The Journal of International Social Affairs: Spring 2019

VOLUME 10 NO. 2

SPRING 2019

The Journal of International Social Affairs A Patrick Henry College Publication

Issue No. 2 Trent Martin

Weaponization of Social Media by Southeast Asian Authoritarian Regimes (pg. 1)

Esther Katz

Representation as a Result of Conformity: How the Music of Arabic Minorities in Israel Became Mainstream (pg. 15)

Manus Churchill

Succeeding at International Trade: Free our Markets or Protect Them? (pg. 26)

From the Editor Dear readers, The editors are excited to present the Spring 2019 edition of the Journal of International Social Affairs. We at the ISA seek to provide readers with informative and insightful research on how peoples and nations address critical issues while facing dynamic changes in their social, political, religious, and economic systems. The three articles in this edition each support this goal with timely analysis of issues at the forefront of the international stage.

In the first of this edition’s academic articles, Trent Martin discusses the need to protect social media platforms from censorship, propaganda, and anti-privacy threats in his article entitled, “Weaponization of Social Media by Southeast Asian Authoritarian Regimes.”

In “Representation as a Result of Conformity: How the Music of Arabic Minorities in Israel Became Mainstream,” Esther Katz explores the heated dynamic between Israelis and Palestinians through the music of the region.

Finally, in “Succeeding at International Trade: Free Our Markets or Protect Them?” Manus Churchill examines the contending theories of international trade, focusing on the shortcomings of protectionism in light of its increased public acceptance.

I would be remiss not to thank the many who made this semester’s publication possible. The editorial staff of Leo Briceno, Kenneth Kisby, Elias Gavilan, Sarah Roberts, and Elizabeth Sluka have spent months preparing the articles and journal for production. I would also like to thank Dr. Stephen Baskerville for his guidance and support as our faculty supervisor, along with the Patrick Henry College Department of Academic Affairs for their assistance.

Most of all we are thankful to you, our readers. We hope you will find the articles in this issue insightful and informative.

Sincerely, David Thetford, Editor-in-Chief

There are no problems we cannot solve together, and very few that we can solve by ourselves Lyndon B. Johnson

STAFF Editor-in-Chief: Deputy Editor Associate Editor: Research Editors: Copy Editor: Layout Editor: Faculty Supervisor:

David Thetford Elias Gavilan Kenneth Kisby Sarah Roberts Elizabeth Sluka Leo Briceno Dr. Stephen Baskerville

PATRICK HENRY COLLEGE 10 Patrick Henry Circle Purcellville, VA 20132 www.phc.edu ISSN 2572-9586

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W A sian

eaponization of

M edia

S ocial

S outheast A uthoritarian R egimes by

Trent Martin

Introduction It was a Wednesday morning in the bustling Chinese city of Shanghai.

A young woman dressed in a yellow t-shirt made her way towards a large public poster of the Chinese President Xi Jinping (Fan, 2018). When she reached the sign, she pulled out her phone and began to live stream a video on her Twitter account, @feefeefly (Fan, 2018). She pulled out a bottle of ink from her bag and brazenly splashed it across the face of President Xi Jinping. It did not take long for the Chinese authorities to observe the post on the social media site and track down the woman, whose name was Dong Yaoqiong. Dong reported, also on her Twitter account, several uniformed men showing up at her house, but after that she disappeared. Later when her father identified himself on social media, he was also detained by Chinese security forces (Fan, 2018). Throughout China, attempts at expression of dissent on social media are quickly suppressed and punished severely.

In the neighboring country of Vietnam, activist blogger Nguyen Van Hoa spoke up against his country’s handling of a chemical discharge accident by a steel factory. The factory “flushed cyanide and other chemicals through its waste pipeline, killed marine life and sickened people along a 120-mile stretch of coastline” (Paddock, 2017). Hoa was arrested and sentenced to seven years in prison for reporting on the disaster and the protests surrounding it (Paddock, 2017). Now the young blogger is confined to live the rest of his twenties in prison.

Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, com-

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mented, “The sentencing of Nguyen Van Hoa shows how profoundly the government’s paranoid desire to maintain political control trumps notions of justice and human rights…How else can one explain that executives of an international firm that poisoned the ocean, ruining the coastal economy in four provinces, are free to go about their business while this idealistic young journalist is heading to prison for helping expose their misdeeds?” (Paddock, 2017).

On the other side of the world, three well-dressed lawyers stood before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee’s Crime and Terrorism Subcommittee. They represented Facebook, Google, and Twitter as Senators grilled them on how authoritarian regimes have and could use their companies’ platforms to undermine democracy around the globe. The Senators wondered how Facebook could allow Russia to disseminate false information to undermine the democratic process in America. However, social media has not only been used by authoritarian regimes to spread misinformation in America. States in Southeast Asia, including the Philippines, Cambodia, and Vietnam, have created state-sanctioned internet troll armies that disseminate propaganda to support the regimes and attack dissidents who speak out against the governments (McRoberts & Voskuhl, 2018).

