Spring 2017

HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW

APARTHEID SUSTAINED

THE NEW COLONIALISM?

INTERVIEW: JAKE TAPPER

VOLUME XLIV NO. 1, SPRING 2017 HARVARDPOLITICS.COM

POLICE STATE

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POLICE STATE

This issue’s cover topic was originally proposed by Sophie DiCara.

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Cyberespionage: And the Need for Norms Sam Kessler

14 Police Brutality: A Statistical Perspective Anirudh Suresh

11 Apartheid Sustained Mfundo Radebe

20 The President’s Generals Wright Smith

CAMPUS

CULTURE

3

Finding Sanctuary at Harvard Anna Biggs

34 The Alabamafication of America Drew Pendergrass

6

STRIKE Alisha Ukani

37 Pussy Riot Cherie Hu

UNITED STATES

INTERVIEWS

17 The Case for Proportional Representation Danny Friedman

40 Jake Tapper Humberto Juárez

20 The President’s Generals Wright Smith 23 Capital Punishment Lizzy Schick 25 Autocracy at Midnight Richa Chaturvedi

WORLD

42 Malcolm Jenkins Marty Berger

ENDPAPER 44 The Liberal Tongue Tasnim Ahmed

25 Autocracy at Midnight Richa Chaturvedi 28 Trafficking in Persons Report: 15 Years Later Rachel Schartz

34 The Alabamafication of America Drew Pendergrass

32 The New Colonialism?

Elizabeth Manero

Email: president@harvardpolitics.com. ISSN 0090-1032. Harvard Political Review. All rights reserved. Image credits: Facebook: 40- Jake Tapper. Flickr: 1- Elvert Barnes; 1- United States Department of Defense; 14- Elvert Barnes; 25- Gopal Vijayaraghavan; 28- Nicolas Nova; 37- PunkToad. Pexels: 23. Photographer: 5- Elmer Vivas Portillo. Unplash: 14- Kimberly Richards, 34- Gabriel Garcia Marengo. Pixabay: 24- xoracio.

The United States Navy: 8. Wikimedia: Cover- Jamelle Bouie; 1- Balatokyo; 1- Jim Bowen; 11- Kyknoord; 20- Ipankonin; 32; 34; 42- Keith Allison; 44- chensiyuan.

SPRING 2017 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW 1

FROM THE PRESIDENT

HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW A Nonpartisan Undergraduate Journal of Politics, Est. 1969—Vol. XLIV, No. 1

EDITORIAL BOARD PRESIDENT: Ali Hakim PUBLISHER: Peter Wright MANAGING EDITOR: Samuel Plank ASSOCIATE MANAGING EDITOR: Quinn Mulholland ASSOCIATE MANAGING EDITOR: Samuel Kessler STAFF DIRECTOR: Ari Berman SENIOR COVERS EDITOR: Sal DeFrancesco ASSOCIATE COVERS EDITOR: Nicolas Yan SENIOR U.S. EDITOR: Carla Troconis ASSOCIATE U.S. EDITOR: Henry Brooks ASSOCIATE U.S. EDITOR: Chad Borgman SENIOR WORLD EDITOR: Jacob Link ASSOCIATE WORLD EDITOR: Derek Paulhus ASSOCIATE WORLD EDITOR: Akshaya Annapragada SENIOR CULTURE EDITOR: Chloe Lemmel-Hay ASSOCIATE CULTURE EDITOR: Russell Reed SENIOR CAMPUS EDITOR: Akash Wasil ASSOCIATE CAMPUS EDITOR: Katherine Ho INTERVIEWS EDITOR: Martin Berger BUSINESS MANAGER: Jennifer Horowitz ASSOCIATE BUSINESS MANAGER: Enrique Rodriguez SENIOR DESIGN EDITOR: Kyle McFadden ASSOCIATE DESIGN EDITOR: Victoria Berzin ASSOCIATE DESIGN EDITOR: Eliot Harrison SENIOR MULTIMEDIA EDITOR: Sebastian Reyes ASSOCIATE MULTIMEDIA EDITOR: James Blanchfield SENIOR TECH DIRECTOR: Richa Chaturvedi ASSOCIATE TECH DIRECTOR: Alisha Ukani ASSOCIATE TECH DIRECTOR: Will Finigan

STAFF Perry Abdulkadir, John Acton, Victor Agbafe, Tasnim Ahmed, Solange Azor, Fernanda Baron, Marie Becker, Marty Berger, Devon Black, Mark Bode, Evan Bonsall, Jack Boyd, Harman Paul Brar, Jiafeng Chen, Hana Connelly, Chris Cruz, Pedro Luis Cunha Farias, Justin Curtis, Ashish Dahal, Nick Danby, Sunaina Danziger, Ali Dastjerdi, Sophie DiCara, Brandon Dixon, Avika Dua, Casey Durant, Austin Eder, Steven Espinoza, Joshua Florence, Adam Friedman, Daniel Friedman, Miro Furtado, Edgar Gonzalez, Jay Gopalan, Samarth Gupta, David Gutierrez, Olivia Herrington, Thomas Huling, Chimaoge Ibe, Minnie Jang, Michael Jasper, Alejandro Jimenez, Cindy Jung, Matthew Keating, Daniel Kenny, Andrew Kim, Kieren Kresevic, Amelia Lamp, Ashiley Lee, David Leeds, Elton Lossner, Kay Lu, Patrick McClanahan, Olivia McGinnis, Ayush Midha, Malvika Menon, Erica Newman-Corre, Kiera O’Brien, Nadya Okamoto, Anna Raheem, Anne Raheem, Apoorva Rangan, Neill Reilly, Alyssa Resar, Bella Roussanov, Chico Payne, Juliet Pesner, Stefan Petrovic, Lily Piao, Tess Saperstein, Lizzy Schick, Audrey Sheehy, Soraya Shockley, Wright Smith, Nick Stauffer-Mason, Sydney Steel, Gloria Su, Anirudh Suresh, Richard Tong, Rachel Tropp, Nico Tuccillo, Celena Wang, Katie Weiner, Joseph Winters, Jenna Wong, Sarah Wu, Emily Zauzmer, Catherine Zhang, Anna Zhou, Yehong Zhu, Andrew Zucker

ADVISORY BOARD Jonathan Alter Richard L. Berke Carl Cannon E.J. Dionne, Jr. Ron Fournier

Walter Isaacson Whitney Patton Maralee Schwartz

2 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW SPRING 2017

Police State

A

t no point in our nation’s recent memory—and certainly not in the memories of the millennials who comprise this magazine’s staff— has policing been as contentious an issue as it is today. The killings of black men from Trayvon Martin to Philando Castille at the hands of officers have thrust conversations about racial bias in law enforcement into the national spotlight. Only just having occupied the Oval Office, Donald Trump has taken command of a White House determined to make policing U.S. borders a hallmark of his presidency.

However, to paint policing as a solely American problem would be to ignore that challenges that communities and nations across the world face in balancing security, rule of law, and individual rights. Rodrigo Duterte’s deadly war on drugs in the Philippines, honor killings in South Asia, a fierce crackdown on gangs in El Salvador— all pressing cases of agents wielding authority in an attempt to discipline those who don’t follow the rules.

Wherever power dynamics exist, the role of police is central.

And it’s never sexy. Enforcing the law is dirty, perilous, and polemic at times and mundane at others. Being policed, on the other hand, can be frustrating, restrictive, and even oppressive.

Striking harmony between these two groups—the policers and the policed—is an ongoing project here in America and

beyond.

In this issue of the HPR, writers examine the work of police operating in diverse contexts around the globe.

Nick Danby takes us to Iceland, where he shines a light on one of the most non-violent law enforcement agencies in the world. Mfundo Radebe discusses South African president Jacob Zuma’s unforgiving use of police for political protection and advancement.

Samuel Kessler probes policing on the Internet, noting the troubling lack of international norms regarding law enforcement in cyberspace. Finally, Anirudh Suresh adopts a healthy skepticism of media reports on police violence, employing raw data to challenge popular narratives.

This magazine is the first of four to be produced by the HPR’s 49th editorial board. The articles that follow, spanning six sections, are as varied in content as they are remarkable in quality. This is a testament to the brilliance and passion of our staff, who continue to renew our status as the nation’s finest college political publication. I am confident that the work done here reflects the very best of their efforts. Thank you for appreciating its importance.

Ali Hakim President

CAMPUS

FINDING SANCTUARY AT

HARVARD

Anna Biggs SPRING 2017 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW 3

CAMPUS

O

n December 6, President Drew Faust announced that Harvard would not designate itself a “sanctuary campus.” The label’s lack of “legal significance,” she argued, renders it toothless. Policies associated with sanctuary campus status vary by university. Self-proclaimed sanctuary institutions characteristically institute policies that support undocumented students. For instance, many refuse to willingly assist federal officials in deportation efforts or reveal students’ immigration status.

It makes sense for Harvard to prioritize concrete actions that protect undocumented students over symbolic gestures. However, the word sanctuary carries a moral conviction that matters independently of policy concerns. Harvard should reconsider a sanctuary declaration to affirm its commitment to undocumented and mixed-status students, unequivocally celebrating their membership in the university community.

CALL A SANCTUARY A SANCTUARY With administrative initiatives to protect undocumented students underway but incomplete, the value of the label “sanctuary” lies more in the ethical stance it represents than any concrete policy changes. Symbolically designating Harvard a sanctuary campus would provide undocumented students with mental security. For Daishi Tanaka ’19, co-director of Harvard College Act on a Dream, “the greater meaning behind the word … [is] most meaningful to [him] personally.” As the protracted development of university initiatives leaves some questioning administrative priorities, the declaration would re-affirm Harvard’s commitment to student safety. Transcending inconsistent practical definitions, “sanctuary” sends an unambiguous message: “that the administration supports you, that they know that you’re here, and they don’t want to keep it a secret, that they’re not afraid, and that you shouldn’t be either,” in the words of Miguel Garcia ’17, student organizer and advocate for Harvard’s undocumented community.

Furthermore, the sanctuary campus dispute also presents Harvard a chance to publically oppose Trumpian ethnocentrism. The university’s political currency and cultural eminence mean that “having Harvard be a sanctuary campus along with the other schools … will be a huge step for that movement,” Tanaka pointed out. Indeed, Harvard’s declaration could spur on national conversation about the undocumented experience, a perspective absent from mainstream American narratives. While the administration may have considered the label’s immediate use inadvisable, the attitude it communicates—one of diversity,

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inclusivity, and equal opportunity fundamental to Harvard’s pedagogical mission—remains as important as ever.

PROTECTING UNDOCUMENTED STUDENTS Given the unspecified practical definition of the term sanctuary, Garcia explains, “each school has to figure out what it means for them.” Cornell, for example, guarantees continued financial aid and need-blind admission for DACA students if Trump discontinues the program, while Columbia bars federal immigration officials from campus entry without a warrant and from student information without a subpoena.

Regarding the policy implications of labeling Harvard a sanctuary campus, Garcia pointed to “Protect Undocumented Students at Harvard,” a petition he helped draft and present to administrators. The document proposes institutional supports for the university’s undocumented community—many of which remain unrealized. Of the petition’s proposals, Harvard administration responded most noticeably to the call for centralized resources and advising. “Protect Undocumented Students at Harvard” requested an Office for Undocumented Student Support, and although Harvard has demonstrated little progress toward a physical office, administrators have increased efforts to consolidate resources for undocumented students. Days after the petition’s delivery, Dean Katie O’Daire responded. She cited the centralization of undocumented student initiatives under Loc Truong, Harvard’s director of diversity and inclusion programs, as well as the continued search for a new assistant dean. Since then, Truong has established a student working group for future programs, and President Faust appointed Lars Madsen, her chief of staff, as coordinator for resources regarding immigration concerns.

To most of the petition’s demands, however—many of which seek to institutionalize policies which undocumented students consider important for their mental health and intellectual development—Harvard has not responded. For instance, the petition also requested more tenured faculty of color, an additional culturally competent mental health professional, and a new dean and assistant dean of equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Yet movement towards additional hiring appears negligible. The EDI website exhibits no news of headway toward the hiring of a dean or assistant dean, and administrators remain silent on new efforts to diversify the cultural experience of tenured faculty members and mental health providers.

Harvard’s bureaucratic response in the face of a Trump presi-

CAMPUS

dency has kindled frustration among undocumented students.

Garcia, a member of Truong’s group, worries that progress “will take months upon months” and “is not a feasible response to this situation,” while those advocating for a centralized office consider Faust’s nomination of a “point person” inadequate. “I don’t think that undocumented students or students from mixedstatus families feel like [their interests] are a priority,” Garcia observed. A participant in meetings with Dean Khurana and President Faust, he noted that “the tone throughout the whole process was, well, we want to provide these protections but let’s not make a big deal out of this … let’s keep this on the low because we don’t want everybody to know.” Harvard’s avoidance of “sanctuary” has only exacerbated student suspicions that the administration seeks to appease alternative interests.

A DECENTRALIZED APPROACH Individual Harvard leaders have, however, striven to uphold the moral tenets of “sanctuary” in the absence of an institutional designation. The Crimson published a letter by three Harvard faculty members calling on the administration to stand behind undocumented student organizers in defense of diversity. Some have stepped beyond verbal advocacy, indicating their willingness to defy federal law. In his sermon on December 18, Memorial Church minister Jonathan L. Walton professed his commitment to a “higher moral law” regarding the security of Harvard students. He affirmed the church’s unconditional allegiance to all, documented or not, and declared the space a sanctuary for those facing adverse changes to federal immigration policy.

Harvard professor Walter Johnson, one contributor to the Crimson letter, considers the “ethical orientation” adopted by Memorial Church a step in the right direction. He persuasively argued that Harvard should mirror the minister’s “unequivocal position of defiance” in vindication of university priorities.

Even without a sanctuary campus declaration, bypassed for lack of legal clarity, individual university leaders have recognized its transcendent meaning. Harvard should mind and reinforce their endeavors by verbalizing Walton’s attitude with sanctuary campus status.

UNWARRANTED CONCERNS Some opponents of sanctuary campuses worry that Harvard will run into legal challenges if it adopts the term. Traditionally, “sanctuary” has denoted an institution’s willingness to defy the

law and suffer the consequences. But students advocating the term’s adoption have not suggested Harvard promise to defy federal law, nor have other self-proclaimed sanctuary campuses stated an intention to do so. If Harvard still anticipates sanctuary campus status binding the university to unlawful actions, the administration could develop a Harvard-specific definition of sanctuary that clarifies the university’s intention in adopting it.

President Faust has voiced concerns that the label “would endanger, rather than protect” Harvard students by predisposing them to “special attention.” Yet it is no mystery that Harvard matriculates undocumented students, and sanctuary campus status publicizes no new information about them. “DACA students are required to register through a federal program, so that information is already held by federal agencies,” Garcia pointed out, and for those not registered under DACA, “Harvard has already multiple times told its undocumented population that it does not keep a record of undocumented students … in case [people of power] ask for it,” Tanaka said.

Faust’s concern about drawing unwanted attention implies that sanctuary campus status will render undocumented students the rhetorical punching bag of the movement’s opponents.

If such apprehensions exist among undocumented students, they must be taken seriously. Yet currently, the argument appears more an unsubstantiated hedge than palpable problem.

The uncertainty of what “sanctuary campus” will mean under Trump’s presidency breeds hesitancy while obfuscating progress. Yet forgoing a sanctuary declaration amounts to its own decision—one that ignores the voices of many students who call Harvard home.

Perhaps there exists a way for Harvard to communicate the moral convictions of “sanctuary” without using the word itself.

But why take the long road? Symbolic support remains an essential part of Harvard’s responsibility toward its undocumented community. So far, however, Harvard has failed to convince its undocumented community of, in the words of President Faust, the university’s “clear and unequivocal support.” Individual Harvard leaders like Minister Walton have already embraced the moral conviction of a sanctuary campus. Certainly, student organizers and administrators continue concerted efforts to provide the undocumented community more emotional, legal, and economic resources. Yet as long-term initiatives undergo slow progress, Harvard’s hesitancy to make a public commitment disrespects the efforts of students and faculty to keep the school inclusive, open-minded, and safe for all. “Sanctuary” points the way forward.

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MONEY

STRIKE ACTIVISM ON HARVARD’S CAMPUS Alisha Ukani

T

his past fall, Harvard dining hall workers went on strike for 22 days after seven months of failed contract negotiations. Harvard University Dining Services workers wanted to maintain their previous health care plan. Local 26, the union representing HUDS workers, distributed flyers detailing Harvard’s proposed health care plan: emergency room costs would increase by 150 percent and copays by 60 percent.

Harvard Medical School students declared this new plan “unaffordable.”

In addition to health care, salary was heavily negotiated.

In an email sent to the Harvard community, Harvard’s Vice President for Human Resources revealed that the HUDS hourly wage was $24.08. This figure was $9.04 higher than the City of Cambridge’s living wage, $15.04. Yet Local 26 flyers point out that 70 percent of HUDS workers earned less than $35,000 per year without working overtime. According to MIT’s Living Wage Calculator, a single parent must earn approximately $55,900 per year to live in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton area. Local 26’s request for $35,000 in annual earnings is less than the living wage estimate by more than $20,000 for single parents. Because HUDS workers cannot work or collect unemployment benefits during school breaks, high hourly wages are turned into low annual earnings.

