefits of full GM cotton adoption for developing countries is eight times larger than the above estimate of the global economic welfare gain from complete removal of all cotton subsidies and tariffs The Colonial Bloc’s rejection of the Declaration comes at a time when they each must navigate the contours of cultural difference in a global world. The United States, in particular, should have noted that the recognition of indigenous peoples has both national and international ramifications and that cultural differences of indigenous populations influence regional governments and affect foreign policy. For states that have failed to adhere to international human rights standards thus far, it is quite likely that they view the Declaration as an additional layer of compliance inconsistent with their own inherent powers, which have been derived through conquest and colonization.

NOTES

1 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, 13 September 2007, available at http://www.ohchr.org/english/issues/indigenous/decl aration.htm.

2 UN Press Release, The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights-Media Unit, “Adoption of Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples a historic moment for human rights, UN Expert says” [Available online] Geneva, 14 September 2007 [cited September 14, 2007]; Available from http://www.unhchr.ch/huricane/huricane.nsf/view01

/2F9532F220D85BD1C125735600493F0B?opendocument.

3 Ibid.

4 UN Press Release, Department of Public Information, News and Media Division, New York, “General Assembly Adopts Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples; ‘Major Step Forward’Towards Human Rights for All says President,” and “By a vote of 143 in favor to 4 against (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States), with 11 abstentions, the Assembly adopted the UN Declaration on the

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Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which sets out the individual and collective rights of the world’s 370 million native peoples, calls for the maintenance and strengthening of their cultural identities, and emphasizes their right to pursue development in keeping with their own needs and aspirations.” [Available online] 13 September 2007 [cited 14 September 2007]; Available from http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2007/ga10612.doc.htm.

5 Stephen Cornell, “Indigenous Peoples, Poverty and Self-Determination in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States,” Joint Occasional Paper on Native Affairs 02 (2006): 1.

6 Julie Ann Fishel, “Symposium: Lands: Liberties and Legacies: Indigenous Peoples and International Law: Application of International Law to the Problems of Indigenous Peoples: United States Called to Task on Indigenous Rights: The Western Shoshone Struggle and Success at the International Level,” American Indian Law Review 31 (2007): 619; and see also, SLorie M. Graham, “Resolving Indigenous Claims to Self-Determination,” ILSA Int’l & Comp L 10 (2004): 385.

7 S. James Anaya, Indigenous Peoples in International Law (2d ed. 2004) 8 Royal Proclamation, 7 October 1763, reprinted in Canadian federal statutes at R.S.C. 1985, App. II, No. 1 [Available online] The Avalon Project Yale Law School; Available from http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/proc1763.htm.

9 Johnson v. M’Intosh, 21 U.S. 543 (1823); Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, 30 U.S. 1 (1831); Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. 515 (1832).

10 Alaska v. Native Village of Venetie Tribal Government, 522 U.S. 520 (1998) 11 The Constitution Act, 1982, being Schedule B to the Canada Act 1982 (U.K.), 1982, c. 11. Section 35 (1) states: "The existing Aboriginal and treaty rights of the Aboriginal peoples of Canada are hereby recognized and affirmed."

12 Omniyak v. Canada, UN GAOR, 45th Sess., Supp.

No. 40, Annex 9, at 27, UN Doc. A/45/40 (1990).

13 Signed February 6, 1840; see The Governor General of New Zealand – New Zealand’s Founding Documents; The Treaty of Waitangi; Available from http://www.gg.govt.nz/aboutnz/treaty.htm. See also, Stephen Kingsbury, "Competing Conceptual

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Approaches to Indigenous Group Issues in New Zealand Law" (2002) 52 UTLJ 101.

14 The New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 (15 & 16 Vict. c. 72).

15 This statute was followed by the New Zealand Settlements Act Amendment Act 1864, the New Zealand Settlements Amendment and Continuance Act 1865, the New Zealand Settlements Amendment Act 1866, the Friendly Natives' Contracts Enforcement Act 1867 and the Confiscated Lands Act 1867.

See R.P. Boast, “Recognizing Multi-Textualism: Rethinking New Zealand’s Legal History”, 37 VUWLR 547 (2006): n 24.

16 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, Rodolfo Stavenhagen, Addendum: MISSION TO NEW ZEALAND, 13 March 2006, E/CN.4/2006/78/Add.3, [Available online]; Available from http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G06/1 18/36/PDF/G0611836.pdf?OpenElement.

17 Mabo v Queensland (No 2) [1992] HCA 23; (1992) 175 CLR 1 (3 June 1992). For subsequent legislation on native title see , Native Title Act 1993 (Cth), amended

by Native Title Amendment Act 1998 (Cth).

18 CERD, Findings on the Native Title Amendment Act 1998 (Cth), UN Doc ERD/C/54/Misc.40/ Rev.2 (18 March 1999) [7].

19 S. James Anaya and Siegfried Wiessner, “The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: Towards Re-empowerment” [Available online] 3 October 2007, Jurist: Legal News & Research, The University of Pittsburgh School of Law [cited October 2007]; Available from http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2007/10/un-declaration-on-rights-ofindigenous.php.

20 Maya Villages of Santa Cruz and Conejo v. The Attorney General of Belize and The Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, (claims No. 171 and No. 172) (The Supreme Court of Belize, Abdulai Conteh, C.J.C., released 18 October 2007) [Available online]; Available from http://www.law.arizona.edu/depts/iplp/advocacy/may a_belize/documents/ClaimsNos171and172of2007.pdf 21 David Ljunggren, “Canada's commitment slipping, U.N. Rights Boss Says”, The Boston Globe, 22 October 2007, Canada section.

Law & Ethics

Global Mental Health Changing Norms, Constant Rights

Lawrence O. Gostin and Lance Gable Of all the vulnerable groups that face stigmatization in our society, persons with mental disabilities are perhaps the most disadvantaged. The litany of abuses perpetrated against persons with mental disabilities is long and sadly varied. Persons with mental disabilities have been involuntarily confined without due process or adequate cause, subjected to squalid living conditions, denied appropriate care and treatment both within and outside of institutions, and confronted with daunting physical and social barriers that prevent their full participation in society. Moreover, the widespread recognition of this mistreatment has not prevented it from continuing to occur in multiple locations around the world. The vast majority of communities continue to treat individuals with mental disabilities according to the hurtful and incorrect stereotypes associated with incompetency and dangerousness.

This article will explore the changing norms in mental health systems around the world. Frequently, these systems— and the societies that implement them—fail to protect the health and well being of persons with mental disabilities. In order to remedy these historical and ongoing problems, mental health policies should incorporate human rights standards and corresponding notions of fairness and justice. More specifically, mental health law and policy should provide due

Lawrence O. Gostin is an associate dean at Georgetown University Law School. He is the Linda D. and Timothy J. O’Neill Professor of Global Health Law and the director of the O’Neill Institute of National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University. He is also a professor of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University.

Lance Gable is an assistant professor of Law at Wayne State University and a scholar at the Center for Law and the Public’s Health at Georgetown and Johns Hopkins Universities.

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process and humane treatment for persons housed in institutional settings, facilitate individualized mental health care plans and community care wherever possible, and recognize the right to health in the form of public access to mental health care.

The Abiding Myths of Mental Illness. Persons with mental disabilities

have faced three historic burdens that have been transformed into powerful and enduring myths in the social consciousness. These pervasive myths inform much of the public discourse surrounding mental illness and guide many of the related policy decisions. Unfortunately, the perpetuation of these myths has resulted in continuing misperceptions regarding the reality of persons with mental disabilities and has contributed to enduring negative stereotypes.

The myth of incompetency revolves around the concept that individuals with mental disabilities are incompetent to make rational decisions or give consent.

In reality, incompetency is not synonymous with having a mental disability.

Mental disabilities vary greatly. While some mentally disabled people lack socalled competence, many mental disabilities do not cause any sort of incompetency or only limited forms of incapacity.

Competency is not an all or nothing proposition. It is tied to specific services, decisions, or functions. Policies that assume a constant state of incompetency or impute a finding of incompetency in one area to apply to all other areas of decisionmaking misunderstand mental disability and violate human rights standards. Rights violated by policies that presume incompetency include rights to work, vote, maintain privacy, and have a family life. In addition, these policies

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may contravene the rights to health, the benefits of scientific advancements, bodily integrity, and procedural rights and protections.

Another common misconception is that individuals with mental disabilities present a danger to society. The evidence suggests that persons with mental disabilities are no more dangerous than the population in general. A key variable in predicting dangerousness is co-morbidity with alcohol and drug addiction, rather than mental illness. Research demonstrates that there is no statistical correlation between mental disorders and the potential to pose danger to others.1 In fact, most violence is committed by people who do not have a mental illness.2 Nevertheless, the media often exaggerates the relatively few instances where a mentally ill person commits a violent act.3 Media accounts of these incidents highlight mental illness as the cause of the violence and thereby increase stigma for all persons with mental disabilities. In the United Kingdom, such singular incidents have sparked sufficient public outrage to serve as an impetus to change existing mental health laws. The recently enacted Mental Health Act of 2007 attempts to address this “dangerousness” by placing more emphasis on preventive confinement at the expense of treatment and patients’ rights.4 The mental health law reform slogan in England and Wales was, “safe, sound, and secure,” which evokes stubbornly resistant stereotypes about persons with mental disabilities.5 The third myth is that deinstitutionalization solved many or most of the human rights problems faced by persons with mental disabilities. The discovery of powerful psychotropic drugs in the 1960s and 1970s sparked a revolution in the

GOSTIN & GABLE

treatment of mental disabilities. Prior to the advent of these medications, many persons with severe mental disabilities required institutional care and were compulsorily admitted to mental health facilities for indefinite periods to receive that care. The new medications proved to be a remarkable new way to treat many mental disabilities and allow for the release of many institutionalized patients back into the community. This development had the potential to benefit both the patients, many of whom regained their freedom to move freely and associate with others in society, and the governments who ran the institutions and were able to save money from the decrease in institutionalization.6 This putative win-win situation nevertheless has turned out to be another myth. It has been widely noted that deinstitutionalization was not the panacea envisioned by mental health policymakers and mental disability advocates.7 Treatment with pharmaceuticals in the community is only effective if there is a well-established infrastructure to ensure

Law & Ethics

symptoms of schizophrenia and other forms of major mental illness, they have disabling adverse effects, especially when administered in large doses and over prolonged periods of time. Powerful antipsychotic medications have caused uncontrollable and usually irreversible tics and shaking—a debilitating neurological condition called tardive dyskinesia.

Community mental health services that have been established often remain chronically under-funded, fragmented, and punitive.8 As a result, incarceration and homelessness have become part of life for society’s most vulnerable population.9 What eventually transpired was a massive transmigration of mentally ill people from “old” psychiatric institutions to “new” institutions—jails, remand centers, prisons, nursing homes, and homeless shelters.10 Prisons have become the de facto mental health systems in many countries around the world, leaving this population segregated and forgotten. Tragically, a policy designed to allow persons with mental disabilities greater freedom ended up with many of

Community mental health services that

have been established often remain chronically under-funded, fragmented, and punitive. that medications are available. In countries where deinstitutionalization was not coupled with the creation of a community care system, such as in the United States, many persons with mental disabilities do not have sufficient access to medication or any other treatment for their mental disabilities. Moreover, anti-psychotic medications, even when available, offer sharply mixed results. Although they ameliorate many of the serious

them incarcerated, usually for minor offenses, in a prison system that similarly restricts their liberty but does not provide adequate, if any, treatment.

These changes to the mental health system have affected the range of relevant human rights concerns. In the past, the biggest human rights problems were connected to civil liberties issues related to involuntary confinement and other restrictions on autonomy and dignity.

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However, new human rights issues have arisen as the consequences of deinstitutionalization: prison suffering, drug side effects, reduced access to care and treatment in the community setting, and homelessness.

UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), completed in 2006, embodies the most direct and comprehensive articulation of human rights to persons with mental disabilities within the UN system.15 Regional human rights systems in Europe and the AmeriThe Proliferation of Human cas also have developed jurisprudence Rights. The development of human applying human rights to persons with rights protections for persons with men- mental disabilities.16 Yet, despite the tal disabilities represents the culmination promise of expanding applications of of the collective efforts of two of the great human rights to mental health, achieving international social movements of the this reality remains elusive. Ongoing last sixty years: the human rights move- abuses defy human rights enforcement ment and the disability rights move- and continue a shameful history of stigment.11 The human rights movement has ma, discrimination, and mistreatment of generated foundational principles for persons with mental disabilities across protection of the rights and freedoms of many societies. people around the world. Human rights apply to all individuals regardless of The Need for Human Rights nationality, geography, or disability sta- Protection. Persons with mental distus. The disability rights movement has abilities continue to face numerous viochampioned the rights of persons with lations of their human rights. Most disabilities through many national and often, these violations of human rights international settings, often using the comprise four interrelated categories: language and moral grounding of human liberty, dignity, equality, and entitlerights. ment.17 The liberty interests of persons The links between human rights and with mental disabilities may be infringed disability rights have strengthened as through unwarranted detention. Withhuman rights have proliferated and out appropriate due process protections, evolved in international legal instru- people with mental disabilities may be ments, national legislation, and court confined against their will and often rulings. Several notable developments without justification. Even if involuntary have expanded the scope of human rights confinement is warranted, persons with norms and enhanced the structures in mental disabilities frequently are not place to enforce these norms.12 The UN provided with humane living conditions General Assembly adopted the Principles in institutional settings. Failure to assure for the Protection of Persons with Men- suitable standards of sanitation, access to tal Illness and for the Improvement of needed care and treatment, and other Mental Health Care (MI Principles) in conditions necessary for a person’s well 1991.13 The MI Principles recognize being undermine dignity. Multiple barrihuman rights principles such as respect ers erected in law and misperceptions in for dignity, non-discrimination, and public understanding exacerbate the pernatural justice, and apply these principles petual stigma and discrimination that to persons with mental disabilities.14 The confront persons with mental disabili[ 8 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

GOSTIN & GABLE

Law & Ethics

ties. These pervasive waves of social opprobrium engender ongoing inequality between persons with mental disabilities and other members of the community.

Finally, access to high quality mental health services in the community is central to the health of persons with mental disabilities. This entitlement to services is consistent with the right to health and bolsters other human rights such as liberty and dignity. However, these services often are not provided due to cost and political opposition.

International legal instruments recognize the importance of these four principles and apply these rights to persons with mental disabilities. In so doing, these international instruments can act as a tool to enforce the welfare and human rights of persons with mental disabilities.18 All four categories of human rights violations arise from circumstances in which systemic conditions and individual actors fail to treat persons with mental disabilities fairly. Consequently, it is imperative that these human rights receive appropriate consideration and protection to guarantee justice and fairness for persons with mental disabilities.

Human rights jurisprudence, principally in Europe and now emerging in the Americas, addresses these four themes of liberty, dignity, equality, and entitlement through cases involving involuntary detention, conditions of confinement, civil rights, and access to mental health services.19

pean Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has been highly active in protecting the human rights of persons with mental disabilities. In a series of cases, the ECHR required proof of a recognized mental illness and a speedy independent hearing by a court for involuntary admission to a hospital pursuant to Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Winterwerp v. The Netherlands established that civil commitment must follow a “procedure prescribed by law” and cannot be arbitrary; the person must have a recognized mental illness, and require confinement for the purpose of treatment.21 X v. the United Kingdom mandated speedy periodic review by a court with the essential elements of due process. The availability of habeas corpus was not sufficient for these purposes because it simply reviewed the technical lawfulness of the detention, but not the substantive justification.22 The ECHR has also addressed the problem of “non-protesting” patients, those that are physically confined but not under the force of law. A person may succumb to a show of authority or may be unable to provide consent.23 In HL v. United Kingdom, however, the ECHR held that the “right to liberty in a democratic society is too important for a person to lose the benefit of Convention protection simply because they have given themselves up to detention, especially when they are not capable of consenting to, or disagreeing with, the proposed action.”24 The shift toward community care has Liberty: Involuntary Detention. resulted in much lower numbers of perHuman rights instruments and courts sons involuntarily confined in psychiassert broad protection over liberty atric hospitals. In the aftermath of this interests. The CRPD and Article 5 of the deinstitutionalization, however, prison European Convention on Human confinement remains a substantial Rights, for example, guarantee liberty human rights problem for persons with and security of the person.20 The Euro- mental disabilities. Rates of mental illWinter/Spring 2008 [ 8 7 ]

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tal illness.32 Further, the ECHR has found that inhumane and degrading treatment can be found when the cumulative effects of prison conditions are sufficiently abhorrent.33 The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has begun to apply human rights standards to protect persons with mental disabilities from inhumane treatment.34 In Victor Rosario Congo v. Ecuador, the IACHR found a violation of the right to humane treatment.35 A person with mental illness had been struck in the head, denied medical treatment, and left in his cell for forty days. The Commission, relying on the MI Principles and other international obligations, asserted that “a violation of the right to physical integrity is even more serious in the case of a person held Dignity: Conditions of Confine- in preventive detention, suffering a ment. Non-governmental organizations mental disease, and therefore in the cuscontinue to discover appalling conditions tody of the State in a particularly vulnerin institutions and residential homes for able position.”36 In December 2003, for persons with mental disabilities.28 These the first time in its history, the IACHR include long periods of isolation in filthy, approved “precautionary measures” to closed spaces, lack of care and medical protect the lives, liberty, and personal treatment, and severe maltreatment, i.e. security of 460 people detained under being beaten, tied-up, and denied basic deplorable conditions in a psychiatric nutrition and clothing. The ECHR said institution in Paraguay.37 that vigilance is vital due to “the position of Violations of dignity occur in prison powerlessness which is typical of patients settings as well. Mentally ill prisoners are confined in psychiatric hospitals.”29 highly vulnerable in these settings. This Despite this vigilance, the ECHR’s early population is twice as likely to have been jurisprudence was highly deferential to homeless before entering prison.38 They medical opinion in cases involving inhu- also suffer disproportionately from problems with drug and alcohol abuse.39 mane and degrading treatment.30 More recently, the Court has required While in prison, few inmates receive increased medical attention and appro- access to adequate mental health services, priate facilities for persons with mental both psychological care and essential illness.31 More importantly, it has medicines. Mentally ill prisoners are at emphasized that the European Conven- very high risk of harm or death.40 Many tion’s proscription of inhuman and experience physical or sexual abuse and degrading treatment includes actions are injured before and during their time designed to humiliate persons with men- in confinement. ness in the prison population frequently exceed rates in the community.25 In many different countries, severe mental illness occurs five to ten times more frequently among people in prison than in the general population.26 Data from countries as diverse as Australia, Iran, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States confirm this conclusion.27 Due to their condition, persons with mental disabilities are more susceptible to becoming imprisoned for minor behavioral disruptions. Once confined, they often have difficulty complying with prison rules and, as a result, suffer from additional punishment, isolation, and longer prison sentences. Imposing such severe consequences does not seem to be compatible with notions of fairness and justice.

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Equality: Civil Rights. Human rights norms extend to the exercise of a wide array of civil rights both within and outside institutions. Simply because a person has a mental illness, or is subject

Law & Ethics

rights theme, entitlement, is more fragile than the others because it involves the right of access to core mental health services. Although essential health services have a basis in ethics, they are more difficult to attain under international law.

Prisons have become the de facto mental

health systems in many countries around the world, leaving [the mentally ill] population segregated and forgotten. to confinement, does not mean he or she is incapable of exercising the rights of citizenship. Human rights bodies have helped secure equality through norms of access to the courts and privacy. The ECHR has found violations of the right to a fair and public hearing in the determination of a person’s civil rights. The subject matter of these cases includes the right to control property, exercise parental rights, and be granted a hearing in the determination of incompetency, or placement into guardianship.41 The right to a “private and family life” under the European Convention can be a powerful tool to safeguard the civil rights of persons with mental illness. The ECHR, for example, has applied this privacy protection to free correspondence, informational privacy, marriage, and the parent-child relationship.42 It has thus far declined to do so for sexual freedoms, but advocates are pursuing cases to defend this form of intimacy. The CRPD also explicitly protects many of these civil rights and will serve as an impetus for expanding these rights as the CRPD is implemented.43

The right to health is a social and economic entitlement. Notably, the European Convention of Human Rights does not capture this set of entitlements. The IACHR also has not pursued the right to health even though the Protocol of San Salvador enunciates a full set of health rights.44 Consequently, the scope and definition of the right to mental health has remained vague and variable.

Several contemporary initiatives on health rights in general and mental health rights in particular seek to further develop the right to mental health. The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights issued General Comment 14 on the Right to Health.45 The UN Commission on Human Rights subsequently appointed a Special Rapporteur with a mandate to focus on the right to health.46 The Rapporteur’s first report in 2003 identified three primary objectives: promote the right to health as a fundamental human right, clarify its contours, and identify good practices for the implementation of the right.47 The Rapporteur subsequently published a report on the right to health for persons with mental illness, which offers a comEntitlement: Right to Mental prehensive account of the elements of Health Services. The final human adequate mental health services.48 The Winter/Spring 2008 [ 8 9 ]

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mental health care and treatment should ensure settings more similar to hospitals than to prisons or warehouses. Whenever possible, length of stays in these facilities should be limited and the model of comConclusion. The persistent human munity provision of care should be folrights violations that continue to affect lowed. Also, mental health policies should persons with mental disabilities will only strive to provide care in the least restrictive be reduced through diligent efforts to setting possible, preferably in the comrecognize and remedy these violations at munity. Ideally, countries should offer a all levels. There are several possible solu- range of mental health services, including screening for mental illnesses, mental tions: legal, practical, and economic.

Legislation related to mental health health education, and psychiatric services should incorporate human rights norms in hospitals and the community. Finally, and avoid pernicious misperceptions communities should take affirmative steps about the dangerousness and incompe- to improve equality of opportunity for tency of persons with mental disabilities. and reduce discrimination against perCountries should ratify the CRPD and sons with mental disabilities.