While social media sites can often be tools to circumnavigate government censors and promote human rights, they also can be turned around by authoritarian regimes to be used against activists and dissenters in their countries. In Vietnam, the National Assembly passed a new cybersecurity law that attempts to force social media sites operating in the country to store Vietnamese users’ data in local data centers where the government can more easily access personal information (Walters & Hilliker, 2018). While it is understandable that Facebook and Twitter desire to operate in the profitable, emerging markets of Southeast Asia, the social media companies also must determine how to respond to authoritarian attempts to use the platforms for their own means. The research question of this paper is whether the policies and practices of Facebook in Southeast Asia enable the governments of Vietnam, the Philippians, and Myanmar to suppress human rights movements in their country. My hypothesis is that Facebook’s policies too frequently allow authoritarian governments to weaponize the powerful platform to suppress human right movements. It should adopt more stringent policies to protect its users’ personal information.

Literature Review

During the early years of social media’s introduction to Southeast Asia, there was great hope that this new era of technology would break down information barriers and promote freedom throughout the region. While social media

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certainly has brought some advantages to Southeast Asia, it has also been heavily censored by some countries and utilized to spread disinformation in others.

Palandino (2018) shows how the rapid spread of disinformation in Southeast Asia has hurt the development of fledgling democracies in the world’s fastest growing internet market.

In Vietnam, the Philippines, and Myanmar, the governments have bent social media to conform to their repressive agendas. Tyrrell and McCloy (2018) criticize Google for offering a pre-censored search engine in compliance with China’s restrictive censorship laws. They express that while it is understandable that Google would seek to gain income from the massive Chinese market, the new censored search engine will help the Chinese repress information (Tyrrell and McCloy, 2018). Segal (2018) posits that “The Xi era will be remembered for putting an end to the West’s naïve optimism about the liberalizing potential of the internet.” He reviews how China has tightened its control of social media over the last five years by utilizing software that automatically removes unwanted images of human rights defenders from social media chats by putting into action AI systems that partially use social media to track where and what they are doing, and by working on AI that “mine social media to predict political movements” (Segal, 2018). In Vietnam, Walters and Hilliker (2018) investigate the harmful political and economic ramifications of the new Bill on Cyber Security Law that will increase censorship of the internet and social media. As the Philippines continues to slide towards despotism under Duterte, armies of online “patriotic trolls” target government opponents in political intimidation and disinformation campaigns (Williams, 2017).

Some scholars attempted to set up frameworks for understanding the role of social media in activism. Malcom Gladwell argues that social media activism in general is a low-risk and low-reward form of activism that makes people think they are making a difference while not actually making much of an effect (Joseph, 2012). Gladwell says, “Facebook activism succeeds not by motivating people to make a real sacrifice but by motivating them to do the things people do when they’re not motivated enough to make a real sacrifice” (Joseph, 2012). Evgeny Morozov argues that the internet is in general beneficial to authoritarian regimes because the many trivial uses of the internet distract citizens from focusing on important political issues (Joseph, 2012). Morozov cites the example of how the story discussing the 2009 Iranian uprising was swiftly cast aside by Twitter users when the story broke that Michael Jackson died (Joseph, 2012). Clay Shirky presents a more positive framework of how social media can be a positive force for social change (Joseph, 2012). Shirky reasons that forming “well-considered political opinions is a two-step process. The first step requires access to infor-

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mation; the second, use of that information in conversation and debate” (Joseph, 2012). Shirky concludes that social media has helped in this process by greatly increasing people’s access to information that can help them be more informed in their political opinions (Joseph, 2012).

Different articles suggest several possible solutions to protect user data and stop disinformation on social media. Yaraghi (2018) argues against censoring for political bias. He says that social media giants should not be broken up and ideological diversity should not be forced upon tech companies. He advocates that people who disagree with the policies and views of social media sites should create their own sites (Yaraghi, 2018). Nilekani (2018) explores India’s approach of offering digital infrastructure as a public good and advocates it as an alternative to private companies, such as Facebook, controlling all the user data. He argues that Section 230 of the U.S. Communications Decency Act of 1996 provision—that online platforms will not be held responsible for content that users post—does not give enough accountability for those platforms to monitor what third parties are doing with user data (Nilekani, 2018). The Indian system of government platforms is set forth as a possible alternative because, Nilekani (2018) argues, the government will not have the same incentive to sell private data to third parties like what happened with the Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal. This obviously would not work as well in countries that have repressive governments. Mayer-Schonberger and Ramge (2018) advocate for the breaking up of the centralized control of social media companies by adopting “a progressive data-sharing mandate” which would require companies to share anonymized parts of their collected data with other companies. Palandino (2018) argues that stopping disinformation “through legal and technical means” will not be effective, but that educating and supporting physical communities in Southeast Asia would be an effective method of combating the weaponization of social media.

Data and Methods This paper will mainly be qualitative in its research approach into the effect of Facebook on human rights movements in Southeast Asia. Because of the closed nature of the authoritarian regimes being examined, it is hard to find comprehensive data on when and how the governments use Facebook to suppress the rights of their people. Therefore, this paper will rely on the secondary accounts of human rights organizations, news organizations, and academic studies to find cases of regimes weaponizing Facebook. It is beyond the scope of this study to track every or even most instances of weaponization, so only select examples from Vietnam, the Philippines, and Myanmar will be utilized to examine the effect of

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Facebook’s polices on human rights movements in the region.

Three areas of weaponization and Facebook’s policies in those areas will be examined and analyzed. The three areas are 1) removal of content, 2) disinformation campaigns, and 3) posts that led to the arrest of activists. This paper will look at case studies in each of these categories and examine if Facebook was compliant, passive, or hostile to the weaponization. The independent variable is Facebook’s level of compliance or hostility towards the weaponization and the dependent variable is the effectiveness of the weaponization to suppress human rights. The independent variable will be operationalized by categorizing Facebook’s compliance level into the category of compliant, ignorant, or hostile.