Despite the importance of this issue, negotiations were hidden behind closed doors, restricted to only a select group of people. In an interview with the HPR, Local 26 Chief Steward Ed Childs described how the union fought Harvard’s administration for weeks to even let workers watch negotiations. Childs also recalled how the administration intended to end negotiations if the Harvard community was allowed in the negotiating room. Thus, while negotiations officially started in February 2016, many undergraduate students were unaware of them until the possibility of a strike was announced seven months later.

Even though negotiations were restricted, the strike felt very public: workers picketed every day in Harvard Yard and Harvard’s Student Labor Action Movement held numerous events.

SLAM, a student activist group for labor justice that supports various groups of Harvard workers during their contract negotiations was heavily invoked in the strike. The group organized

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rallies and dominated social media, rallying the Harvard community to support HUDS workers. In this manner, student activist organizations like SLAM can influence Harvard’s administration by helping students to engage with relatively inaccessible administrative affairs.

#HUDSLOVE: MOBILIZING STUDENTS SLAM held many large events throughout the semester for students to come and show their support for the strike. In an interview with the HPR, Eli Langley ‘20 said that he didn’t “know how I personally would have been able to get involved [with the strike] without the hardworking members of SLAM.” Langley attended some of SLAM’s numerous events, including the dine-in on October 6. At the dine-in, approximately 700 undergraduate students brought their dinners to Harvard Yard to hear student and worker speeches, and to see performances by student music groups. Two weeks later, at 2 p.m., 500 students walked out of class and joined a rally that turned into a sit-in in the building where HUDS negotiations were taking place. Union members periodically left the negotiating room to give updates to students, 250 of whom stayed as late as 9 p.m. Live videos from these events were also streamed to Facebook, helping even more students understand the details of the strike. Events like these allowed students to engage with the strike and show their support for HUDS workers, even if they were not directly privy to the contract negotiation details.

And while these large events were heavily publicized, SLAM simultaneously offered opportunities for differing levels of student involvement. Low-commitment forms of activism created a wide base of support by allowing students to become easily involved. Some of these campaigns included the creation of a strike petition, dissemination of “Support the Strike” pins, and and appeals to students for photos of unsanitary food provided in dining halls during the strike. These efforts were succesful, as evidenced by the more than 2,000 student signatures on the petition. Students who wanted to engage more could call and email Harvard Corporation Fellows, and attend the dine-in and rallies.

Additionally, students could participate in walk-outs and sit-ins.

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The variety of ways to get involved allowed students to engage in the strike more frequently and in different ways.

The multiple levels of commitment also energized students to stay involved by forming a community of strike supporters.

This community showed supporters they were not alone and made them feel like they had a stake in the strike. As Langley described, events like the dine-in “[were] one of the things that made [the strike] feel more personal to me.” Thus, these many commitment levels not only attracted a wider base of students, but also encouraged some to donate even more of their time and efforts. For instance, after attending the dine-in and encouraging his friends to join him, Langley attended the walk-out on October 17 and gave a speech at the subsequent rally. Langley’s growing participation over the course of the strike paralleled the student body’s increasing involvement. Three hundred students participated in the first walk-out, while 500 participated in the second.

#ONEHARVARD: UNITING COMMUNITIES To facilitate student engagement with the strike, SLAM united various Harvard communities, such as students and HUDS workers. SLAM events helped students hear workers’ firsthand perspectives and understand why negotiations were failing, which was otherwise impossible due to the restricted nature of the contract negotiations. In an interview with the HPR, SLAM member Anwar Omeish ‘19 described the strong relationship between workers and the student group. Students “had to coordinate very closely with workers … to know what they were asking and what’s going on with contract negotiations.” The workers attended SLAM meetings and suggested actions for the group, like the sit-in. Workers also spoke at SLAM rallies and Harvard house-specific events, emphasizing the importance of affordable health care by sharing personal experiences of dealing with chronic illness or children with illnesses. These speeches were one of the central ways students could hear workers’ experiences directly.

While SLAM primarily connected students and HUDS workers, it also created a link between graduate and undergraduate students. Graduate school students attended SLAM meetings and updated the group on their own actions to support the strike. As a result, SLAM was able to coordinate joint rallies with students at some graduate schools, like the Harvard Divinity School, and promoted events like a Harvard Kennedy School discussion about the strike. SLAM also amplified the work of graduate students. For example, when Harvard Medical School students helped HUDS workers with their report analyzing Harvard’s health care packages, SLAM spread the report’s findings in its own messaging.

In addition to working with graduate students, SLAM connected the community by working with undergraduate student groups. The Phillips Brooks House Association held a barbecue for workers; the Harvard Undergraduate Global Health Forum held a dinner with HUDS; and music groups like Kuumba, the Breakers, and the Veritones performed at the dine-in. All of these groups planned their events with SLAM. Students with diverse interests could further engage with the strike by planning or attending these events. SLAM also helped to support other groups, like the Native Americans at Harvard College. Langley, a member of NAHC, described how SLAM coordinated with Local

26 to halt picketing during Indigenous People’s Day programming and to find a Native American worker to speak at NAHC’s rally. Fostering relationships with other groups and promoting their efforts helped SLAM to further connect students to the strike while supporting fellow activists.

Though SLAM largely helped students engage with the strike, the group’s actions prevented some groups from engaging. Students with eating disorders, for instance, were negatively impacted by the constant discussions of food. SLAM’s advertising and events contributed to this. SLAM started planning a response affirming its support for these students, but the response was never finished. Activist organizations should increase engagement through actions that are as inclusive as possible.

SLAM can improve in the future through a renewed emphasis on ensuring that all students can interact with administrative issues.

#SUPPORTTHESTRIKE: STUDENT POWER The negotiations between Harvard and HUDS were largely hidden from the Harvard community, but SLAM changed this.

SLAM helped students get involved with the strike by organizing events and creating requests along a sliding scale of commitment. It also united the HUDS, undergraduate student, and graduate student communities to increase participation in strike-related events. This work helped Harvard students influence decisions regarding how members of their community are treated.

Some may argue that students should focus on their classes instead of protesting against their school’s administrative decisions. However, this argument ignores the power students have to create change at their universities. As Omeish explained, undergraduate students “have a lot of influence because we can generate a lot of press coverage, and we can cause a lot of problems for the administration.” When it is time to rally for a cause, “we can leverage that particular personality and that privilege and that media coverage.” Students have a special type of privilege within their institutions. It is their responsibility to use it to ensure that members of their community are respected.

Today’s student activism often focuses on local progress with respect to broader, national campaigns. For example, SLAM focused on affordable healthcare and fair wages on a local level.

This relatively small scale is beneficial because it allows students to make local victories happen faster than national ones. The national Fight for 15 movement hopes to establish a national $15 minimum wage. It started with hundreds of New York City workers striking in November 2012, and while the movement has succeeded in increasing minimum wages in a number of states and cities, it must continue fighting for a $15 wage nationally.

The HUDS negotiations officially started in February 2016 and were resolved in October 2016. HUDS’ victory happened in eight months, and can bolster support for national movements that, like Fight for 15, can continue for years.

Local change is easier to enact than national change, and students have a unique privilege to advocate for change in their institutions. Students have a moral obligation to ensure that their communities are fair and just by using their privilege to promote change. Whatever causes students champion, their actions will simultaneously improve their communities and contribute to national political movements.

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MONEY

CYBERESPIONAGE AND THE NEED FOR NORMS Sam Kessler

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POLICE

I

n 2007, cyberwarfare nearly became real warfare when Russia waged a series of Distributed Denial of Service attacks against Estonia.

A DDoS attack makes a website inoperable by overloading its servers with excessive traffic. “The attacks were aimed at the essential electronic infrastructure of the Republic of Estonia,” Estonia’s Minister of Defense told Wired shortly after the event.

“All major commercial banks, telcos, media outlets, and name servers—the phone books of the Internet—felt the impact, and this affected the majority of the Estonian population. This was the first time that a botnet threatened the national security of an entire nation.”

In light of this clear act of aggression, Estonia’s NATO allies considered invoking Article 5 of the NATO treaty, which establishes the organization’s principle of collective defense.

According to Article 5, an “armed attack against one or more [NATO members] ... shall be considered an attack against them all.” Thus, in the event of an enemy power attacking a NATO member, Article 5 stipulates that all other members of NATO should join in their ally’s defense. Although Estonian online infrastructure suffered real damage from these cyberattacks, Estonia’s NATO allies were unsure if they should invoke Article 5 and take up arms against Russia. It remains unclear whether similar attacks would be considered “armed attacks” should they take place in the future.

The 2007 conflict between Russia and Estonia underscores a major problem with international convention and law: cyberspace is largely a grey area. A majority of the modern world communicates and stores information through the Internet, but there are no official conventions that police how states may or may not use it. This ambiguity should not exist; internationallyaccepted norms must be established to define appropriate cyber behavior. Although the United Nations has made some important progress in determining what these norms should look like, the dialogue surrounding norms must appreciate the fact that most cyber threats today are not aimed at infrastructure, but at information.

RUSSIA AND THE NEED FOR NORMS Harvard Kennedy School professor Joseph S. Nye notes that the term “cyberwar” doesn’t even have a concrete definition. In an op-ed for Project Syndicate, Nye likens strategic studies of the cyber domain to nuclear strategy of the 1950s, arguing that “analysts are still not clear about the meaning of offense, defense, deterrence, escalation, norms, and arms control.”

The cyberattack on Estonia happened nearly a decade ago, but attacks between state powers have become more frequent in recent years. Today’s cybercrimes have the potential to not only destroy critical infrastructure, but undermine trust and cost governments and companies tremendous sums of money. On the heels of a U.S. presidential election in which Russia has been accused of meddling with America’s democracy, the need to define internationally-accepted cyber behavior is more vital than ever before.

Unless clear norms are set in place, Russia and other countries will continue to test the tolerance of their peers. Eventually, some experts believe this game of tactical trial-and-error may lead to catastrophe.

THE PRESENT LANDSCAPE The largest-scale effort toward establishing norms to date has come from the United Nations, which has put together a series of Groups of Governmental Experts to report on the impact of information and communication technology on national security. Published in 2010, 2013, and 2015, the GGE reports contain recommendations for norms, rules, principles, and other measures by which the international community may approach the issue of cybersecurity in a more unified manner. Notably, the group concluded in 2013 that cybersecurity norms should reflect existing international principles and laws.

The 2015 UN GGE report suggested that “states should not conduct or knowingly support ICT activity that intentionally damages critical infrastructure.” Variations on this theme are at the core of the United Nations’ project to establish norms: states should refrain from inflicting intentional damage upon critical infrastructure. “This is a pretty ambiguous and nebulous concept,” New America cybersecurity policy analyst Rob Morgus told the HPR. “What does it mean to attack? What is critical infrastructure? Are you hacking critical infrastructure if you gain access to a financial institution and you just sit there and you watch, and you’re not doing anything, just collecting data?”

The United Nations’ work on norms has centered primarily around the military implications of cyber threats. In a December 2015 event at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum, Former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter underscored the defensive utility of cybersecurity norms: “Norms won’t necessarily offer that kind of hard protection, but norms do two things: they keep many people, most of the time, from doing something bad, and they provide the rationale that helps everyone else understand what must be done to protect them.”

Some degree of focus on the military consequences of cybercrime is undoubtedly important in labeling aggressive actions.

Nevertheless, consider how almost every recent cybercrime is called a “cyberattack” by the media. North Korea’s hack into Sony Pictures, China’s theft of American personnel records, and Russia’s attack on Estonian online infrastructure were all dubbed “cyberattacks,” despite their significant differences. The repeated use of this simplistic label has muddied dialogue surrounding this issue by obscuring the unique qualities of different cybercrimes—making it difficult to keep track of what actions warrant retaliation.

In the past, a lack of precision might have worked to the advantage of the norms movement. Since the start of the decade, experts have warned of an impending “Cyber Pearl Harbor” in order to draw attention to the fact that cyberattacks are a legitimate threat. “The focus is no longer on simply trying to get attention,” Tim Maurer, who co-leads the cyber policy initiative at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the HPR. “We are rather trying to figure out how we can channel that attention into some meaningful output.”

When it comes to establishing norms, Morgus emphasized, “the precision of language is of the utmost importance ... Because you’re talking about restricting certain activities and if you get too ambiguous or too narrow you either restrict too much or too little.”

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POLICE DIVERSITY

FOCUSING ON INTELLIGENCE Any attempt at establishing norms must consider that most recent encounters between states do not involve damage to critical infrastructure. Today’s cybercrimes usually consist of acts of espionage, or the theft of government and company information.

The aforementioned North Korean and Chinese hacks of Sony Pictures and U.S. government personnel records were acts of espionage, as was the recent Russian breach of the Democratic National Committee’s private servers. Although they were offensive, none of these acts would fall under the purview of any of the norms proposed by the United Nations GGE. As David Fidler of the Council on Foreign Relations wrote in a CFR blog post, “international law does not prohibit or regulate espionage.” Thus, any of the norms proposed by the UN GGE would not be able to address cyberespionage, despite it being “one of the most important state uses of ICTs that causes international security problems.”

This lack of espionage regulation comes from the fact that cyber intelligence, like traditional intelligence, is not always used to facilitate aggressive acts. Germany and the United States are among the nations which have been caught engaging in cyber espionage against their own allies. As President Obama explained in a December interview with NPR, “Among the big powers, there has been a traditional understanding that everybody is trying to gather intelligence on everybody else. It’s no secret that Russian intelligence officers, or Chinese, or for that matter Israeli or British or other intelligence agencies, their job is to get insight into the workings of other countries that they’re not reading in the newspapers every day.”

Morgus believes cybersecurity norms can enable states to continue operating strategically in the cyber domain while avoiding future conflict. “What I’d like to see,” he says, “is [the United States] focusing on negotiating norms that focus more on stipulating what states should and should not do once they have [intelligence] information.”

The 2016 election illustrated the necessity of these kinds of intelligence norms when Russia leaked unflattering information relating to the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign after hacking into the DNC. While the collection of this data could have been looked upon as a routine intelligence exercise, the release of the data had extraordinary political and geopolitical consequences. Whether or not the leaked information helped elect Donald Trump, as some argue, it certainly worked to the Kremlin’s advantage by undermining public confidence in the American political system. Illustrating the gravity of this hack, the Obama administration imposed heavy sanctions against Russia and expelled 35 Russian intelligence agents from the United States.

To address precisely this sort of intelligence incident, Morgus proposes that states “can conduct espionage to gain information

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on political parties, but cannot release that information to the public. So, intelligence gathered by the state should be intelligence for the state.”

FROM PRIVATE SECTOR TO PUBLIC POLICY Although the verdict is still out on exactly how cyber norms can be used to manage the theft of state secrets, they have shown early promise in preventing the theft of commercial secrets.

In 2015, China President Xi Jinping pledged to work with the United States to curtail the spread of commercial espionage.

“Cybertheft of commercial secrets and hacking attacks against government networks are both illegal,” Xi said in a September 2015 interview with the Wall Street Journal. “Such acts are criminal offenses and should be punished according to law and relevant international conventions.”

Xi’s emphatic opposition to cybercrime initially seemed like lip service—it came on the heels of Obama’s threat to bring sanctions against China in response to China’s breach of millions of U.S. federal employee records. Nevertheless, Chinese economic espionage against the Unites States has plummeted since the announcement of the 2015 agreement, signaling that it has—at least so far—been successful.

The success of last year’s agreement is compelling evidence that norms can be effective if implemented properly. This is also evidence that cyberespionage norms—both commercial and political—may need to come from individual agreements between states rather than from the United Nations, which governs based on international law. Indeed, China has been a trailblazer in this area, striking deals with Germany and the United Kingdom similar to the one with the United States.

In order for more of these agreements to come about, many states must change their militaristic focus on cybersecurity.

Indeed, part of why Russia has been able to get away with so much hostile behavior may be its comprehensive understanding of information security. “[The United States has] looked at cybersecurity very much from a military operations perspective,” Maurer said. “The Russian doctrine on information security is much more comprehensive and includes that information operations piece.” Maurer sees a silver lining in the DNC hack, insofar as it “has elevated [information security] in terms of awareness among policymakers. I think there is now a greater willingness … to cut a deal with the Russians.”

Whether or not a deal between the United States and Russia is realistic in the near-term, the international community as a whole must reconsider whether the United Nations is the avenue by which norms can be meaningfully established, or if negotiations between individual countries may prove more effective. Whatever the method, precision of language and a focus on information security will be vital to ensuring that cyberspace can be used safely and strategically in the years ahead.

MONEY

APARTHEID SUSTAINED

Brutality and Distrust in South Africa’s Police Force Mfundo Radebe SPRING 2017 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW 11

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wenty-two years after the fall of apartheid, South Africa conceals a harsh reality: the country’s political elite is beginning to forget its promise that, as the country’s post-apartheid 1996 constitution guaranteed, “never again” would state-sanctioned violence against its people be witnessed.