Countries and communities should implement its human rights provisions. At the level of national legislation, the World ensure adequate funding for community Health Organization has published a mental health services. Human rights mental health legislation manual that pro- standards require robust community servides a tool for countries to adopt interna- vices to get people with mental disabilities tional human rights norms into domestic off the streets into community care, and legislation.50 International human rights to facilitate their integration and inclunorms will have maximum impact only if sion in the community. A strong comthey are adopted by nations into domestic mitment of resources is a necessary underpinning for these efforts. laws, policies, and programs.

These approaches—legal, practical, The practical implementation of mental health policies consistent with human and economic—can contribute to a rights norms has the potential to greatly mutually reinforcing support structure improve the well being of persons with for persons with mental disabilities based mental disabilities by reducing stigma, on human rights standards. The wideincreasing public acceptance, and reduc- spread and consistent adoption of poliing social barriers to living a full life. cies and practices consistent with human Institutions that provide services to per- rights can help address the longstanding sons with mental disabilities should be inequity and injustice faced by this popstrictly monitored—whether civil psychi- ulation. Moreover, this model can proatric facilities or prisons—to ensure com- vide the impetus to eliminate the insidipliance with human rights norms of dig- ous myths that surround mental disabilinity. Institutions should conform to the ties and allow for persons with mental rule of law and uphold principles of disabilities to fully participate in our human rights. Institutions providing societies.

CRPD also affirms a right to the highest attainable standard of health, access to habilitation and rehabilitation services, and inclusion in the community.49

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Law & Ethics

NOTES

1 MacArthur Violence Risk Assessment Study, Executive Summary, April 1999.

2 Seena Fazel and Martin Grann, “The Population Impact of Severe Mental Illness on Violent Crime,” American Journal of Psychiatry 163 (2006): 1397-1403.

3 M. Smith, “Role of the Popular Media in Mental Illness,” The Lancet 349 (1997).

4 Mental Health Act of 2007, http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2007/pdf/ukpga_20070012_en.pdf (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

5 Lawrence O. Gostin, From a Civil Libertarian to a Sanitarian, 34 J. Law & Society 594-616 (2007).

6 Richard G. Frank and Sherry A. Glied, Better But Not Well: Mental Health Policy in the United States Since 1950 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006).

7 Robert A. Burt, “Promises to Keep, Miles to Go: Mental Health Law Since 1972,” in The Evolution of Mental Health Law ed. L.E. Frost and R.J. Bonnie (Washington, D.C.: American Psychology Association, 2001), 11-30; David L. Bazelon, “Institutionalization, Deinstitutionalization and the Adversary Process,” Columbia Law Review 75(5) (Jun., 1975): 897-912.

8 “The Unseen: Mental Illness’s Global Toll,” Science 311 (2006): 458-461.

9 G. N. Grob, “Mental health policy in America: Myths and realities,” Health Affairs, 11 (3) (1992): 722; Gerhard Langle, Birgit Egerter, Friederike Albrecht, et al., “Prevalence of Mental Illness among Homeless Men in the Community: Approach to a full Census in a Southern German University Town,” Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol 40 (2005): 382-390.

10 New York Times, series on nursing home abuse 11 Stanley S. Herr, Lawrence O. Gostin, Harold Hongju Koh, eds., The Human Rights Of Persons With Intellectual Disabilities: Different But Equal (Oxford University Press, 2003).

12 Lance Gable, “The Proliferation of Human Rights in Global Health Governance,” Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (forthcoming 2007).

13 G.A. Res. 119, U.N. GAOR, 46th Sess., 3d Comm., 75th plen. Mtg., reprinted in [1991] 45 U.N.Y.B. 620, U.N. Sales No. E.92.I.1.

14 Ibid., Principle 1.

15 Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, General Assembly Resolution A/61/611 (2006).

16 Lawrence O. Gostin and L. Gable, “The Human Rights of Persons with Mental Illness: A Global Perspective on the Application of Human Rights Principles to Mental Health,” Maryland Law Review 63 (2004): 20-121.

17 Richard J. Bonnie, “Three Strands of Mental Health Law: Developmental Mileposts,” in The Evolution of Mental Health Law ed. L.E. Frost and R.J. Bonnie (Washington, D.C.: American Psychology Association, 2001), 31-54.

18 Lawrence O. Gostin and L. Gable, “The Human Rights of Persons with Mental Illness: A

Global Perspective on the Application of Human Rights Principles to Mental Health,” Maryland Law Review 63 (2004): 20-121.

19 Brenda Hale, “Justice and Equality in Mental Health Law: The European Experience,” International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 30 (2007): 18-28.

20 CRPD, supra note 13, art. 14.

21 33 Eur. Ct. H.R. (ser. A) (1979).

22 X v. the United Kingdom, 46 Eur. Ct. H.R.(ser. A (1981). See Pereira v. Portugal, Judgment, 26 February 2002 (finding a violation of Article 5(4) for the delay in holding a hearing).

23 Guenat v. Switzerland, App. No. 24722/94, 81B Eur. Comm’n H.R. Dec. & Rep. 130 (1995).

24 HL v. United Kingdom, 5 October 2004, para 90.

See Phil Fennell, “Convention Compliance: Public Safety, and the Social Inclusion of Mentally Disordered People,” Journal of Law and Society 32 (2005): 90110.

25 Paul White and Harvey Whiteford, “Prisons: Mental Health Institutions of the 21st Century?,” Medical Journal of Australia 185 (2006): 302-303.

26 Fazel S, Danesh J, “Serious Mental Disorder in 23,000 Prisoners: A Systematic Review of 62 Surveys,” Lancet 359 (2002): 545-550; Jablensky A, McGrath JJ, Herrman H, et al, People Living with Psychotic Illness: An Australian Study 1997-1998 (Canberra: Australia: National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing, 1999).

27 Butler T, Andrews G, Allnutt S, et al., “Mental Disorders in Australian Prisoners: A Comparison with a Community Sample,” Austr NZ J. Psychiatry 40 (2006): 272-276; Sayed Mohammad Assadi, Maryam Noroozian, Mahdi Pakravannejad, et al., Psychiatric Morbidity Among Sentenced Prisoners: Prevalence Study in Iran,” British Journal of Psychiatry 188 (2006): 159-164; Brinded PM, Simpson AI, Laidlaw TM, et a., “Prevalence of Psychiatric Disorders in New Zealand Prisons: A National Study,” Austr NZ J. Psychiatry 35 (2001): 407-413; Traolach Brugha, Nicola Singleton, Howard Meltzer, et al., “Psychosis in the Community and in Prisons: A Report From the British National survey of Psychiatric Morbidity,” American Journal of Psychiatry 162 (2005): 774-780; Doris J. James, Lauren E. Glaze, Mental Health Problems of Prison and Jail Inmates (Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2006), available at www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bis/pub/pdf/mhppif.pdf.

28 “Reforming Mental Health and Illness: Policy & Practice,” Presented by the Mental Illness Advocacy Program (MDAP), 23-25 January, 2003. Agenda available at http://www.soros.org/initiatives/health/events/mental_20030123/agenda_20030123.pdf.

29 Herczegfalvy v. Austria, 244 Eur. Ct. H.R. (Ser. A) at 25-26 (1992).

30 See, e.g., Dhoest v. Belgium, App. No. 10488/83, 55 Eur. Comm’n H.R. Dec. & Rep. At 23 (1987) (finding no violation when patient was tied to his bed).

31 Keenan v. United Kingdom, 33 Eur. H.R. Rep. 913

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(2001); Bock v. Germany, 150 Eur. Ct. H.R. (ser A) at 8 (1989).

32 Ibid.

33 Dougoz v. Greece, 10 BHRC 306, EHRLR 2005, 5, 594-596.

34 Lance Gable, Javier Vasquez, Lawrence O. Gostin, and Heidi V. Jimenez, “Mental Health and Human Rights in the Americas: Protecting the Human rights of Persons Involuntarily Admitted to and Detained in Psychiatric Institutions,” Pan American Journal of Public Health 18 (2005): 366-373.

35 Case 11.427, Inter-Am. C.H.R. 63/99, para.

66 (1999).

36 Victor Rosario Congo, Inter-Am. C.H.R. 63/99, para. 67.

37 Mental Disability Rights International, OAS Human Rights Commission Orders Paraguay to End Horrendous Abuses in National Psychiatric Facility, 18 December, 2003, available at www.mdri.org/projects/americans/paraguay/pressrelease.htm.

38 Bureau of Justice Statistics, “Mental Health Problems of Prison and Jail Inmates” (2006): 4.

39 Dale E. McNiel, Renee L. Binder, Jo C. Robinson, “Incarceration Associated with Homelessness, Mental Disorder, and Co-occurring Substance Abuse,” Psychiatric Services 56 (2005): 840-846.

40 Ingrid A. Binswanger, Marc F. Stern, Richard A. Deyo, et al., Release from Prison: A High Risk of Death for Former Inmates, New England Journal of Medicine, 2007, 356: 157-65.

41. Winterwerp v. the Netherlands, 33 Eur. Ct. H.R. (ser.

A) (1979); B v. the United Kingdom, 10 Eur.R. 87 (1987); Matter v. Slovaka, App. No. 31534/96 (July 5, 1999); Bock v. Germany, 150 Eur. Ct. H.R. (ser A) at 8 (1989).

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42 Herczegfalvy v. Austria, 244 Eur. Ct. H.R. (ser. A) at 50-51 (1992); J.T. v. United Kingdom, [2000] 1 FLR 909 (Eur. Ct. H.R. Mar. 30, 2000); Draper v.

United Kingdom, 24 Eur. Comm’n H.R. Dec. & Rep. 72 (1980); K v. Finland, 2001-VII Eur. Ct. H.R. 192.

43 CRPD, supra note 13, arts. 21 (freedom of expression), 22 (respect for privacy), 23 (respect for home and family), 29 (participation in political and public life), and 30 (participation in cultural life).

44 Additional Protocol To The American Convention on Human Rights in the Area of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, "Protocol Of San Salvador;" San Salvador, 17 November 1988, OAS Treaty Series 69.

45 Lawrence O. Gostin, “The Right to Health: A Right to the ‘Highest Attainable Standard of Health,’ Hastings Center Report 31 (March/April 2001): 29-30.

46 P. Hunt, “The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health: Key Objectives, Themes, and Interventions,” Health and Human Rights 7 (2003): 1-26.

47 The Right of Everyone to the Enjoyment of the Highest Attainable Standard of Physical and Mental Health: Report of the Special Rapporteur, UN ESCOR Comm. On Human Rights, 59th Sess., Agenda Item 10, UN Dc E/CN4/2003/58 (2003).

48 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Right of Everyone to the Enjoyment of the Highest Attainable Standard of Physical and Mental Health, E/CN.4/2005/51, 11 February 2005.

49 CRPD, supra note 13, art. 25; CRPD, supra note 13, art. 26; CRPD, supra note 13, art. 19.

50 WHO Manual on Mental Health Legislation.

WHO, Department of Mental Health and Substance Dependence, Geneva, 2005.

Politics&Diplomacy Changing the Political Climate on Climate Change Tom Daschle The primary foreign policy challenge confronting the United States in the next three decades is also our country's largest domestic policy challenge: climate change. In both arenas— foreign and domestic policy—we are in effect racing the clock, aware that the longer we delay action, the more costly the fixes at home will be, and the less able we will be to induce the kind of change necessary in China, India, and beyond.

Yet despite the obvious threats posed by climate change at home and abroad, there is alarmingly little urgency to confront it by our leaders. The next president will be faced not just with these threats, but also with little time to prepare the United States to lead the world in solidifying and expanding the next phase of the only global agreement to meet this global challenge: the Kyoto Treaty.

Tom Daschle is a special policy adviser at the law firm Alston & Bird and distinguished senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. He is also a former Democratic senator from South Dakota and former senate majority leader.

The Threat. The political, economic, and environmental challenges associated with climate change are daunting, particularly when you consider the United States's heavy reliance on carbon-intensive energy sources and the volatile regions in the world from which the nation purchases its oil.

The global economy uses eighty-four million barrels of oil per day, one quarter of which is consumed by the United States.

The amount the nation consumes is expected to increase 3 Winter/Spring 2008 [ 9 3 ]

CHANGING THE POLITICAL CLIMATE ON CLIMATE CHANGE

percent per year by 2020, an increase in demand that will be met by more imports. Imports are predicted to rise to 70 percent from 60 percent of the nation's current oil supply—nearly thirteen million barrels per day—by 2025.

These imports cost the United States roughly $300 billion dollars—a figure that is sure to climb as oil approaches the previously unthinkable price of $100 per barrel. This is an alarming fact given that oil has become the largest single contributor to our national trade deficit, and that our continued reliance on the Middle East's oil reserves forces U.S. leaders to make political concessions to authoritarian regimes and compromise national security in the process.1

can act as a threat multiplier for instability in some of the most volatile regions of the world, and it presents significant national security challenges for the United States."2 A series of studies have highlighted the danger posed by climate change. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, warned of people faced with—and countries threatened by— food shortages, water scarcity, devastating natural disasters, and deadly disease outbreaks.3 More ominously, a forthcoming study by Peter Ogden and John Podesta warns that climate change may be a global humanitarian catastrophe,

The single biggest obstacle to

implementing a comprehensive climate change policy is the lack of political will in Washington.

In addition to subjecting the nation to the whims of the global oil market and the unstable countries that own the vast majority of known oil reserves, the reliance on oil presents a further environmental threat to national security— greenhouse gas emissions. The United States is responsible for a quarter of the world's global warming emissions. Those emissions threaten to increase the intensity and frequency of storms, destroy coastlines, and devastate communities least prepared to confront them around the world. The conclusion of a recent study written by eleven retired U.S. military flag officers and commissioned by the CNA Corporation perhaps best captures the critical issue that the United States currently faces: "Climate change [ 9 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

including large-scale human migration, intensifying intra- and inter-state competition for food, water, and other resources, as well as increased frequency and severity of disease outbreaks and heightened risk of state failure. Such developments could increase strain on the capacity of the United States—and in particular the U.S. military—to act as a "first responder" to international disasters and require a broadened role for the UN in managing environmental refugees and acting as a forum for international climate agreements.4 The changing climate is certainly impacting poor countries most, but the United States is not immune from its devastating impacts. A years-long drought that is devastating the west

DASCHLE

recently spread, and now 43 percent of the United States is experiencing "moderate to extreme" drought.5 And, of course, in the more than two years since Hurricane Katrina's tragic landfall, the United States has invested more than $100 billion rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

Nothing captured the magnitude of the nation's current challenge better than a map that appeared in the New York Times in December 2006.6 The map shows that by 2050, climate change will push land suitable for wheat cultivation deep into Canada and Alaska. While there were 3,315,000 acres of wheat planted in South Dakota in 2005, according to the United States Department of Agriculture, that number could very well be zero in 2050.

A review of this troubling literature underscores a central fact: climate change is not only a security challenge, but also an economic one. The impact on agriculture, currently on wheat and rice, is just the beginning.7 A recent study

by Lehman Brothers warns, "Conservative estimates suggest a cost of between 0 and 3 percent of global GDP annually by the time that Earth's temperature has risen by 2-3ยบC, with poor countries affected disproportionately."8 And a separate study commissioned by the United Kingdom's Chancellor of the Exchequer and undertaken by former World Bank Chief Economist Nicholas Stern had similarly dire conclusions if we do not act.9

Politics & Diplomacy

at a cost of about 1 percent of the global GDP. Even better news is that there are enormous business opportunities in the creation of a low-carbon economy. The Stern Review estimates that "low-carbon energy products are likely to be worth at least $500 billion per year by 2050, and perhaps much more."10 Likewise, Morgan Stanley recently estimated that clean energy sources such as wind, biofuels, and solar could generate $1 trillion a year in revenue by 2030.11 Faced with such numbers, it is astounding that policymakers in Washington have not acted upon the market incentives of such corrective measures.

But the fact is that neither the White House nor Congress has acted with the urgency or aggressiveness needed to confront our reliance on carbon-intensive fossil fuels or to mitigate the emissions of greenhouse gas pollution.

Thus, this is not simply a question of domestic or foreign policy. When it comes to energy security and climate change, the distinction between the domestic and foreign policy arenas simply does not hold. First and foremost, getting the foreign policy right demands the right domestic policy.

Domestic policy. In the United

States, the challenge for policymakers is to ensure that we are moving away from a reliance on carbon-intensive fossil fuels.

Succeeding in this effort demands a federal policy framework that builds a robust domestic renewable-energy industry now. There is a way forward.

First, Americans have to become more The Response. Despite these studies' overall gloomy predictions, the Stern efficient with the energy that they curReview provides some cause for cheer: By rently use. Energy efficiency remains the aggressive corrective action today, the cheapest way to address demand growth. most devastating economic and other Better building codes, appliance stanimpacts of climate change can be averted dards, and market-driven demand side Winter/Spring 2008 [ 9 5 ]

CHANGING THE POLITICAL CLIMATE ON CLIMATE CHANGE

management programs can make a 10 to 15 percent dent in the need for new capacity in the United States This can be done while minimizing costs. Through the use of timers, skylights, and low impact light bulbs, the largest furniture company in Southern California—Today's Furniture—has lowered its monthly electricity bill from $86,000 to $60,000. These energysaving efforts certainly cost Today's Furniture money, but because of innovative grant programs from Southern California Edison, the company's owners recouped the expense of investing in efficient technology in just three months due to lower electricity bills.12 Nevertheless, it is impossible to depend on local companies or residences to make all savings in efficiency. One needs to go straight to the electricity utilities and help them decouple profits from electricity output. At present, utilities can profit only by producing more electricity, which results in harmful greenhouse gas pollution. Decoupling profits from electricity output—in effect, encouraging utilities to become more efficient—will be the most effective way to increase overall efficiency.

At the same time, Americans need to be more efficient with the oil they consume. The quickest way to do that is to mandate an increase in the average fuel efficiency of automobiles. Embarrassingly, the United States currently lags behind China, South Korea, Canada, and Australia in its fuel-efficiency requirements—something that must change.13 Second, the government has to put in place a federal tax infrastructure necessary to harness the power of wind, solar, and geothermal energy. Remarkably, global wind production has more than [ 9 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

tripled since 2000. In addition, the use of solar cells for electricity has increased over six times in the same period, making solar one of the fastest growing industries on the planet.

Too little of that robust development has happened in the United States because Congress has allowed the Production Tax Credit (PTC) to lapse. This problem is compounded by the fact that, when the PTC is reauthorized, it is only for abbreviated periods that are insufficient to maximize investment in this attractive market.

Hopefully, the current Congress will see a long-term PTC enacted. Since the enactment of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which included a two-year PTC, there came an explosion of new wind, solar and geothermal activity. A five-year extension of the PTC would send a strong message to the market that U.S. federal policymakers are serious about renewable energy.

Third, the United States needs to enact a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) to obligate utilities to purchase a set proportion of their electricity from renewable sources. Overseas, Germany's Renewable Energy Sources Act will increase the share of electric power sourced from renewables to 12.5 and 20 percent by 2010 and 2020, respectively.

There is no reason the United States cannot do the same, if not more. As a goal for U.S. policymakers, the United States should reach a level of 25 percent by 2025. It is worth noting that more than twenty states have already established a RPS requirement, and several proposals on a national RPS have been introduced in Congress. The ongoing failure to reach an agreement on a national RPS in Congress is therefore a lost opportunity.

Fourth, more efforts should be made

DASCHLE

to boost the domestic renewable fuels industry so that transitional fuels, such as corn ethanol, could give way to other fuels such cellulosic ethanol. The latter will allow not just to blend ethanol with gasoline, but also to replace gasoline altogether. This will not happen, however, unless the nation as a whole adjusts its renewable fuels standard (RFS) to ensure that the initial success in ethanol is not undercut by a glut in the market. The volatility in the ethanol market in just the last several months illustrates the problem: too much production is chasing too little guaranteed demand.

As a result, prices are plummeting.

This trend will continue unless the United States ensures new demand for ethanol that does not lead to surplus of the fuel in the coming years.

The EU has pledged to ensure that biofuels such as biodiesel and imported sugar ethanol comprise at least 10 percent of fuels used for transport by 2020. Earlier this year, President Bush announced his support for such a measure and there are several bipartisan proposals in the House and Senate to enact such a vision. Before additional price erosion further undercuts the industry and thereby sets back the development of renewable fuel alternatives even more, the Congress and the president should act.

Fifth, the United States needs to cal-

Politics & Diplomacy

culate all the externalities in the price of energy. The most efficient way to do that is to establish a national cap and trade system on greenhouse gases. In addition to this step, Americans should go even further by emulating their friends in Europe and impose a tax on each metric ton of carbon dioxide emitted. This "belt and suspenders" approach would ensure a clear price signal that increased efficiency and low carbon alternatives will be profitable.

Far from a drag on growth, this market will provide the requisite capital for innovation and perhaps even finally b o o s t emerging technologies like carbon capture, (14) sequestration, and cellulosic ethanol from laboratory exploration to market reality.

Foreign policy. Each of these steps

will have a dramatic influence on the U.S. energy market and on its ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But the impact will be far greater beyond American shores, where the United States will show a skeptical world it is finally taking the lead to battle climate change.

Due to the U.S. pollution record, past inaction, and even recalcitrance, international skepticism of the United States is well founded. Though recently surpassed by China as the world's largest current emitter, the United States Winter/Spring 2008 [ 9 7 ]

CHANGING THE POLITICAL CLIMATE ON CLIMATE CHANGE

remains by far the largest per capita emitter. U.S. share of the existing atmospheric stock of greenhouse gas pollution far exceeds emerging emitters like China and India. In fact, estimates suggest that even with China and India dramatically increasing their emissions today, it will be the end of this century before the developing world's contributions to the existing stock of greenhouse gas pollution surpasses those of the developed world.