Facebook is compliant when it actively agrees to give information or take down content that leads to the suppression of human rights, it is passive when it simply allows, knowingly or unknowingly, authoritarian regimes to utilize the platform for the purposes of suppressing human rights, and it is hostile when it resists or shuts down attempted suppression of human rights on its platform.

This study defines “human rights” as fundamental concepts of ordered liberty that are generally recognized, such as those found in the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. Central rights include freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, right to a fair trial, and freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention. Secondly, this study uses the term “weaponization” in the sense of government suppression or elimination of the human rights stated above by actors or individuals supporting government policies utilizing social media. Finally, “authoritarian regimes” in this paper refer to the current governments of Vietnam, the Philippines, and Myanmar. Each of these governments suppresses some or all the human rights defined above.

My hypothesis that Facebook’s policies too frequently allow authoritarian governments to suppress human right movements will be verified if Facebook is systematically compliant or passive in the suppression of human rights when it could reasonably take action to correct the injustice. The intervening variable that Facebook has no good option for opposing the suppression of human rights in certain circumstances will be accounted for by evaluating possible options that Facebook could have chosen.

Research and Analysis Removal of Content

The first layer of suppression of human rights this study will examine is the removal of content from Facebook at the behest of the governments of

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Vietnam, the Philippines, or Myanmar. Vietnam is the most active of the three countries in attempting to force Facebook to remove content from the platform.

There are various methods that governments can use to censor content they deem subversive to their regime. In Vietnam, the government passed a new cybersecurity law that clamps down on freedom of speech on Facebook and the internet in general (Nguyen, 2018). In a country where the government controls almost all media outlets, Facebook served as a means for human rights activists and citizen journalists to circumnavigate the censored media system (Walters & Hilliker, 2018). However, this new law requires some tech companies, including Facebook, to keep servers in Vietnam and remove any content from their platform within 24 hours if the Vietnamese government asks them to (Walters & Hilliker, 2018). This poses a grave threat to the last channel of uncensored information in Vietnam. Having Facebook servers in the country allows the Vietnamese government to easily access Facebook’s user information of Vietnamese citizens. If the Vietnamese government follows through with the implementation of the law, which it is slated to do January 1, 2019, then the last bastion of free press and speech could be cut off.

U.S. lawmakers from the Vietnam Caucus called on Facebook and Google to resist the new law, but so far Facebook has not commented publicly on its position (Boudreau, 2018). Tim Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies Inc., commented that “If [Facebook and Google] comply with this law, they violate their own terms of service to protect the privacy of their users…Officials could also censor content at will given the way the law is written” (Boudreau, 2018). Vu Tu Thanh, senior Vietnam representative of the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council, whose members include Google and Facebook, said that even if Facebook does not comply fully, Vietnamese government officials “who aggressively seek foreign investment and support a robust digital economy, have indicated they won’t block services” (Boudreau, 2018). Facebook already has a direct channel for the Vietnamese government’s information ministry to request the removal of content from the platform (“Vietnam Jails”, 2018). While Facebook does not comply with every content removal request, some activists have complained that a growing amount of content was blocked in 2018 (“Vietnam Jails”, 2018). Currently, Facebook’s response seems to be compliant to a large extent with the requests of Vietnam in removing content that dissents against the government position, and there has not been a visible effort of Facebook to oppose the new cybersecurity law.

In comparison, Facebook has actively opposed the incitement of violence by Myanmar’s military on the platform. Facebook shut down a network of accounts and pages that were linked with military leaders who were propagating violence against Myanmar’s Rohingya population (Long, 2018). Facebook took

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similar steps in the Philippines by removing a network of paid internet trolls that supported President Duterte and attacked his opponents (“Facebook Removes”, 2018). There is a sizable difference between how Facebook treats the government of Vietnam and how it treats Myanmar and the Philippines.

Disinformation Facebook’s standards state that they will not remove false news because there is only a fine line between opinion or satire and actual false news (“False News”, 2018). According to their standards, Facebook does combat false news in the following ways: • Disrupting economic incentives for people, Pages, and domains that propagate misinformation; • Using various signals, including feedback from their community, to inform a machine learning model that predicts which stories may be false; • Reducing the distribution of content rated as false by independent third-party fact-checkers; • Empowering people to decide for themselves what to read, trust, and share by informing them with more context and promoting news literacy; • Collaborating with academics and other organizations to help solve this challenging issue (“False News”, 2018).

Facebook also has a policy against content that contains credible threats of violence or comes from organizations or individuals that promote “terrorist activity, organized hate, mass or serial murder, human trafficking, (or) organized violence or criminal activity” (“Violence and Criminal Behavior”, 2018).

In Myanmar, government forces have cracked down on Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine State in response to insurgent attacks in the region. The indiscriminate crackdown caused over 700,000 Rohingya to flee the region to other countries (Dave, 2018). This attack on the Rohingya population is fueled in part by the hate speech posted on Facebook (Dave, 2018). According to Stecklow (2018), posts on Facebook “call the Rohingya or other Muslims dogs, maggots and rapists, suggest they be fed to pigs, and urge they be shot or exterminated.