Despite the institutional achievements of the Mandela administration, including a strong constitution and government accountability, it is now evident that the apartheid legacy of a police state ruling by force has remained. Today, under President Jacob Zuma’s governance, it has even become clear that not only has little been done to change that legacy, but police force is being used in ways that have led some to question the strength of democracy in South Africa.

Much of Zuma’s second term as president of the African National Congress, the party that has been in power since Nelson Mandela’s election in 1994, has been spent battling allegations of corruption. He has been accused of using state money on personal upgrades to his home located in Nkandla, just hours southeast of Johannesburg. His opponents have also alleged that he has placed his cronies into top government positions. Having survived many motions of no confidence in the National Assembly, South Africa’s parliament, Zuma is evidence that the status quo will remain in South Africa. Specifically, his need to protect himself from state institutions and politicians trying to hold him accountable will mean an increased police presence in the lives of a population already distrustful of the police.

A POLICE UNTRUSTED Introduced by the National Party in 1948, apartheid was a system of institutionalized racism in South Africa that ensured white South Africans would retain economic, political, and social power. It ensured “separate development” in an effort to segregate every aspect of the country’s society. Though the apartheid regime was able to marginalize the country’s black majority, a resistance movement began to rise with the emergence of organizations such as uMkhonto weSizwe, a military wing of the ANC. In the 1960s, preying on Cold War-era fears of communism, the National Party gained the support of the United States and banned the ANC, claiming they were communists.

Prominent struggle leaders, including Mandela, were sentenced to life imprisonment.

In an attempt to crush any remaining resistance to apartheid, the NP government introduced the Terrorism Act in 1967, which allowed police to detain anyone who they thought “might endanger the maintenance of law and order.” Under this law, along with other forms of pro-police legislation passed in the 1960s and ’70s, historians estimate that 217 activists were detained. Many look to the ‘accidental’ death of Black Consciousness movement leader Steve Biko in 1977 as the most horrific legacy of the act. In 1976, Biko’s movement inspired thousands of students in Soweto, a township south of Johannesburg, to march against the government’s discriminatory single-language Afrikaans policy. It would later be exposed that Biko was beaten to death by security police while in detention.

Forty years later, in 2015, university students once again took to the streets, this time to protest an increase in fees at South

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African universities. Student protesters forcibly shut down universities to demand that university fees be dropped for all because, as Reuters reported, “the fees [made] attending university impossible for many black youth.” The campaign, which became known as the #FeesMustFall movement, proved effective when Zuma declared that no university fees would increase for the 2016 year. Buoyed by this initial success, students then marched in late-2016 to demand completely free higher education for the 2017 year. This time, however, South African TV stations broadcast countless bloody encounters of police quelling protests. Some of the students had resorted to violence (with some looting shops near the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg), but most were peaceful. Nevertheless, reports emerged that police responded to protesters with rubber bullet shots and tear gas. It was reported that 831 student activists were arrested, some of whom still remain in police custody without the prospect of a bail hearing.

Zuma would only break his silence as news of the violent encounters between the students and police began to spread around the world. A statement from his office read: “We urge the students to explore peaceful avenues to engage on this issue constructively. The destruction of property is a criminal offence and will be treated as such by the law enforcement authorities.”

A POLICE UNLEASHED Evidence of the extent to which Zuma would rely on police action appeared soon after his inauguration in July 2009, with his appointment of Bheki Cele as National Commissioner of Police. Infamous for his ruthless rhetoric, Cele instructed police to “shoot to kill” criminals without concern as to “what happens after that.” Despite an alarming increase in police-involved violence, Zuma expressed confidence in Cele, urging police in September 2015 to “defend yourselves with everything at your disposal if you are attacked, within the confines of the law. Our laws allow the police to fight back decisively when their lives or those of the public are threatened.”

In an interview with the HPR, Max Du Preez, a South African political author and columnist who has written about Zuma’s administration, noted that “[Zuma] has failed miserably in transforming the police to a people-centred protection and crime-fighting service.” In fact, Du Preez argued, “the police [have become] even more militarised,” and “accountability, right up to the minister, has dwindled.” Although South Africa’s constitution prevents the country from becoming a de jure police state, Du Preez observed “troubling tendencies” in how police currently operate. These troubling tendencies were on full display during the 2012 Marikana massacre, which remains one of the darkest days since the dawn of South Africa’s democracy.

Workers at the Marikana platinum mine, just 100 miles northwest of Johannesburg, were striking for better wages and working conditions, but Lonmin, the company which owned the mine, refused to negotiate with the workers and instead called for the police to resolve the conflict. On August 16, police opened fire, killing 34, injuring at least 78, and arresting more than 250 of the miners. Most of the victims had been shot in the back, many without a single weapon, and far from police lines. At the

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“I have faith in the capacity of South Africa to argue with itself. It sometimes screams at itself, often it is very rude. But rudeness is not always very bad. It has a shock effect, but it forces people to listen.”

Farlam Commission of Inquiry put together to investigate the details of the incident, the South African Police Service defended its actions by arguing that “[the workers] were acting as a single concerted group under command and instruction, bent on a very murderous route.”

However, attention soon drifted away from the police involved to the political agents behind the scenes. The commission uncovered an email sent on the eve of the shootings by thenANC National Executive and business mogul, Cyril Ramaphosa, to company management. Ramaphosa declared that the protests were “plainly dastardly criminal acts and must be characterized as such.” Ramaphosa was a shareholder and director at Lonmin.

Despite this glaring conflict of interest, the commission—which Zuma had assembled—abdicated Ramaphosa of any responsibility.

In an interview with the HPR, Daniel de Kadt, a PhD candidate in South African political science at MIT, drew a picture of how Zuma’s government has on the public front supported many mass protests, only to then order police to quell the protests.

Using parallels to several mass protests and conducting Twitter analysis, de Kadt pointed to a tweet from the ANC during the #FeesMustFall movement’s protests which read: “We have called on ANC members to join the March of students to the Union Buildings & support students.” According to Kadt, this is evidence of how the ANC attempts “to merge itself with the student movement, blurring the lines between protesters and the incumbent regime.” In doing so, the ANC abdicates itself of accountability. It is easy to find similarities between the ANC’s handling of #FeesMustFall, and its handling of Marikana. After many had called on the president to release his report on the Farlam Commission’s findings, he remained silent for years. Instead, the ANC used social media to praise a documentary about the massacre, ‘Miners Shot Down’ stating it “encourages South African voices to continue telling the story of South Africa”.

As Du Preez points out, there is a disinterested and “uncaring attitude of the present government when it comes to people opposed to the governing party”.

A POLICE UNINTERESTED Newspapers like The City Press allege that Zuma has put many of his cronies into positions of power. Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas recently came forward, revealing that friends of Zuma, the Gupta family, had offered him the position of Finance Minister after Zuma fired then-Nhlanhla Nene because of his alleged rebellion against the Gupta’s corruption.

In 2016, Zuma’s finance minister, Pravin Gordhan, a loyal ANC member with the party’s deviance from good governance decided to crack down on the plan by Zuma to benefit from a nuclear energy deal with Russia involving the Guptas. Gordhan refused to pay for the ambitious and costly project, which, according to The Mail and Guardian, South Africa could not afford.

The police’s investigative unit, the Hawks, obtained a warrant for Gordhan’s immediate arrest.

“The Zuma administration has allowed the police to be under-policed very badly,” John Comaroff, a professor of African Studies at Harvard, told the HPR, adding that “the police killings and killing of political protestors is truly un-South African.”

Comaroff believes that brutal public order policing in any country cannot be separated from that country’s : “During the Bush era, we saw a peaceful New York protest on globalization being quelled and Bush responding to it as ‘a minor popular forum.’”

Leaders, Comaroff argued, “use the excuse of public order to protect private property [and interest]. The contradiction of policing being predicated on violence without supervision becomes terrifying. And South Africa has that problem.”

“Media has weakened over the last two decades … [though] there are some commendable exceptions,” Du Preez said. “Still, civil society is in the process of becoming more activist and energetic and is increasingly also watching over the police.”

Likewise, Comaroff is hopeful about the future of the country. “I have faith in the capacity of South Africa to argue with itself. It sometimes screams at itself, often it is very rude. But rudeness is not always very bad. It has a shock effect, but it forces people to listen.”

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BRUTALITY A Statistical Perspective

Anirudh Suresh 14 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW SPRING 2017

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ighly publicized incidents of violence by police against African Americans are often linked to issues of racial profiling and police brutality. While preconceived biases may have played a role in many of these cases, such as the killings of Eric Garner and Philando Castile, each instance of officer-involved violence against a black citizen does not necessarily reflect the same racial biases. Attributing the same bias to all officers based on a few cases paints a blanket image of all police. Clearly, biases do exist within individual officers in this country; however, identifying the police as one block of people with the same mindset, biases, and behaviors is dangerous if one hopes to understand the racial aspect of police brutality.

All too often, a brutal police officer is presumed to be white and male, even though not all cases of police violence or brutality necessarily involve white policemen. Why does this bias exist, and does the data confirm or debunk this commonly held notion?

To effectively address these two questions, it is necessary to take an objective view of the issue, prioritizing empirical evidence over sweeping statements about police brutality. Specifically, by breaking down available data to investigate the tendencies of police by race and gender, we may be able to develop a more factual and actionable analysis of the role of racism in police brutality than currently exists.

PERCEPTION VS. REALITY One key area of analysis is citizens’ sentiments regarding the origin of police brutality. In large American cities and metropolitan areas, women represent about 16.5 percent of all full-time police officers, while African Americans and Hispanics constitute 25.2 percent and 17.3 percent of full-time officers, respectively. Yet citizen complaints against officers in metropolitan police departments rarely mirror those figures. Based on data from the nonprofit Police Foundation’s Public Safety Open Data Portal, in Cincinnati, only 8.6 percent of citizen complaints from 2010 to 2015 were against policewomen. Similarly, in Indianapolis, only 10.5 percent of complaints from 2012 to 2016 were against female officers. For these large, diverse cities, the statistical disparities are further reflected in the racial breakdown of officers who had complaints lodged against them. In Cincinnati, only 25 percent of officers who faced complaints were nonwhite, and in Indianapolis, that figure was approximately 20 percent. In both cities, over 70 percent of all complaints were lodged against white male police officers.

External information and politicization aside, these figures appear to validate the stereotype of white male officers being responsible for police brutality. Most often, this blame centers on deadly shootings of black males by white officers. Yet complaint data does not necessarily speak to officer culpability; some complaints may be the result of inherent bias or preconceived notions of police intent. Cincinnati municipal data spanning the last 20 years indicates that for every white subject targeted by a white male police officer, 3.92 black subjects were targeted.

Meanwhile, for every white subject targeted by a black male officer, four black subjects were targeted. Perhaps surprisingly, this data bespeaks a negligible difference in racial targeting between white and black male officers.

“It’s very difficult to study all this,” explained Justin Feldman, a doctoral candidate at the Harvard School of Public Health, in

an interview with the HPR. “But there has been, for decades, research on the influence of officers’ race and their likelihood of using force on a subject of their own race versus a subject of another race … Basically, the finding is that black officers are no less likely to use force against black subjects than white officers.”

Pinning down the reasons for this phenomenon is much more challenging. One potential interpretation lies in the fact that black officers are often more likely to be assigned to precincts with greater numbers of black residents. A Cincinnati Police Department officer, who wished to be identified only as Officer T, elaborated on this in an interview with the HPR. “I sometimes do undercover work, but my undercover experience in black precincts is limited. Black officers are much more likely to be undercover in black neighborhoods and environments because they don’t stand out as much.”

Another explanation may be that black police officers also carry implicit anti-black biases. Studies and firsthand accounts by black police officers attest to this possibility. Neil Franklin, an African American officer who served in the Baltimore Police Department and Maryland State Police, admitted his own previous prejudices during service in an interview with Vox. “When I’d see a young black male in a particular neighborhood, or his pants were sagging a little bit, or he walked a certain way,” he said, “my first thoughts were, ‘Oh, I wonder if he’s selling drugs.’”

Whatever the reason for this phenomenon, efforts to eliminate any racial basis of police brutality by diversifying police departments may be misguided. “I know that in some cities, they’re trying to get more black officers,” said Officer T. “But that didn’t work in Baltimore; 70 percent of their force is black officers.

They still had the same riots, the same crime. People often think that having a different color of officer might solve the ‘brutality’ issue, but that isn’t the case.”

THE FAILINGS OF A SINGLE STORY Of course, nationwide data by itself does not tell the whole story. Other sources of information specific to the region and case, including municipal-level correlations between officer and subject race and eyewitness testimonies, are critical for assessing whether an individual shooting represents a case of police brutality. Data from the Indianapolis Police Department over the last two years, for example, suggests a stark difference in the targets in white and black officer-involved shootings. While black officers targeted white subjects about twice as often as black subjects, white officers targeted black subjects about twice as often as white subjects. The contrast between the Indianapolis statistics and those of Cincinnati, where black officers seem no less likely to use force against black subjects, may be tied to the unique circumstances of officers working in each police department. Thus, drawing one overarching conclusion from the data about the role of the officer’s race in police-involved shootings may not be accurate. However, that message is the very essence of the data-driven method: instead of constraining ourselves to publicized anecdotes, nationwide blanket statistics, and a single conclusion about the entire police force, we should strive to objectively understand the intricacies and variations of the issue.

One way to do so is by examining numerical data that specifically pertains to the region or type of case in question.

Data in these contexts may also help to explain the stereotype that male officers are more likely to be involved in instances of

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police brutality than female officers. Although women represent a visible portion of the police force, especially in large metropolitan police departments, most highly-publicized cases of police brutality have involved male officers. In Indianapolis, only two officer-involved shootings between 2014 and 2016 were connected to female officers. In Austin, over a 14-year period, that number was one. Yet, as before, other sources of data may tell different stories. In Cincinnati, for example, nearly 12.6 percent of officer-involved shootings included a female police officer, consistent with the proportion of female officers in its police force.

The lack of a single conclusive finding may be frustrating to those attempting to bolster their opinions with data, but it does reveal that the situation is more complex than most people imagine. One conclusion that we can reach is that different cities feature variations in police violence and the racial dynamics of that violence because of their differences in community-police department relations.

Officer T explained the differences he sees in his city, where the racial and gender gap in officer-involved violence is less prominent than in other regions. “We’re all trained the same, regardless of whether you’re an Asian officer or a black officer, and in Cincinnati, we have good relations with the public … Our city has gone out and explained why it does things and how it helps, and the citizens of our city embrace our police department because they understand why we’re there.”

Officer T contrasted this example of thriving community relations with what he sees as a more common national trend: “In general, citizens themselves say that they want police in their neighborhoods, like in New York in the 1980s due to cocainerelated deaths. After about 10 years of people enjoying the police presence, they forget the original reason for the police presence and begin to view police in a bad light. I think residents often forget over time why police are even there.”

THE POWER OF DATA Looking back at the big questions surrounding the blame for police brutality—why it is so often attributed to white male officers and what data says about this stereotype—the consensus supported by years of studies that white and black police officers are equally likely to use force against black subjects suggests that the notion of individual police officers being racist against black subjects is not accurate throughout the nation. While individual officers’ biases may play a large role in significantly higher rates of violence against black subjects in some places, the real source of anti-black bias in other places may be of a systemic or institutional origin. Therefore, the data may point toward a need for further research into the structure and historically rooted conventions of local legal systems and law enforcement agencies

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Such efforts may shed light on sources or anti-black bias that are engrained in regional institutions.

To explain why the stereotype of white male officers being responsible for police brutality exists in the minds of the public, one must consider not only the facts and figures of the present but also their historical context and significance. “History exists,” said Feldman, “and there’s a very long history in the United States of either white police officers or white vigilantes committing explicitly racist acts of violence [against black people].”

Though it is infeasible to propose any single solution to this pervasive social issue, the objectivity, specificity, and transparency of data analysis make it better than hastily scanning for broad, surface-level statistics or relying solely upon emotionally charged anecdotes. Contrary to intuition, using data doesn’t necessarily take away from the emotional core of the issue.

Historical data about officer-involved lynchings and shootings of African Americans certainly reminds people of the cruel legacy of Jim Crow racism, and modern polling on the culpability of the police force can reveal the disparate sentiments of different groups of people. Data in both cases may have a strong impact on individuals who feel affected or threatened by these issues.

Feldman expounded on this intersection between the quantitative and emotional aspects of the police brutality issue: “Data can be emotional; I don’t see the dichotomy. There is this idea among academics that social problems are technical problems and can be solved through technical solutions… I don’t think that that’s how the world works, especially on this issue, when data is so politically charged and it does come to questions of politics and power and different groups of people who perceive the world in profoundly different ways.”