U.S. policy overseas continues largely unchanged. The United States continues to dominate the global oil market. U.S. foreign assistance shows no evidence of having recognized the changed climatic conditions in which those important investments are made, meaning that many such investments are largely wasted. Meanwhile, the United States's export promotion program, the Export-Import Bank, maintains an inexplicable policy of promoting the export of petroleum-related technology while promoting almost no low-carbon energy alternatives.

This troubling foreign policy dynamic—where the rest of the world remains skeptical that the United States is cognizant of world-impacting climate threats—was on display during President Bush's meeting with the world's largest emitters at the White House in September 2007. While the domestic American press reported that the meeting marked a policy shift for the White House, the twoday conference is perhaps more notable for its record of complacency. Its closest allies barely contained their disappointment in the United States, which was unwilling to consider binding reductions in its greenhouse gas pollution.

Leadership. The single biggest obsta-

cle to implementing a comprehensive climate change policy is the lack of polit-

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ical will in Washington, D.C. Any action on climate change will require political courage and strong leadership, coupled with a willingness to work in a bipartisan fashion. There has been, and will continue to be, fierce resistance by those opposed to any change in the status quo.

One only has to be reminded of Vice President Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force to appreciate the entrenched special interests behind the current domestic energy policy.

Leadership must come from the Congress, which must put national interest above special interests and become a champion of the country's energy independence. As mentioned previously, Congress needs to enact a long-term production tax credit (PTC), renewable portfolio standard (RPS), and expand the renewable fuels standard (RFS). In order to maximize effectiveness, these policies must be joined with a national cap and trade system and a carbon tax.

Unfortunately, the recent energy bill debate in Congress demonstrates the great difficulty before the nation in enacting these policies. The auto and oil industry opposes implementing tough CAFE standards. Utilities located in southern states are resisting a national RPS, fearing that a lack of wind and solar power will prevent them from meeting the mandate. Faced with such powerful opposition, congressional members must thus decide whether to buck local interests for the greater national interest.

As a member of Congress for twentysix years, including ten years as the Democratic leader in the Senate, I appreciate the difficult choices facing the Congress. However, if we are serious about addressing climate change, all options must be on the table.

In addition to Congressional action,

DASCHLE

the next president of the United States must provide visionary leadership on the issue of climate change. Rather than using the power of the presidency to be a good steward of the environment, President Bush ceded leadership to the EU, isolating the United States in the process.

While leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel have confronted climate change, President Bush has remained a bystander. This absence of executive leadership has come at a price: instead of leading by example, which might even have improved U.S. standing in the world, the president abdicated our responsibility to confront a worldwide security, economic, and environmental threat.

The naysayers will claim that if the United States implements a mandatory system to reduce emissions, it will unduly harm our economy, especially if China and India do not follow suit. This argument is a red herring. China and India

Politics & Diplomacy

nently institutionalize the "major emitters," or what Tony Blair called the G8+5: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, United Kingdom, United States, Brazil, China, India, Mexico, and South Africa. Such a forum will permit the largest emitters to meet and discuss ways to reduce their emissions, mitigate the damage of existing emissions, and meet their obligation to limit the impact of our emission on the developing world and help poor countries to adapt to a new climate reality.

Nevertheless, relying on a G8+5 infrastructure has its drawbacks. While it ensures that the richest economies—those most able to invest in the technology necessary to reduce emissions—are at the table, it perpetuates the power imbalance that keeps the powerful "in" and the less powerful, those most effected by climate change—"out."Arrogance of power should not preclude the vulnerable from a seat at the table. The United States and

In the United States, the challenge for

policymakers is to ensure that we are moving away from a reliance on carbon-intensive fossil fuels. the EU would be better served by reflecting some humility and sensitivity to the plight of the rest of the world community.

The Conference of Major Emitters should open a secretariat and mandate The Way Forward. Ironically, while meetings of members' heads of state at President Bush refused to take the steps least yearly. The secretariat should host necessary to confront climate change, he permanent subcommittees of member had constructed exactly the right infra- states, focused on low-carbon energy structure for grappling with the problem. technology transfer and best practices in The next president will need to perma- energy efficiency and energy policy. Most will act to curb emissions only if the United States acts first. If the United States commits itself to binding action to reduce greenhouse gas, China and India will be compelled to act as well.

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CHANGING THE POLITICAL CLIMATE ON CLIMATE CHANGE

importantly, the Conference of Major Emitters must establish a permanent subcommittee focused on a global carbon regulatory mechanism for Phase II of the Kyoto Protocol. The first phase of the Protocol expires at the end of 2012, and the goal of this subcommittee will be to bring the United States, as well as China and India, into a binding global carbon cap. Ultimately, of course, such a deal can only be finalized within the UN and Kyoto process, but the subcommittee at the Conference of Major Emitters should immediately begin the legwork on these difficult negotiations in a smaller forum not plagued by the jockeying and posturing that is certain to mark the larger Kyoto process—and which has apparently hobbled the WTO's Doha Round.

The permanent subcommittee can also work through emerging issues in the international carbon trading market.

Drawing upon the experience of three years of the EU Emissions Trading System (EU-ETS) and the nascent Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), the subcommittee can improve on the process whereby capped countries can offset carbon pollution by investing in carbon-reducing energy technologies in

the developing world. Such a market should be a win-win situation for developed and developing countries, but the CDM has failed to live up to expectations to-date.

Conclusion. The next president of the

United States will face a series of pressing global and domestic challenges, from reforming our health care system, to ending the war in Iraq, to stopping Iran's nuclear program. Nevertheless, due to the emerging consequences of climate change and the looming deadline of the 2012 expiration of phase I of the Kyoto Protocol, confronting our energy and greenhouse gas pollution crisis may very well be the most pressing challenge confronting the United States. Meeting and defeating this challenge will require the next president, in conjunction with the Congress, to address it with urgency and as the shared domestic and foreign policy challenge that it is. By leading the international response to the threat of climate change, the United States will not only be more economically and environmentally secure, but also better positioned to lead the world on other pressing challenges.

NOTES

1 http://www.eia.doe.gov/.

2 “National Security and the Threat of Climate Change," http://securityandclimate.cna.org/report/National%20Security%20and%20the%20Th reat%20of%20Climate%20Change.pdf.

3 Summary for Policymakers of the Synthesis Report of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessmentreport/ar4/syr/ar4_syr_spm.pdf.

4 John Podesta and Peter Ogden, "National Security and Foreign Policy in the Age of Climate Change," Center for American Progress, forthcoming.

5 http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gSw_2PWzxnM_xpZhDvYCSWmoZVLwD8SAISU01.

6 http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2006/12/-

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05/americas-breadbasket-moves-to-canada/.

7 One report suggests that the annual yield of rice will decrease 10 percent for each 1 degree Centigrade increase in global temperature. See Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Working Group II, Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability http://www.gtp89.dial.pipex.com/chpt.htm.

8 Lehman Brothers, "The Business of Climate Change: Challenges and Opportunities," February 2007, p. 3.

9 See "The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change," http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_cha nge/sternreview_summary.cfm.

10 "The Stern Review: The Economics of Climate Change," page 302.

DASCHLE

11 "$1 trillion green market seen by 2030," Timothy Garner, Reuters, 18 October 2007.

12 Staff interview with Sharm Scheuerman, Founder of Today's Furniture, 31 March 2007.

13 The International Council on Clean Transportation, "Passenger Vehicle Greenhouse Gas and

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Fuel Economy Standards: A global Update," July 2007, p.

23, http://www.theicct.org/documents/ICCT_GlobalStandards_20071.pdf.

14 "Ethanol's Boom Stalling as Glut Depresses Price," New York Times, 30 September 2007.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 0 1 ]

Politics & Diplomacy The Sarkozy Effect

France’s New Presidential Dynamic J.G. Shields Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidential campaign was predicated on the need for change in France, for a break—“une rupture”—with the past. His election as president of the French Republic on 6 May 2007 ushered in the promise of a new era. Sarkozy’s presidency follows those of the Socialist François Mitterrand (1981-95) and the neo-Gaullist Jacques Chirac (1995-2007), who together occupied France’s highest political office for more than a quarter-century. Whereas Mitterrand and Chirac bowed out in their seventies, Sarkozy comes to office aged only fifty-two. For the first time, the French Fifth Republic has a president born after the Second World War, as well as a president of direct immigrant descent.1 Sarkozy’s emphatic victory, with 53 percent of the run-off vote against the Socialist Ségolène Royal, gave him a clear mandate for reform. The near-record turnout of 84 percent for both rounds of the election reflected the public demand for change. The legislative elections of June 2007, which assured a strong majority in the National Assembly for Sarkozy’s centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP), cleared the way for implementing his agenda over the next five years.2 This article examines the political context within which Sarkozy was elected to power, the main proposals of his presidential program, the challenges before him, and his prospects for bringing real change to a France that is all too evidently in need of reform.

J.G. Shields is an associate professor of French Studies at the University of Warwick in England. He is the first holder of the American Political Science Association's Stanley Hoffmann Award (2007) for his writing on French politics.

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The context. Three major events outpouring of anger was provoked by the marked the second presidential term of Sarkozy’s predecessor, Jacques Chirac.

The first was that Chirac won his second term against the leader of France’s farright Front National (FN), Jean-Marie Le Pen.3 The unprecedented appearance of a far-right candidate in the presidential run-off was but the latest indicator of a political disaffection that had grown more pronounced through the 1990s.

The threat of Le Pen reaching the runoff again hung like a specter over the presidential campaign of 2007.

Another defining event of Chirac’s second presidential term was France’s vote against the European Union (EU) constitutional treaty in the May 2005 referendum. Drafted by a convention under former French President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, the treaty was designed to give new impetus to the process of European integration. It was a cause personally espoused by Chirac and massively supported by the National Assembly and the Senate. The disparity

accidental death of two teenage boys fleeing the police in the Paris commune of Clichy-sous-Bois, but it expressed a much wider revolt against the failure of the French Republic to honor its contract of “liberté, égalité, fraternité” with France’s largely ghettoized immigrant communities and urban underclass.

The above sequence of events presented many symptoms of the ills besetting France in the run-up to the 2007 elections. While the years following the liberation of 1945 had favored economic growth and increased prosperity, those after the oil crises of the 1970s had been characterized by economic recession, industrial restructuring, rising unemployment, worsening crime, and the difficulties of integrating large immigrant communities. Elected to implement change, French governments were often impeded from doing so—then punished for not having done so. In all six legislative elections between 1978 and 2007, the governing majority was overturned,

For the moment Sarkozy has brought a new

dynamic to the presidency. between 90 percent parliamentary support and the 55 percent of French voters who rejected the treaty in the referendum highlighted the gulf between France’s governing elite and its citizens, many of whom saw the treaty as institutionalizing an unbridled economic liberalism across the EU. The third and most dramatic event of Chirac’s fin de règne was the outbreak of extensive urban rioting in Autumn 2005 by youths of mainly North African origin, prompting the declaration of a national state of emergency. This violent [ 1 0 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

while a succession of twelve prime ministers and their governments outdid one another in unpopularity.4 Campaigning for election in 1995, Jacques Chirac lamented the “monarchical drift” of a Mitterrand presidency which, he charged, had neglected the needs of the French people, leaving the country “in a state of social emergency.”5 Then, throughout his own quasimonarchical presidency, Chirac failed on his promises to heal the “fracture sociale” caused by high unemployment and socio-economic inequalities.6 When

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labor-market or welfare reforms were attempted by his center-right premiers, they were met with social and political opposition. As Chirac’s would-be successors rehearsed a new litany of electoral promises in Spring 2007, many believed France to be a country in inexorable decline. The term coined to describe this pervasive mood of pessimism was “le déclinisme,” and the growing number of commentators articulating it even earned their own neologism as “déclinologues.”

The challenge. In an unsparing

assessment of France published in October 2006, the Economist charted a persistently slow-growing economy and a faster-growing public debt as a share of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) than that of any other EU-15 state.7 With its bloated public sector, over-regulated labor market, high taxation, diminished purchasing power, low-ranking university sector, and intractable unemployment of over 8 percent—over 20 percent among those under 25—France was, despite many countervailing economic and social strengths, in danger of being diagnosed “the sick man of Europe.”

Other depressing statistics recorded 3.7 million people living in poverty, 2.5 million on the minimum wage, and 2.4 million unemployed.

These statistics can be read as an indictment of the failure by successive French governments since the 1970s to mold public policy to meet the changing social and economic realities. Developed in a time of near-full employment, the French “social model” is ill-adapted today. Founded on a worthy notion of solidarity, it perpetuates an unbridgeable divide between those with secure jobs, pension rights, and special welfare privileges, and those who live the daily realities of unemployment, job insecurity, pover-

Politics & Diplomacy

ty, and exclusion. Nowhere is this disparity more starkly illustrated than in the treatment of France’s ethnic minorities, drawn largely from North African immigration and often corralled in rundown banlieues (outskirts) where unemployment, crime, and social alienation are rife. In the name of a secular and theoretically colorblind state, French officialdom refuses even to acknowledge the presence of a Muslim community estimated by some to be as high as six million, close to 10 percent of the population.8 It is a principle deriving from the Revolutionary creeds of 1789 that all French citizens are indistinguishably French. No European country has been more resolute in refusing the “Anglo-Saxon model” of multiculturalism, effectively denying the existence of its largely disadvantaged ethnic minorities.

In the judgment of its most severe (usually Anglo-Saxon) critics, the French model has become a perverted expression of “good intentions, bad policies, and vested interests,” which invoke the language of solidarity to obstruct change.9 While acknowledging the problems besetting the French Republic, let us keep a sense of proportion too. France is the Eurozone’s second largest, and by some measures the world’s sixth largest, economy. The productivity of French workers is high and the French healthcare system and public transit system remain the envy of foreign observers. Yet it is undeniable that the workplace currently contains too many disincentives to work. Given the social charges and rigidities of employment contracts and the costs and complexities of redundancy procedures, it is no surprise that employers often do not recruit at all or hire temporary staff who fall outside the protective employment regime. When, in the wake of the Autumn 2005 riots, de Villepin’s govWinter/Spring 2008 [ 1 0 5 ]

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ernment passed legislation making it easier to hire and fire young employees, it responded to the needs of one disadvantaged section of youth. However, another section, students, fearing for their future job security, protested so vehemently that the legislation was withdrawn at President Chirac’s urging.

Herein lies the essence of the challenge confronting France’s new president: to dispel the egalitarian myths that entrench existing inequalities and retard economic and social development on a number of levels. The challenge is also to renounce the discourse of denial in which political leaders have too readily taken refuge, blaming outside forces—the European Commission or European Central Bank (ECB), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Trade Organization (WTO), or simply “globalization”—for France’s ills and fashioning policy to mitigate rather than eradicate those ills. Even where the need to engage with the global economy has been acknowledged, it has been too often couched in vacuous rhetoric, as in Chirac’s declaration to the UN in September 2003 that “there cannot be economic globalization if it is not accompanied by a globalization of solidarity.”10 In rejecting the EU constitutional treaty in May 2005, French voters expressed their fear of a “market society” as the dreaded alternative to the “social model,” an alternative embodied by an imagined army of Polish plumbers poised to invade a deregulated French labor market.

Changing culture. Sarkozy’s task goes beyond political reform. It is about changing attitudes, perceptions, and culture. It is also about redefining the role of the state in French Republican psychology vis-à-vis the citizen, ethnic and other minorities, the economy, and the [ 1 0 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

outside world. Sarkozy’s program set out the vision of a recovery based on job and wealth creation, cuts in labor-market regulation and taxation, increased competitiveness, and reductions in the national debt and trade deficit. He argued for a smaller public sector, the curbing of trade-union power, reforms to higher education, and the rationalizing of the “social model.” Work and the reward for work lie at the heart of Sarkozy’s prescription, where reform of the labor market and fiscal regime is paramount. “Travaillez plus pour gagner plus” (“Work more to earn more”) became the defining slogan of a campaign resonant with terms—travail, effort, mérite—to rally “la France qui se lève tôt” (“the France that gets up early”). The 2007 elections revealed that a clear majority of voters preferred this exhortation to the soothing nostrums of France’s first female présidentiable, with her defense of state-subsidized jobs, workplace security and generous welfare provision for those fortunate enough to enjoy these.

The plethora of reforms projected or underway includes creating a more flexible employment contract with incremental protection and circumventing the thirty-five hour week by exempting overtime from income tax and payroll charges. Other proposals are to cut income, corporation, inheritance, and wealth taxes to an annual sum of over $18 billion, while raising healthcare charges and potentially value-added taxes. The reform package includes measures to lower the personal tax ceiling to 50 percent of earnings, make mortgage interest payments tax deductible, abolish special pension programs for certain public servants, cut the civil service, and tighten unemployment benefits while banning “golden parachutes” for the bosses of failing companies.11

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Other measures aim to guarantee a minimum service during transport strikes and secret balloting for extended strikes, and to give universities more autonomy and incentive to compete for staff, students, and funding. In keeping with Sarkozy’s previously tough line on law and order, sentences for youth crime and multiple offenders have been stiffened. The new Ministry for Immigration, Integration, National Identity and Co-development has been created to oversee the integration of immigrant communities, to clamp down on illegal immigrants, and to ensure that new arrivals should be competent in French language, respectful of French values, and have adequate means of financial support. Those seeking to join relatives in France may be subject to DNA testing, while the government has set a deportation target of 25,000 illegal immigrants for 2007 alone. A cross-party commission has been established to look into institutional reform, considering such

Politics & Diplomacy

world markets. The choice of London as Sarkozy’s first foreign campaign trip in January 2007 was a mark of his respect for British economic success and a bid to encourage up to 300,000 mostly young, highly qualified expatriates in Britain to take their skills back to France. Though an avowed believer in the market economy, Sarkozy makes a distinction between “fair” (what benefits France) and “unfair” (what does not) competition. As finance minister in 2004, he displayed a very Gaullist penchant for industrial intervention and the protection of “national champions.”12 As president, he showed the same interventionist impulses over the merger agreement in September 2007 between the state-owned Gaz de France and the private utilities group Suez. He has blamed EU monetary policy for some of France’s economic woes and called for “community preference” for EU products.13 In his victory speech, Sarkozy warned of the EU’s image as a “Trojan horse” for globalization, and his

Sarkozy’s task goes beyond political reform. It is about changing attitudes, perceptions, and culture. questions as the representativeness of parliament and the accountability of the executive. Other objectives on the new president’s agenda encompass restoring authority in schools, celebrating national identity, ending the “culture of repentance” surrounding French history, and stifling the legacy of student and worker uprisings in May 1968.

While the public sector requires the most urgent remedial attention, much of the private sector, by comparison, thrives, as many French companies and entrepreneurs are highly competitive in

protracted timetable for balancing France’s budget threatens to undermine the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact, the fiscal requirements underpinning the euro. He will oppose foreign takeovers of French companies and may seek to deter factory relocations by penalizing companies moving jobs out of France. This combination of economic liberalism and nationalism, though a winning formula with French voters, may make France an unpredictable partner within the EU and WTO.

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France and the world. Foreign pol- President Chirac’s lucidity in foreseeing

icy hardly featured in the presidential campaign of 2007, but Sarkozy’s election has important consequences for France’s standing in the EU and wider world. His first weeks in office saw a flurry of initiatives: talks with Algeria over civil nuclear technology, pressure for a climate change deal at the G-8 summit, calls for ending the genocide in Darfur, and an arms and nuclear energy deal with Libya. This deal occurred in conjunction with the highprofile release of six Bulgarian and Palestinian medics imprisoned in Tripoli, an act for which Sarkozy’s (then) wife Cécilia snatched credit after months of quiet European diplomacy. Sarkozy has proposed and secured a simplified EU institutional treaty to be ratified by parliament, and voiced his opposition to Turkey’s accession. He has called for a “Mediterranean Union” to strengthen commercial and political links between Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East, seeing here perhaps an alternative for Turkish admission to the EU. In an address to French diplomats on 27 August, he declared the “construction of Europe” to be an “absolute priority,” and, with the EU presidency returning to France in 2008, he will have an early opportunity for a leading role in EU affairs.

Described by one opponent as an “American neo-conservative with a French passport,” Sarkozy is an unabashed admirer of American economic dynamism and has signaled his intention to repair Franco-American relations damaged by the rift over the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.14 Speaking in Washington in September 2006, Sarkozy, as interior minister, criticized the “sterile grandiloquence” of an “arrogant France,” though he later praised

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a disastrous outcome in Iraq, which he declared a “historic mistake.”15 A new Atlanticist spirit was evident from the address in his victory speech to “nos amis américains,” and in his decision both to spend his first holiday as president on Lake Winnipesaukee and to share a picnic with the Bush family in Kennebunkport.

This sentiment was also evident in the recall from Washington of former French Ambassador Jean-David Levitte to serve as Sarkozy’s diplomatic adviserin-chief.