The material also includes crudely pornographic anti-Muslim images.” These images go directly against Facebooks policies against “attacking ethnic groups with “violent or dehumanising speech” or comparing them to animals”, and its policy “against pornographic content” (Stecklow, 2018). These examples of hateful misinformation appeared on Facebook even after CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that

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Facebook was hiring dozens more analysts who speak Burmese to monitor for hate posts (Stecklow, 2018). This effort seems to be too little, too late. According to Stecklow (2018), “In early 2015, there were only two people at Facebook who could speak Burmese reviewing problematic posts. Before that, most of the people reviewing Burmese content spoke English.” Facebook’s response to the Myanmar crisis was passive, but they are beginning to take steps to actively shut down hate speech on its platform. Facebook’s report outlining its response said Facebook now has 99 Myanmar language specialists reviewing content and has increased its range of automated tools reviewing content (Dave, 2018). According to Dave, “In the third quarter, the company said it ‘took action’ on about 64,000 pieces of content that violated its hate speech policies. About 63 percent were identified by automated software, up from 52 percent in the prior quarter.” Facebook has also recently identified a network of Myanmar military operatives using social media to fuel violence against the Rohingya (Long, 2018). They linked the accounts to the military by “examining public data on website registration, shared IP addresses, and admins with access to multiple accounts” (Long, 2018). This ultimately resulted in 18 accounts and 52 pages being banned in the country (Long, 2018).

In the Philippines, current President Duterte took power and initiated a brutal crackdown on the drug trade that included thousands of deaths of those suspected or charged with being involved in drugs (Williams, 2017). Duterte even likened himself to Hitler when he said, “Hitler massacred three million Jews…Now there is three million drug addicts. There are. I’d be happy to slaughter them” (Williams, 2017). Duterte paid for a veritable Facebook user army to smear his opponents and silence activists speaking out against his brutal crackdown on drugs (Etter, 2017). According to Etter, his targets included “a prominent senator and human-rights activist who became the target of vicious online attacks and was ultimately jailed on a drug charge” (2017). Messages against the activist, Maria Ressa, included messages such as, “Leave our country!!!! WHORE!!!!!!” and “I want Maria Ressa to be raped repeatedly to death” (Etter, 2017). She reported that she received up to 90 such messages per hour and her news site, Rappler, lost 52,000 of its Facebook followers (Etter, 2017). Facebook has taken some steps to address disinformation sites that were part of a “spam network” in support of President Duterte. Facebook recently took down “95 Pages and 39 accounts in the Philippines that violated its policies on spam as well as its authenticity policies” (“Facebook Removes”, 2018). However, when Duarte took power, Facebook give him the same instruction on best Facebook practices that they give to governments around the world and deepened their partnership with the administration (Etter, 2017). In fact, many of the third-party contractors that help determine what content to remove are based in the Philippines, creating a possible conflict of interest (Etter, 2017). Facebook did conduct educational workshops in 2016 to show

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journalists and NGO workers how to combat disinformation and report abusers (Etter, 2017).

Posts That Led to the Arrest of Activists

Myanmar’s government has also arrested people who have utilized social media to criticize its leaders. Several individuals were arrested and charged for libel of Myanmar’s leaders under a provision of a 2013 Telecommunications Law (Paladino, 2018). Since Suu Kyi took power in Myanmar, 17 journalists have been charged or arrested under the law as of 2017 (Naing & Lee, 2017). Myanmar’s parliament did revise the law in 2017, but the changes were relatively minor and left the clause that “prohibits the use of the telecommunications network to ‘extort, defame, disturb or intimidate’” (Naing & Lee, 2017).

In Vietnam, people who have spoken out against the government on Facebook have faced severe jail time. Prominent human rights advocate Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh, also known as “Mother Mushroom,” was sentenced to 10 years of jail time for advocating for government accountability in Vietnam in interviews with newspapers, Facebook posts, and on her blog (Associated Press in Hanoi, 2017). Nguyen Huu Quoc Duy and his cousin Nguyen Huu Thien An were arrested in 2015 for posting anti-government content on Facebook (Whong, 2018). Duy posted, “Forty years have passed, DMCS [a four-letter abbreviation for an obscenity attacking Vietnam’s ruling communists], according to earlier reports” (Whong, 2018). For this post Duy was sentenced to three years in jail and his cousin was sentenced to two years (Whong, 2018). Blogger and human rights advocate Huynh Thuc Vy was recently arrested for posting a picture of her splattering paint on Vietnam’s national flag (Finney, 2018). She was charged with “affronting the national flag or national emblem” and sentenced to a two year and seven month prison term (Finney, 2018).

Arrests of citizens for Facebook posts have not been as prevalent in the Philippines, but there was controversial anti-cybercrime legislation passed in 2012 that led to the arrest of an environmental activist (Mongaya, 2012). Esperlita “Perling” Garcia is the president of the Gonzaga Alliance for Environmental Protection and Preservation and his organization opposed mining operations in Gonzaga town in Cagayan Province (Mongaya, 2012). The mayor of Gonzaga had Garcia charged with libel under the new anti-cybercrime legislation for disrupting the community leaders by calling the mayor an idiot in a Facebook post opposing the mining project (Tan, 2014). The Supreme Court of the Philippines eventually upheld the libel section of the anti-cybercrime law, and some activists fear that the law could be used to further crackdown on anyone who criticizes

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government officials (Tan, 2014).

Facebook is not able to control what authorities do with their citizens in the world outside of the internet. The arrests of human rights advocates may not be the responsibility of Facebook when all things are taken into consideration.