Thorough data analysis—performed on a considerable amount of case- or region-specific data—reveals the folly of proposing ineffective one-size-fits-all panaceas, such as increasing the racial and gender diversity of all police departments. Instead, policymakers and social scientists should identify the root of the police brutality problem to suggest more pertinent solutions by analyzing data. For example, data can be used to reveal which police departments feature the most serious epidemics of police brutality in order to more effectively target critical cities. Data may also help reveal which levels of violence different demographics are most susceptible to, thereby improving contemporary understanding of the complexities of the issue. In addition, some solutions may involve improving the quality of the data available for future research. By noticing gaps, inconsistencies, or weaknesses in currently available data, scientists and policymakers—along with the public—can push police departments to release more specific or relevant information publicly. Doing so would increase transparency and improve society’s grasp of the intricacies of police brutality, demonstrating data’s ability to usher in mutual understanding and to make a significant social impact.

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the case for

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION Danny Friedman

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he 2016 election cycle was unlike any other. However, some fundamental flaws in the American voting process played as much of a role as ever. Low voter turnout, gerrymandering, the risk of vote-splitting, and the underrepresentation of third parties were all discussed as serious issues that affected the election. What receives less attention is the impact of the plurality voting system we use in the United States and how it connects with each of these issues. It’s time Americans discuss the benefits of an alternative system: proportional representation.

The United States’ plurality system uses “single-winner districts” which are represented by the candidate who receives the most votes. Each citizen has, for instance, one congressperson that represents his or her district in the House of Representatives. Under proportional representation, however, representation is awarded in proportion to the vote that either parties or individual candidates receive. This system, almost by definition, creates a government more representative of the electorate.

There are several systems of proportional representation, but the one most feasible to implement in the United States is the single transferable vote. STV involves districts with multiple representatives chosen by a ranked choice vote, in which voters select the representatives they prefer in the order they choose.

An STV system of proportional representation could correct significant flaws inherent to the current plurality electoral system both in terms of the effectiveness of the actual voting process and the representativeness of the government it creates.

THE VOTING PROCESS Put simply, more votes matter under STV, and more races are competitive. In the United States, we’ve seen a spike in safe Democratic and Republican congressional seats, meaning fewer races are truly anyone’s game. According to statistician Nate Silver, the number of congressional swing districts has fallen steadily, from 103 in 1992 to just 35 in 2012.

STV offers a solution to this problem. Having multiple members in each district allows representation to be divided proportionally to the vote. Neither party will settle simply for more votes than its opponents, but instead will compete for the largest margin of victory possible. And in districts dominated by one party, votes will not be wasted but will instead determine the proportion of representation offered to each party. Thus, more votes matter.

According to a 2013 survey, voters prefer STV. This is largely because voters under STV systems are happier with their options. STV offers both a greater number and a greater diversity of candidates, increasing the chance that voters find candidates they like. But voters also prefer their options with STV because of the absence of the threat of vote-splitting. Vote-splitting is common to any plurality system, and it’s capable of completely changing the results of elections, the most commoly cited example being the 2000 presidential election, in which Al Gore’s loss is often attributed to support in Florida for third-party candidate Ralph Nader.

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Plurality systems encourage strategic voting. Under the current system, each voter only gets one vote, and third-party votes are almost always wasted ones. Strategic voting occurs when a voter casts his or her ballot for a second-choice candidate with a more realistic shot at winning the election. This typically means supporting a nominee from one of the two major parties who stands a better chance at defeating an opponent from the other.

This issue came to the forefront in the 2016 presidential election, in which even a relatively radical politician like Bernie Sanders encouraged strategic voting. “This is not the time for a protest vote,” Sanders told his supporters, urging them to vote for Hillary Clinton in light of the threat from Donald Trump.

Opinions on Clinton aside, voters should be able to support their preferred candidate without any cost.

STV also changes the strategy of third-party candidates through a process called strategic entry. Candidates who genuinely aim to take office know their only viable option is to run through one of the two major parties, largely because of strategic voting. This was the case for Bernie Sanders, who had never been a Democrat until the day he began his presidential campaign.

Strategic voting and strategic entry effectively eliminate the presence of third parties in U.S. politics. This is damaging both because of the lack of options for voters who don’t identify with a major party, and because third-party influence is essential for changing the major parties.

This wouldn’t be the case with STV. Under STV, voters can rank their preferred candidate first without the risk of hurting a more realistic second-choice candidate. As long as they ranked Clinton ahead of Trump, for instance, those who felt the Bern could have ranked Sanders first with no harm to Clinton.

Even more than vote-splitting, American elections suffer at the hands of low voter turnout. Nations with proportional representation tend to have higher voter turnout than those without.

The United States, France, and Great Britain, all of which use single-member districts, have lower turnout rates than other Western nations like Germany, Italy, and Belgium, which use some form of proportional representation.

Proportional representation has been estimated to increase turnout by 10 percent. As FairVote legal director Drew Spencer explained to the HPR, “turnout tends to be higher when there are candidates in the race that people find interesting, when there are candidates that the voters identify with and feel like they can help elect, and when the race is competitive.” An STV system of proportional representation would guarantee greater competition and preferable candidates.

REPRESENTATIVENESS OF GOVERNMENT Beyond the process of the voting system itself, a STV system is better for the representativeness of government. The most obvious issue that results from our current plurality system is the magnification of majority support, whereby slight majorities in several districts amount to huge majorities in representation.

Consider the case of Massachusetts: not a single Republican has been able to win one of Massachusetts’ nine congressional seats over the past 20 years. And yet, over a third of state consistently votes Republican. Republican voters effectively have no voice in their congressional representatives.

Even when minorities are purposefully empowered through

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the drawing of district lines, the winner-take-all system with single-member districts has an enormous distorting effect on representation.

Louisiana offers a perfect example. Thirty-two percent of the state is African American, yet majority-minority districts consolidate black voters into one of six congressional districts, meaning that African Americans hold only 17 percent of the state’s Congressional seats. In other words, if voters in Louisiana vote along racial lines, African Americans can expect half the seats they deserve by their numbers. Ironically, the majority-minority district was drawn to guarantee a single seat for African Americans, but given the size of their underrepresentation, this clearly doesn’t do enough.

Any argument on the flaws of representativeness in American government would be incomplete without discussing gerrymandering, the process through which minorities—either ideological or racial—are divided between districts to minimize the effect of their vote. STV ameliorates this issue in two ways. First, it prevents the strategic division of minority populations: multi-member districts are larger than single-member districts, so minority populations cannot be split up so easily. Second, it guarantees fair minority representation within a district: minorities will be guaranteed representation equal to their proportion of the population, unlike under the current system, where a plurality of votes is required to win a single seat, often leaving minorities with no representation whatsoever.

THIRD PARTIES While the main effect of STV would be balancing representation between the main two parties, it would also guarantee proper representation for third parties and independents.

In 2014, only 55 percent of the nation identified with either of the two major parties, yet Republicans and Democrats made up 98 percent of the Senate and 100 percent of the House. Republican and Democratic office-holders cannot claim to accurately represent the 45 percent of the nation that identifies with a third party or no party at all.

Proportional representation would increase third-party representation for two reasons. First, as mentioned, the risk of vote-splitting would be eliminated, so voters could support less likely candidates at no cost. Second, the threshold necessary to win a seat would be greatly reduced. In multi-member districts with three to five representatives, candidates would only need 17 to 25 percent of the vote to get into office. This would be much more plausible than obtaining a plurality, which the current system requires but third parties rarely achieve.

In districts where third parties could not gather enough support for representation, they would still pose a much more meaningful threat. This would encourage the major parties to consider third-party and independent voters when drafting their platforms or policies. According to FairVote’s Spencer, “This would be a multi-party system in the sense that multiple political parties would likely be participating in every election and would not be seen as spoilers.”

A greater shot at minority representation—in terms of race, ethnicity, or party-identification—would mean candidates can take office with the support of much smaller bases. According to Jan Devereux, a member of the Cambridge City Council, one of the few bodies elected proportionally in the United States,

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Proportional representation, despite its many advantages, its successes abroad, and its support from political scientists, has not received the consideration from American policymakers it deserves.

“The proportional representation system encourages candidates to find a base that they can be confident of getting number one votes for.” While this is largely true of any electoral system, what is different under proportional representation is that any base with large enough support can get representation in office.

The definition of “large enough” varies among existing proportionally represented bodies, but the threshold for winning minority representation is lower in any district with multiple members than it is in the current system of the United States.

Successful candidates under proportional voting systems not only seek bases, but they expand their appeal to less obvious populations. This marks a crucial difference between proportional and plurality systems: while candidates in winner-take-all districts need only appeal to their supporters and those on the margin, candidates in proportional systems are concerned with second- and third-choice votes. This means our current candidates can entirely ignore and antagonize those who vote for other candidates, whereas representatives in STV systems are always looking to place themselves higher on any voter’s ballot.

In effect, candidates and parties in proportional systemsare more cooperative; they maximize their appeal not just to the voters on one side or another, but to a greater share of the electorate. According to Spencer, because of this fact, STV “incorporates all of the voters into the coalition-building process.” This is important given the diversification of ideology within the major parties over the past election cycle. Under the current system, representatives have an incentive to make centrist appeals because the greatest number of voters lie in the moderate middle.

But as opinions diversify within parties, many candidates are shifting their platforms in an effort to avoid losing support from the political extremes.

This phenomenon wouldn’t occur with STV. Centrist candidates wouldn’t worry about losing votes from the extreme of their own party because would be sure to be ranked higher by these voters than their challengers from across the aisle. Mainstream Republican candidates, for instance, wouldn’t fear losing votes to Tea Party challengers, because they know that Tea Party

voters woud still rank Republicans over Democrats. In effect, parties wouldn’t be dragged to opposing sides of the political spectrum, and we would see less polarization.

BARRIERS TO REFORM Proportional representation, despite its many advantages, its successes abroad, and its support from political scientists, has not received the consideration from American policymakers it deserves.

Part of the reason for this is the solidity of electoral procedures in the United States. Americans have voted nearly the same way for centuries, making other electoral systems hard to imagine. As Harvard professor Steven Levitsky has shown, institutionalization has a conservatizing effect. Our long-standing electoral traditions make elections reliable and secure, but also resistant to reform. To Spencer, the biggest hurdle standing in the way of proportional representation “is for people to get out of the mindset that the way things are done is just the way they’re done.”

Another reason that proportional representation is seldom discussed is that the very people with the ability to propose proportional representation are those that won under a plurality system. As we know, politicians aren’t likely to support anything that compromises their chances of reelection.

This suggests that change will have to come from the people, not politicians. The passage of Question 5 in Maine offers hope.

The legislation makes Maine the first state to use ranked-choice voting for federal and state elections. Though it will still take a bill from Congress to establish multi-member districts, this is a step in the direction toward proportional representation. Should Maine see the improvements ranked-choice voting stands to offer, other states are likely to follow its lead. And as the mindset toward electoral systems continues to adapt like it has in Maine, we may see a greater push for multi-member districts, single transferable votes, and a fairer, more proportional system of representation.

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The President’s Generals Wright Smith

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he Trump administration is likely to feature the largest number of retired generals in modern history. Retired four-star generals James Mattis and John Kelly have been selected to lead the Defense and Homeland Security Departments, respectively, while retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn has been appointed to serve as National Security Adviser.

Several academics, commentators, and politicians, most notably Congressman Ruben Gallego (D - Ariz.) and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D - N.Y.), have suggested this concentration of generals in traditionally civilian security positions will have a detrimental impact on American civil-military relations. Critics suggest that the presence of so many senior generals will, at best, cause the military’s view of international affairs to be overrepresented—as the saying goes, “all problems look like nails when you have a hammer.” At worst, commentators have suggested it could lead to military professionals crafting advice for political, rather than strategic aims, threatening national security and potentially intruding directly into domestic politics.

While these concerns are valid, and the accumulation of political power by military professionals is a risk to be carefully guarded against, the appointment of generals to top military posts will not be the most likely driver of a potential civilmilitary crisis in the Trump administration. History shows that

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while civil-military breakdowns can occur when military leaders challenge their civilian counterparts, equally damaging situations occur when civilian leaders fail to communicate effectively with military and national security professionals. Given the recent public battle between the presidential transition team and the Central Intelligence Agency over the extent of Russian influence in the 2016 election, communication failures driven by civilian leaders, including the president, could begin to multiply in coming years.

THE CIVIL-MILITARY PROBLEM IN AMERICAN HISTORY Civilian control of the military is a core principle of the United States, enshrined in the earliest articles of the Constitution. The central challenge of civil-military relations rests on the simple fact that military officers are trained to use violence to achieve political ends, while their civilian peers are not. As a result, the American founders feared a violent military effort to seize control of the government, and established the president, a civilian, as the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and Congress as the chief paymaster in order to institutionalize civilian power over the military.

The constitutional checks on military power, combined with

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the strong commitment to a democratic republican government among the American officer corps, have ensured that a coup d’état or similar violent confrontation between the military and civilian leadership has never occurred in U.S. history. However, these checks have not eliminated the inherent tension in civilmilitary relations, and the rigidity of this relationship has been illuminated in public clashes between civilian and military leaders in several notable instances of American history. The most well-known of these disputes—President Lincoln versus General George McClellan over Civil War strategy, President Harry Truman versus General Douglas MacArthur over the Cold War—were spurred by disrespect and violations of presidential policy by the generals in question. The civil-military dynamic, though, is a two-way street, and poor presidential leadership can be just as damaging to the relationship.

DWIGHT EISENHOWER AND PRESIDENTIAL MISMANAGEMENT OF CIVILIAN CONTROL While the examples of McClellan and MacArthurare some of the best known, they are not the only examples of civilmilitary discord in American history. A less notable, but in many ways more prescient episode occurred when Dwight Eisenhower served as president. Eisenhower, like Trump, had no experience in electoral politics or government. Instead, his primary leadership experience was as a senior general in the U.S. Army. While his positions as Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Forces during World War II and first military commander of NATO near the end of his military career required significantly greater political activity than most military positions of the time, the majority of Eisenhower’s career was spent in the hierarchy of the U.S. Army. As president, he ran the White House in a similar manner.

Eisenhower relied primarily on his Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to implement his national security policy. However, he also was extremely confident in his own understanding of national security affairs, remarking at a press conference in 1960 that his lifelong military service allowed him to know “more about it than just about everybody.”

His choice for Secretary of Defense, Charles Wilson, had no prior background in military affairs, and was selected primarily for his managerial talent as the CEO of General Motors. His pick for Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Arthur Radford, differed significantly from his colleagues with regards to national defense and strategy. Radford emphasized the importance of nuclear weapons as a central component of national defense, at the expense of conventional forces in the Army, Navy, and Air

Force, earning pushback from the other Joint Chiefs during his tenure. As a result of this structure, Eisenhower ran the Defense Department and military through two senior leaders who were viewed at times skeptically by other members of the military, contributing to a sense of isolation from the President and from the policymaking process among many senior officers.

Eisenhower also entered office with strong opinions about national defense, and chose to focus on pursuing his views visà-vis defense policy, rather than soliciting assessments and fashioning his strategy in cooperation with the military. He believed the defense budget had grown too large, and set out to slash huge numbers of troops from the Army and reduce the size of the Navy. These cuts were generally undertaken against the recommendations of the Joint Chiefs, and by ignoring their input, Eisenhower `steadily alienated them.

The primary victims of Eisenhower’s alienation, Army Chiefs of Staff Matthew Ridgeway and Maxwell Taylor, were especially alarmed by what they saw as a policy designed to seriously weaken the Army, and with it the nation’s ability to defend itself. Both sought avenues to push back against the President, using congressional and public pressure as their most effective weapons. Ridgeway testified multiple times in the run-up to his retirement in 1955 that the president’s policy of emphasizing nuclear arms over conventional forces was leaving the country unprepared to fight non-nuclear conflicts. Ridgeway’s defiance did not alter administration policy, but it did spark an effort by Eisenhower to exercise stricter control over the Joint Chiefs.

When he was asked to replace Ridgeway as chief of staff, Taylor was consulted not for his strategic advice, but to determine whether he would comply with Administration objectives.

After initially agreeing, Taylor also became disenchanted with Eisenhower’s detachment and refusal to incorporate the advice of the Joint Chiefs in his national security policy. In protest, he retired in 1959.

Taylor’s retirement however, was only the beginning of his conflict with the administration. Less than six months after leaving his position, he published The Uncertain Trumpet, a book that castigated the Administration’s defense policy and called for a new strategy he called “flexible response.” Taylor’s plan relied on a series of military options ranging from small scale infantry forces to the nuclear deterrent. While the serving Joint Chiefs did not publically support Taylor, numerous other commanders backed his recommendations or issued similar criticisms of Eisenhower’s defense policy. General William Quinn, the Army’s Chief of Information, declined to explicitly endorse Taylor, but publically stated his support for the policy proposals in Taylor’s book. Testifying at the Senate

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Subcommittee on Preparedness a day after General Taylor had, the commander of the Strategic Air Command, General Thomas Power, suggested the United States was vulnerable to a surprise attack by the Soviet Union and called for a continuous airborne alert protocol, directly reversing Eisenhower’s policy of a temporary, crisis-driven airborne alert for American nuclear bombers. And numerous Democratic leaders, including Senators John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, joined the chorus of criticism as they prepared to run for president in 1960.