At a moment when American foreign policy is deeply discredited, a friendlier voice in Paris will be welcome, but its early value may be more symbolic than substantial. Though French troops remain engaged in Afghanistan, and though Sarkozy’s administration firmly opposes Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the White House will draw no sympathy from the Elysée on Iraq.16 Speculation, too, about France rejoining the integrated military structure of NATO is premature, despite Sarkozy’s hints at resuming a full role. In the same victory speech that hailed the United States as friends, the incoming president added, “Friendship is about accepting that one’s friends can think differently.”17 When Condoleezza Rice asked Sarkozy what she could do for him, he reportedly replied, “Improve your image in the world,” stressing the difficulty of being an ally to “the most powerful,” yet “one of the most unpopular countries in the world.”18 At the same time, a poll showed the ambivalence of French public opinion towards the United States, with 40 percent of respondents wishing to maintain the Franco-American relationship as it is, 33 percent wanting closer links, and 26 percent wanting a more distant relationship.19

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Politics & Diplomacy

A reformed and reforming gov- have expected Sarkozy to be as abrasively ernment. The government charged right-wing in office as he had been in his with implementing President Sarkozy’s reform program is itself a conspicuous expression of renewal. It is led by François Fillon, a former social affairs and labor minister best known for steering through a modest pension reform in the Raffarin government of 2003. Of the fifteen other senior ministers, seven are women, and three hold the key Ministries of the Interior, Finance and Justice. The latter, Rachida Dati, is of Muslim working-class Moroccan-Algerian origin. She brings a very rare element of ethnic, religious and social inclusiveness to the government, as do the junior ministers Rama Yade and Fadela Amara, of Senegalese and Algerian origin respectively. Yade is in the office of Foreign Affairs and Human Rights, while Amara, a feisty Muslim feminist and anti-racist, is in the office of Urban Affairs, confronting the pressing problems of France’s multi-ethnic banlieues.

The government’s inclusiveness is also evident in the nomination of some leftists to major posts. Most eye-catching is the appointment of Bernard Kouchner, the former Socialist health minister and popular humanitarian activist, as foreign minister. Other leftists in Sarkozy’s government include former Socialist Culture Minister Jack Lang and ex-Premier Michel Rocard. Centrists and non-political figures such as former national rugby coach Bernard Laporte also have representation in government posts or consultative bodies. The aim of this ouverture (opening) is to forge some cross-party legitimacy for government action, to respond to calls for more bipartisan politics, and to confound and further divide an already divided Socialist opposition.20 Socialist leaders may

campaign, but thus far he has assumed the role of the more astute, pragmatic and consensus-building president.

Despite some twenty-five years in politics, with the past five of them spent as interior and finance minister, Sarkozy has managed to appear as a new man. He combines sharp political intelligence with seemingly boundless energy. Terms commonly used to describe him include “hyperactive” and “omnipresident,” but, for all his populist instincts, he is no man of the people. This long-time mayor of the affluent Ile-de-France commune of Neuilly-sur-Seine inhabits a rarefied world, with a weakness for ostentatious wealth and strong personal connections to business and high finance. He is also on intimate terms with some of France’s most powerful media barons, prompting worrisome comparisons with Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi.

Welcomed by business leaders and investors, Sarkozy’s first steps in office also won approval across French public opinion. His energetic, hands-on style and sheer appetite for work proved a refreshing change from the regal selfindulgence of his predecessor. Opinion polls showed resounding support for his animated style and for almost all of his government’s early priority reforms. A poll in late July recorded that 82 percent of respondents appreciated this “new type of presidency,” and 78 percent—at a time of diminished faith in politicians— judged Sarkozy “capable of reforming the country.”21

The prospects. What, then, are the prospects of this new French president and government succeeding? On some reforms—the thirty-five hour week, uni-

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versities, minimum public transport service, and tax relief on mortgages—concessions have already been made. These early retreats disappointed proponents of more radical reform but helped defer the inevitable social unrest, which did not gather pace until November. Even union leaders seemed at first oddly beguiled by the bold confidence of this new president, but they will now fight to protect the public-sector jobs, working conditions and droits acquis (entitlements) that are under threat. Students, too, will oppose any moves towards increased selection or competition in a higher education sector that remains, with its lofty grandes écoles, among the most selective in the world, but where egalitarian ideals have long stood in the way of sensible reform.

The composite nature of the support on which Sarkozy has come to power is another potential problem.

Siphoning votes from Le Pen ensured Sarkozy’s wide margin of victory, but it makes his task as president all the harder, since he must now satisfy the liberal, free-market, pro-European centreright, as well as the nationalist, protectionist, anti-European hard right

al will wait to capitalize on their disappointment should Sarkozy falter. A worsening international economic climate could hamper economic growth and job creation, while the government’s package of tax cuts and credits threatens to stretch an already excessive budget deficit.22 Most ominously, the melting pots of discontent that are France’s banlieues continue to simmer and will surely boil over again unless drastic intervention improves the quality of life and economic prospects for their inhabitants. The burning of some 21,000 vehicles in the first half of 2006 dispelled any notion that the ills underlying the riots of the previous autumn had been cured.

For the moment, Sarkozy has brought a new dynamic to the presidency. In all, he has been dealt a strong opening hand to implement his policies. Despite its municipal and regional strength, the left is too weak nationally to block his program, while his arch-rivals on the centreright, de Villepin and Chirac, have been too busy fending off judicial investigation for their own alleged misdemeanors to create mischief. The new president has enjoyed approval ratings comparable only to those of de Gaulle in the early

Popularity in politics is a fragile

commodity, however, and Sarkozy knows from the fate of other incoming presidents how quickly support for reform can evaporate. attracted by his more populist pronouncements. These largely blue-collar and lower white-collar voters will look for early results on purchasing power, immigration control, law and order, and the protection of French jobs and interests, while Le Pen and the Front Nation-

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days of his presidency, with even Le Pen joining in the initial approbation.23 Unemployment fell in July to 8 percent, its lowest level for 25 years, with the aim being its reduction to 5 percent by 2012.

A poll in late August gave a positive rating of 71 percent for Sarkozy’s first 100 days

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in office, and 75 percent for his initiatives relating to “France’s place in the world.”24 Popularity in politics is a fragile commodity, however, and Sarkozy knows from the fate of other incoming presidents how quickly support for reform can evaporate. As a candidate, he clearly spelled out his intentions, and his party and he won backing in four election rounds. Presidents of the Fifth Republic have always set the governmental agenda, but Sarkozy is already more exposed than his recent predecessors through his visibly activist approach. By maximizing his authority he also maximizes his personal responsibility. As a president setting out to liberalize France’s economy, he might reflect upon a survey conducted in 2005 which found that, whereas 71 percent of American, 66 percent of British, and 74 percent of Chinese respondents supported a market economy, only 34 percent of French respondents concurred.25 Finance Minister Christine Lagarde might also warily reflect that she is the tenth minister to hold that office in ten years.26 The municipal elections of March 2008 may allow the Socialist Party to

Politics & Diplomacy

recover some ground and begin to mount a more credible challenge.

Beyond potential opposition from the political left and far right, unions, students, and other groups whose vested interests may be threatened, Sarkozy will also face what former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan famously feared most in government: “the opposition of events.” Almost all of the political initiative has so far been with the new president. This has now begun to change, however, with the succession of publicsector strikes, university student protests, and localized rioting in outskirts of Paris in November. The way in which Sarkozy responds to such events will be as important in defining his presidency as the scheduled implementation of his reform program. As France prepares to mark the fiftieth anniversary of its Fifth Republic, one thing is certain: this presidency will not be uneventful.

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Dr. Shields acknowledges the British

Academy for its award of a generous grant to support research in France on the 2007 presidential and legislative elections and their political consequences.

NOTES

1 Sarkozy is the son of an aristocratic Hungarian émigré father and a French mother of Greek-Jewish descent.

2 The UMP won 313 seats out of 577, returning a governing party to power in France for the first time in almost 30 years.

3 J. G. Shields, The Extreme Right in France: From Pétain to Le Pen (London and New York: Routledge, 2007), 281-290.

4 See J. G. Shields, “Political Representation in France: A Crisis of Democracy?,” Parliamentary Affairs 59, no. 1 (2006), 118-137.

5 Jacques Chirac, La France pour tous (Paris: Nil Editions, 1994), 9-15, 35, 45-52.

6 Ibid., 81-83, 87-92.

7 French public spending stood at 54 percent of GDP, compared with an OECD average of 41 percent, while public debt in France amounted to 66 percent of GDP, compared with 42 percent in Britain (Sophie

Pedder, “The Art of the Impossible: A Survey of France,” The Economist, 28 October 2006).

8 U.S. Department of State figures (August 2007). Other estimates are closer to four million, or 6-7 percent, demonstrating the lack of hard statistical evidence on this important question.

9 Timothy B. Smith, France in Crisis: Welfare, Inequality and Globalization since 1980 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 1.

10 Sophie Meunier, “Free-falling France or freetrading France?,” French Politics, Culture and Society 22, no. 1 (2004), 103.

11 The government aims to shed 22,700 fonctionnaires in 2008, and 100,000 over five years, from a civil service of some five million.

12 Most notably, he rescued the engineering company Alstom, makers of the high-speed TGV train, brokered the merger of Aventis and Sanofi-Synthélabo to avert a takeover by the Swiss Novartis group,

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THE SARKOZY EFFECT

and helped fend off a potential bid for Danone by PepsiCo. 13 Sarkozy advocates, inter alia, protection for European farm policy and barriers against “dumping” from cheaper markets.

14 The former Socialist economic adviser who coined this description, Eric Besson, subsequently joined Sarkozy’s campaign team and now serves in the government as secretary of state for public policy.

15 Reported in The Financial Times (12 September 2006) and International Herald Tribune (28 February 2007).

16 Untainted by the Iraqi debacle, France is now positioning itself as a potentially influential mediator within and beyond Iraq. See the article by Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, “What France can do in Iraq,” International Herald Tribune (26 August 2007).

17 Le Monde (8 May 2007).

18 Adam Gopnik, “Letter from France: The human bomb – The Sarkozy regime begins,” The New Yorker (27 August 2007), 45.

19 Le Journal du dimanche (11 August 2007).

20 Sarkozy neutralised another dangerous Socialist opponent, former Finance Minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn, by engineering his nomination in July 2007 to head the IMF–the fourth Frenchman currently to head a large international institution, alongside Jean-Claude Trichet at the ECB, Pascal Lamy at the WTO, and Jean Lemierre at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).

[ 1 1 2 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

21 Arnaud Folch, “Sarkozy: l’été de grâce,” Valeurs actuelles, no. 3687 (27 July 2007), 12-13. Another poll in mid-August revealed approval ratings of 87 percent for tax relief on mortgages, 84 percent for tougher sentences for multiple offenders, 72 percent for a minimum service during transport strikes, 66 percent for tax exemption on working overtime, 64 percent for lowering the personal tax ceiling, 61 percent for a simplified EU treaty, and 58 percent for increased university autonomy. In contrast, the proposal to cut civil service posts found only 38 percent in favor and 61 percent opposed. See Le Journal du dimanche (11 August 2007).

22 Growth of only 0.3 percent in the second quarter set the government back on its full-year growth target of 2.25 percent; job creation, too, stalled in the second quarter, after a first-quarter rise of 0.6 percent.

23 Le Monde (9 August 2007).

24 TNS-SOFRES poll, “Le bilan des 100 jours de Nicolas Sarkozy” (22-23 August 2007).

25 Gideon Rachman, “France braces itself for a stiff dose of Thatcherism,” The Financial Times (8 May 2007).

26 The incautious suggestion during the legislative election campaign that payroll tax cuts might be offset by a rise in VAT appears to have cost Sarkozy’s party some seats and certainly cost Lagarde’s predecessor, Jean-Louis Borloo, his ministry after barely a month in post.

Business&Economics A French Action Figure:

Nicolas Sarkozy’s First Months as President Arthur Goldhammer On 6 May 2007, Nicolas Sarkozy was elected the sixth president of France’s Fifth Republic with just over 53 percent of the vote. In campaigning for the post, he proposed a series of economic and social reforms, and upon taking office he moved with surprising speed to implement them. In the scant months since his election, President Sarkozy has surprised the French by the decisiveness and vigor of his actions and impressed more minds than would be pleased to admit it—including many who opposed his election—with the zeal with which he has applied himself to the job.1 Sarkozy’s reform program contains three central elements: tax reform, overhaul of labor market institutions, and reorganization of French universities. After reviewing the main proposals in each of these three areas, I will discuss the broader strategy that underlies them and the likelihood of their success.

Arthur Goldhammer is an affiliate at the Center for European Studies, Harvard University. He is a member of the editorial board of French Politics, Culture, and Society, as well as a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He has translated over 100 books from the French, including Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy.

The Reforms. Fiscal Reform: The tax package that was enacted

on 1 August has several distinct elements.2 The first component is the elimination of payroll and income taxes on hours worked above the legally mandated thirty-five per week. This measure is intended to reduce labor costs for overtime work and allow greater flexibility in workforce management, while encouraging workers to put in extra hours. The second component of the tax package is a measure to provide a tax credit for interest paid on home mortgages in order to encourage a higher rate of home Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 1 3 ]

A FRENCH ACTION FIGURE

ownership in France.3 The tax bill also sharply reduces the inheritance tax—eliminating it altogether for bequests to a surviving spouse—and adjusts the maximum percentage of income that can be taken by the state—the tax shield, or bouclier fiscal—from 60 to 50 percent.

second major reform would involve a further overhaul of the French retirement system, extending the changes introduced by the Fillon Law of 2003.5 As with contract reform, this move would simplify the existing system, which includes a number of “special retirement

The main resistance that Sarkozy has faced thus far has come from outside France.

Two related reforms are worth mentioning here. The first, an increase in the co-payment for medical treatment and prescription drugs, is effectively a small tax increase to finance medical research on cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. The second, discussed though not yet enacted, is a proposed increase in the valueadded tax (VAT) to compensate for the decrease in payroll tax revenues specifically earmarked to support the social security system. “Social security” in France includes universal health care, day care, and other benefits, and hence is much broader than social security in the United States. The revenues from this “social VAT” would reduce the social security deficit, which would otherwise increase due to the elimination of the payroll tax on overtime. The burden would be borne by the final purchaser of goods rather than by producers.

Labor Market Reform: President Sarkozy is also sponsoring three labor-market reforms. The most significant of these, a proposal to replace the several different existing labor contracts—covering longterm, short-term, and newly hired employees—with a single, more flexible contract, has yet to be given a precise formulation, but it would ease existing restrictions on layoffs and dismissals.4 A [ 1 1 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

regimes” applicable to specific categories of workers in addition to the “general regime” restructured in earlier reforms.

The third institutional reform of the labor market is the “minimum service law,” which was enacted on 3 August. Its intent is to ensure a minimum level of service in public transportation in the case of a strike.6 More narrowly focused than the other two labor-market reforms, this could be regarded as a tactical measure to provide the government with the legal instruments to contain anticipated opposition to its more ambitious proposals. The transport sector is particularly sensitive. In 1995, a strike of transport workers paralyzed the country and forced Prime Minister Alain Juppé to withdraw key elements of his retirement reform.

University Reform: The third panel of Sarkozy’s triptych features the universities. The keyword here is autonomy. Power would be devolved from the ministry of education to the presidents of France’s eighty-four universities. The presidents will gain control of their own budgets, greater influence over hiring, and a mandate to compete for teaching and research talent. Ultimately, the goal is to revise university curricula to equip more students with marketable skills. Research

GOLDHAMMER

Business & Economics

slogan “Work More in order to Earn More” might be interpreted as an appeal to individualism, his concrete policy proposals instead suggest that he plans to use individualist incentives to effect incremental improvements in the balance sheet of the social welfare system to make it sustainable over the long term.

Indeed, as French diversity increases and a common culture can no longer be taken for granted as the basis of the state’s The Underlying Strategy. Sar- coherence, “social solidarity” takes on kozy’s approach to economic reform is increasing importance for a nationalist based on three principles. First, the like Sarkozy. As interior minister, he French are attached to their social mod- demonstrated a willingness to tolerate a el: universal health care, generous retire- greater degree of cultural diversity than ment benefits and employment protec- many other French political leaders do. tions, broad access to state-subsidized To hold this diverse society together, he higher education, and numerous other believes that the state must continue to state-managed services. Since the pro- provide substantial benefits to its citiposed European constitution was per- zens. For these reasons, privatization of ceived, rightly or wrongly, as a threat to state services, including the national railthat model, the French voted against it. road and higher education, is not his goal.

Second, in light of demographic change Nor does he show any sign of believing and increased international competi- that private firms are necessarily better tion, the French will need to work addi- managed than state firms. He has not tional hours, if they want to continue liv- been reluctant, moreover, to use the ing under the current social model. resources of the state to advance the Finally, people cannot be expected to interests of the latter. One of his first work more simply by fiat; rather, they moves in foreign policy was designed to must be offered incentives to forgo benefit the nuclear power firm Areva, a leisure, especially in the form of early 90 percent state-owned enterprise. His retirement, in favor of work. At the same negotiations with the government of time, additional work hours must be Libya are said to have guaranteed Areva available for those willing to take them, access to a 1,600-ton Libyan uranium and incentives must be offered to reserve and to conduct advanced talks employers to encourage the creation of related to Libya’s desire to purchase two European Pressurized Reactors from new jobs and overtime opportunities.

The proposed program is therefore Areva at a price of $4.3 billion each.7 one of marginal changes intended to preserve the French welfare state. Sarkozy is The Likelihood of Success. If the best understood as a moderate conserva- goal of economic reform is to preserve tive, not a radical free-market ideologue the welfare state, several questions arise. in the mold of Margaret Thatcher and First, will “working more” solve the Ronald Reagan. Although his campaign problem? Second, will Sarkozy’s reforms is to be integrated with teaching rather than segregated in a series of parallel institutions. Maladapted university curricula and a lack of facilities for applied research are seen as impediments to economic growth in an era when economies with high labor costs must shift away from manufacturing toward high technology and information-intensive services in order to compete effectively.

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A FRENCH ACTION FIGURE

both encourage and enable the French to work more? And third, can he gain acceptance of his proposals by the legislature, Constitutional Council, and key social actors, such as employers, unions, minorities, university administrators, and students?

Will more hours at work produce a significant reduction in unemployment and more rapid growth without deepening the budget deficit to unacceptable levels? To be sure, the diagnosis of insufficient effort has some merit. The productivity figures reveal that, while France’s economy is efficiently organized and technologically advanced, the French do not devote as many hours of their lives to work as do citizens of some other countries. According to Eurostat figures for 2005, the hourly productivity of the French worker slightly exceeds that of the American worker—index of 118.1 for France, 116.9 for the United States, and 109.5 for Germany. But if we turn from hourly productivity to productivity per worker, we find a different story: 135.7 for the United States, 119.2 for France, and 102.5 for Germany. The difference lies in the number of hours worked per year.

The French, with their shorter work week, longer vacations, and penchant for early retirement, work fewer hours per person—indexing the United States at 100, the French stood at just 67 in the year 2000; the comparable figures for 1970 were 100 and 99.8 The French appear to have a somewhat higher preference for leisure over work than do citizens of other countries. Yet there are many who would like to work but cannot find jobs. The unemployment rate, which counts only people actively seeking work and unable to find it, had remained above 10 percent for an extended period, though in the past year it has declined to [ 1 1 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

8.1 percent, last seen in 1982.

Will employers see the elimination of payroll taxes on overtime as an incentive to offer more jobs?9 Although the impact is likely to be marginal, it will perhaps influence only those already employed, and will do little to increase the hours worked per person. The main impediment to an increase in work hours is a combination of high unemployment levels and the low workforce participation rates in the 50-64 age group, which stands at 53 percent for France compared to 69 percent for the United States. The anticipated reforms to the special retirement regimes will encourage a rise in the participation rate of older workers, but more so in the public sector than in the private sector, which has already been subjected to the Fillon reforms. Sarkozy intends to reduce employment in the public sector overall. Substantial reductions in the number of teachers and ministry personnel have already been announced—as many as 27,000 jobs will be eliminated. The single labor contract may do more to encourage investment in new jobs by reducing the associated risk.

Firms will be able to downsize at lower cost if market conditions change and may therefore be less reluctant to take on new workers during a positive phase of the business cycle. Additional employment should lead to increased demand for products, thereby producing a positive feedback effect. Nevertheless, it is misleading to think of France as a country in which firms are reluctant to invest due to labor-market rigidities. Indeed, France is one of the most attractive countries in Europe for foreign direct investment: in 2003 it received approximately $160 billion of FDI, or roughly 6 percent of its GDP, including $80 billion from the United States.

It is clear that Sarkozy is not an

GOLDHAMMER

uncompromising supply-sider, nor is he systematically hostile to the state.

Inevitably, however, he has been cast by some opponents as the thin end of the “Anglo-Saxon neoliberal” wedge, whose true aim is to dismantle the social welfare system, slash taxes, widen inequalities, and deliver France into the hands of capitalist buccaneers, many of whom he counts among his friends. Hostility to his program is therefore strong in certain quarters, and although there is no doubt that with his party holding an absolute majority of seats in the National Assembly, Sarkozy can enact any law he deems important. Bernard Thibault, the head of the CGT trade union, which represents many of France’s transport workers, has called the minimum service law an “attack on the right to strike,” and the Socialist Party has laid the issue of the law’s constitutionality before the Constitutional Council.10,11 If the single labor contract ultimately resembles the proposals laid down by a 2003 Economic Analysis Council report to the prime

Business & Economics

the Socialist Dominique Strauss-Kahn for the position of head of the International Monetary Fund has made it more difficult for Socialists to argue that his economic reforms make no sense, and the appointment of several other Socialists to important cabinet and advisory posts has similarly dampened opposition.

Interestingly, the main resistance that Sarkozy has faced thus far has come from outside France. Criticism has been heard from another moderate conservative, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, and from a number of finance ministers and central bankers, including JeanClaude Trichet, the head of the European Central Bank (ECB). There is concern about the cost of Sarkozy’s reforms.

Christine Lagarde, the minister of the economy, estimates a net cost of the program at $14 billion to $16 billion in 2008, and $20 billion when fully implemented. That makes up between 0.5-0.8 percent of the French GDP of $1.9 trillion. Under the European Union’s Stability and Growth Pact,

The vast majority of Frenchmen seem eager to drink a toast to the new regime. Yet pockets of virulent resistance remain. minister, one or more of the major unions will likely mount protests.12 Yet Sarkozy has thus far shown himself to be adroit in dealing with opposition.