Conclusion

While many of the cases of human rights abuses examined in this study would have happened regardless of Facebook’s policies, Facebook’s lack of a proactive response in certain situations exacerbated the human rights abuses. Most of Facebook’s reactions to the situations examined in this study fell into the passive response category. The findings show a lack of foresight in a volatile region of the world where Facebook executives should expect government or private actors to attempt to misuse their platform. While Facebook did respond to situations, such as Myanmar’s Rohingya genocide, it did so reactively when it faced public pressure to do so. The company did not place priority status on fighting disinformation until it was forced to do so by the light of press coverage. Facebook’s accommodation of the Vietnamese government’s requests for removal of some content that activists post also shows an active role that Facebook plays in suppressing free speech in Southeast Asia. It is particularly disconcerting that Facebook plays this active role in the Vietnamese government’s crackdown on human rights. Perhaps Facebook’s response to the Vietnamese government differs from their response to Myanmar and the Philippines because of the profitable market opportunities in Vietnam that might not be available if Facebook does not comply with Vietnam’s requests. Therefore, the hypothesis that Facebook’s policies too frequently allow authoritarian regimes to manipulate the platform for their own ends is shown to be correct.

Facebook can improve its record on protecting human rights by refining its approach to situations that might arise in the future. If it implements systems that are meant to prevent human rights abuses, then the amplifying effect of social media on disinformation can be muted. A possible system that Facebook could set up would be an advisory board composed of NGOs and community leaders from volatile regions where Facebook is used. This advisory board could offer insight and warnings to Facebook when situations become volatile on the ground. Facebook, even with its massive resources, cannot be expected to be everywhere at once. This partnership with local leaders would help to dispel false narratives and dangerous propaganda. If Facebook is not responsive to calls to clamp down on disinformation, then amplifying media pressure has been shown to be an effective method of forcing change. The local partners could also run information campaigns that would counteract the false disinformation campaigns in the country.

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As Paladino argues, local education and building up physical local communities is the best bulwark against disinformation campaigns (2018). Facebook could consider giving grants to NGOs or local organizations that work to build up local communities in countries where the government has shown a propensity for weaponizing social media. No one debates that Facebook has not met the first step of Shirky’s two-step process of forming “well-considered political opinions” by exponentially increasing access to information for people in Southeast Asia.

However, the second step of allowing people to use that information in conversation and debate is limited by the “troll armies” and censors of authoritarian regimes. The regimes often prevent information from reaching their people and if the information does reach the people then the conversation is often warped by misinformation.

Regarding attempts of Vietnam to force Facebook to compromise user information and remove content, Facebook and other tech companies should realize the economic leverage they can pull on the country. A threatened tech embargo of Vietnam might just be enough to force the Vietnamese to the negotiation table.

Regardless of Vietnam’s response, Facebook has a contract with its users to not compromise their personal data. Facebook took a solid step forward when it revealed its content removal policy, but they need to actually live up to their policy if they truly value human rights (Bickert, 2018). A new proactive human rights policy could help avert the next human rights crisis.

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22. Posamari, L. (2018). How fake news stifles democracy in Asia. Eureka Street, https:// www.eurekastreet.com.au/article/how-fake-news-stifles-democracy-in-asia 23. Segal, A. (2018). When China rules the web: technology in service of the state. Foreign Affairs, 97(5).

24. Siu-fung, L., Long, Q., Mudie, L. (2018, July 16). “China Holds Father, Supporters of Woman Detained for Inking President’s Image.” Retrieved from https://www.rfa.org/ english/news/china/inking-07162018103924.html 25. Stecklow, S. (2018). Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar.

Reuters Investigate. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/myanmar-facebook-hate/ 26. Tan, O. (2014). Calling Tito Sotto an idiot is no cybercrime. Inquirer.net. https://opinion. inquirer.net/71780/calling-tito-sotto-an-idiot-is-no-cybercrime 27. Vietnam jails activist for 27 months over anti-government posts on Facebook. (2018). Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-vietnam-security/vietnam-jails-activist-for-27- months-over-anti-government-posts-on-facebook-idUSKCN1M510P 28. Violence and criminal behavior. (2018). Facebook Community Standards. https://www. facebook.com/communitystandards/violence_criminal_behavior 29. Whong, E. (2018). Vietnamese online activist released after serving three-year sentence.

Radio Free Asia. https://www.rfa.org/english/news/vietnam/vietnamese-online-activist- released-after-serving-three-year-sentence-11282018160459.html 30. Williams, S. (2017). Rodrigo Duterte’s army of online trolls: how authoritarian regimes are winning the social media wars. The New Republic, https://newrepublic.com/article/138952/rodrigo-dutertes-army-online-trolls 31. Yaraghi, N. (2018). Regulating free speech on social media is dangerous and futile. Brookings Institute, Techtank, Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/ techtank/2018/09/21/regulating-freespeech-on-social-media-is-dangerous-and-futile/

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R esult of C onformity : H ow the M usic of A rabic M inorities in I srael became M ainstream epresentation as a