For his part, Eisenhower blasted the senior command as “too many generals” with “all sorts of ideas.” His Defense Secretary, Thomas Gates, sarcastically suggested he was not “as wise as General Taylor” when asked to comment on the recommendations. Eisenhower even considered legal action against Taylor, asking aides to assess the administration’s legal grounds before eventually deciding against the move so as to not “make a martyr” of General Taylor. Rather than consider the validity of Taylor’s critiques, Eisenhower and his team treated the military officers who critiqued the administration as borderline insubordinate and dismissed their claims as baseless, furthering the gulf between the civilian leaders and the military.

By the time Eisenhower left office, his relations with the military had reached a serious low. He famously warned the country against military influence with his invocation of the “military-industrial complex” in his farewell address in 1961.

However, Eisenhower failed to recognize his own role and mismanagement as central elements of the breakdown that had occurred between him and the senior generals.

PROSPECTS FOR A CIVIL-MILITARY CRISIS Eisenhower’s crisis is an instructive one for the present day.

Like Eisenhower, Trump’s largely hierarchical experience in leadership differs from the consensus and political compromise based backgrounds of most other Presidents. Trump also has strong views on the War on Terror, Russia, and China that are at odds with the senior commanders of the American military. His track record over the past election cycle, as illuminated by his dispute with the experts in the CIA, is one of confronting and degrading those who present information opposed to his current worldview rather than acknowledging criticism and using it to refine his opinions.

Flynn, Mattis, and Kelly themselves hold a series of competing views about the world that simultaneously complement and contradict Trump’s stances. Of these, Flynn’s hostility towards Islam and friendliness towards Russia are the closest to Trump’s views, but place Flynn far outside the mainstream of the senior American officer corps. Mattis and Kelly, as well as the

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Joseph Dunford, differ with the president in multiple ways which may lead to clashes over American national security. In contrast to the president, Mattis has been highly skeptical of Russia, and has supported both close coordination and working with American allies and reducing the numbers of American nuclear warheads. Kelly, for his part, has spoken much more favorably about immigration, and has even suggested that transnational drug trafficking outstrips radical Islam as a threat to the United States. General Dunford strongly defended NATO during the Presidential campaign against Trump’s charges that the alliance is obsolete while naming Russia as the top military threat to the United States at his confirmation hearing in 2015. Moreover, both Mattis and Kelly have demonstrated a willingness to push back against presidential directives and positions they disagree with under President Obama. Mattis pushed the Obama administration to adopt a more thorough assessment of American foreign policy towards Iran, while Kelly questioned lifting restrictions on women in combat, suggesting both men would not hesitate to work against White House policies they see as detrimental to American national security interests.

These serious differences between senior generals within Trump’s cabinet, combined with the president’s tendency to push back against opposing viewpoints rather than refine his own, suggests that a dangerous chasm between Trump and American national security professionals may steadily emerge throughout the next four years. The most likely civil-military dilemma that this administration will face, then, is not that a former or serving general like Mattis, Kelly or Dunford will be able to usurp greater power; it is that the president will decline contradicting advice from military and national security professionals, and push them into open public opposition to national policy. Administration priorities that clash with the bipartisan foreign policy consensus in Congress will place generals and admirals in an increasingly difficult spot, forcing them to both deliver their own, potentially contradicting, analyses while simultaneously defending administration priorities. Such a dilemma could possibly lead to efforts to remove sitting generals for their political views, a practice which has precedent in the run-up to the Iraq War. This could have the detrimental effect of politicizing military advice and forcing commanders to consider political rather than security issues in their assessments. Should a sitting, highly controversial president end up in a widely publicized clash with the military—one of the few remaining American institutions that retains public confidence under the leadership of charismatic and popular generals—then the potential political fallout would be impossible to predict.

CALIFORNIA’S REFFERENDUM ON CAPITAL PUNISHMENT Looking back.

Lizzy Schick

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ast November, Californians had the chance to abolish the death penalty. Given declining support for capital punishment and a decade-long hiatus in its use, abolition seemed possible. However, the ballot initiative, Proposition 62, fell short of majority support.

California is not an anomaly for maintaining capital punishment; only 18 states and the District of Columbia have banned it. The failure of Proposition 62 presents a case study through which to examine the death penalty—in particular, its status within American society and government.

AN AMERICAN INSTITUTION When we talk about capital punishment, we are really discussing local decisions occurring in about 3,000 counties throughout the nation, which vary widely. A recent report from the Death Penalty Information Center found that over the past 40 years, one third of all executions came from only 15 counties. Yet most judicial decisions regarding capital punishment occur at a national level. The Supreme Court has long taken an interest in the death penalty, perhaps most importantly in the 1972 case Furman v. Georgia, which struck down 39 of the 40 existing state death penalty statutes because of unfettered discretion in their enforce-

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ment. Even then, the topic was so contentious that all nine justices wrote separate opinions. After Furman, each state either revised its death penalty or abolished it altogether. California was one of the 37 states that chose to reinstate capital punishment during the subsequent four years.

In general, support for and use of the death penalty is in decline today. Both Gallup and Pew Research found that an alltime high rate of two in five Americans oppose capital punishment. Moreover, court rulings have increasingly restricted the use of the death penalty—a trend that points toward eventual abolition. Texas, the state with the second highest rate of execution per capita, has not sent any inmates to death row since July of 2013. California, which maintains the largest roster of death row inmates, has not executed anyone in over a decade.

CALIFORNIA’S CHOICE The death penalty in California was not abolished in November, but it might as well have been. Its disuse in recent years led a California district court to rule capital punishment cruel and unusual in 2014 because executions were “so infrequent, and the delays preceding it so extraordinary … [that it] is antithetical to any civilized notion of just punishment.” Almost 11 years have passed since California’s last execution, and only 13 men have been executed since 1978, out of 850 sentences in that period.

These men served an average of 17.5 years on death row, a truly “extraordinary” delay that historically was considered cruel and unusual punishment by the courts. Jamar Tucker, an inmate on California’s death row, told ABC News, “Give it to me. Don’t sit me, have me sitting on the shelf 20 and 30 years. You told me you’re were going to kill me. Kill me already.” His sentiment echoes the district court’s ruling on delayed executions.

Although California has not carried out an execuion in many years, 53 percent of Californians—a slight majority—chose to keep death on the table as a form of punishment in 2016. In fact, in 2012, a similar ballot initiative proposing to abolish the death penalty, Proposition 34, also lost, with 52 percent of Californians in opposition. It seems in California’s case that abolition is only a matter of a few percentage points.

Although California is currently wrangling with the fate of capital punishment at the state level, historically, sweeping changes to the death penalty as a whole have come from the federal judiciary. Furman is just one example of the Supreme Court’s role in defining the American death penalty; the Court narrowed the use of capital punishment in other instances, banning capital punishment for rape in 1977 with Coker v. Georgia and prohibiting its application to minors in 2005 with Roper v.

Simmons. The Supreme Court continues to be the most heavyhanded in shaping capital punishment today, though action at the state and local level, like Proposition 62, occasionally replaces judicial procedure as the instrument of change.

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WHAT NEXT? Americans have a strange fascination with punishment, particularly of the lethal variety. Many popular television shows deal with the process of investigating, trying, and incarcerating citizens. Some have called the obsession with such shows, like Orange Is The New Black, “trauma porn” meant for those who are insulated from the actual criminal justice system.

And while these shows are fictional, Americans seem to also crave real criminal storylines as well, no matter how lurid—just consider the enduring legacy of O.J. Simpson’s trial. Even serious coverage of California’s death penalty from the Los Angeles Times panders to this fascination: a recent article on the 13 men executed in the state since 1978 has detailed descriptions of the men’s crimes as well as their exact last meals. This apparent obsession with the facts of death exemplifies the tension created by our societal craving for entertainment in any form.

Internationally, it has become increasingly difficult to argue for the retention of the death penalty. America’s peers—including Canada, France, and the United Kingdom—have long since rejected capital punishment, leaving the United States in the company of China and Iran. If executions are meant to deter further crime or provide retribution for victims’ families, the long stays on death row and low rates of execution render the death penalty ineffective. On California’s death row, in the same time period that 13 people were executed, 70 died of natural causes and 24 committed suicide. This illustrates what the state’s death row has become: a long-term holding cell for those considered the most deadly offenders.

In the wake of Proposition 62, the United States has an obligation to rethink its approach to death row. Temporary living conditions meant for offenders awaiting imminent death no longer suffice for inmates who spend decades on death row.

Joseph Perez, an inmate on California’s death row for over 15 years, called his surroundings a “concrete coffin.” These inmates arguably deserve the full services that other long-term inmates receive at a minimum. Whether or not the death penalty exists, the state must fulfill its duties to uphold our Eighth Amendment protections from cruel and unusual punishment.

As part of this ongoing discussion, it is also worth considering Proposition 66, which did pass in November. This proposal, meant to speed the appeals process for death sentences, imposes a time limit of five years for appeals and relegates them to the original trial judge rather than to a higher court. Within two days of its passage, opponents filed a lawsuit on the grounds that these changes infringe upon the constitutional rights of those sentenced. As the legal battle plays out, Californians will face a new sort of referendum on capital punishment. In four years, it is likely that another initiative to end the death penalty will appear on the ballot.

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AUTOCRACY AT MIDNIGHT Richa Chaturvedi SPRING 2017 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW 25

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n every currency note issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the following statement is printed and signed by the Governor of the RBI: “I promise to pay the bearer the sum of [x] Rupees.” On November 8, 2016, this promise was broken by the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, in a move that took 86 percent of Indian currency out of circulation. Mr. Modi enacted a demonetization decree in which Indian citizens could slowly transfer their now-defunct 500 and 1,000 Rupee bills to new 500 and 2,000 notes in small amounts (4,000 Rupees a day) with proof of identification. He also limited the amount of money individuals could withdraw from their bank accounts to 20,000 Rupees per week.

Since November, the Modi government has issued several decrees imposing a litany of new requirements and restrictions. Five days after the announcement, the RBI advised banks to make separate lines for senior citizens and disabled people.

Then came the Standard Operating Procedure for putting indelible ink on fingers of bank customers to track who had already exchanged cash. Two weeks later came a decree to allow 250,000 Rupees ($3,700) withdrawals for weddings. Agriculture, medical bills, authentication card relaxations – the caveats kept on coming.

Modi’s demonetization has not only unnecessarily complicated the lives of Indians. His subsequent decrees have violated the social contract inherent in any constitutional republic: that a leader rules by the popular will, within the confines of the law. Mr. Modi cannot use his grip of the former as an excuse to trample upon the latter. While the Indian Supreme Court has thus far kept silent regarding the decrees’ legality, there is good reason to think they contravene the Indian constitution both in text and in spirit, by extending beyond the Prime Minister’s delegated power, and by imposing undue unilateral restrictions on the rights and freedoms of Indian citizens.

A MOVING TARGET Why demonetize? Amar Singh, the pro-demonetization leader of the Samajwadi party, explained to the HPR that Mr. Modi fulfilled a major campaign promise of eradicating corruption through demonetization. Singh and other supporters of the move were surprised at the amount of cash that returned to the banking system following demonetization, allowing the government to now redeploy it to promote targeted industries. Singh further commented, “Too much of politics should not be read into this decision, which is applicable to all the political parties.”

While Mr. Modi has changed his justification of demonetization since November 8th, the original goals he outlined were similar to those of the 1978 Demonetization Act, which also featured the phasing out of bank notes. Originally, Mr. Modi argued that his actions would rid the economy of black money and corrupt holdings. He then proclaimed that demonetization would cut off cash flows to terrorists and remove counterfeit currency.

Shortly thereafter, Modi enjoyed something of a Marie Antoinette moment when his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) issued a press release encouraging citizens to transfer their transactions to online banking—in a country where roughly 30 percent of the

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population is illiterate and the Internet reaches only 26 percent of its citizens. This inspired the final goal: to begin India’s evolution into a cashless economy.

“The story keeps morphing and changing as they keep trying to maintain a positive spin,” claimed Swaminath Badrinath, the Canara Bank Professor of Finance at IIM Bangalore, in a conversation with the HPR. He explained that demonetization does not attack the biggest chunks of illegally held money, which are often tied up in real estate or dummy bank accounts. While Badrinath considers a transition to a cashless economy a more feasible goal, it still faces daunting barriers due to widespread illiteracy and a lack of access to technology in India. In his words, “Modi’s demonetization at best encouraged people to change their behaviors, moving the country slightly toward these goals, but it in no way achieves them.” It seems that while demonetization could help ameliorate some issues in theory, in practice it has resulted in a number of unforeseen negative consequences.

A BOTCHED EXECUTION Take the case of Madan Ojha, a 32-year-old domestic helper, whose mother was recently diagnosed with a rare degenerative neurological disease. Ojha stood in line for several days to procure cash for medical expenses, hoping to slowly convert his savings to new currency notes to pay the 25,000 rupee medical bill. All of his savings are in 1,000 rupee notes because they are easier to store and, like many others, Ojha has to pay for the treatment entirely in cash. His mother still has not undergone the procedure. Unfortunately, Ojha’s story is one of many that reflect the botched execution of Mr. Modi’s demonetization.

Ravindra Verma, the founder and Managing Director of Mobility Infrastructure Group, was also greatly affected by the midnight decree. He explained to the HPR that his company invests in Indian infrastructure and makes revenue through tolls.

Mr. Modi’s sudden move cut off his source of income.

Initially told to accept tolls with the defunct currency for two days before transitioning to the new bills, Verma geared up for this decree by procuring lower denomination notes to provide change. Later that day, the industry was ordered to allow toll-free passage for a limited (though undefined) period. This duration was later mandated through December 2nd, 2016, resulting in industry-wide losses of $200 million and a subsequent government promise to repay the stakeholders.

The government’s ability to pitch demonetization as a patriotic act involving short term pain is reflected in Verma’s response. He plans to bring more infrastructure into India and is bullish about the long-term effects of demonetization on the Indian economy. Nevertheless, this story presents a reason for concern for those who hoped that Mr. Modi’s actions were taken with a great deal of forethought and planning.

Planning requires methodology, yet Dr. Badrinath was unable to think of any specific economic model that would recommend the seemingly arbitrary cash swapping and withdrawal limits that Mr. Modi enacted. He hopes that the numbers are based off of some average statistics available to the government. “Instead of explaining, they said, ‘This is the amount of money that you

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will get.’ They cannot be totally cavalier about it.”

NOW WHAT? Through the confusion and chaos, Mr. Modi has nonetheless enjoyed substantial support from the Indian electorate. His narrative about sacrificing now for the greater good later seems to appeal a people well accustomed to self-sacrifice.

There are, however, prominent Indian political parties and figures against demonetization, including Raghav Chadha, spokesman and treasurer of the Aam Aadmi Party. He told the HPR, “In no other country in the world do people face restrictions in withdrawing their own hard earned money from banks.

PM Modi’s dictatorial implementation of demonetization has been an assault on the rights and liberties on Indian citizens.

After being told by the Modi government what to eat, who to marry, and what to say, people are now being dictated on how much to withdraw and how much to spend in a month.” Chadha’s claims regarding the Prime Minister’s infringement of civil rights have been attacked by Modi’s supporters, who quickly point to the constitutionality of the 1978 Demonetization Act as legal precedent for Modi’s actions.

Following the period known as the ‘Indian Emergency’ in the 1970s, the government enacted a demonetization of high denomination currency in order to combat black money and to keep it out of the hands of corrupt government officials. Both the law, known as the High Denomination Bank Notes (Demonetization) Act of 1978, and its implementation were deemed constitutional after a challenge in the Supreme Court of India.

Perhaps Modi’s demonetization is also legal. However, several key differences between the 1978 and 2016 demonetizations imply that the legality of the former may not necessarily provide legal cover to the latter.

Firstly, Modi’s demonetization was done without provocation. Unlike the 1978 demonetization, there is currently no vast social and political upheaval in India that would necessitate such an action. While Mr. Modi did campaign on a promise to combat corruption, a move this drastic, in a country where , may have exceeded his mandate.

Secondly, this act was done as a unilateral executive decree without consultation, debate, vote, or recommendation. In the 1978 demonetization, a law was passed upon the recommendation of the Wanchoo Committee, a group of political and economic policy experts. This time, even the Reserve Bank of India, a beacon of good governance, was notified about the move only a day before it took place. Mr. Modi’s unilateral decision, and subsequent decrees, undermine the institutions of governance that are the foundation of a sound democracy. To Chadha, “It was an entirely unilateral decision by the PM without consultation with his economic advisors, the RBI, eminent economists or even cabinet colleagues. The PM is not an economist, but took this step regardless, therefore he alone can answer for the economic

motivations that led him to this bold and catastrophic decision.”

Finally, unlike the Demonetization Act in 1978, Modi never passed a law before acting. His action was similar to an American Executive Order, intended to bypassed the legislature altogether. By restricting the amount of money individuals can swap and withdraw from their accounts each day, Mr. Modi has singlehandedly limited citizens’ access to their assets.

Since November 8th, Modi has issued several decrees modifying how Indians can access their property, and under what circumstances. Such decrees infringe on individual rights by unilaterally and arbitrarily assigning rupee values to things such as weddings, medical care, and funerals. These measures have been consistently taken without a vote and without representation of the biggest stakeholders: the citizens of India.