Initially, both student unions and the Association of University Presidents opposed his university reform. When his minister of higher education, Valérie Pécresse, had difficulty placating the opposition, Sarkozy intervened personally and, with a combination of charm and readiness to compromise on key issues, overcame all objections. His backing of

France has pledged to keep its budget deficit under 3 percent of GDP and total deficit under 60 percent of GDP. In 2006, France stood at 2.4 percent and 63.9 percent, respectively, and both numbers were trending downward.13 The addition of at least $14.5 billion of debt annually will reverse this trend unless a spurt of economic growth increases tax revenues.14 Indeed, even before the tax package was passed, it was announced that unemployment in France had declined to 8.1 percent. Although the French Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 1 7 ]

A FRENCH ACTION FIGURE

recovery has not been as robust as that of neighboring Germany, there has been some improvement. Sarkozy has never claimed that deficits are not important, but he is gambling that they will not get out of hand and that his reforms will indeed stimulate new employment and new tax revenues that will defray much of their cost. He has also been critical of the ECB for attaching too much importance on price stability and too little on growth and exports. This cavalier attitude toward the principle of central bank independence—regarded as sacrosanct in financial circles as well as in countries that fear inflation—has rankled many officials, including Trichet and German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück.15 Economists too have weighed in with their own criticisms. A study by Alpha Etudes contends that the government has underestimated the costs and overestimated the benefits of eliminating overtime taxes.16 Three respected labor economists, Patrick Artus, Pierre Cahuc, and André Sylberger, produced a report for the Prime Minister’s Council of Economic Analysis in which they noted that the measure may also provide an incentive to substitute overtime for new hires and perhaps even to engage in fraud, disguising regular work hours as overtime to take advantage of reduced taxes.17 Yet many economists believe that the central labor-market reforms are reasonable if they are solely used to address problems that have not been resolved for years. The tax package is more controversial, especially the reductions of the estate tax, and runs the risk of increasing inequality without stimulating sufficient growth.

The popular mortgage interest deduction may stimulate employment in the construction industry, but will also add about $11.5 billion to the budget deficit. [ 1 1 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

Conclusion. In the months since Pres-

ident Sarkozy’s election, there can be no doubt that he has successfully become a European cynosure. He surprised the French and disarmed his enemies by opening his government to members of the Socialist and centrist opposition.

With great artistry, he set out to change the image of the French presidency from an aloof, almost otherworldly office, to a paragon of energy and engagement. The senescent torpor of Chirac’s fin de règne gave way to months of seemingly ceaseless activity and the promise of fundamental constitutional reform. Yet the impression of renewal may be somewhat misleading. The key economic reforms outlined above are essentially reformulations of ideas that have been debated for years.

As a campaigner, Sarkozy pulled off the remarkable feat of appearing to run against the extremely unpopular Chirac, who had been his mentor and for whom he had served as minister and party leader. For now, pouring old wine into new bottles seems to have worked wonders. The vast majority of Frenchmen seem eager to drink a toast to the new regime. Yet pockets of virulent resistance remain. The “anti-liberal left” remains unalterably opposed to reforms largely accepted by both the center-left and the center-right.18 More serious still, despite the nomination of members of France’s “visible minorities” to important cabinet posts, Sarkozy remains extremely unpopular, if not detested, in the banlieues, where unemployment runs high.19 The rap musician Doc Gynéco, who supported Sarkozy, was recently driven from the stage in Geneva by an angry crowd that denounced him as a “collaborator” with “Sarko facho,” Sarkozy the fascist. Despite the apparent success of his first hundred

GOLDHAMMER

days in office, virulent emotions lurk just below the surface. Any number of things could set off an explosive reaction similar to the riots of the fall of 2005. How Sarkozy might meet such a challenge remains to be seen. For now, however,

Business & Economics

the suburbs seem resigned; the Socialists are routed, confused, and unable to regroup; and two-thirds of France's population remains pleased with the government to a degree that seemed unthinkable six months ago.

NOTES

1 In the first weeks from 63 to 65 and then 67 percent, heights not seen since the days of General de Gaulle. On Le Pen’s appreciation. See http://artgoldhammer.blogspot.com, 8/7.

2 The tax package is officially known as the Law on Work, Employment, and Purchasing Power. A presentation of its principal points by finance minister Christine Lagarde can be found at http://www.lefigaro.fr/debats/20070801.FIG000000014_travail_e mploi_pouvoir_d_achat_une_loi_pour_redonner_confiance_aux_francais.html.

3 A study has shown that 85 to 90 percent of the French who don’t own homes would like to. The home ownership rate in France is just 52 percent, compared with 80 percent for Spain. See http://tempsreel.nouvelobs.com/actualites/opinions/3_questions_a/20070 530.OBS9463/cette_mesurene_se_traduira_pas_en_in flation.html.

4 For a thorough analysis of the influence of French labor-market institutions on unemployment, see Olivier Blanchard and Jean Triole, “Protection de l’emploi et procédures de licenciement,” report for the Conseil d’Analyse Economique, available at http://www.cae.gouv.fr/.

5 The Fillon Law aligned the retirement regime that applies to civil servants with the "general regime" that applies to most private-sector employees. It left in place a number of "special regimes" applicable to railway workers, employees of certain state-owned utilities, sailors, fishermen, and employees of the Paris Opera and the Comédie Française. Only about 550,000 active workers and just over a million retired workers are covered by the special regimes, out of a total work force of some twenty-seven million.

6 The law requires workers and management to consult about grievances in order to head off potential strikes; prior notice of any strike; individual notice to management of the intent to walk off the job forty-eight hours in advance; and a vote on whether to continue after a week off the job.

7 Sarkozy has denied that any deal was concluded regarding the EPR.

8 Lecture by MIT economist Olivier Blanchard, See http://econ-www.mit.edu/faculty/download_pdf.php?id=1505, slide 3.

9 Some believed that ambitious workers would be free to extend their working hours voluntarily. As enacted, however, the law makes it clear that the offer of overtime is entirely at the employer’s discretion.

10 See http://abonnes.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-3224,36-937490@51-925281,0.html.

11 See http://abonnes.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-3224,36-942724@51-925281,0.html.

12 By Blanchard and Triole, see note 4 above.

13 http://mediaserver.fxstreet.com/Reports/0435 10df-a836-4b86-a9b3-a88c80ec83c3/dfde39026a7d-490d-8a2b-d5d5f14d3be5.pdf.

14 On 14 August, estimates of French economic growth in 2007 were revised downward. See http://www.latribune.fr/info/Croissance-decevantede-0-3--en-France-au-deuxieme-trimestre-~ID682CECFA6DE62E6FC1257337002709DB$RSS=1. Only a month earlier, the ministry of the budget had argued that growth estimates might be too low and that France therefore had more headroom to remain under the SGP ceiling.

15 For the reaction of Steinbrück and other finance ministers to Sarkozy’s appeals to a meeting of EU finance ministers, See http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/economie_terre/266835.FR.php?rss=true.

16 Alpha Etudes, “Travailler plus pour gagner plus: quels effets ?” available at http://www.alphaetudes.com/lire_publication.asp?id_publi=222.

17 See http://www.liberation.fr/actualite/politiques/256832.FR.php.

18 The “anti-liberal left” includes a faction of the Socialist Party together with all of the Communist Party and several small parties of the extreme left, as well as social movements opposed to globalization, such as ATTAC. 19 The phrase “visible minorities” is preferred in France to designations such as racial or ethnic minority.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 1 9 ]

Science&Technology Battling Botnets and Online Mobs Estonia’s Defense Efforts during the Internet War Gadi Evron What would happen if tomorrow the Internet ceased to function? To most critics, and particularly state officials and policy makers, the possibility that the Internet could one day suddenly disappear is no more than a mere speculation, a highly improbable concept. On May 2007, the events that took place in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, proved everyone wrong. On that day, Estonia fell victim to the first-ever, real Internet war.

This article delves into the political context that shaped the incident and analyzes some of the key lessons and policy implications that emerged as a consequence.

Gadi Evron is security architect for Afilias Global Registry Services, a cyber-crime expert, and a recongnized leader in Internet security.

The Roots of Anger. Estonia’s difficult past—World War

II, the Soviet occupation, Cold War, and post-communist transformation—set the stage for the conflict that ultimately erupted in Tallinn between its Estonian and Russian citizens.

Estonia’s relationship with its large Russian minority dates back to World War II, when the Soviet Union annexed the Baltic States in the 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Estonia declared that all immigrants that have entered the country after 1940 are obliged to pass a language and history test before they can acquire Estonian citizenship. The regulation inadvertedly left the Russian minority in Estonia marginalized, without a clear political voice and status under the new, Estonian system.

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BATTLING BOTNETS AND ONLINE MOBS

The contentious relationship between the Estonians and Russians living in Estonia stems from the Soviet experience, while the Russian minority felt mistreated in some way. After declaring Estonia a Soviet republic, Stalin forced the small Baltic nation to become completely subordinate to Moscow. The Soviet authorities took full control of Estonia and were tasked to transform Estonia into a Soviet republic: centrally-planned economy, collectivization, and the realities of labor camps in Siberia. All of the Sovietimposed changes have been met with grave dissatisfaction and resentment from the local Estonians, who felt oppressed under the new, imposed system. To assert their legitimacy in a nation charged with cultural and political hostility, the Russians celebrated and promoted the World War II victory. A bronze statue of a Soviet soldier was erected in the capital as a memorial for the unknown soldier in WWII. To the Estonians, however, the monument was a visual affirmation of Soviet oppression and occupation that deeply hurt their national pride. On 27 April 2007, after more than fifteen years since its independence from the USSR, the Estonian government decided to move the statue to a military graveyard in the outskirts of the city. The decision was met with outrage and retaliation from ethnic Russians, who rioted and looted downtown Tallinn. The event was ultimately a catalyst for the Internet war discussed in this article.

The Initiation.Political and ethnic tensions manifest themselves through a variety of outlets, and in the case of Estonia—through cyberspace. Staged by Russians, the cyber attack on Estonia—the depth of the incursion, the organization of its perpetrators, and the threat to Estonian national security—escalated this [ 1 2 2 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

incident from a case of petty hacking to an Internet war with real implications for regional stability. Such brute force attacks are also known for the possibility of an Internet global fallout, as the attacks can be relayed through the global infrastructure.

On 26 April, public unrest gave way to virtual attacks on Estonia's network infrastructure, targeting government offices, news agencies, and banks. While the attack was political in nature, banks became a major target since many Estonians often rely on online banking services. Over the years, Estonia has outpaced its European counterparts in integrating the Internet in all aspects of its everyday life, becoming a truly online society. In lieu of attending traditional parent-teacher conferences, Estonian parents communicate with their children’s schools and teachers online. Virtually all financial transactions are processed online. In the last elections for the Estonian parliament, over 30,000 Estonians voted from their homes, on the Internet.

In the days leading up to the attack, numerous clues pointed to a large-scale operation that was being planned online.

Russian-language Internet discussion forums were abuzz with preparations for an online attack. Three days before the expected onslaught, Estonia planned to release the news of the coming strike in hopes that European media attention would oblige the EU to pressure the Kremlin to intervene, whether or not the attacks emanated from the Russian authorities. At the time, a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who then shared the rotating EU presidency, was fast approaching and pressure from within the EU compelled

EVRON

Estonia to refrain from releasing the statement.

A cyber riot against Estonian government websites commenced at 10:00 p.m. on 26 April 2007, fueled by step-by-step instructions so simple that any Internet user could follow, complete with a preselected list of targets. The attack, whether intentional or not, coincided with the physical riots taking place in Tallinn's streets. By the next day, the attacks reached significant scale and put severe strains on Web servers, inundating the Estonian government network with malicious traffic. In the following days, more websites and mail servers, including those of banks, news outlets, and

Science &Technology

government officially sanctioned the strike, it is undisputed that Russians were responsible. Russian-language websites, online forums, and blogs came alive with chatter about the moving of the war memorial and the subsequent cyber attacks in Estonia. Some Russian-language websites even posted messages outlining potential Estonian targets to attack and manuals for how to proceed.

The technological systems in place to trace the sources of the cyber attack and those involved provide insufficient and unreliable information. Because the protocols used to run the Internet were originally designed in an open, allinclusive environment, information

Political and ethnic tensions manifest

themselves through a variety of outlets, and in the case of Estonia—through cyberspace. schools, became victims of the attacks.

The Estonian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), in cooperation with local providers and volunteer networks of IT professionals in industry and government, coordinated the emergency defense program. The team was immediately involved in analyzing the severity of the incident, sending abuse reports to service providers abroad, and facilitating information exchange between the affected organizations and service providers. Though the Estonian CERT was able, to a degree, to mitigate the impact of the attacks, due to its ad hoc, unofficial status, it lacked the authority to enforce its recommendations on all parties involved.

streams can easily be falsified. The allocation of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses to large areas, such as countries or regions, makes it difficult to pinpoint the exact location of a computer or a source.

Moreover, the IP addresses of computers and networks can also be falsified. Finally, computers can be hacked—taken over and compromised—allowing anyone to manipulate and use them anonymously as proxies for their own attacks.

While the exact source of the attacks remains unknown, evidence suggests a highly organized assault. Not only did the cyber riot start almost simultaneously with the actual riots, fresh posts in the Russian-language blogosphere continuously appeared with new targets and instructions. These details suggest that The Unknown Attacker. Though it the cyber attackers reacted to Estonian remains unclear whether the Russian defenses. The attackers launched “botWinter/Spring 2008 [ 1 2 3 ]

BATTLING BOTNETS AND ONLINE MOBS

nets,” online robot networks, into Estonia’s IP space from the outside. Centrally-controlled Trojan horse software then transformed a network of compromised computers into a botnet. When attacks

The CERT coordinated a successful response to the unexpected cyber crisis and ultimately helped Estonia get back on its feet. The team organized an online chat room, which became a safe forum

Not only did the cyber riot start almost

simultaneously with the actual riots, fresh posts in the Russian-language blogosphere appeared with new targets and instructions. where defenders from across the geographic region and from all relevant organizations could articulate and exchange their personal anecdotes and information. The forum also provided the Estonian authorities with real-time information on attack targets and types, and communicated with foreign CERTs and the international Internet security operations community. Four CERT organizations from Germany, Finland, and Slovenia filed abuse reports documenting the incidents. Global cooperation with trusted contacts helped synchronize an effective, multilateral response.

Preventing disruptions from accidents or attacks, however, is not enough. In Crisis Response and the Internet today’s world, Internet security demands as Critical Infrastructure. In ret- a robust response capability that can utirospect, Estonia did not have the neces- lize defensive measures to ensure cyber, as sary defense mechanisms to confront a well as civilian, order.

It is clear that computers across the large-scale Internet assault. The incident exposes some of the structural vulnerabil- world can be compromised, spoofed, and ities of the Estonian state and shows the utilized in attacks. Thus, the power of one importance of effective emergency computer to impact and undermine the response systems. Moreover, the Estonian security of another computer, organizaauthorities need to revise some of their tion, or even a nation is alarming and former preconceptions and define the deserves greater attention from authoriInternet as critical infrastructure, equally ties. Online attacks damage not just the strategic to national security as its electric- intended target, but can disrupt international Internet traffic. ity grid and water supply. from abroad were successfully mitigated, botnets were launched from compromised computers inside Estonia.

It is evident that Russian bloggers and their followers did participate in the attacks. We cannot tell, however, who it was that inspired them. Once bloggers started reporting their small-scale attacks, more experienced players became involved. Before long, botnets were being used. The involvement of the Russian government in the affair cannot be confirmed. What raised speculation, however, is the failure—or unwillingness—of the Russian authorities to stop the cyber riot against Estonia for over three weeks after the initial attack.

[ 1 2 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

EVRON

Recent global trends—from industrialization and urbanization to rapid diffusion of technology—make the world increasingly dependent on and vulnerable to the forces of the Internet. Though the attacks in Estonia did not hurt critical infrastructure, energy, and transportation, the incidence reveals the inherent weaknesses of the state authorities to protect their citizens and industries against analogous strikes. An Internet-staged attack on energy could easily disrupt entire supply and distribution chains, prompting severe shortages and other negative spillover effects to the entire nation. In a second, an entire city could be left without power, leaving households without electricity, streets without lights, and airports without air traffic control systems. In Estonia, however, private and business infrastructure, including banks, Internet Service Providers, and media websites, came under direct attack—making the business and private infrastructure more critical.

Personal computers on broadband connections were a neglected weakness in Estonian Internet infrastructure. Compromised personal computers launched the majority of the attacks. The challenge of protecting this infrastructure from coordinated Internet attacks, even at the level of criminal activity, has yet to be sufficiently addressed. Thus, personal computers need to be reprioritized and considered as critical infrastructure in order for appropriate defense strategies to be developed.

Science &Technology

involved in initiating the attacks, but could have just as easily been a spoofed address or compromised computer.

This shows that manipulating technical data could be widely used for political needs and purposes. While Estonia could use the Internet war to cast criticism on the Russian government, the Russians could use it to advance their political agenda through individual computer users and networks.

In the aftermath of the attacks, many questions concerning the proper response to this new kind of warfare remain unanswered. Does an Internet attack warrant a reaction from NATO? What about the UN? Is there such a thing as a “just” Internet war, and what is a country's right to defend itself against one? As the world becomes increasingly dependent on the Internet, coordinating effective global responses to cyber attacks is critical for national security. However, international legal mechanisms and law enforcement authorities are hardpressed to keep pace with the complexities of cyber-crime. While some politicians today often do not even recognize that the threat is plausible, denying its existence altogether, others willingly choose to neglect it.

Politics Today. The current dynamics

surrounding Internet warfare—its sophisticated organization and intelligence, global scale and impact, and politicized incentives and targets—signal the beginning of a new era for global security. The attacks in Estonia ushered a quick NATO Internet Warfare. The political ele- response, which—although had no disments of the virtual attack remain com- cernable impact—indicated a high level of plicated. Technical data has shown that political attention for the incident. Four one of the attacks came from an IP weeks after the events in Tallinn, the Penaddress allocated to the Russian govern- tagon dispatched a team to gather informent. This computer may have been mation about the incident. President Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 2 5 ]

BATTLING BOTNETS AND ONLINE MOBS

Public and political attitudes to cybercrime must change and law enforcement must be given greater resources to cope with its growing presence in the virtual community. Legal standards for the provable damages of cyber-crime need to be reformed since they inherently differ from physical damage. Different national law enforcement agencies and operations should collaborate and establish a common framework that will help trace recent developments involving Internet security in a significantly faster fashion, as current measures have completely failed to cope. Countries should create CERT authorities which are able to coordinate law enforcement and private industry on security incidents and crimPolicy Recommendations. Although inal activity, while maintaining operaauthorities understand how computer tional relationships with similar organiattacks work and grasp their potential zations world-wide. These can prove damaging effects, because Internet war- essential for future attacks, both against fare is a relatively new phenomenon, themselves and others nations.

Given that some countries, such as there is a lack of experience and case literature on subjects ranging from strategy Russia and China, have lax standards for to tactics. For the initiator, the Internet prosecuting Internet offenders, it is provides an easy, low-cost, risk free important that the move comes from method to achieve immediate, large- Western nations, who should reach out scale impact. Because illicit tools such as and develop treaties and agreements, as botnets exploit millions of compromised well as facilitate, monitor, and enforce computers, security experts cannot easily much faster cooperation in law enforcefind computers free of malicious soft- ment. In a world of increasing political ware. Although the private sector may not uncertainty and cyber dependency, mulbe keen on government intervention in tilateral state-led action, in cooperation Internet security, firms will welcome, if with industry stakeholders, is required to not demand, state involvement once the help protect the national and global infrastructure, which is the Internet. crisis strikes their own operations.

Bush spoke with Estonian President Toomas Hendrick Ilves on the subject in June 2007. NATO has agreed to establish research facilities to develop new ways to respond to future cyber attacks.

In the case with Estonia, the perpetrators used the Internet to both organize and execute their attack. Prominent military historian Martin van Creveld first noted several decades ago that future fighting may occur among organizations, rather than countries. Today, this has become obvious that the impact of such fighting can now be achieved at a low cost and remotely, by populations, small groups, and even individuals, not necessarily organized under any banner.

[ 1 2 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

Books

Turkish Hindsight: Muslim Roots, Secular Minds.

to know about Turkey at this moment in history.

After a short introduction concisely stating the objectives of the work, the Review by Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad book is in three parts titled “Turkey’s Historical Trajectory,” “Turkey’s RelaGraham Fuller. The New Turkish tions with the Muslim World,” and Republic: Turkey as a Pivotal State in the “Turkey’s Future Trajectory.” The first Muslim World. Washington, D.C.: and last of these cover what the titles U.S. Institute of Peace Press, indicate, while the second also deals with 2007. $14.95.

Turkey’s relations with Israel, Eurasia, Europe, the United States, and the MusAfter eight decades of self-imposed lim world. exile on the periphery of Islamic affairs, Throughout the book, Fuller emphaTurkey is again emerging as a potentially sizes that Turkey’s self-identification as a major influence in the development of European state is a phase. Both Turkey’s the Muslim world. Graham Fuller, in his roots in the Middle East and the nature book The New Turkish Republic: Turkey as a Piv- of recent historical events necessitate a otal State in the Muslim World, demonstrates reconsideration of Turkey’s place in the that he is an analyst of scholarly tempera- world. Turkey’s identity is complex, its ment and sound perception. He has history is rich—richer than Turkish elites thoughtfully assembled and organized care to admit—and its interests are widethe essential information that scholars, reaching. policymakers, and pundits in any way Naturally, Fuller places appropriate concerned with the Muslim world need Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 2 7 ]

TURKISH HINDSIGHT

emphasis on the Ottoman predecessors of the modern Turkish republic and on the revolutionary impact of Kemal Ataturk’s forcible establishment of a secular republic. Fuller masterfully navigates the problematic nuances of an authoritarian democracy. He draws on the important multiplicities of the Turkish experience—a democratic republic with military oversight; an enforced secularity imposed on a Muslim society colored by a deep spirituality; and a pragmatically cooperative relationship with Israel in spite of popular sympathy for the Palestinians—to explain how today’s complex relations between Turkey and the rest of the world have emerged.