Esther Katz Music represented culture in two ways, as a form of expression common to humanity, and as one of the most extreme manifestations of difference. On the one hand, the essence of universal culture was borne by music; that is, the commonness that the colonizer and the colonized shared. On the other hand, the fact that music might embody profound differences accounted for the way it was totally incompatible with the culture of the colonizer. (Bursheh, McDonald, Kanāʻinah, & Thorsén, 2013, p. 1) The role of music in Israel is especially insightful into the region’s cultural dynamics. Mizrahim, Yemenite, and Moroccan Israeli styles clamor for recognition alongside Israel’s two mainstream genres: Shirei Eretz Yisrael, “Songs of the Land of Israel”; and Rock Yisraeli, “Israeli Rock.” In addition to the aforementioned Arab Jews, Palestinians also publicize their own nationalistic and hip-hop styles within Israel’s borders. Because Israeli and Palestinian Arabs have learned to musically express their experiences through combining elements of Eastern and Western styles, minority Arabic genres have gained momentum in Israel. This paper will enumerate the five influences on Palestinian music (occupation, globalization, Islamization, Arabization, and Western participation), presenting musical examples that result from some of these factors. The paper will then explore the beginnings, successes, and musical components of three Arabic minority genres: Mizrahim, Israeli Yemenite, and Israeli Moroccan music.

The first, and perhaps most significant, factor that influences the construction of Palestinian music is Israeli occupation. Much of Palestine’s musical library consists of subversive “music resistance” that laments Israeli presence in the region (Bursheh et al., 2013). Palestinian music is powerful. For one, it

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helps Palestinians construct, preserve, and assert their collective identity. To these convictions, music attaches nationalistic sentiment. Some Palestinian music also discreetly forms political ideologies, affiliations, goals, and tactics. On a more confrontational level, the music incites, provokes, and mobilizes people to action.

For example, revived and reconstructed folklore songs signify a return to “pure” Palestine (Bursheh et al., 2013). They serve as markers of the Palestinian struggle.

During the 1960s and 1970s, Palestinian music exuded ultra-nationalistic tones.

In the 1990s, themes became more reconciliatory. Today, the more popular Palestinian vocalists advocate a utopian dream of coexistence between Arabs and Jews.

Specifically, Jerusalem serves as a popular musical landmark that encapsulates the essence of the occupation struggle. Throughout history, both Palestinians and Israelis have used the city as a symbol to promote their own perceptions of the conflict. One of the most publicized and iconic songs concerning Jerusalem is Fairuz’s ‘Zahrat al-Mada’in’, “The Flower of All Cities.” Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Fairuz served as the Lebanese “musical ambassador” as she pleaded for peace in her beloved homeland (Al-Taee, 2002, p. 44). Fairuz herself is an anomaly. She is ethnically Lebanese, but religiously Christian. Fittingly, in “The Flower of All Cities,” Fairuz narrates the historical significance of the city to the three monotheistic religions. As a Palestinian Arab, she naturally infuses her lyrical content with pulsating nationalistic themes. While her Christian faith owes its roots to the Jews, Fairuz recognizes the war atrocities that the Jewish people have inflicted upon the Palestinians. She condemns the Jews for their behavior and asserts that Palestinians deserve dominion over Jerusalem.

Fairuz begins the renowned work with a symphonic prelude. It includes two contrasting themes between the soft strings and a solo keyboard. The first theme, a descending melody sequence, suggests the tragedy of the bloody civil war of 1967. Each time it repeats, the theme’s volume increases. The timpani punctuates the work and the brass interjects its own blasts. As the themes transition, the ensemble introduces a more heavy participation of the brass. This sound starkly suggests a military-like atmosphere. Drumbeats roll on in a dotted rhythm (AlTaee, 2002). Evidently, the Land of Peace has been riddled with suffering.

As the prelude subsides, Fairuz begins her lyrics with a prayer to the City of Prayer: Jerusalem. She engages with the city, explaining how the eyes of Palestinians, Christians, and Jews all turn towards it daily from the temples, great churches, and mosques. She references the Dome of the Rock, where Muslims believe Mohammad ascended to heaven. She then moves to the fourth stanza where she references a Christian connection. She recounts the birth of baby Jesus, tended to

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by the Virgin Mary. Meanwhile, a Christmas carol lightly marks the lyrical content. Suddenly, blasts from brass reoccur from the prelude and shatter the mood of the carol. Fairuz sings how the infant and mother both weep. They cry on behalf of people displaced from their homes; they cry on behalf of Palestinians. Fairuz shifts the lyrics to a narration of the war. Slaughter litters the ground outside of the city’s gates. Fairuz capitalizes on this moment of emotional outpouring to point the finger at the Israeli army for violating peace and justice. With the city, love has fallen. It has been replaced by colonization. After another Christmas carol interlude, interrupted by the brass, the song culminates with Fairuz claiming Jerusalem for the Arabs. This actualization of Palestinian rule seems far from peaceful. The lyrics read that anger exudes from all directions, mounted on horses of fear. Instead of locking Palestinians out, the city’s gates will welcome them to wash their faces with holy water. Fairuz ends her masterpiece with the lyrics, “This home is our home. Jerusalem is ours. And by our hands we will restore the splendor of Jerusalem” (Al-Taee, 2002, p. 45). By the hands of the Palestinians, peace is coming.

Globalization is the second factor that guides the direction of modern Palestinian music. It has moved Palestinian music away from its more traditional cultural distinctiveness. Globalization blurs, and sometimes erases, certain cultural boundaries between people groups. Before globalization, an artist’s priority was preserving nationalistic sentiments based on history and experience. His audience reached only to the borders of his nation. He reminded his people of their past, endeavored to unify them with common purposes, and prompted them to function with words and actions in the future that would reflect their unification. The goals of globalization dramatically depart from these. In stark contrast with nationalism, globalization seeks to instill sentiments of unification across borders. Where globalization surfaces, artistic emphasis shifts from catering to a specific group to catering to the globe. Through more popular music composition and lyrics, the modern artist endeavors to appeal to the tastes of people other than his country’s natives. He encourages his own group to connect, and even identify, with others.