Is this illegal? That is for the Supreme Court of India to decide. Unfortunately for the Indian people, the Justices of the highest court in the land have, so to speak, dropped the ball. In Badrinath’s words, “This is the first time since Independence that every citizen has been so affected by a government action.

Unlike the previous demonetization, which only affected the richest of the rich, this is totally unprecedented. The Supreme Court has not responded in any way—the judiciary has basically choked in doing their job.” The highest court of India has refused to accept any public interest litigation against demonetization. It is not clear if or when they will permit such a case to be heard.

This refusal itself may be an indicator of a cozy relationship between the Judiciary and the Legislature, though there is no evidence that the Justices on the bench were coerced in any way into their decision. Regardless, the consequence is that Mr. Modi’s actions will remain unchecked at a time when the citizens of India are most in need of an advocate for their rights.

Mr. Modi’s move also sets a dangerous precedent for the future.

There is already talk, at the highest levels of government, of him instructing government officials to arbitrarily go door-to-door and demand proof of property ownership without a warrant.

Possible actions like these are being justified under the the pretenses of fighting corruption, and may become reality in coming months. No matter how effective such moves are in combating corruption and black money, they exemplify Mr. Modi’s predilection towards using his mandate to impinge upon the democratic rights of his citizens.

It can at once be true that Modi’s methods are effective and that they greatly expand his executive power. Yet the former does not justify the latter. Modi’s demonetization decree and subsequent modifications reflect a slow but relentless chipping away of his citizens’ individual freedoms. His disregard for the government institutions in place reveals his imperious nature, which remains unchecked as the Supreme Court silently watches. This sets a dangerous precedence for the future: as long as Modi can continue to successfully sell his autocratic actions to the electorate under the banner of patriotism, in theory his powers can continue to grow without bound.

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TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS REPORT 15 YEARS LATER

Rachel Schartz

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ccording to recent studies, most Americans associate the term “slavery” with the transatlantic slave trade that ended in the 1860s. The number of enslaved in 2016, however, totaled over three times the total number of those enslaved between the 15th and 19th centuries. Generating $150 billion in profits annually, modern slavery drew renewed attention in the early 2000s, yet the problem only continues to grow.

Covert by nature, human trafficking is difficult for governments to tackle and can easily go unnoticed by authorities.

For 15 years the U.S. State Department has issued a Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report analyzing the state of global slavery and ranking countries’ compliance with international humanitarian law. Unfortunately, the report lacks an in-depth analysis of the root causes of slavery. The lack of research, both quantitative and qualitative, has been pointed out by experts who believe the report’s reach is not extensive enough to eliminate modern slavery. The U.S. State Department has pushed back against criticisms of the report’s findings, but even amongst supporters of the Trafficking in Persons Report, one sentiment is shared: there is not enough data. Without a true understanding of the nature of modern slavery, the problem will be impossible to successfully fight.

THE NEW SLAVE TRADE Modern slavery is difficult to dismantle because researchers have been unable to isolate and collect data on its causes.

Whereas the transatlantic slave trade thrived on otherness defined by race, modern slavery exploits the most vulnerable victims, regardless of what factors make them vulnerable. Professor Eric Edmonds, an expert on trafficking and an economics professor at Dartmouth, has studied these vulnerable populations in hopes of identifying root causes of modern slavery. In an interview with the HPR, Edmonds discussed his work combining data on rescued child slaves with data on the communities these children come from. He stated that “family dissolution and paternal disability stood out as strong markers of vulnerability to trafficking. A lot more work could be done in this area, but data is scarce.”

Systemic social, cultural, and economic policies and power structures disadvantage certain groups, including those who are impoverished, disabled, or ethnic outsiders. In Pakistan, for example, Muslims have enslaved over 30,000 Christians as a source of forced labor. As a religious minority in Pakistan, Christians are especially vulnerable to enslavement. Globally, however, modern slavery does not exploit one religious group in particular; it preys upon those who lack security, education and economic opportunity. As Edmonds explained, “Ultimately, a lot more needs to be done to understand vulnerability to trafficking in sending areas.”

Globalization and technology dramatically changed the dynamics of slavery, and have made the modern slave trade in-

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creasingly more profitable and easier to participate in. Manufacturing advancements have incentivized poor countries to offer even cheaper labor, and the Internet has allowed consumers to purchase sex slaves without fear of prosecution. Dr. Louise Shelley, Director of the Terrorism, Transnational Crime and Corruption Center, outlined this side of the Internet in a preview of her new book on illicit trade. “Over a two-year time frame traffickers spent about $250 million to post more than 60 million advertisements. Mapping the networks in the deep and dark web has revealed the global expanse of the traffickers.” Attempts to thwart modern slavery through the methods that ended the transatlantic slave trade are therefore ineffective. In 1850 the average slave cost $1,000 to $1,800—3 to 6 times the average American annual income at the time, the equivalent of nearly $50,000 today.

Today, that average cost has dropped to $90. Slaves, formerly viewed as long-term investments, are now disposable. When they stop generating profits, due to injury or contraction of an STD, they are often murdered.

In response to the evolution and growth of slavery, the U.S. State Department began studying the issue in 2001, and has published its findings in an annual TIP report. The State Department heralded the report as “the world’s most comprehensive resource of governmental anti-human trafficking efforts.”

Countries receive a tier ranking—tier 1, tier 2, tier 2 watch list, or tier 3—depending upon whether they meet minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), and whether the number of trafficking victims in their country is increasing.

Countries categorized as tier 3 have made no effort to comply with minimum standards of the TVPA, and may be subject to U.S. sanctions.

TIP REPORT UNDER FIRE Although the TIP report has sparked action in the form of increased legislation and national action plans, it has not been lauded by all. Some foreign governments have questioned the objectivity and research methods of the State Department, pointing out that the United States did not include itself in the report until 2010—nine years after the report began. Even the U.S. Government Accountability Office went as far as to argue that the State Department “does not comprehensively describe compliance with the [TVPA] standards, lessening the report’s credibility and usefulness as a diplomatic tool.” Other countries object to the report’s bias due to cultural differences. Child labor is common and acceptable in Brazil and Guyana, and debt bondage is part of Nepal’s economy. These cultural practices shape their TIP rankings, and countries have pushed back against a point system they perceive as ‘westernized.’ By its own admittance, the State Department recognized in the 2016 report that “significant gaps in knowledge remain,” highlighting the need for more refined research methods. However, analyzing and improving those research methods is difficult, since the State

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Department did not publish raw quantitative data in its report.

In an interview with CNN following the release of the 2016 TIP report, Susan Coppedge, U.S. Ambassador At-Large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, discussed a renewed focus on funding research and data that identifies vulnerable populations and indicators of vulnerability. Yet according to a study conducted by the Institute for the Study of International Migration, research reports by intra-governmental organizations, international NGOs, and the United Nations account for nearly 90 percent of the literature on human trafficking—with merely seven percent authored by the U.S. government. Furthermore, much of this research is of questionable quality: the methodological challenges of identifying the root causes of slavery make it difficult to obtain reliable data.

Establishing the number of trafficking victims was a part of the presidential directive in 2001, and though the capabilities appear to exist, little progress has been made. Hidden populations have been quantified and monitored through capturerecapture methodology and respondent-driven sampling. Using these methods, the United Kingdom determined the number of homeless within the country as well as their movement. The methodology has further been used to track illegal prostitution across several countries, and some researchers say it could be translated to monitoring enslaved populations.

A DATA-DRIVEN FUTURE In regards to causation, TIP reports have offered little analysis of substance. The 2001 TIP report stated, “Root causes of trafficking include greed, moral turpitude, economics, political instability and transition, and social factors.” Those causes have not drastically changed through the past 15 years. The country narratives section of the TIP report explains culturally-specific causes, even if they are not quantified. Yet as Ambassador Coppedge has stated, properly quantifying root causes of modern slavery is the future.

One productive method of identifying these causes is to compare countries’ TIP status with their performance in other indexes. For the past 20 years, the Heritage Foundation has published an economic freedom index, measuring countries’ market liberties and government regulations. The data, in categories ranging from labor freedom to corruption, is averaged and countries are ranked according to their degree of overall economic freedom—free, mostly free, moderately free, mostly unfree, or repressed. When the data is compared to TIP tier rankings, there is a clear correlation between a country’s economic freedom and the extent of its human trafficking problem. Of the countries that received a free rating, 60 percent were tier 1, while none were categorized as tier 3. Similarly, mostly free countries stood at 66 percent tier 1, without a single tier 3 country. Of the economically repressed countries, 46 percent were tier 3 and none received a tier 1 ranking. It appears that countries that promote

economic freedom have populations more resistant to trafficking.

Poverty, one of the largest causes of modern slavery, is also rampant in tier 3 countries. On average, 39 percent of tier 3 countries’ populations are below the UN poverty line, according to CIA income data. Zimbabwe, a longtime tier 3 country, is reported to have an alarming poverty rate of 72.3 percent. A lack of sustainable economic growth has forced its citizens into debt bondage and exploitative labor conditions.

Across the United States, data-driven studies have shown their effectiveness in reducing trafficking. Harvard University recently released a study that followed the work of an NGO in India. The organization used a community empowerment model that first identified at-risk populations, and then customized preventative methods according to their vulnerabilities. Across the four-year study, human trafficking dropped at a statistically significant rate. The study proved the effectiveness of an approach customized to a population’s specific vulnerabilities, such as level of literacy, level of poverty, caste, and gender.

While it has long been apparent in the United States that community based anti-trafficking projects have higher success rates, these local models have the potential to be translated to a national level. Rep. Kristi Noem (SD-R) has been a vocal supporter of the anti-trafficking movement in the United States. She remains hopeful that the 115th Congress will continue to offer more help to victims. “We’re committed, not only to preventing trafficking, but making sure victims have the resources they need to rebuild. Many escape only to face significant barriers in housing, education, and employment, making them vulnerable to exploitation. There is a role for communities and public policy to play in the recovery process as well.” A number of anti-trafficking bills have already been introduced this session, including the CATCH Traffickers Act and the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act. Edmonds added that he is “extremely optimistic about the scope of technology to improve our ability to identify where trafficking victims are in receiving areas and when families in sending areas are vulnerable.”

Despite having implemented anti-trafficking policies and protocols such as the TIP report, the U.S. government has not been able to gauge their effectiveness or target assistance to vulnerable populations. The TIP report has, however, proved useful in shedding light on trafficking and encouraging governments and NGOs to collaborate to end slavery worldwide. Although the number of slaves continues to increase, the number of enslaved rescued in 2016 nearly doubled from the previous year, indicating a promising future. As Secretary of State John Kerry stated in the 2016 TIP report: “The magnitude of the challenge is real, but make no mistake: So are the opportunities for progress.” The U.S. State Department continues to claim that identifying slavery’s root causes on a smaller scale is a priority. With the release of the 2017 TIP report expected this summer, it will soon be apparent if those intentions have translated into real progress.

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the new colonialism?

china’s investment in africa Elizabeth Manero

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frica is no stranger to exploitation. After decades of colonial rule under major Western powers, the continent was left with a legacy of harsh, imperialist rule that set it back years in modernization. As a result, it has become the focus of mountains of developmental assistance from countries hoping to foster social, institutional, and infrastructural change—totaling over $300 billion in foreign aid since 1970. This assistance was often conditional, with aid dependent on a country’s record on human rights. The West however, has ceased to be Africa’s only option when it comes to aid and development. Recently, a number of African countries have become increasingly drawn to China’s “no-strings attached” developmental assistance and promises of growth. While these policies certainly create economic gains for Africa, the vestiges of colonialism evident in this relationship raise questions about the true cost of these benefits.

A DOUBLE EDGED SWORD? Currently the continent’s largest trading partner, China relies on African markets for a steady flow of natural resources to sustain manufacturing. The African resources China imports are varied, covering everything from oil, to iron ore, timber, and copper. In exchange for broad access to resources, China exports cheap manufactured goods back to its African trading partners, builds much needed infrastructure, provides foreign direct investments, and loans out billions of dollars. In 2014 alone, the value of this trade totaled over $200 billion. Furthermore, over half of China’s foreign aid is distributed in Africa.

Though advocates of this inflow of money claim it spurs development, critics of China’s policies in Africa paint a picture of trade imbalances that are handicapping the nations involved, while grossly advantaging China at the expense of the African people. These critics believe that China seeks to establish itself

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as a new colonial power.

Infrastructure programs funded by the Chinese government, for example, are often carried out by Chinese workers. Instead of giving local companies and citizens a vital opportunity to grow experience and capital, these contracts overwhelmingly benefit Chinese corporations and bring in massive profits. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce reported $50 billion in new contracts in 2015. The following year, the China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC) announced over $5 billion in contracts within Africa.

Chinese goods are also flooding African markets, overwhelming local producers with large volumes of cheap products that are difficult to compete against. Moreover, in industries that do employ African workers, companies are still not exempt from criticism. In 2011, Human Rights Watch released a scathing review of treatment of Zambian workers in Chinese owned copper mines, claiming unsafe working conditions, exploitative hours, and threats to those that posed complaints.

PARTNERSHIP OR COLONIALISM? Despite criticisms of colonialism, this relationship has provided Africa with significant benefits. China, for its part, has gone out of its away to deny claims of colonial abuses. Wang Yi, China’s Foreign Minister, insisted in a 2015 tour of Kenya, that “[China] absolutely will not take the old path of Western colonists, and we absolutely will not sacrifice Africa’s ecological environment and long-term interests.”

Indeed, this relationship is not as black and white as it may first seem. Dirk Willem de Vilde, a Senior Research Fellow and head of International Economic Development at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), told the HPR that “on all the infrastructure indicators, African countries are way behind

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compared to other countries. There is a huge infrastructure gap that is holding back development in many African countries at the moment.”

In an attempt to bridge this gap, numerous Chinese-funded infrastructure programs have created roads, bridges, railways, schools, and hospitals. Chinese doctors played an important role in addressing the Ebola outbreak in 2015, and, despite criticisms of exploitative labor treatment, the Chinese saved mines that had been deteriorating under previous investors, which expanded facilities, rescued jobs, and created thousands of new ones. Beyond this, there has also been significant investment in services and manufacturing.

Based on these benefits, Willem de Vilde characterizes the relationship between China and Africa differently than some of its critics, noting that “There is mutual interest… If there are good policies and institutions in place, [African countries] can use the investment well to grow their economies.” He does not believe that China is engaging in neocolonialism.

It is difficult to paint the relationship between China and Africa with one broad brush— Africa itself is made up of diverse countries that each strike independent deals with China and go through their own economic ups and downs. Despite this, the continent as a whole has seen positive change as a result of Chinese policies and developmental aid.

MUTUAL BENEFIT Africa is reaping economic benefit, but there is no doubt that China’s interest in the continent goes beyond mere altruism.

Economically, both the private and public sectors in China are benefiting from this developing relationship. Chinese companies get new business investments, and the country as a whole gets steady access to much-needed natural resources.

Beyond these obvious gains however, China also receives a number of less easily quantifiable benefits. Yong Deng, an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, spoke with the HPR about these benefits, stating that, “China feels that it is entitled to a Great Power status, so maintaining that in a global world order is always a long-term foreign policy goal.” According to Deng, “In terms of great power rise… Africa carries an enormous amount of diplomatic weight in [shifting] China’s diplomatic and political influence away from U.S., Western dominated world order.”

In a move that clearly demonstrated these objectives, construction of China’s first ever overseas military base officially began on the African continent in April of 2016. Located on the coast of Djibouti, the naval base is located less than ten miles away from US AFRICOM, the United States’ largest African military base, and it offers China strategic access to the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.

China has also been using its aid strategically. While China provides aid in proportion to how poor a country is, there is a strong correlation between the amount of aid given, and support for China’s foreign policy objectives. In fact, AidData calculates that if an African country votes with China 10 percent more frequently in the United Nations, Chinese aid to that country increases by an average of 86 percent. This strategy is working.

African countries have supported China in its foreign policy pursuits on numerous occasions. For example, in 2014, South

Africa denied entry to the Dalai Llama, and in early 2016, Kenya deported 50 Taiwanese nationals to China.

Furthermore, last month, after Sao Tome and Principe broke off relations with Taiwan and re-established diplomatic ties with China, the Chinese Foreign Minister proclaimed that “China is willing to provide support to the economical and social development of Sao Tome and Principe within its capacity.” Concurrently, the Director of External Politics in Sao Tome and Principe said that the nation “hope[s] more and more Chinese interests will invest in Sao Tome and Africa.”

BUMPY RIDE Sustaining economic growth in the long run will be Africa’s next big challenge. Given that much of the continent’s recent economic success has been due its increased access to Chinese markets, as China’s economy slows, projections for African growth do as well. In 2015, Chinese imports from Africa dropped 40 percent, and price fluctuations in oil and food prices have made economic prospects appear grimmer than before. Successful development cannot only depend on the prosperity of foreign actors; it will require meaningful policy initiatives that focus on long-term economic sustainability.

Unfortunately, many African nations have missed a vital opportunity to enact this change while their economies were showing promising growth. Willem de Vilde commented on this, stating that, “many African countries haven’t been using that wealth that was created on the basis of natural resources for economic transformation. They haven’t really upgraded their country’s infrastructure, or skills levels to a sufficient degree.”