The New Turkish Republic also explains how American policymakers have misread Turkey. Fuller remarks that expectations that Turkey would “be a natural partner and source of support in the Global War on Terror (GWOT), back U.S. military operations in the region, and […] continue to be an enduring symbol of antiIslamist ideology […] did not materialize as Washington had hoped.”1 A careful reading of Fuller’s text will reward the reader with an understanding of why these hopes didn’t materialize, which will better equip readers to avoid such errors in the future.

In his analysis of the historical trajectory of Turkey, Fuller traces how the late Ottoman Empire’s attraction to the strengths of the West and dissatisfaction with Muslim—especially Arab—shortcomings, motivated “a conscious effort to synthesize Islamic ideas with those of the Western enlightenment.”2 Fuller argues that the vision was a pan-Islamic one, and that before 1914, whatever differences the Turks had with the Arabs, they were not nationalistic in character.

It was Kemalism, not a romanticized “Arab revolt,” that split Turkey from the [ 1 2 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

Arab and broader Muslim world, according to Fuller. Because the caliphate was perceived as an obstacle to Turkish nationalism, its abolition was “roughly akin to a snap decision by an Italian prime minister to abolish the papacy without consultation with the worldwide Catholic community.”3 The extreme steps in the rejection of Islam— such as the replacement of the Arabic script with Latin characters and the purging of words of Arab or Persian origin from the language—have had a devastating effect on Turkish self-perception.

Turks cannot use their own Ottoman historical archives, but must rely on Western sources for an understanding of their Ottoman past. Islam is the main connection between the Turks and the Arabs, and its removal from public life has split the two groups in an unprecedented manner.

The rise of the Soviet Union and its threat to Turkish territorial integrity under Stalin precipitated an abandonment of Kemalist neutrality and moved Turkey into alignment with the Western powers. Fuller amply demonstrates that Turkey’s enthusiasm in support of Western positions was sometimes so extreme that it was almost embarrassing. Fuller notes that, when communists seemed to be in a position to seize power in Damascus in 1957, “Turkey threatened to unilaterally invade [Syria]” and the United States and United Kingdom had to caution it against doing so.4 Fuller goes on to point out, “In 1958, Turkey unsuccessfully called for Western military intervention in Iraq to restore the monarchy after its overthrow.”5 In the 1960s it was Turkey’s turn to be embarrassed by American insensitivity to its interests, exemplified by the Cuban missile crisis and U.S. policies towards Cyprus.6 Additionally, the refugee prob-

AHMAD

lem caused by the establishment of Israel and the humiliation of the Arab states by its subsequent military successes prompted the evolution of the countries on Turkey’s borders into “security states” ruled by authoritarian—often military— regimes. Many Arab leaders were turning towards the Soviet Union, giving rise to a reconsideration of Turkey’s “singleminded strategic commitment to the United States.”7,8 Turkey returned to its

Books

characterized by “the state’s impartiality towards every form of religious belief and philosophical conviction […]” and the fact that “[…] the state, rather than the individual is restricted by this.”12 As a result, Fuller notes, three groups found themselves empowered: “a new and growing Anatolian business class, traditional lower classes in the cities, and a new and growing Islamic professional and intellectual class that, while modern,

Turkey’s roots in the Middle East and the

nature of recent historical events necessitate a reconsideration of Turkey’s place in the world.

Kemalist neutrality, not taking sides in the Iran-Iraq war.

Fuller appropriately places great stress on the importance of Turgut Özal’s role in turning economic policy into “a driving force in Turkish foreign policy.”9 Özal temporarily broke with the neutrality policy to side with the United States in the 1991 Iraq War, but the experience was costly for Turkey in a variety of ways, including the problems engendered by the flow of Kurdish refugees. As a result, Turks became even more wary of the wisdom of supporting U.S. regional policies, and the stage was set for Necmitten Erbakan to succeed in establishing a successful Islamic political party for the first time in the republic’s history.10 Although Erbakan’s party was eventually deprived of power by the military, it paved the way for the more spectacular success of the Justice and Development Party (JDP) and the “largely apolitical communitarian movement of Fethullah Gülun.”11 The increasing democratization of Turkey has caused the radical French-style secularism of the elites to give way to a more moderate, American-style secularism,

still finds meaningful identity in Muslim tradition.”13 Fuller quotes Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül’s assertion that “[at] the time that people are talking about a clash of civilizations, Turkey is a natural bridge of civilizations.”14 It is the moderates who stand to benefit the most from the liberalization of Turkish society.

Fuller is inclined to accept the claim of Gül’s movement that its purpose is societal reform, and not, as its radical, secular critics claim, the political power to impose their vision of Islamic law on the rest of Turkish society. He notes that “[o]ne of the Gülen movement’s greatest accomplishments—and a demonstration of its search for greater universalism—has come through a remarkable process of intellectual outreach, a series of roundtables called the Abant Forum” which has brought together “Muslims, secularists, traditionalists, modernists, atheists, Christians, leftists, and conservatives—to hammer out common positions.”15 These positions include an opposition to state dictation of clothing codes that either mandate or ban any form of reliWinter/Spring 2008 [ 1 2 9 ]

TURKISH HINDSIGHT

gious dress or expression.

The second part of the book is split into ten chapters dealing with Turkey’s current relations with various parts of the world. In the chapter on “JDP Policies Toward the Muslim World,” Fuller argues that “Turkey has moved away from viewing Iraqi events entirely through a Kurdish prism and has developed ties” with various groups, both Sunni and Shi`a.16 Talks held with Syria allow Turkey to speak frankly about needed reforms in ways that the intransigent American administration cannot. Turkey has demonstrated its independence from the United States with regard to Iran even more strongly—as shown when “the staunchly secular President [Ahmet Necdet] Sezer visited Iran” in the wake of President Bush’s “axis of evil” speech.17 The JDP has maintained “close working ties with Israel” even as it demonstrates “greater involvement in the Palestinian problem” and spoke out forcefully “against Israel’s excessive use of force” in the 2006 invasion of Lebanon.18,19,20 Turkey’s warming towards the Organization of Islamic Conference reached a climax when “Turkey actually assumed the chairmanship of the OIC” in 2004.21 In the eighth chapter Fuller examines what he calls “The Foundations of Turkey’s Regional Influence.” He considers the roles of military modernization, peacekeeping efforts, economic, financial and labor factors, energy and water policies, as well as the Kurdish problem and pan-Turkism as factors pulling Turkey back into a closer relationship with the Middle East. Fuller then explores the dynamics between Turkey and Syria, and its implications with respect to Israel. He moves on to a chapter focused on Turkey and Iraq, which gives special attention to border [ 1 3 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

issues like Mosul, Kirkuk and the Turkmen, and the various wars. As a result of the current war, Fuller states, most “Turkish circles across the ideological and political spectrum…now believe that the United States has become a typical imperial power marching in the footsteps of past European imperialism […]” and that a Kurdish state is about to be created that will destabilize the region and become the same “source of discord, conflict, and struggle” as Israel is viewed to be.22 The relationship between Turkey and Iran, as Fuller explains, has been long, complex and without significant SunniShi`a hostility. While the Kurdish problem and issues regarding Turkic speakers in Iran are points of friction, the two nations have been remarkably successful at maintaining their cordiality: “Foreign Minister Gül has made efforts to maintain regular ties with Tehran, but he has also offered some friendly criticism; he has publicly stated that all countries must open themselves up to internal criticism and self-examination.”23 Although Turkey is deeply concerned about the prospect of nuclear weapons in Iran, “it also fears that U.S. policies will only push Iran to move more rapidly and dangerously in the nuclear direction.”24 Chapter 12, on “Turkey and Israel,” makes intelligible Turkey’s working relationship with Israel. Fuller also explores other regional relationships, and examines the varied strategic and political factors that govern Turkey’s current position in the world. His section on “Turkey and Eurasia” does the same for Turkey’s relationships with the Russian and Central Asian republics and other parts of Asia.Fuller provides insight on the increasing levels of trade with various partners and on Russia’s role as an

AHMAD

important energy supplier and as a complement to the West as a source of military hardware.25 He also predicts that “pan-Turkic identities may grow stronger with democratization.”26 He notes that Prime Minister “Erdogan has wisely sought to turn the highly contentious issue of past Ottoman massacres of Armenians over to an international scholarly panel for resolution rather than to leave it to politicians to pass historical judgment.”27 The chapter focusing on the U.S.Turkey relationship starts by explaining the close affiliation between these two countries in the five decades of the Cold War, in which the United States “facilitated Turkey’s entry into the Western alliance […] securing its position as a ‘Western’ state and beneficiary of Western largesse.”28 The strength of this closeness has had perverse effects on Turkish-Arab relations. Yet, despite this relationship, the U.S.-Turkey relationship has had its points of tension. Fuller cites examples of such tensions, including American pressure in 1972 “to ban all poppy production in Turkey—an entirely legal and supervised process for Turkey’s significant pharmaceutical industry”—the Kurdish refugee problem from the first Gulf War, and the U.S. Congress’s repeated attempts to make political hay out of the Armenian massacres.29 Furthermore, the

Books

domestic efforts of neoconservatives to paint religious Turks as a threat to the West fly in the face of the fact that polls show that supporters of the JDP have “consistently held more moderate views toward the United States than did supporters of two other major Turkish parties.”30 Turkey’s future trajectory is covered in two chapters, “Turkey’s Future Foreign Policy Scenarios,” and in the conclusion, “What Can Washington Do?” The bottom line in Fuller’s The New Turkish Republic is that Turkey will have to choose from among three options: a Washington-centric policy, a Euro-centric policy, or a Turkocentric policy. Turkey, understandably, will seek to put its own interests at the center, and Fuller argues that such a course could also serve the long-term interests of the United States if the United States makes certain key policy changes. These include opening dialogues with Turkey’s neighbors Syria and Iran, as well as making meaningful positive efforts to settle the Palestinian-Israeli dispute.31 I believe that Fuller’s analysis is accurate and constructive and that American policymakers will do well to take it into account.

Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad is an AmericanMuslim scholar and president of the Minaret of Freedom Institute.

NOTES

1 Graham Fuller, The New Turkish Republic: Turkey as a Pivotal State in the Muslim World (Washington DC, U.S. Institute of Peace Press), 7.

2 Ibid., 20.

3 Ibid., 26.

4 Ibid., 35.

5 Ibid 6 Ibid.

7 Ibid., 36.

8 Ibid., 37.

9 Ibid., 40.

10 Ibid., 41.

11 Ibid., 49.

12 Ibid. 50.

13 Ibid., 49.

14 Ibid., 51.

15 Ibid., 63.

16 Ibid., 71.

17 Ibid., 73.

18 Ibid., 76.

19 Ibid., 75 20 Ibid., 77.

21 Ibid., 78.

22 Ibid., 102.

23 Ibid., 110.

24 Ibid. 111.

25 Ibid., 129.

26 Ibid., 132.

27 Ibid., 135.

28 Ibid., 147.

29 Ibid., 149.

30 Ibid., 152.

31 Ibid., 171.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 1 ]

Books

Africa and Anger Algeria Remembers

the United States a more knowledgeable and more effective partner in the region, and will not only preclude the need for armed intervention but will also support African solutions to Africa’s issues.

Review by James Jay Carafano The creation of the command was a long overdue decision. In an increasingMartin Evans and John Phillips. ly globalized world, the United States can Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed. New no longer afford to ignore Africa or Haven: Yale University Press, engage with it only during times of crisis.

2007. Pp. 322. ISBN: 978-0Africa is a vital source of energy and min300-10881-1. eral resources. Failing and failed states are fertile grounds for conflict. Nations The publication of Martin Evans and are often incapable of addressing John Phillips’ Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed transnational health and environmental could not be more timely or necessary. concerns that could spread far beyond Recently, the Pentagon established the their borders.

AFRICOM will enable U.S. policyU.S. Africa Command—AFRICOM. Its creation was not due to plans by the mil- makers to focus more closely on Africa’s itary to invade any African nation. In problems, support regional efforts to fact, the motivation for creating the address mutual concerns, and bolster command was the opposite: to disprove capacity to tackle regional issues. This will the notion that the outside world needs only take place if the staff at AFRICOM to solve the problems of Africans for and others interested in the region help them. Establishing AFRICOM will make to end the misconception, in thought Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 3 ]

AFRICA AND ANGER

and in speech, that leads people to consider the African continent simply as a single entity. Africa is a polyglot of various countries, many of which resemble the nation-states of the West only in their possession of a seat at the UN. Each African nation has a unique history, culture, geography, and polity that cannot be ignored in the search for solutions and a future that will bring more prosperity than problems.

Algeria is particularly worthy of more detailed and informed study by the West.

It is an African nation with global influence. Algeria is part of the “labor frontier,” a handful of developing nations with young, large populations. These states have achieved only modest strides in economic growth and education. A characteristic they share is a geographic position that allows them access to the developed world. Algeria, for example, is only a two-hour plane ride from the heart of Europe. The nations that comprise the labor frontier provide the overwhelming bulk of the tens of millions of transnational workers worldwide.

Through globalization, the problems of specific countries such as Algeria affect the rest of the planet. These issues include the scourge of transnational terrorism that stretches from Tangiers to Paris and “Londonistan.”1 It would be wrong, however, to think of Algeria’s presence in the world as only a liability to itself and other nations. Algerians help fuel economic growth in the West. They also carry a lifeline back to their part of the world. Remittances—funds sent home by the labor diaspora living and working overseas—make up one of the largest forms of direct foreign investment but in many ways also dwarf other foreign assistance programs.

The influence of Algeria, along with [ 1 3 4 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

the other nations of the labor frontier, will likely only increase on the world stage in the years ahead. By some estimates, over the next fifteen years, Algeria and the surrounding countries will contribute an additional 15.5 million people to the European workforce alone.

Nonetheless, Algeria is an exporter of problems as well as people. Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed delves into the origins of these problems, exploring why solving them has proved to be intractable. The focus of the book is on a bloody internal struggle that spanned the 1990s, killing about 200,000 people.

The book nicely blends the strengths of its co-authors. Martin Evans is a professor of contemporary history at the University of Portsmouth. John Phillips is a veteran journalist, having worked for the Times and many other papers. They have indeed written a history worth reading.

The thesis of Algeria is eminently appealing since, from the outset, the book rejects the simplistic, cardboard explanations of why things go wrong in Africa.

“We want to go beyond stereotypes,” assert Evans and Phillips, “which interpret the conflict as the consequence of a pathological Oriental mindset, the simple battle between secularists and Islamists, or the inevitable failure of the post-independence regime. There is nothing inevitable or predetermined about Algeria. Instead, the country’s tragedy has to be understood as the product of a specific and complex historical context filled at every point with alternative possibilities and counter-factual scenarios.”2 Algeria traces the link from the past to the present, showing how the country arrived at its current political environment through historical precedents.

Evans and Phillips frame the context

CARAFANO

for the civil war that crippled the country by outlining Algeria’s troubling colonial past, from the shaky period of independence, marred by a malaise of high unemployment, rampant corruption, and political violence, to the post-Cold War era that saw superpower competition replaced by the rise of Islamic extremism.

The great strength of Algeria is the intelligent choices made by the authors in crafting a satisfying narrative that is com-

Books

Like all the purveyors of violence in Algeria, Bin Laden found followers. One of the most notable was Ahmed Ressam.

Ressam migrated to Canada where he became engaged in a plot to bomb the Los Angeles International Airport on New Year’s Eve 1999. The “Millennium Bomber” was arrested at the border, convicted, and sentenced to a long prison term. Ressam should have been a wakeup call announcing the proliferation of

If poverty alone does not cause terrorism

and civil wars, then foreign aid alone will not bring peace. prehensive but not overwhelming, highlighting key social, economic, and cultural developments as well as the country’s political trials.

Indeed, about half the book covers the historical roots of contemporary Algeria.

History is not only the subject of Evan and Phillip’s study; it is the major protagonist in the book. In Algeria, history became one of the principal tools for fueling conflict as factions competed to monopolize and manipulate the lessons of the country’s ancient roots, colonial past, and the disappointments and difficulties of independence in hopes of delivering on promises of peace and prosperity.

Osama Bin Laden and his followers were only the latest in a long line of those who reinterpreted the past to justify the present, equating battling “globalist” influences in Algeria with throwing off the colonial imperialist yoke. Throughout the 1990s, al-Qaeda looked to Algeria, not only as base of operations and a potential source of recruiting, but also as a future battleground in the war to reestablish dominion over Muslim lands.

transnational terrorist threats. The notice, however, went largely unheeded.

“Although Ressam was the most extreme example,” write Evans and Phillips, “many young Algerians, dispersed across Europe and North America either as immigrants or asylum seekers, gravitated toward extremist action. It would, of course, be wrong to suggest that every member of the Algerian diaspora was a potential terrorist. Nevertheless, the conditions of their lives abroad made a small minority highly susceptible to the lure of armed Islamism.”3 Astutely, Evans and Phillips do not make the simplistic case that poverty causes terrorism.

Instead, they make a subtle, more accurate point: vulnerable populations are always tempting targets for radicalization.

What Algeria should prompt most of all is a serious discussion on how to combat the forces that lead to extremism. If poverty alone does not cause terrorism and civil wars, then foreign aid alone will not bring peace. Addressing the “root” causes of political violence requires more than simply satisfying humanitarian Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 5 ]

AFRICA AND ANGER

impulses. The vaccine against spiraling violence is building a just civil society. As Evans and Phillips illustrate, however, over the course of a long, bitter history, Algerians have made many missteps that have frustrated the effort to foster transparency, good governance, and justice.

The result, as has happened in so many

other places on the continent, was the rise of conflict in Algeria.

James Jay Carafano is an assistant director of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies and senior research fellow at the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies.

NOTES

1 The nickname given to London after it turned a blind eye to religious extremists. Martin Evans and John Phillips, Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed (New Haven:

Yale University Press, 2007), xv.

2 Ibid., xv.

3 Ibid., 261.

View from the Ground

Invisible, Insecure, and Inaccessible: The Humanitarian Crisis in Chad Stephanie Getson The night before I arrived in Abéché to begin my internship with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Chad, a small group of rebels attacked the UNHCR guesthouse where I was planning to stay. Rebels killed one guard, and bound and gagged two other guards while the rebel leader threatened a colleague at gunpoint until he gathered enough money to pay off the intruders. Incidents like this have become common in Abéché, the third largest city in Chad, which serves as the base of humanitarian operations working to protect the refugees streaming across the border from Darfur.

Before arriving in the country I assumed that the Darfur refugee situation was the largest crisis in the region, but I soon found out that there are other equally dire problems that need to be addressed.

Stephanie Getson is a masters candidate in Georgetown’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, expecting to graduate in 2008.

She is concentrating her studies in International Conflict Management.

Last summer, she interned at the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Chad.

Off the Map. Chad is a vast, but little-known country in

Africa. The majority of its landscape is comprised of the inhospitable Sahara desert, contributing to the underdevelopment of the nation. Less than 3 percent of the land is considered arable and 80 percent of the population survives on less than one dollar a day.1,2 Even among other African nations, Chad remains isolated with few economic and political ties to its neighbors. It is not a member of the Economic CommuWinter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 7 ]

INVISIBLE, INSECURE, AND INACCESSIBLE

nity of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Sahara separates Chad from its northern neighbor, Libya. Although relations to the east with Sudan were initially amiable, in 2005, Chad lent support to the Justice and Equality Movement, Khartoum’s least popular rebel group operating in Darfur, effectively severing ties with Sudan.3 Even historical ties with its southern neighbor, the Central African Republic, are further strained by an ongoing conflict there.

Isolated from its neighbors both politically and geographically, Chad has continued to rely on its former colonial master—France. The French colonial legacy is omnipresent in Chad, as demonstrated by the French Cultural Center in N’Djamena, the capital of Chad, and the myriad of French army bases dotted throughout the country.

The borders of the country, similar to the borders of so many others in Africa, have been arbitrarily delineated by the former colonial rulers. Chad has continuously struggled to unite its diverse ethnic and linguistic groups, including the northern African traders that traverse the Sahara and the sedentary farmers of the nation’s southern reaches. Chad’s artificial borders, conflict-territory disputes, and consequent ethnic tensions have earned the nation a spot amongst one of the thirteen “most artificial” countries in the world, according to a study conducted by the National Bureau of Economic Research.4

Culture of Violence. Today, Chad

faces conflicts along its two longest borders: in the east with the highly publicized Darfur region of Sudan, and in the south with the less notorious Central African Republic.5 In eastern Chad, UNHCR has established twelve camps for [ 1 3 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

approximately 231,000 refugees from Darfur. Southern Chad houses four refugee camps for 44,000 refugees from the Central African Republic. If mentioned at all in the media, violence in Chad is dismissed as a spillover effect from the violence in Darfur. A more complete picture, however, reveals that the country is facing increasing internal violence.

Violence and war have become so pervasive in Chad that its population seems not to recognize it anymore. When I asked one Chadian friend if soccer was the national pastime, he responded with a laugh, “No, it’s war. If the International Olympic Committee made it a sport, Chad would win.”6 Chadians certainly have enough reasons to be fatalistic; one need only look at their leader, President Idriss Déby, to see why.