Palestinian music displays that the Levant has not gone untouched by globalism.

In the 1990s, the rise of Hamas ushered in an enormous amount of political Islamization in Palestine (Bursheh et al, 2013). This event significantly informed modern Palestinian music. Palestine’s society, especially among the Occupied Palestinian Territories, felt significant influence, as did Israel’s Islamic Movement within the ’48-area. Islamization is responsible for blurring local cultural attributes of Muslim people and countries. It replaces nationalism with pan-Islamic jihad. Religious Sharia law takes the place of secular laws and original codes of

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behavior native to certain areas. The ultimate goal of Islamization is to unite all Muslims worldwide into one national entity: “the Islamic Ummah” (Bursheh et al., 2013, p. 4). This entity is practically embodied in an all-encompassing political institution called the caliphate. Due to the philosophy undergirding Islamization, Palestinian music has taken a more “Islamic” turn than a Palestinian one.

The melody, lyrics, and instrumentation of Palestinian music all communicate this observation.

Arabization has also effectually neutralized the local cultural identity of Palestinian music. In 1901, German theologian and linguist Gustaf Dalman ascertained Palestinian music’s distinctiveness when he published Palestinian songs in Palastinischer Diwan, “Palestinian Diwan” (Bursheh et al., 2013, p. 5). Throughout the past 25 years, the Arabization of Palestinian music has replaced traditional Palestinian music with the Arab music of Egypt, Lebenon, Syria, Iraq, and even Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries. Primarily, Arab satellite music channels are to blame. These include those of Rotana from Saudi Arabia, Melody and Mazzika from Egypt, and Nojoom from Dubai. Palestinians rarely listen to, much less perform, folk songs such as ataba and daluna (Bursheh et al., 2013 p. 6). Musicians that Palestinians lionize and listen to on a daily basis include Lebanese Fairuz and Nancy Ajram, Egyptian Shireen, Iraqi Kathem Al-Saher, Saudi Arabian Mohommad Abdo. These set the standard of professionalism and sophistication that Palestinian composers, singers, and musicians try to imitate and integrate into their own musical production. Palestinian singers like Mustafa al-Kurd, Reem Talhami, or Al-Ashiqeen rarely surface. While the previous individuals are featured on television and radio channels, the latter appear only on expensive CDs, not easily accessible in the markets (Bursheh et al., 2013). As a result, the musical preferences of the Palestinian public have transformed from their original loyalty 100 years ago.

“Who’s the Terrorist” by Palestine’s first rap group DAM incorporates elements of Arabization (Burkhalter, Harbert, & Dickinson, 2013). The group does so for a specific purpose. Its goal is to demonstrate that the Palestinian liberation struggle is not only a national one, but also one that is culturally international.

“Who’s the Terrorist” experiences much influence from African American rapper Tupac Shakur. Its literary influences include Lebanese, Algerian, and Egyptian writers. In an act of globalization, DAM dedicates its song Ihda, “Dedication,” to the world’s downtrodden and oppressed. The group consistently appeals to the human, rather than the political, aspect of suffering (Burkhalter, et al., 2013).

The final factor influencing the creation and circulation of modern Pales-

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tinian music is the participation of Western governments and nongovernmental actors in Palestinian music. The involvement first surfaced after the outburst of the first Intifada in 1987 and substantially increased in 1994 following the Oslo Accords and the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority in the Occupied Territories. In 2003, the West significantly increased its involvement during the aftermath of the second Intifada. Practically, the West has exerted its influence through channeling a considerable amount of humanitarian funds to cultural activities, including music. The aid comes with an ulterior motive: to transition Palestinian society from a belligerent one that resists occupation and struggles for liberation to one that focuses on self-betterment and rebuilding (Bursheh et al., 2013). Some hypothesize that the West’s desire to have a hand in Palestinian cultural development comes with a certain political conviction: that Palestinians should resign themselves to their colonial condition (Bursheh et al., 2013). While Palestinian music has not yet satisfied Western objectives, the aid has certainly contributed to an increase of Palestinian musical participation in genres not native to Palestine (i.e., hip-hop).

Palestinian hip-hop is a genre that meets some of the criteria of globalization while surprisingly maintaining Palestinian cultural uniqueness. Its singers integrate traditional Palestinian tones and melodic forms into their songs (Bursheh et al., 2013). Palestinian hip-hop contains interrelated qualities that contribute to its uniqueness: protest poetry, internationalism, improvisational technologies, and a “keep it real” appeal (Burkhalter et al., 2013).

Increasingly, Palestinian hip-hop challenges American and Israeli stereotypes that dub Palestinians fanatical Islamic terrorists. DAM’s “Who’s the Terrorist” attempts to offset the emotionally-charged aggression of identity politics. MWR, another Palestinian rap group, strives after a similar mission as it raps in colloquial Palestinian, claiming, “It does not matter who among us is Christian or Muslim” (Bursheh et al., 2013, p. 216). DAM’s lyrics portray Palestinians describing their daily experiences under Israeli occupation. Through the song’s stylistic vocal and musical resemblances to American hip-hop, “Who’s the Terrorist” complicates ideological assumptions of “us” and “them”. Western synthesizers and percussion characterize the work while Arab musical phrases and hand-drum rhythms punctuate it. This “sonic alliance” (Burkhalter et al., 2013, p. 216) allows listeners to make key connections between the American and Palestinian hip-hop experience.