African countries will need to “start promoting other sectors such as manufacturing or services”.

Whether African countries will begin to seize more opportunities to diversify their economies remains to be seen. They may soon need to renegotiate trade contracts to promote more foreign spending in energy infrastructure and manufacturing to weather shrinking investment from China. Their long-term growth prospects will depend on it.

MOVING FORWARD However you characterize their relationship, there is no question that both China and African nations stand to benefit.

Any drawbacks notwithstanding, there is much reason to hope for continued economic benefits to both parties, and growing infrastructural improvement throughout Africa. In 2015, China and Kenya launched a joint solar energy venture, investing in expanding solar capacity and training local technicians on new technologies. Also in 2015, a loan package worth over $100 million was announced to support youth job training.

China’s investments have already begun to change how the West approaches development deals—causing a shift from a focus on pure lump sum aid to new systems like Aid for Trade, where developing countries receive focused trade capacity and infrastructure building assistance. If China is ultimately successful in bringing about a new surge in African economies—something the West has tried and failed to achieve for decades—then the global handbook on foreign development will be rewritten.

At the same time, China finds itself one step closer to achieving the “Great Power” status it so longs for.

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THE ALABAMIFICATION

OF AMERICA Drew Pendergrass 34 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW SPRING 2017

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he 2016 presidential election looked, more than anything else, like an Alabama election. Donald Trump’s relentless appeals to populist conservative ideas echo decadeslong trends in the South. The current worries about Trump’s irresponsible governing style are similar to concerns Alabama commentators have been expressing about their often-demagogic leaders since before the 1940s. To understand the Trump administration, in which Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions serves as attorney general, we should look to Alabama, and the reasons why the state government is teetering toward collapse.

Leaders in all three branches of Alabama’s government are either under investigation or have been recently removed from office. After using his position to obtain over $1.1 million in financial favors, Mike Hubbard, the former speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives, was convicted of 12 felony corruption charges in July 2016. Because the governor has relatively little authority and the legislature holds all the cards—a simple majority is all that is required to override most vetoes—Hubbard has been described by many as “the most powerful man in Alabama.” His trial was full of fireworks, including testimony from former Governor Bob Riley, but ended in a sentence of only four years in prison.

The drama of the Hubbard case stirred up another scandal which otherwise might have gone unnoticed. Governor Robert Bentley, a man who ran his 2010 campaign on family values, divorced his wife of 50 years after allegedly having an affair with his powerful chief advisor, Rebekah Caldwell Mason. Although neither admit to a “physical affair,” sexual voicemails the governor left for Mason say otherwise. After the divorce, Bentley became more deeply mired in scandal. It was uncovered that as governor in 2014, he ordered a state law enforcement helicopter to retrieve his wallet, which he had left by accident at his exwife’s house in Tuscaloosa on his way to the beach.

In 2016, Roy Moore, the former chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, was removed from the bench for ethics violations after he ordered the state’s probate judges to ignore the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing same-sex marriage. The result has been mass confusion in courthouses across the state, several of which stopped issuing marriage licenses altogether.

Moore was previously removed from the same office in 2003, after erecting a stone monument of the Ten Commandments in the Alabama Judicial Building and ignoring a court order to have it removed.

Montgomery, the state capital, has become dominated by special interests, creating an environment where corruption is the norm. Far-right swings in the electorate have enabled extremists like Moore to come to power. But the forces destabilizing Alabama are not unique to the state. Donald Trump’s cabinet selections suggest that moneyed interests will be given influence in the federal government and that far-right voices, like Steve Bannon, will be given a stage. Montgomery’s fate may be Washington’s future.

After the election of Donald Trump, many commentators expressed shock that the president-elect, with his lewd comments and sexual impropriety, did so well in the South, a place known for “family values.” The truth is that the South has never prioritized the personal values of its leaders. Back in the 1940s and ’50s, Governor “Big Jim” Folsom was one of the most popular men ever to hold the position. To this day, many Alabamians say that if another Folsom ever runs for office, they will vote for

him, because Big Jim famously paved rural roads to underserved places. Big Jim was also famous for his vices—in a televised debate with George Wallace, Folsom showed up drunk and failed to remember the names of his many children. His apocryphal line—“if they bait a hook with whiskey and women, they’ll catch Big Jim every time”—remains prominent in Alabama lore.

The lesson is simple: populism rises above all other concerns in Alabama. Demagoguery has a long track record of success in the South, and a politician who sufficiently channels that energy can say and do most anything—“grab them by the pussy,” for example—and still win by a landslide. George Wallace’s racism cost Alabama millions in economic development and outside investment, yet his populist appeal won elections. He served several nonconsecutive terms as governor, including one as late as the 1980s.

Trump won the election with the same flair as Folsom and Wallace. With his cabinet picks and his agenda, it looks like Trump will govern like an Alabamian as well.

CONSERVATIVE POPULISM VS. THE LAW Moore’s flagrant disregard for court rulings is not unique in Alabama. According to Richard Fording, a professor of political science at the University of Alabama, “Moore follows a tradition of defiance” to federal authority that has thrived in Alabama since the Civil War, reaching a climax when Wallace barred the doors to the University of Alabama after the Brown v. Board of Education case. Alabamians elected Moore back into office even after he was removed from the bench for ethics violations because, as Fording told the HPR, “it is politically profitable to get kicked out of office in this state.”

So why is this the case? Why is Alabama, a place known for social conservatism, evangelical Christianity, and strong emphasis on family values, a hotbed for corruption and sex scandals where removal from office serves to prove one’s conservative bona fides? To Fording, the answer lies in Alabama’s traditionalistic culture, a hierarchical system where citizens fall in line with authority and accept “an elite class entitled to power.” This results in low rates of citizen participation.

Religion is an important tenet of traditionalism. For Wayne Flynt, professor emeritus of history at Auburn University, Alabama’s traditionalistic culture is best illustrated by the popular relationship between its citizens and Christianity. Flynt explained to the HPR, “Religion is a stool with four legs: one is theology, one is social ethics, one is personal ethics, and one is ritual and practice.” In his view, southern protestantism makes ritual irrelevant, as “the closer religion is to everyday practice, the more [Alabamians] like it.” Strong cultural ideologies undermine social and personal ethics, as “dealing with poor immigrants is off the table” to many traditionalists. As a result, Flynt finds that “the evangelical church is not concerned with social justice.”

Personal ethics are also not important: “Southern Baptists have one of the highest divorce rates in the United States. When it comes to premarital sex and children out of wedlock, Alabama doesn’t do well.” This leaves only theology, which Flynt sees as strict adherence to the text of the Bible.

Despite his public failures in social and personal ethics, Trump, like Moore, gives off strong traditionalist airs. He may not know the books of the Bible, but his strong stance against Islam is a classic evangelical stance—traditionalist Christians

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stand up to those that do not accept the text of the Bible. This antagonistic thinking is advanced by men like Michael Flynn, Trump’s national security adviser, who claims that fear of Muslims is rational. Steve Bannon, another Trump adviser, has repeatedly talked of the civilizational struggle between Islam and Christianity.

Many of Donald Trump’s populist ideas, like a Muslim registry and his practices, like the immigration ban, are of questionable legality. If Donald Trump can leverage himself into a champion for Christianity or conservatism, as Moore has done with great success, the unconstitutionality of his actions will be of little consequence.

THE DANGER OF LOOPHOLES Alabama’s constitution is amended frequently, making it the longest in the world, but the reason for its length points to the most dangerous legacy of Alabama history: over-centralization.

The writers of the 1901 Alabama constitution did not want poor whites or black voters to control their own counties or lives, so they required even the most minor changes to local law—such as salary increases for local officials—to be passed as amendments to the constitution. To this day, only a few areas in Alabama have been granted home rule, and they still face challenges in Montgomery. When Birmingham tried to raise the minimum wage, the move was struck down by the state legislature.

“In conservative thought, the best government is closest to home,” John Archibald, a columnist for the Birmingham Times, told the HPR. Yet Alabama is set up with a strong central government in mind, an irony not lost on Archibald. He associates centralization with the problems facing Jefferson County, where a large part of the Birmingham metro area is located, and its troubles with corrupt county commissioners. “Because [the Birmingham city government] didn’t have home rule and couldn’t fund themselves legally, they had to use tricks to get around the law,” Archibald said, careful to clarify that he didn’t mean to justify corruption. Eventually, these moves resulted in multiple arrests and what was, at the time, the largest municipal bankruptcy in history (Detroit has since claimed that title).

The legacy of centralization is closely related to Alabama’s recent scandals, not just those in Birmingham. In most states, if a lobbying group wishes to gain influence, they not only lobby in the capital, but they must also go to areas where they hope to work and lobby the mayor, the county commissioner, and other local officials to gain their favor. In Alabama, only Montgomery’s voice matters, leading to a city populated by special interests.

Mike Hubbard used this centralized system of favors and kickbacks for his own material gain.

There is plenty of outdated federal law that can be abused to enable the Trump administration to do surprising things in the manner of Alabama. These loopholes in our legal structure are usually avoided (President Obama, for instance, could have forced Merrick Garland past the Senate and into the Supreme Court with some legal justification), as they would lead to uproar and judicial challenges. A leader unconcerned about uproar could make liberal use of these structural failings.

The Senate confirmation proceedings for Trump’s cabinet nominees were criticized by the Office of Government Ethics, as

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several nominations proceeded to confirmation hearings without clearing an ethics check first. Newt Gingrich has suggested that Trump pardon his family members in advance for any violation while he is in office. The recent Trump University case suggests that Trump is more than willing to use legal technicalities to advance himself, with little concern for ethical implication.

These loopholes can go a long way.

REMOVING CIVIL RIGHTS The roots of Alabama’s unusually toxic political climate date back to the anti-populist movement orchestrated by plantation owners and industrialists, which culminated in the Constitution of 1901. While an anti-populist force and Donald Trump may seem antithetical, the political strategy used in 1901 remains relevant today.

Following the Civil War, Alabama industrialized rapidly.

Wealthy “Bourbon” Democrats, worried about labor insurrections, called for a new constitutional convention to cement their interests and power. While the suppression of the black vote figured most prominently in the convention (John B. Knox, president of the convention, opened by saying: “And what is it that we do want to do? Why, it is within the limits imposed by the Federal Constitution to establish white supremacy in this State”), the suppression of the white populist vote was important as well.

According to Flynt, the constitution’s poll taxes, as well as literacy and residency requirements, targeted the poor, uneducated, and transient population. The results were a success for the rich and white—between 1900 and 1903, the 181,000 registered black voters declined to under 5,000. By the 1940s, 600,000 whites and 520,000 blacks were disenfranchised by some provision of the constitution.

Blatant voter suppression like this continued through the 1960s, but the practice is far from over. After the 2013 Supreme Court case Shelby County v. Holder, which gutted the Voting Rights Act, Southern states promptly started to pass voter ID laws. There is plenty of evidence that voting fraud is negligible, but politicians claimed that it was a pressing issue, and capitalized on those fears to pass legislation that previously would have been struck down as a civil rights abuse. Recently, Alabama has closed DMV offices in largely poor, black, Democratic counties, curbing access to driver’s licenses just as the strict new voter ID law has come into practice. The move has been defended as necessary to balance the budget.

Trump’s recent claim that millions voted illegally fits soundly into this tradition. His statements are already changing perceptions of facts—about half of Americans believe that voter fraud is at least somewhat widespread. Trump’s prowess in media, coupled with a chance to fill vacant seats in the Supreme Court, leaves little to prevent Alabama-like changes in election law.

Alabama columnist Kyle Whitmire warned this past May that Donald Trump was part of what he called the “Alabamafication of America.” Like Alabama, America is full of promise, great ideas, and diverse people. But it is in danger of succumbing to the same fate as the Yellowhammer state, barraged with scandals until its citizens lose hope.

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ounded in Russia in 2011 as an anonymous feminist guerrilla punk collective of roughly 10 members, Pussy Riot is now represented in the public eye by only two women, Masha “Maria” Alyokhina and Nadezhda “Nadya” Tolokonnikova, who declared in 2013 that they were no longer members of the group. The videos that these two women have released over the last few years—still using the name “Pussy Riot”—have largely abandoned the harshness of punk-rock for the universality of pop, the protection of invisibility for the glitz of celebrity.

Nowadays, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova spend much of their time outside of Russia, speaking on panels and meeting with Western politicians instead of playing music.

Yet, when Alyokhina spoke at Harvard’s IvyQ Conference last November in a panel moderated by Professor Caroline Light, she insisted that her fundamental goals had not changed. “Our art is our activism,” she told the audience. “There was no ‘before’.”

Indeed, the legacy of Pussy Riot as a symbol of free speech and artistic activism remains alive and well on the world stage.

This February marks the five-year anniversary of Pussy Riot’s infamous performance in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, criticizing the stringent marriage between church and state under Russian President Vladimir Putin. Alyokhina, Tolokonnikova and fellow member Yekaterina Samutsevich were subsequently sentenced to two years in prison on charges of “hooliganism,” drawing outcries of anger and support from celebrities like Madonna, the Beastie Boys and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. New York-based advocacy group The Voice Project stepped in to manage Pussy Riot’s international support fund, which lasted the entirety of their sentence.

Upon their release from prison in late December 2013, however, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova announced their official departure from Pussy Riot, ushering in a fundamentally different strategy for their activism—one that preferred to operate in the Western mainstream, rather than underground. Ahead of their appearance at Amnesty International’s “Bringing Human Rights Home” Concert in February 2014, other anonymous members of Pussy Riot wrote an open letter justifying Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova’s departure, outlining clear ideological differences.

“We charge no fees for viewing our art-work … the spectators to our performances are always spontaneous passers by, and we never sell tickets to our ‘shows’,” reads the letter. “We are anonymous, because we act against any personality cult, against hierarchies implied by appearance, age and other visible social attributes.”

Yet, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova have found a surprising sanctuary on American soil, leveraging more public-facing platforms like YouTube and Spotify to tackle some of the most overwhelming forces in U.S. politics: the media, the Internet and President Donald Trump. They may no longer be “Pussy Riot” on paper, but they are striving to adapt their dissident roots for a distinctly American agenda.

Weathered by travel, fame and legal troubles, Alyokhina defended this pivot in front of the IvyQ audience, pointing to the support she has received abroad. “The government will change … presidents, they change,” she said. “So the most important thing is your community. That doesn’t change. People by your side, to love and protect you. If you have a community to support you, you can do anything.”

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FROM MUSIC TO JOURNALISM Protest music around the world develops under what music critic Dorian Lynskey calls a carrot-and-stick framework. The “stick” is a political situation, such as a war or a divisive leader, that inspires artists and citizens to speak out; the “carrot” is an outspoken, transformative artist who takes the first step, making the otherwise daunting endeavor of political music more exciting and approachable for the rest of the artist community.

While Pussy Riot’s “stick” is rooted in Putin’s restrictive regime, the collective found its “carrot” of inspiration abroad, co-opting an American musico-political movement for its own purposes. In an interview with the New York Times, Tolokonnikova called Pussy Riot a “cosplay version” of riot grrrl, an underground feminist punk-rock movement founded in Washington state in the early 1990s. Aside from its outspoken stance on female sexuality and its role in establishing third-wave feminism, riot grrrl’s manifesto was also rooted in ownership over its distribution and communication. Several members published their own magazines to communicate with each other, while others called for a total media blackout, refusing interviews with journalists in protest of their ideological misrepresentation in the mainstream press.

This manifesto of independence and self-sufficiency has come to pervade the art activism scene in Russia as well.

“There’s a constant tension between a clear critique of the system and this concept of fragility and evanescence, of passing into oblivion under capitalism and consumerism,” says NataliaGluklya Pershina, founder of the Russian art collective Factory of Found Clothes, in an interview with the HPR. In this vein, aiming to take control of their own voice amidst their rising fame, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova realized that their work had to expand beyond wreaking musical havoc in the streets. As the latter told Reuters in May 2016, “the real punk is to build institutions.”

Hence, upon their release from prison, the two women sought out to do just that, from the lens of nonprofit work.

Inspired by their own case, they first founded Zona Prava, a nonprofit that provides legal aid and informational support to Russian prisoners and criminal defendants. Months later, they expanded into journalism and founded MediaZona, an independent news organization focusing on the Russian criminal justice system. While its website is only in Russian, MediaZona attracts an average of 2.2 million visitors a month and has partnered with English-language publications like The Guardian and VICE for one-off investigative projects.

While it is uncommon for musicians to invest directly in journalism, Pussy Riot’s ventures make creative as well as political sense. From a creative standpoint, “journalism is an art form,” Mike Lerner, director of the 2013 documentary Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer, told the HPR. “It’s creative writing. It may be factbased, but it’s only good when it’s creative and captures people’s imagination. It’s also not simply the reporting of facts, but also the communication of ideas, understanding and context.”