Déby was born in northeast Chad but received military training in N’Djamena and France. Eager for power, he lent support to warlord Hissène Habré during his rise to control Chad. After Habré deposed the president and took his post in 1982, he appointed Déby to the post of commander-in-chief of the army in gratitude. In 1990, Déby staged a coup and took power from his one time leader. Since then, his presidency has been characterized by brutality, greed, and a complete disregard for the needs of the Chadian people. In 2006, Déby earned Chad the title of the most corrupt nation in the world, a designation primarily given for redirecting revenues from a World Bank-sponsored oil pipeline project and health and education initiatives to buying arms and strengthening the Chadian military instead.7 In its Failed States Index, published this past summer, Foreign Policy highlighted Déby, along with Presidents

GETSON

Omar Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir of Sudan and Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, as three of the world’s worst leaders.8 Déby is equally unpopular internally.

In 2005, Déby changed the constitution to allow himself to run for a third term in office. In response, rebels from eastern Chad, including the United Front for Democratic Change and the Alliance of Revolutionary Forces, attacked the town of Adré on the Sudanese border.9 Déby accused the Sudanese government of backing the rebels, an accusation Khartoum vehemently denied. By February 2006, the governments of Chad and Sudan signed the Tripoli Agreement, pledging to restore diplomatic relations and enact a cease-fire along the border.

At the same time, rebel groups, many of which had coalesced into either the United Front for Change (FUC) or the Plat-

View from the Ground

August 2007 attacks by the FUC and SCUD rebel alliances drove 180,000 Chadians to flee their homes internally.

Still, others have fled to find safety in Darfur.

More than Spillover. Despite large rebel activity in the east and even the attempted coup in 2006, the situation in Chad has failed to make the international radar. A friend of mine who worked with a humanitarian relief organization in Darfur described eastern Chad as “Darfur in French.” Others consider the conflict a “forgotten crisis.” Unrecognized might be a better adjective to describe the problems in Chad, for the international community has barely recognized the trouble in Chad as anything but a consequence of the situation in Darfur.11

Unrecognized might be a better adjective to

describe the problems in Chad, for the international community has barely recognized the trouble in Chad as anything but a consequence of the situation in Darfur. form for Change, Unity, and Democracy (SCUD), refused to recognize the agreement.

Although many of the current rebels fought to put Déby in power in 1990, they fought to overtake the capital before the elections scheduled for May 2006.10 On 13 April 2006, rebels attacked the capital before being turned back. In May, elections went ahead as scheduled, but with the opposition boycotting the process, Déby easily won reelection to a third term. Rebel activity quieted during the summer rainy season of 2006, but resurged in December of that year. By

Well-meaning celebrities such as George Clooney contribute to the neglect. After he retuned from a visit to eastern Chad, he talked about a trip to Darfur, a place in which he never, in actuality, set foot. Such misrepresentation by the media has brought awareness and money to the atrocities of Darfur, not Chad, which also needs more international assistance. Since 2004, campaigns such as Save Darfur, STAND (the Student Anti-Genocide Coalition), and the Genocide Intervention Network, among others, have successfully organized fasts, rallies, and petitions that Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 3 9 ]

INVISIBLE, INSECURE, AND INACCESSIBLE

bring media and congressional attention to Sudan, but rarely mention its neighbors. While there are numerous UN agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) on the ground in Sudan, many of my colleagues who worked there feel that the proliferation of NGOs and the influx of money are going to waste in Darfur because true progress cannot be made without a lasting political resolution in Chad.

Excess money and international support are not an issue in Chad. More than three years after the refugee camps were established, most camps in eastern Chad have only four international actors present: the World Food Program (WFP), UNHCR, and representatives of two NGOs for camp management and health, though the particular NGOs vary by camp. The newly formed refugee camps were even more meager because

crises such as this, they are especially acute in Chad where even the most basic needs of the beneficiary population are not being met. Three-year old latrines are full and have not been replaced for a long time now. Aid workers built a water tower, but it has not held any water since its construction. Tents that are intended to last one season of good weather have become completely tattered after three years of use in the harsh, Saharan climate.

Security Crisis. The April 2006 coup attempt was followed by a relative calm throughout the summer and fall.

In November of last year, however, the tranquility was broken when a new coalition of rebel groups took over much of eastern Chad. In Abéché, their target was President Déby’s family compound.

A friend who lives two compounds away

If the international community is truly

serious about its efforts to bring international security to the sub-region, nations must back up their forceful words with sufficient action. the other lead agencies of the UN’s cluster system were not on the ground to perform their defined duties. UNICEF’s office in Abéché focuses mainly on serving the local Chadian schools.12 With no permanent presence at all except for one field office, their activities for refugees consisted mainly of sending tents and books for the schools.

The UN Office of the Coordination for Humanitarian Assistance (OCHA) has been operating in Darfur since 2003, yet they arrived in Abéché just this summer with only a small preliminary team.13 While budget issues exist in all [ 1 4 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

from Déby’s house showed me the threeinch holes in his ceiling from shells targeted at him. One landed two feet from where he slept, but luckily it did not explode. During the attacks in Guéréda, the chief of the UNHCR field office remained under rebel-controlled house arrest for three days until the UN coordinated an evacuation.

Some humanitarian staff did choose to stay at their posts throughout eastern Chad and attempted to work through “the insecurity” of last winter, but most evacuated by April of this year. For more than four months the refugee camps were

GETSON

View from the Ground

The rainy season in Chad lasts for about three months. Instead of absorbing the water so it can be used for farming and drinking, the parched land channels the water into waddis, or seasonal riverbeds. Nightly downpours erode the landscape and swell the waddis, making transportation nearly impossible. A trip of less than fifty kilometers can take an entire day. Daily plans to visit the camps from the field offices were planned according to what waddis were crossable that day. Sometimes we misjudged and a member of the convoy would get stuck in the mud. One morning I waited three hours by the side of a waddi for the pickup carrying our mandatory armed escort to dry out. By the time we got to the camp we only had three hours to work; leaving by three o’clock in the afternoon was mandatory to ensure that we made it back to the compound safely before dark.

Ground transportation during the rainy season is so difficult that the humanitarian staff has come to rely on flights, but even air transportation has its own problems. Wet weather routinely cancels scheduled flights. As I was leaving one field office, our small plane got stuck on the runway. All the passengers had to disembark and wait for the pilots to dig our way clear.

Seasonal rains not only make the existBad Weather. Increasing insecurity is ing job difficult, they add additional not the only problem confronting the problems to the humanitarian effort. humanitarian efforts in the country. The night before I arrived at Mile Camp, Prior to arriving, I read numerous a waddi overflowed and destroyed half of reports alluding to the difficulties of the plant nursery. I watched as workers transportation during the rainy season. I tried to salvage the tatters of six months always dismissed their complaints as of work. Many children also become vicirrelevant, naively concluding that rain in tims of the rain; each year a significant the desert was primarily beneficial for the number of children drown while swimdesert. I arrived in Chad in mid-June at ming in the waddi as the strong undertows the start of the rainy season and soon carry them downstream. Others suffer realized how thoroughly mistaken I was. from water-borne diseases that prevail

left with little outside help and no security or material relief. Two kilometers outside of Mile Camp, in Eastern Chad, an abandoned tank still stands as an eerie reminder of the past events.

When the humanitarian staff returned to the field offices in April, they were confronted with growing numbers of internally displaced Chadians fleeing attacks from Sudanese and Chadian rebels. The violence and corresponding displacement is worse in southeastern Chad. Chadian rebels have burned every village on the stretch of road between the towns of Goz BeĂŻda and Kou Kou. Charred foundations are the only remnants of the homes that once existed there. The former residents crowded to the outskirts of those two towns in makeshift lean-tos. Unidentified rebels operating under the command of various Chadian rebel groups or others originating across the border in Sudan attack the humanitarian community as well, regularly carjacking vehicles and kidnapping staff. In the first eight months of 2007 alone, over fifty security incidents involved humanitarian personnel in the region.14 As a result, all land travel now must be done in convoys with armed escorts, prolonging an already difficult process.

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 4 1 ]

INVISIBLE, INSECURE, AND INACCESSIBLE

in N’Djamena and several vehicles belonging to foreigners were attacked in the capital, including that of a Canadian colleague.18 As anti-foreign sentiment in the country grows, it threatens the ability of the humanitarian assistance community to operate in an already volatile environment.

If the international community is truly serious about its efforts to bring international security to the sub-region, No End in Sight. The end of the nations must back up their forceful words rainy season means that road conditions with sufficient action. This begins by will improve, facilitating the movement of putting pressure on member states of the not only humanitarian supplies, but also UN, particularly China, which has been rebel forces. Recent clashes between the reluctant to condemn the governments government and rebels hint that this win- of Sudan and Chad. It also means that ter could bring a security situation worse Chad and the Central African Republic than last year’s evacuations.15 Although in must be part of the Darfur peace talks. mid-October the EU gave final approval Without the full participation of all parto deploy up to 3,000 troops to Chad ties, including regional neighbors, any and the Central African Republic, it is agreement cannot hope to achieve apparent that the number is not sufficient regional stability.

Aside from offering help in the politto stabilize the region. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has already ical arena, the international community stated that the mission will not attempt to must provide adequate financial support secure the border without the support of for the growing crises in Chad and the Central African Republic. Donor counothers.16 In late October humanitarian efforts tries that are beginning to contribute aid throughout Chad were further impeded to the displaced must not forget the after Chadian authorities arrested repre- established refugees by cutting funding to sentatives of a French NGO attempting those populations. Additional financial to fly local children for adoption to support must be accompanied by suffiEurope. While the NGO claims they cient security to allow not only the delivwere told the children were orphans from ery of humanitarian aid and protection Darfur, reports have surfaced that they of staff, but also the protection of civilare in fact Chadian children from small ians who have been exposed to the viovillages on the border. Six NGO workers lence. Though more than 3,000 troops remain in police custody and the chil- from the European Union have been dren are being cared for in an orphanage mandated for these purposes, their while they await reunification with their forces are thinly spread over Chad and parents.17 Since then, distrust of cooper- the Central African Republic, making ation between Chadians and the human- their contribution to aid delivery inadeitarian community has grown. On 14 quate and minimal. The force’s small November anti-French protests erupted scale combined with its one-year manduring the rainy season. In early September, floods blocked aid workers from the refugee camp less than five kilometers away. The number of cholera and malaria cases spiked in the refugee camps and among the clusters of internally-displaced Chadians. Throughout the region strong downpours destroyed the mud and woven stick houses that the displaced had constructed.

[ 1 4 2 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

GETSON

date cannot effectively manage the destabilized region. In addition, these troops are assigned an unrealistic goal—to secure “favorable conditions for the reconstruction and economic and social develop-

View from the Ground

ment” of the sub-region—that ultimately cannot be achieved without additional provisions to the embattled country.19 Without proper support, the crisis in Chad will continue to deepen.

NOTES

1 Chad Country Profile. World Resources Institute, Internet, http://earthtrends.wri.org/ (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

2 Hasdai Westbrook, “Swarms at the Border: The Dead Heart of Africa.” Guernica. (July 2006), Internet, http://www.guernicamag.com (date accessed: 5 November 2007).

3 Roland Marchal, “Creeping Conflict: Chad, Sudan, and Darfur.” The World Today Vol. 63, no.

4.(April 2007).

4 Alesina, Alberto, William Easterly and Janina Matuszeski, “Artificial States.” Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper (June 2006), Internet, http://www.nber.org (date accessed: 9 October 2007).

5 U.S. Agency for International Development.

“Chad – Complex Emergency Situation Report #1” (2007), Internet, http://www.reliefweb.int/ (date accessed: 24 October 2007).

6 Djerrassem Mbaiorem. Interview with author.

N’Djamena, Chad, 17 June 2007.

7 “The Most Corrupt Countries.” Forbes Magazine (2006), Internet, http://www.forbes.com (date accessed: 9 October 2007).

8 “The Failed States Index.” Foreign Policy Magazine (July/August 2007), Internet, http://www.foreignpolicy.com (date accessed: 9 October 2007).

9 “Sudan and Chad Agree Peace Plan.” BBC News (9 February 2006), Internet, http://news.bbc.co.uk/ (date accessed: 29 October 2007).

10 “Behind Chad’s Rebel Alliance.” BBC News (12 April 2006), Internet, http://news.bbc.co.uk/ (date accessed: 29 October 2007).

11“The Failed States Index.” Foreign Policy Magazine (July/August 2007), Internet, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/ (date accessed: 9 October 2007).

12 Secretary-General’s High-Level on UN System-wide Coherence in the areas of Development, Humanitarian Assistance, and Environment, Transition from Relief to Development: Key Issues Related to Humanitarian and Recovery/ Transition Programmes (2006), UN, http://www.un.org/events/panel/resources/pdfs/Issu es%20Paper%20(8May06%20FINAL).pdf (date accessed: 31 October 2007).

13 UN Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance. OCHA Annual Report (2003), ReliefWeb, Internet, http://www.reliefweb.int/ (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

14 UN Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance. “Eastern Chad: Summary of Security Incidents affecting Humanitarian Operations From January 2007 to August 2007.”

ReliefWeb, http://www.reliefweb.int/ (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

15 “Chadian Rebels Attack Eastern Town.”

Reuters (October 18, 2007), Internet, http://www.alertnet.org (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

16 Constant Brand. “EU nations give final approval to deploy 3,000-strong force for Chad, Central African Republic.” Associated Press (October 15, 2007) http://www.nctimes.com (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

17 “Anti-French Riots Erupt in Chad.” BBC News (14 November 2007), Internet, http://news.bbc.co.uk/ (date accessed: 15 October 2007).

18 Bryn Boyce. Email to author. N’Djamena, Chad, 15 November 2007.

19 UN Security Council Resolution 1778 (September 25, 2007), Internet, http://www.un.org/Docs/sc/unsc_resolutions07.htm (date accessed: 29 October 2007).

Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 4 3 ]

View from the Ground

Perception and the Costs of Waiting Transition in Cuba

John-Michael McColl Life in Cuba is about waiting. Waiting for buses, waiting in line at banks, waiting for food. I spent most of my time in Cuba waiting for something. Today, Cubans continue to wait for just about everything, including news of the ailing Fidel Castro.

The rest of the world, particularly the exile community in Miami, scrutinizes every image of the aging leader, trying to determine if he is more or less frail and scraping for any information that will give them some indication of how much longer it will be until Castro is confined to the history books. Yet, the truth is that El Commandante shuffled off his mortal coil decades ago, when he ceased existing as a man and became an icon. For many, Castro is Cuban communism, pure and simple. They imagine that when he dies, his revolucíon will follow him into oblivion. Some picture a situation similar to the fall of the Berlin Wall, when communism seemingly collapsed overnight.

They expect Cubans from Miami and Havana to rush across the water straight into each other’s arms. On 24 October, President Bush laid out his plans for the upcoming “transition” in Cuba. Anticipating the day the “Cubans [will] rise up to demand their liberty,” President Bush announced the creation of a multi-billion dollar “Freedom Fund” which promises Cubans access to grants, loans, and debt relief to rebuild their country as soon as they oust the undemocratic

John-Michael McColl is currently a master’s candidate in Georgetown’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, concentrating in Latin American Government. He is from British Columbia, Canada, and graduated from Queen’s University in 2007.

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PERCEPTION AND THE COSTS OF WAITING

regime.1 To the U.S. president and everyone else who is planning for this big day, I have a piece of advice: don’t hold your breath.

Cuban Socialism: Myth versus Reality. Cuba is a place that captures

people’s imaginations and ignites their passions. The mythologizing began back with Christopher Columbus, who famously declared that it was “the most beautiful land that human eyes have ever seen.” Today leftists like Ignacio Ramonet, editor of Le Monde Diplomatique, continue to believe that Cuba is a Latin American oasis of equality, an island taking a brave stand against U.S. hegemony.

Journalists on the other side of the political spectrum, for example, Carlos Montaner, stubbornly insist on treating Cubans as a people held hostage by a ruthless and oppressive regime.2 My personal experiences revealed that both camps are right and wrong.

When I arrived in Cuba, I was more sympathetic to the island’s socialist experiment. When I left, I was more critical of it. Mostly though, I gained an appreciation for its complexity. People see what they want to see, and what I wanted to know was how Cubans saw their country.

I went to Cuba thinking it would be my last chance to see a socialist experiment in action. Even when I arrived, my first impression was that the system had passed its “best-before date” a long time ago.

The main reason people assume Cuban socialism is on the verge of collapse is because Soviet communism failed so miserably. To many, Cuba seems like a strange throwback from a different era, one that is stubbornly holding out against the widespread triumph of democracy and capitalism. But Cuban socialism is [ 1 4 6 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

very different from its Soviet kin; the main difference is that the Cuban variant is not a system maintained by force.

Communism was brought to Eastern Europe by force of arms, and it was the secret police and direct military measures that sustained it. In contrast, despite what Cuban exiles say, Cuba is not a police state. In Havana, you may see young people from the countryside standing around in ill-fitting uniforms directing traffic and checking residency permits, but the people they stop are more likely to start an argument than cower in terror. I met Cubans who were frustrated, bored, fed-up, and even disgusted with the political situation in the country. Cubans are not a free people, but they are not a people who live in fear.

By arguing that repressive force does not maintain the regime, I do not mean to deny that repression exists. The regime can be quite vicious, and its most outspoken opponents are frequently rounded up and arrested when their criticisms become too loud. Nonetheless, Cuba’s human rights record, though dismal, has actually improved from earlier years when the state was even less tolerant.

Homosexuals were singled out for especially cruel and degrading treatment, a phenomenon that culminated in their exodus during the 1980 Mariel Boatlift.

Without forgiving its inexcusable sins, we must admit that the Cuban regime has never put down a genuinely popular protest. There has never been a Tiananmen Square, a Prague Spring, or a Hungarian Uprising in Cuba. This is not because Cubans have not had the chance to organize opposition. Eastern Europeans faced the most sophisticated and repressive state apparatuses yet conceived, and they still organized resistance. Rather than facing Soviet tanks, Cuban dissi-

McCOLL

dents enjoy the full support of world’s sole superpower. The fact that they have been unable to mobilize popular protests against the Castro regime testifies to the fact that the regime retains widespread acceptance. In part, this is because unlike Eastern Europeans, Cubans feel socialism is their system, not something thrust

View from the Ground

ished neighborhoods in countries such as Venezuela, proud of their Olympic medals, and proud of their anti-imperialist foreign policy.

Not only do Cubans revel in their exceptionalism within Latin America, they also see socialism as being in their material self-interest. I remember a

Cubans are not a free people, but they are not a people who live in fear. upon them by outsiders. An old woman once said to me, as we looked out on a crumbling city from the window of her once-grand apartment, “The worst thing about all this is that we’ve done it to ourselves.”3 My professors in Cuba were erudite, eloquent, and critical on any topic except Cuba. When it came to discussing life on the island, they staunchly defended the party line. At the University of Havana, I found that you do not learn much by listening to what people say; you learn by listening to how they say it. Cubans believe, and not without reason, that before Castro came to power the island had not fully gained its independence.

Indeed, Cuba’s heavy economic dependence on the United States limited its sovereignty during its earlier experiment with democracy. In every class, we were told that Cuba’s subjugation by colonial powers during most of its history was the direct and unavoidable consequence of capitalism, and that the failures of liberal democracy in Cuba proved that socialism was the only path to national dignity and independence. In Cuba, socialism is made synonymous with patriotism, and Cubans are very patriotic. They are proud to provide doctors to impover-

Jamaican athlete whom the Cubans had brought over on a scholarship. We had been waiting about an hour by the highway, just to watch our bus cruise by because it was full. At that point I made it perfectly clear how I felt about the Cuban public transportation system. My Jamaican friend smiled and replied, “Well, man, at least there is a transportation system.”4 When Cubans look at their capitalist neighbors—Jamaica, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic—they can see that capitalism does not always work.

Using a combination of health, economic, and educational indicators, the UN ranks Cuba 50th out of 177 countries in this year’s Human Development Index, putting Cuba far ahead of the Dominican Republic (94th) and Jamaica (104th).5 People still look to Miami for the good life, but they remember that the free market did not bring the American dream to most Cubans. Instead, Habaneros worry that capitalism will bring them the poverty of Kingston and Port-au-Prince.

The importance of memory was impressed upon me from an old AfroCuban man whom I met on my way home from one of mass political rallies that form part of life in Havana. The march Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 4 7 ]

PERCEPTION AND THE COSTS OF WAITING

had gone on for hours, and covered several kilometers, but the old man assured me, he would always come out for the revolution. “Before socialism” he told me, “the black people of Cuba were treated like dogs.”6 It was the revolution that taught him how to read, and how to “live with dignity.” While racist attitudes still exist in Cuba, in 1990 Cuba’s population of 11 million people included more than 13,000 black physicians. As a point of comparison, the United States, with a population of 300 million (and a black population four times as large as Cuba’s), counted just over 20,000 black doctors in the same year.7 Afro-Cubans feel that the revolution has vastly improved their position in Cuban society, but more importantly, they feel the return of capitalism threatens all that.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Cuban economy contracted by about 35 percent, forcing the socialist regime to permit a partial economic liberalization that allowed remittances from Cuban exiles in Miami. In the 1990 census, 85 percent of Cuban-Americans listed themselves as white; their remittances flowed disproportionately to white Cubans back on the island.8 The result was a widening of the economic gap between white and black Cubans—that had narrowed under socialism. The racial division between those who benefited from economic liberalization, and those who did not, was not lost on the Afro-Cubans I met.

Income inequality along racial lines is just one concern Cubans have about a return to capitalism. Everyone in Cuba, from the urban poor to rural farmers, has become accustomed to free education, free and universal health care, and a guaranteed minimum standard of living. While the minimum standard of liv[ 1 4 8 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

ing is not high, and Cuba’s schools and hospitals have seen better days, Cubans remind themselves that everyone else is waiting in the same line, and that at the end of the day, no one is going to starve.