Politically, the state dominance of mass media in Russia has silenced much of the Kremlin opposition, strengthening the country’s media isolationism and turning conservative officials into arbiters of taste. In response to the Pussy Riot incident in

CULTURE

Trump’s post-election meeting with top news anchors last November (which nearly coincided with Alyokhina’s IvyQ appearance) may have signaled his plans to secure a tighter hold on the American media’s reins, à la Putin.

Moscow, the Russian government approved a new law in 2013 allowing jail sentences of up to three years for “offending religious feelings”; this was followed by a 2014 law promising to restrict foreign ownership stakes in Russian media assets to 20 percent by this year. Nonpartisan think tank Freedom House gave Russia a “press freedom score” of 83 out of 100 (100 being the least free), with more severely negative rankings for the country’s legal, political and economic media environments.

Russia’s exacting political situation presents a unique financial obstacle for Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova that incentivizes their heightened activity abroad. MediaZona and Zona Prava are funded largely by donations and speaking fees, with public options like crowdfunding out of the question due to political pressures. As a result, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova are now a prolific presence on the American conference circuit, speaking at events like Miami Art Basel and SXSW and meeting with prominent female political figures like Hillary Clinton and Samantha Power. In addition to IvyQ, Alyokhina also appeared alongside Tolokonnikova in 2014 at the Institute of Politics, when the duo spoke about their musical and journalistic work in conversation with former CNN Foreign Affairs Correspondent Jill Dougherty In recent years, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova have been wielding American popular culture more aggressively—not just as a status symbol, but also as a tool for promoting freedom of speech. In February 2015, they appeared on an episode of House of Cards, speaking out against the Putin-esque rival of Kevin Spacey’s Frank Underwood. That same month, the two women released their first-ever English-language song “I Can’t Breathe,” a dark urban ballad inspired by the controversial death of Eric Garner. Days before the presidential election in November 2016, Tolokonnikova’s musical criticism of Trump, “Make America Great Again,” topped the Spotify Viral 50 chart—an unprecedented feat for a Russian artist.

A DIFFICULT ENVIRONMENT It is a mere, perhaps fortunate, coincidence that “Pussy Riot” sounds like the name of a protest group fighting explicitly

against Trump, referencing the leaked tape from 2005 containing his lewd remarks toward women. Indeed, 2016 was a banner year for otherwise neutral artists taking a clear political stance.

Musicians from Rihanna and Jay-Z to Miley Cyrus and Garth Brooks criticized the president’s racist, sexist rhetoric and refused to perform at his inauguration. The Prophets of Rage, an anti-Republican rap-rock protest supergroup formed by Rage Against The Machine, Public Enemy and Cypress Hill, is currently in the middle of an international tour spanning the United States, Europe and Latin America.

In light of the new administration, however, looking to the American journalism landscape for inspiration and support may not be any easier for Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova. Trump’s post-election meeting with top news anchors last November (which nearly coincided with Alyokhina’s IvyQ appearance) may have signaled his plans to secure a tighter hold on the American media’s reins, à la Putin.

“The publications today that talk about fake news coming from Russia should realize that the fake news is also right here, that the call is coming from inside the house, so to speak,“ says Hunter Heaney, executive director of the art advocacy nonprofit The Voice Project, in an interview with the HPR. “Some of President Lincoln’s yellow journalism tactics were outrageous.

And look at how [William Randolph] Hearst used his New York Journal to foment the Spanish American War. Our 2016 election is not as much of an outlier as many would have us believe.”

Unfortunately, the flashiness of public speaking engagements and loud music videos has only highlighted Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova’s surface image, instead of encouraging deeper, more targeted structural change. Their public perception, and in turn their rhetoric, tends to rely too heavily on the original Pussy Riot’s early days in Russia, rather than on the moniker’s current status as an intangible guiding mindset. The world must come to understand that these two women are not Pussy Riot any longer, but rather standalone activists who are eager to use their oppositionist expertise to contribute to American and international causes. As they are swept further into the American celebrity machine, however, stardom may hurt, rather than help, their quest.

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Jake Tapper with Humberto Juรกrez

40 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW SPRING 2017

INTERVIEWS

Fake news played an important role in this election. How will journalists address this issue?

In regard to the relationship between President Trump and the media, what will be the biggest challenge?

We have to stop calling it fake news, we have to start calling it what it is—lies and disinformation. I think the first thing that

I don’t know what type of relationship we’re going to have. Is

the media needs to do is to gain a little self-awareness about

it going to have press conferences? Are his people going to share

the phenomenon. For instance, Rolling Stone, which did the

information? Is he going to going to continue to attack indi-

most notorious, false story of the last couple of years [“A Rape

vidual reporters by name when they factually report information

on Campus”], set back that issue for years, with Rolling Stone

like Jeff Zeleny when he pointed out, like a number of us have

handling it the way they did. They then turn around and start

been, that there is no evidence of fraudulent votes? Jeff Zeleny

interviewing President Obama about what a problem fake news

reported that and the president-elect, soon to be the most pow-

is. That to me shows a lack of self-awareness that is part of the

erful man on the planet, starts attacking him by name. That’s a

problem. That story was fake news more than any other story

problem. I don’t know what it’s going to be, but it’s going to take

in the last couple of years and it was a true scandal. That said,

a lot of fortitude and it’s going to take a lot of people standing up

this disinformation is shocking and very upsetting. There was a

for what’s right—facts, truth, honesty, even when Donald Trump

totally crazy one about the NYPD finding all this evidence about

is, as a pitcher, delivering balls as close to the batter as possible.

insane child sex-rings on Anthony Weiner’s computer—not a true story, completely false. But General Michael Flynn, who will be the next Security Advisor, tweeting it out—that’s a prob-

What is it like to interview Trump and do you expect to interview him again?

lem. And if people in power are not willing to stand against this kind of fraud, then I really worry about where we’re going. The

I don’t know if I’ll ever get to interview him again. The last

media needs to call it out, and the media also needs to make sure

one I did with him was the one in June when I pressed him on

that our standards are so rigorous and when we mess up, we

Judge [Gonzalo] Curiel and whether or not it was fair to say that

acknowledge and explain how it happened and that we’re trans-

someone could not do their job because of their heritage. That

parent so that we can regain some credibility. The loss of cred-

was the last time I got to interview him and I suspect that it

ibility in mainstream media is one of the reasons why people are

will be the last time ever, but I don’t know. He is a very forceful

turning to this fake news stories. We are culpable to a degree.

presence … him and Hillary Clinton are both very challenging in their own way. They’re both larger than life, charismatic, forceful, and suspicious. But the truth of the matter is Donald Trump has a side to him that is much more, both of them really, can be very personable and very charming. In fact, Donald Trump, after the Judge Curiel interview, didn’t storm out, he was totally welcoming and nice. But I have no idea what it’s going to be like.

My hope, as an American, is that he will be successful and I hope that he unites the country and I hope he respects the role that people in the press have. But we’ll see on all of those accounts.

SPRING 2017 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW 41

INTERVIEWS

with Marty Berger

Malcolm Jenkins with Marty Berger

Take us back to the first game you protested alone.

Can you describe your thoughts and emotions before the national anthem played?

It was one of those things that we had already done [for] a few weeks. It already felt like a lonely feeling when it was just a few of us, but I remember specifically having that feeling where it was a really lonely space. But I also knew that everyone would be looking to see if I would stand when I was by myself, because there’s nobody else to spread the criticism around with. It’s just me. Being a leader on the team, a lot of people pay attention to what I do, so I did feel that responsibility to make sure that I kept my word.

What inspired you to take your activism off the field?

Well, we had already been doing some things off the field before the protests started. When we saw what happened to Philando Castile, and that summer it was two killings back to back, and then there were the police shootings in Dallas. It just came to a boiling point that week in July, and I reached out to some people I knew in the city that worked or formerly worked for the mayor’s office. I just said, “Look, I want to talk to somebody high up in the police department here in Philadelphia and have a conversation about what’s going on.” In July, I brought a couple of my teammates and some leaders from around the communities, and we sat down with the commissioner of Philadelphia Police, Richard Ross, and we just talked. We had a candid conversation about some of the things that are going on in the nation [and] around the country; our concerns as community members [and] community leaders. Then we asked him to give

42 HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW SPRING 2017

us his take on what are some of the struggles with police officers and what are they dealing with. It was a good conversation to at least bring people to the table, have candid, open dialogue about each other’s perspectives, and start to figure out how we can work together to change not only the perception in how we think about each other but how we work and communicate with each other. That was in July before the season even started.

What would you say was your biggest takeaway from that conversation?

The biggest thing for me is that I realized most of what we were getting upset about—like I said, it was these shootings that I was upset about—but we realized that it was a much bigger issue than just the brutality. The brutality ... was a symptom of the system and policies and laws that are in place. While, as community members, we were angry, we also got to hear from a commissioner of a police department who also can acknowledge, “Yes, the system is definitely skewed and we don’t have it all together.” To hear that come from his mouth was an “Okay, now we could work together.” Once we can both admit that there is an issue and there is a problem, then we can work, and I think that’s when my mentality changed from not necessarily focusing on the problems and pointing out the shootings.

You and several other NFL players met with members of Congress to discuss police brutality. Do you see your activism shifting from the local to the national level?

I think it’s both, because one thing that I learned—and all it is for me is a learning process—is if I want to change the system,

m s

INTERVIEWS

I have to learn how it works. We went to D.C. and had some preliminary conversations, but what I’ve learned is that what happens on the federal level does not always reflect each state.

There’s work to be done on Capitol Hill, where they set the example for the rest of the nation, but there’s also a lot of work to be done in our own specific states, cities, and all of that. This is not an easy singular solution. There’s a lot of work to be done on the ground at the state level and on the federal level. It’s complicated, but right now, we’re in the process of finding out who among the decision makers and the lawmakers are willing to work alongside us with this, as well as give a little bit of direction and instruction to citizens and people out there who want to have their voices heard—who want to help push this change.

Could you elaborate on what those partnerships might look like?

We met with representatives of Congress from the Democratic side and the Republican side. We met with the Congressional Black Caucus. What we asked of them was if we could count on them to lend us support, lend us advice, and let us know what is going on at Capitol Hill to address not only criminal justice reform and our prison system, but also reconciling the relationship between law enforcement and communities, and what they have as far as opportunities and resources that they plan on pushing to these communities that live in poverty or high crime. We set up another meeting to go back in March, where we’ll be able to talk to a bigger group of individuals on both the Republican and Democratic sides, to give testimony, to talk, and be able to present and see where we can really form some alliances.

Back to the Eagles, how has all of your activism influenced how other players have seen you?

That part I don’t actually know. There are some people I know for a fact that disagree with some of the things that I do, but it’s never really become an issue to the point where we couldn’t talk or hang out. I know there are guys who have strong opinions on police brutality and the criminal justice system that believe that we should push for change and that there are things that need to be reviewed. But there’s that dilemma as to if that’s a fight that they really want to fight. I get a lot of guys who respect what I’m doing because they recognize the burden and the challenge, which is one of the reasons why there are not many guys around the league that are trying to take this on. But I’ve never gotten any bad feedback. Nobody’s ever challenged me on what I’m trying to do.

What about the fans? Do you see a disconnect at all between how people see you on and off the field?

Well, no. It’s a good representation of where we are as a nation right now. If I paid attention to what people said to me online, on Twitter or Facebook, on social media, I’d really think that fans and people out there were really against what I’m

doing … But I’ve gotten multiple letters of support. When I’m at the stadium, in front of people, I think I’ve probably only got heckled maybe twice this year out of the 15 games that I protested in. Multiple people, when they see me at events, who are out and about, they’re always saying that they support and thank me for what I’m doing—not only just about the protests, but also the work that is being done along with it. I think that’s really what people were waiting to see, is not just protest and make noise and disrupt things, but what are you then going to do to help this problem. I think once they started to see the work, they really appreciated the stand. At least, that’s what I see when I interact with people face to face.

Do you envision more athletes following your example of bringing activism into communities?

I believe so. I believe at this point in time, the level of political consciousness, not only [in] the nation but also athletes that are coming up now, the level of influence has never been higher. The level of consciousness as far as their ability to change and influence has never been higher. So you’re starting to see athletes from different sports or different levels. You’ve got athletes from the professional ranks all the way down to Pop Warner and high school teams that are using their platform, however big or small it is, to voice their opinions, voice what they believe in. Especially with a new administration, where there’s so much change and everyone is very, very concerned about those changes representing the nation as a whole, and making sure that we are all represented under this new administration, I think it’s going to be even more important for those who have a voice and have influence to use it, to organize people, to energize people, and to really keep that message and keep that fight at the forefront of everyone’s mind.

At the end of the day, do you find your roles as a football player and an activist to be mutually reinforcing?

I don’t see two sides of it. I see myself just like any other citizen. I’m a citizen. I have a job that gives me a certain amount of influence or platform, and I’ve used that platform to do what I can to help. And it’s the same whether you’re a doctor, you’re a schoolteacher, you volunteer for a nonprofit, whatever it is.

You’re a citizen, you have concerns, you have opinions, and you have some sort of influence, whether it be over our youth, whether it be your community, whether it be over decision makers. You can open doors of businessmen and women. Everyone has a sphere of influence. Just like I would tell someone to be the change that they want to see, I have to tell myself that. I can’t separate the two and say that I’m an activist here when I step off the field but when I’m on the field I’m just an athlete. No, I’m a citizen, a concerned citizen of this country, and both of those things are part of me. And I think everyone, when they realize that they have a role in this struggle, then the more and more they get active, the more and more people see their potential and influence and use it to help.

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ENDPAPER

THE LIBERAL TONGUE Tasnim Ahmed

B

efore college, most of my understanding of political ideology was constructed through my parents’. Having grown up outside of the United States, they were largely ignorant of this country’s history and the possible roles it could be playing in their own lives. In the immigrant starter pack, America is advertised as a country where racism died decades ago with Jim Crow and where gender equality has been alive and thriving since 1920. My parents painted me the same rosy vision of hope and liberty that they themselves had been fed with their visas. Growing up, my secondary education rarely challenged that mantra. While we learned about slavery and suffrage, each received merely a week (to make room for the glory of manifest destiny and the power of democracy, of course). Thus, while the seeds for identifying discrimination and inequality were certainly planted in me, they were never watered. I read them the same as one would read folklore—at some point this was relevant, but it was now far removed from my own life.

I entered college with this same naïve and overwhelmingly optimistic sense of the world—it may as well have been dipped in glitter and covered with Lisa Frank stickers. I was not aware that implicit racial biases even existed, much less that I could be a victim of them. Privilege, feminism, and inclusivity—words that I cannot go a day without mentioning at Harvard—were rarely spoken of at home or even in high school (and I lived in New York City!). Of course, I realized that I faced certain obstacles as an immigrant and a woman of color, but I had considered them more as internal problems than institutional ones. Because I was never given the tools to discuss these issues, I was unable to identify, much less challenge, such institutional prejudice.

At Harvard, I realized that an essential part of the liberal arts education was the ability to use the appropriate language to discuss matters related to race, gender, and sexuality. After adding word such as mansplaining, racial preference, and gender binary into my vernacular, I was much more aware of the issues they sought to define. My widening liberal vocabulary meant that I was better equipped to understand liberalism. Language can often construct culture, and Harvard is no exception—the prevailing culture of liberal thought is one that can be partially accredited to the way that we talk. Through the repetitive use of liberal phrasing we are able to pay attention to matters that for several centuries were ignored or simply portrayed as nonexistent because we lacked the words necessary to describe them.

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For many, this verbally constrained reality persists.

Of course, my new dictionary presented a language barrier at home. My attempts to encourage dinner conversations about gendered expectations or liberal movements were quickly criticized by my parents for their pretentious Harvard undertones.

I was often jokingly disregarded as taking things a little too seriously. The problem, I presumed, was that my parents were not educated about these issues in the same way that I was. They were taught to normalize them while I was taught to critique them.

On the morning of November 10, this blatant divide between my parents and me hit a high point. I woke up puffy eyed from mourning the election results the night before, while my mother woke up fresh faced after calling it an early night. I remember calling her and complaining about how betrayed I felt, how helpless I felt. I broke into tears again as I recalled campaign promises that were geared toward stripping people, especially minorities, of their rights. My mother, on the other hand, was calm and collected. She told me to be “positive” and “strong.” Of course there will always be a generational gap between parent and child, but this disconnect felt unexplainable. When I asked her how she remained so unaffected, she told me: “Because this election didn’t change anything. All of the bad things you see in Trump were not born with him—they have affected our world forever. The election results just give us some proof.”

Since then, I’ve realized that perhaps I have been the naïve one. I had assumed that my mother was blind to social injustice because she never knew how to engage in dialogue about it in the same way that I did. However, that did not strip her understanding or acknowledgement of those issues, especially as a subject to them. While my liberal vocabulary is a tool I use to critique the world around me, it can cause me to focus on definitions rather than their consequences. I often fall into treating these issues too academically, such that they become an object of study rather than one of experience. These words are used less for identification and more to make important issues digestible for the liberal elite. At Harvard they serve to give us ethos, but don’t always ensure that we know what we’re talking about. The use of the highly academic liberal tongue comes with a responsibility to acknowledge that as much as it aids in our understanding of certain issues, it is rarely all encompassing.

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