In fact, Cubans have become so proud of their meager, yet reliable, social safety net that it is usually the first thing they cite in defense of their revolution. I will never forget what I asked a student I met at the university, “Don’t you think it is crazy that you can’t even publish an independent student newspaper?” He replied, “Of course, but overall, wouldn’t you rather have access to free health care?”9 In the eyes of the Cubans, capitalism, which promises the freedom of choice, cannot compare with socialism, which guarantees access to free health care and education. A false dichotomy between these rights is reinforced by the conditions that prevail in neighboring capitalist countries, where government spending has been strictly limited by the conditions attached to the IMF loans.

Another factor that allows Castro to frame the debate over democracy in his own terms is the economic embargo imposed on Cuba by the United States.

Castro blames virtually all the dysfunctions of the socialist economy on the U.S. embargo, and a surprising number of Cubans actually believe him. Repressive, sometimes illogical, policies are defended as necessary responses to American aggression. Everything from the silencing of dissidents to a law forbidding Cubans from forming friendships with foreigners is justified as an unfortunate but necessary evil in the struggle for national independence. Today, political freedom is presented to Cubans as a choice between being an American colony under capitalism, or a free and independent nation under socialism.

McCOLL

View from the Ground

Transition but no Transforma- not overthrow Raúl Castro, but it will tion. Although socialism seems make it more difficult for him to justify anachronistic to readers in the United States, the discrediting of neoliberalism and the rise of new leftist leaders like Hugo Chávez leads Cubans to believe that the tide of history is with the revolution, not against it. This is not to say that Cubans are blindly devoted to socialism and that its legitimacy will endure indefinitely. Cuban socialism will undoubted-

the failings of his own regime and to portray his opponents as threats to national sovereignty. Allowing Americans to visit and do business on the island will not only show Cubans all they have to gain by opening their economy, but will give them a chance to see face-to-face that Americans and their democracy are not as corrupt as they are portrayed. The real

People still look to Miami for the good life,

but they remember that the free market did not bring the American dream to most Cubans. ly change with the passing of Fidel; Raúl Castro has already indicated that he will take a more pragmatic and less ideological stance. In the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse, he was a crucial advocate for economic liberalization and reform.10 Last December he declared himself “willing to resolve at the negotiating table the longstanding dispute between the United States and Cuba.”11 While many Cubans may not be as inspired by Raúl as they are by his brother, Raúl has clearly consolidated control and the regime is still seen as a legitimate expression of the popular will. The “transition” has already happened, and Raúl Castro is the country’s new leader. However, unfortunately for Cuba, he shows no signs of being much of a democrat, or of allowing free and open elections.

In the final analysis, it is clear that Cuba is changing, but not in the way that President Bush and other wishful thinkers envisioned and wanted the transition to happen. By ending the failed embargo of Cuba, the United States may

force behind the counterproductive embargo, the once-invincible CubanAmerican Lobby, has been on the decline since their radicalism was revealed by the Elián González saga.12 Polls show that even their base in Miami is becoming increasingly moderate in their views on Cuba.13 U.S. policymakers must take advantage of this political opening to break with a forty-sevenyear-old failed policy and end the isolation of the Cuban people.

Conclusion. While dramatic news cov-

erage reminds us that many Cubans are willing to risk everything to seek greener pastures in Miami, it is easy forget that many more choose to stay, and that they are the ones who will ultimately decide the island’s future. It is clear that there will come a day when these Cubans will demand an opening of their politics and their economy. When and how this happens will, and should, depend on a domestic political process within Cuba.

For its part, the United States can best Winter/Spring 2008 [ 1 4 9 ]

PERCEPTION AND THE COSTS OF WAITING

advance the prospects of Cuban democracy by demonstrating that democracy and free markets can actually deliver on their promises of increased prosperity and a more inclusive citizenship for the people of Latin America. With such monumental challenges facing Cuba and the region, it should be clear that nothing will be achieved through a passive approach, sitting and anticipating the death of Fidel Castro. The death of the old Commandante will not ignite a popular uprising against his brother, nor will it open the way for American-led democ-

ratization. The United States must attempt to end the half-century stalemate and set Cuba-U.S. relations on a new track now, before Castro’s death. By embarking on a new policy of constructive engagement with Cuba, the United States can break the old dynamic that has allowed the Castro family to remain in power for this long. The specifics of such a policy invite further debate, but it is obvious that making plans and waiting for Castro to die is no help to the people of Cuba. What Cubans clearly do not need is more waiting.

NOTES

1 Bush, George W. “President Bush Discusses Cuba Policy,” The White House, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/10/20071024-6.html (date accessed: 26 October 2007).

2 Montaner, Carlos Alberto, and Ignacio Ramonet, “Was Fidel Good for Cuba?” Foreign Policy, 1 January 2007, 56.

3 Conversation with the author, Havana, Cuba, January 2006.

4 Interview by author, Cojimar, Cuba, March 2006.

5 UN Development Programme “Human Development Report 2006,” UN, http://hdr.undp.org/hdr2006/report.cfm. (date accessed: 30 October 2007).

6 Conversation with author, Havana, Cuba, 25 January 2006.

7 Dade, Carlo, “Canada, Cuba, Race and Engagement,” Focalpoint, February 2007, Canadian Foundation for the Americas, http://www.focal.ca/publications/focalpoint/fp0107s e/?lang=f&article=article7 (date accessed: 30 October 2007).

[ 1 5 0 ] Georgetown Journal of International Affairs

8 Ibid.

9 Conversation with author, Havana, Cuba, February 2006.

10 Peters, Philip, “Will Raúl Castro Reform Cuba’s Economy?” Cuba Policy Report E-Newsletter, (September 25, 2007), The Lexington Institute, http://lexingtoninstitute.org/1177.shtml (date accessed: 30 October 2007).

11 Castro, Raúl . “Speech Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Landing for the Granma,” Vanguardia (2 December 2006), http://www.vanguardia.co.cu/index.php?tpl=design/secciones/lectura/ingles.tpl.html&newsid_obj_id=11195 (date accessed: 24 October 2007).

12 Marquis, Christopher, “Cuban-American Lobby on the Defensive,” the New York Times, 30 June 2000.

13 New Democrat Network, “Survey of Cuban and Cuban American Resident Adults in Miami-Dade and Boward,” (September 2006), http://www.ndn.org/hispanic/memos/Cuban-ExilePoll.pdf (date accessed: 24 October 2007).

A Look Back

Rethinking Victory in the “War on Terror” Interview with Philip H. Gordon GJIA: You say in your new book, Winning the Right War: The Path to

Security for America and the World, that we've been fighting the wrong war, the war on terror, for the past six years. Why is the war on terror the "wrong" war? What would be the "right" war? What do you mean by the title?

GORDON: Let me start with the notion of war. A lot of people

have criticized the terminology of calling it a war. I think that's fair. There are real problems with thinking about it as a war. I have decided not to fight that rhetorical battle because I think that's what we call it, for better or for worse, that's how it got named. Both the supporters and the critics of the war on terror utilize the term—it’s a shorthand. Is it problematic? A little bit. But then, we also have the war on poverty, the war on drugs, and the war on crime. And nobody thinks that we should use the military to solve poverty. I would rather focus my attention on what we are doing than what we call it. And that's why I use the word "war" in the title and, at least, that has the merit of galvanizing people to know that there's something really serious that we have to do together.

But it is the "wrong" war because we have thought about it and fought it too much like a traditional conflict that you can win by deploying your military power against "the enemy," as

Philip H. Gordon is a senior fellow for U.S. Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. He is the former director for European Affairs at the National Security Council. His most recent book is Winning the Right War: The Path to Security for America and the World.

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RETHINKING VICTORY IN THE “WAR ON TERROR”

if there were some single enemy out there. If there is an analogy at all that is appropriate for this, it is not World War II—it is the Cold War. And that's because I think this is ultimately a question of ideas, an ideological issue that will end only when the adversaries give up their romantic and revolutionary ideology rather than when we somehow defeat them on the battlefield.

So again, a classic war you win on the battlefield. You have political differences, it's decided on the battlefield, and then you impose political conditions on the enemy. That is very much the wrong way to think about what's going on here.

So that's the core argument.

GJIA: You argue that the Cold War "pro-

vides the most instructive metaphor for

Moscow and trying to defeat the Soviets— and just doing nothing and letting them defeat us. That's what we did. We contained it and we ultimately won in that way. The Cold War is a useful analogy now because we have to do the same thing. It would be nice to think that we could win the war on terror by sending military troops to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, Iran, and Pakistan, but the reality is quite different. Merely discussing the war on terror in these terms shows that this strategy is an absurd, ineffective measure. Instead, we should contain the threat, defend ourselves, and promote changes in other ways.

GJIA: Given that President Bush recently

suggested the Iranian nuclear threat might possibly unleash World War III,

The Americans are no longer ready to

follow an argument that says,“Let's go use our power to spread democracy and freedom.” the struggle against Islamic terrorism."

Could you elaborate why?

GORDON: Yes, the Cold War was called the

"Cold War" precisely because it wasn't a traditional war. Our leaders in the mid to late 1940s realized that they could win the struggle against the Soviet Union and communism as if it was a traditional war.

This is why it ended up being a Cold War where we contained it and waited until the ideology in the system crumbled from beneath it. Kennan talked about how the Soviet Union would mellow over time.

He did not know it would take that long.

But his most important insight was to realize that we needed an alternative between World War III—invading

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how real do you think is the threat of another world war? Which war would it be, given that there is some dispute over whether we are currently in World War III? Would this be World War IV? I think that World War III is a terrible concept and it’s linked to what I mean about the “right” war and the “wrong” war. It is a dangerous concept because it does exactly the opposite of what we want to do. It implies that there is one big enemy out there and, if necessary, we need to do something similar to what we did in World War II. In that war, we operated a draft; we had 16 million soldiers; we spent 40 percent of our GDP on defense; we invaded major

GORDON:

GORDON

countries in Europe and Asia; we occupied them for a large number of years.

Now if you think that is what we need to do with this threat, then by all means, make the case. Some are making it. Norman Podhoretz's new book is called World War IV because he considers the Cold War to be World War III. But that misunderstands the nature and scale of the threat.

In World War II, Nazi Germany was in the process of conquering all of Europe, while Japan was dominating Asia. This was a massive and major threat to our interests, and ultimately to our own country. The terrorism threat is very real and very serious, but it is not existential in the same sort of way.

There are indeed people who believe that the threat of another massive terrorist attack in the United States legitimizes emergency military measures and casualties running in the thousands or tens of thousands of lives. In my view, we could send those military forces to Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Syria, and Egypt, but we will only exacerbate the problem.

So I think "World War III" is a terrible concept, and a dangerous one.

A Look Back

our own system as a model to show that freedom, capitalism, and democracy were attractive; and we did our best to assist those fighting for these same principles within the communist world. We couldn't do it for them, but we were confident that in the end they would see the light and do it themselves; and I think that is much more effective and much more lasting, and the same needs to happen now. It would be nice if we were powerful enough to reach in into the Islamic world and show people that they need to change. But ultimately, it has to come from within, and so we have to do something similar to what we did then: uphold our own principles and values and show that in the end our system is worth emulating, and that there are better ways for them to change their own futures than through violence and terrorism.

GJIA: The Cold War came to an end when the people realized that the system was no longer reliable. The United States helped by offering an alternative model for society, and by encouraging change from outside. How could the United States instigate a change from the outside in today's world?

This March will mark five years since the U.S. invasion in Iraq. Many people in this country and in Europe believe that this war was a failure, and that neo-conservative theorists who affected that policy have been effectively discredited. But now it seems that maybe they are not a thing of the past, as neo-conservative thinkers are serving as foreign policy advisers to some of the presidential candidates. Do you think that neo-conservative thought still plays a large role in this administration, and might potentially in the next administration as well?

GORDON: That's a really good question, a hard one. Ultimately, I don't think the United States can itself bring about that change. It has to come from within, just as it did in the Soviet world or in the communist world. We had our role. We defended ourselves; we tried to uphold

GORDON: Neo-conservative ideas will always be around in the United States because there will always be people who think that we can and therefore should use our power to do good in the world. But these ideas are currently on the decline.

They seem to always come in waves, and

GJIA:

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the more powerful the United States is feeling, the more optimistic some people are that we can actually use our power to spread our values. And we did feel this way in the early 2000s when, after the 1990s, we had achieved impressive economic growth, military strength, and political legitimacy and popularity around the world. After 9/11, it was also really tempting to believe that we had to do it. So you had a moment that fueled the rise of neo-conservatism.

But now after these past few years of getting bogged down in Iraq, and seeing how hard it is to spread democracy, those ideas are on the wane and building up budget deficits and overstretching the military. The mood has changed. Americans are no longer ready and comfortable with the idea of using their power to spread democracy and freedom. These ideas are largely on a decline and they will dominate the next administration, and I think even the Bush administration has largely abandoned it. I wrote a piece in Foreign Affairs in 2006 called "The End of the Bush Revolution" in which I tried to show that the Bush administration was already moving away from this policy.

Indeed, certain candidates, including Giuliani, have surrounded themselves with neoconservative advisers, but I do not think that the structure is there anymore to support that sort of foreign policy.

GJIA: Are the sanctions that were recent-

ly imposed on Iran at all related to the neoconservative movement, or is that just a separate idea? Do you think these sanctions are an effective strategy?

There is a spectrum here—it's not one or the other. You don't have to be a neoconservative to think that the

GORDON:

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United States should promote democracy and that there are times when it needs to use force and sometimes sanctions against a regime such as Iran. I would not use the sanctions case as proof that neoconservatism is back. There is a spectrum, and I think that we've moved along it, away from neo-conservatism.

There is a possibility of a comeback, and Iran is an issue than could push the country back in that direction. Those ideas could and would come to the fore again if Iran developed a nuclear weapon, or provoked another conflict in the Middle East via Hezbollah. There would be more support in the United States for dealing with it in ways that neo-conservatives would be sympathetic with. Those ideas could also come back if there was another major terrorist strike on the United States. It's been six years, so people are thinking, "Alright, that was terrible, but maybe we overstated the threat," and if there was another 9/11, people might say, "Bush was right, we have to do what we have to do no matter what it costs and democratize the Middle East."

Therefore it could come back, but I wouldn't necessarily see something like sanctions on Iran as proof that these ideas are still strong.

Comparing and contrasting the events in Iraq in 2002 and 2003 and in Iran today, do you see similarities between the two situations, with accusations of weapons of mass destruction and a drumbeat for sanctions—UN sanctions—or this time, unilateral sanctions?

GJIA:

GORDON: There are both major similari-

ties and major differences. It is similar in the sense that you have the United States accusing a hostile regime in the Middle East of developing weapons of mass

GORDON

destruction. Ironically in this case, those accusations are almost certainly true. It was thought they were true about Iraq the last time, but one of the consequences of being wrong about it is that people do not believe the U.S. government now when it makes allegations.

Frankly, they are right; I think Iran is moving in the direction of nuclear weapons capability. That's similar. The use of UN Security Council resolutions to justify potential action is also similar. Last time it didn't come out of the blue. The Bush administration and others said, "Look, we have seventeen UN Security Council resolutions stating that Saddam Hussein must accept inspectors." A similar situation is happening with Iran now.

There is a Security Council resolution saying that they're not allowed to enrich uranium, but they are enriching uranium, and therefore action is justified. In short, there are some similarities, but there are also major differences. It's important to remember that no one is really talking about an invasion of Iran and occupation and regime change in the way we were about Iraq. That's partly because Iraq has proven so difficult, but

A Look Back

How do you envision the role of the Europe in the diplomatic effort to deal with the Iranian nuclear problem?

GJIA:

Americans realize that they can't do everything alone anymore. The attitude in 2001 and 2002 was that it would be nice to have European support, but we don't need it. People thought, "We're really powerful, they're wrong, they'll come around anyway, and so let's just do what we have to do." Now there is a new mood and new needs to find friends and allies around the world. On Iran, especially, there is a great desire to have European support for sanctions as an alternative to war. The administration has changed its tone on the issue and is now trying to win back European support.

GORDON:

EU Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana has been leading the effort on nuclear diplomacy with Iran. However, those efforts were recently bypassed by the latest sanctions by the United States.

What has been the reaction in Brussels to the latest sanctions? Is there the feeling that the United States is again acting uni-

GJIA:

That's when the “War on Terror� will be over: when the risk of terrorism is small enough that it doesn't drive and shape our policy and society, but is another concern among many others. it's also because Iran is a much bigger country, and to the extent that people are talking about military force, they're talking about air strikes on nuclear facilities rather than invasion, occupation, and regime change. That's a major difference.

laterally and sidestepping Europe?

GORDON: One could argue that the sanctions, rather than undercutting Solana, actually bolster him. They allow him to say to Iran, "Look, the Americans want to

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RETHINKING VICTORY IN THE “WAR ON TERROR”

do a lot more: they want to increase pressure; some of them want to use force; so let's talk about a deal. Here's a package of

tries, and they would be unified in their criticism. They would also criticize Iran for not accepting their compromise, but

Neo-conservative ideas will always be

around in the United States because there will always be people who think that we can and therefore should use our power to do good in the world. they would not support U.S. military force. It's often overlooked how relatively united the Europeans are. They seem so horribly split on Iraq, but Iraq was more the exception. On most issues—the Arab-Israel conflict, Iran, Afghanistan— they have pretty much a similar position.

I would also add on Iraq, that it came out GJIA: When the United States invaded as a European split over Iraq, but it realIraq in 2003, it divided NATO allies and ly was a European split over the United EU member states, and was the most sig- States. The European countries that supnificant transatlantic political split in ported the Iraq war did it not because decades. What is the current conse- they thought it was a good idea, but quence of this rhetoric—for the potential because they wanted to stay close to the bombing of Iran—on European unity United States. So the real thing that and NATO unity? Do you think that divides them is how much they want to go today the EU is a more politically unified out of their way to be close partners to the and cohesive unit that would work United States. together to balance the United States?

GJIA: Do you believe that Iran is the GORDON: Ironically, our actions split greatest issue right now for U.S. national Europe over the war in Iraq and our security? What about Pakistan, North actions in Iran could bring them togeth- Korea, and other countries? Does it even er to oppose the United States. The truth make sense to talk about countries as is, in Iraq, most European governments threats in the age of terrorism? did support the war. Except France, Germany, Belgium, and Luxemburg, the GORDON: I find it hard and not terribly governments supported it. The Euro- useful to rank threats. What does it mean pean people, however, did not. So we to say that North Korea is more dangersplit the governments over Iraq, and I ous than Iran? When you’re making forthink in this case, barring other circum- eign policy, you obviously need to decide stances , U.S. air strikes in Iran would be what the priority issues are, but it’s opposed by all of the European coun- impossible to say which is a greater threat. carrots and sticks, and if we don't strike a deal, then there's a risk that the United States is going to do something unpleasant." Most Europeans didn't support this latest round of sanctions, but at the same time, that threat is useful to them in their diplomacy.

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GORDON

There are some threats that are more likely but less grave, and there are others that are very serious but less likely. A North Korean ballistic missile with a nuclear weapon landing in an American city is clearly a greater threat in terms of seriousness than an act of terrorism, but it's much less likely. How do you balance seriousness and likelihood as you take this all into account? Is Iran the greatest threat to the United States? Again, Iran getting a nuclear weapon would be a very bad thing and would likely lead to further proliferation in the region. I do think that they could be deterred and contained, but, of course, I can't know for sure. But how do you compare that type of threat with the risk of al-Qaeda operating out of the Pakistan/Afghan border and undertaking terrorist attacks in the United States? The latter is a more likely action, but threats like North Korea and Iran could prove to be more consequential.

Going back to the Cold War, you said that we should not try to intervene but instead we should be a model of change and democracy. How do you think the United States should promote its own values in the face of a wide variety of terrorist groups who represent the antithesis of what the United States stands for?

GJIA:

A Look Back

But I do think that there are an awful lot of people out there who are on the fence, who are deciding what they think of the United States and what they think of terrorism and how justified it is. And those people are judging us and our values and our standards, and the more we do to raise questions about whether we really are a decent, caring, and just country and people, the more we do to push them onto the wrong side of that issue, either to support terrorism or at least be indifferent to it. So that's why I think that these things do matter in the end, and ultimately just as we did with communism, we need to prove their ideology wrong.

They're out there preaching that the path to happiness and success is through Islamism, fundamentalism, and terrorism, and we should be able to prove that wrong. We should be confident that we can win this battle of ideas.

A final question. The last chapter in your book is called "What Victory Will Look Like." Could you elaborate on how you envision the future, and how we'll know when we've achieved "victory"?

GJIA:

GORDON: The end of the Cold War offers

an idea of what victory would be like. It is when the adversary realizes that what it thinks it is fighting for is not worth fighting for and looks for a different path.

GORDON: You are right that there are a How will we know we're there? We will variety of terrorist groups out there and know the "War on Terror" is over—it some of them are lost causes, in the sense could take tens of years or a couple of that core members of heavily implicated generations—but we'll know it is over. It terrorist groups are unlikely to change will be a world in which fear of terrorism their view of the United States. To elabo- is no longer the dominant political or rate, were the United States to implement foreign policy issue of the day. The threat the Geneva Conventions tomorrow, of Islamist terrorism is always going to be leaders of al-Qaeda would certainly not a possibility. Eventually, the ideology will lay down their arms and call a truce. be discredited, and the number of its That’s a naïve understanding of the issue. supporters will decrease dramatically, Winter/Spring 2008` [ 1 5 7 ]

RETHINKING VICTORY IN THE “WAR ON TERROR”

reducing the terrorist rhetoric to a residual concern rather than a dominant paradigm that shapes the national and international political scene. This scenario is very much similar to the Cold War. For a time, the Cold War was the top priority.

Of course there were other issues—environment, immigration, poverty—but the Cold War drove and shaped our defense

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budget, until eventually it no longer did.

That's when the "War on Terror" will be over: when the risk of terrorism is small enough that it doesn't drive and shape our policy and society, but is another concern among many others.

PHILIP H. GORDON was interviewed by Jacob Comenetz & Alfia Sadekova.