Unlike Fairuz’ position, DAM’s embrace of the Palestinian struggle is not militant. Rejecting violence and hatred, the group emphasizes its commitment to achieving a solution through words, culture, and education. “I don’t want to be

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misunderstood,” DAM member Tamer Nafar explains, “we reach for peace.” He raps, “Keep on asking for a line of equality/and if someone asks you to hate say no” (Bursheh et al., 2013, p. 221). DAM’s songs address not only the horrors of Israeli colonial racism, but also the disunity of the Palestinian population within, due to religious and class divisions.

While DAM’s lyrics are not militant, they nevertheless contain a “stand tall” ethos, matched by both vocals and music. In “Who’s the Terrorist,” the lead singer communicates his frustration through a strongly-stressed first syllable. The pitch dips and then rises to a state of indignation. The deflecting, “counterheckling” rhythm heightens the effect of the words: “Who’s the Terrorist? I’m the terrorist?/ How am I the terrorist/When you’ve taken my land?” Although not militant, the song is blatantly indignant. Whether producing music of resistance or pleas for peace, Palestinians are not the only Arabic group within Israel to successfully express its experiences through music.

The Arab minority of Mizrahim has created a contemporary hybrid music genre in the form of Israeli Mediterranean music. This is a people group of African and Asian Israeli Jewish descent, with roots in Islamic countries. The history of the Mizrahim includes an inflow of 700,000 immigrants into Israel after its independence. This number was divided equally between European Holocaust survivors and Jews from Islamic countries. Today, over 50 percent of Israel’s Jewish citizens are of Middle Eastern and North African ancestry.

Israeli Mediterranean music emerged from the genius of the Mizrahim. It is a form of musical “hybridity.” Hybridity is “the process by which musicians purposefully combine preexisting, and often seemingly disparate, genres in their creative piece. This combination includes both musical forms and existing lyrics” (Al-Taee, 2002). Israeli Mediterranean music’s main characteristic is that it utilizes the hybridity mechanism; it integrates the disparate music styles that once flourished in the young state.

Musically, this genre interacts between Western and Eastern instrumentation, rhythms, and bridges. The genre’s arrangements feature select Western elements: the electric bass, guitar, and synthesizer around the margins. The vocal center, however, is completely Middle Eastern. The ornamented vibrato of the vocal line is the heart of the genre. It invokes a quarter tonality, characteristic of Middle Eastern music. The quarter notes that lie between the half notes in Western scales are essential components of the many Arabic music scales: maqamat. These scales

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form the foundation of Arabic classical and liturgical music (Horowit, 1999).

With its inclusiveness of Western and Eastern influences, Israeli Mediterranean music serves its necessary function of musical integration.

The lyrics associated with the Israeli Mediterranean music genre combine literary Hebrew with Hebrew and Arabic slang. Songs describe both sacred and secular motifs. Mizrahim musicians record sacred prayers with traditional and modern arrangements to honor the liturgical traditions of the “Father’s house” (Horowit, 1999). They create other songs in Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish to evoke nostalgia and sentimentality as they recount daily life in Yemen, Morocco, Kurdistan, or Iran. Writing lyrics in Greek, Turkish, Spanish, and Italian, musicians reference Israel’s Mediterranean location. They set the genre up as an attempt to create a sense of mediation between the countries by merit of strategic location.

Sitting between Europe and the Middle East, Israel’s Mizrahi mediate between Eastern and Western music styles.

Originally, the Eurocentric Israeli music industry rejected Israeli Mediterranean music as culturally inferior. Ashkenazi European Jew radio editors, record companies, and listeners veered away from the genre. Its Arabic sound violated the prevailing national and artistic categories. The music attempted to reset the boundaries of national identity that Israel was trying to create for itself. The genre’s musical structure also differed from the less-wavering, more linear pitches of European major and minor keys (Horowit, 1999). The subpar training of North African and Asian Jewish musicians contributed to, and seemingly justified, their exclusion from the music industry. Most of these musicians were not even familiar with notation (Horowit, 1999).

Despite the hostile opinions that initially confronted Israeli Mediterranean music, North African and Middle Eastern Jewish musicians began to produce their cassettes. Through this medium, the Mizrahim people created their own market through mass production. Hundreds and thousands of these sold amidst local neighborhoods and Tel Aviv outdoor marketplaces in the 1980s (Horowit, 1999). By the 1990s, the genre had infiltrated national airwaves and mainstream cultural institutions.

Before the genre became a prominent member of the Israeli music industry, however, the Mizrahim needed a marketable artist. Zohar Argov, a Yemenite singer, served as the man for the job. National publication of Mizrahi music at Festival Ha’Zemer Ha’Mizrahi, “The Eastern Song Festival,” prompted a dramatic in-

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crease in the genre’s popularity. Here, Argov won the first place award. Reflecting on Argov’s startling success, Moroccan-born ethnomusicologist Abraham Amzaleg tried to pin down the precise factor that contributed to it. The festival judge admitted that Argov merely possessed an uncanny ability to move even people who found elements of the new music style distasteful (Horowit, 1999). Israeli Mediterranean music fared excellently after Argov’s episode of success. The genre earned more airtime on several stations, including the army’s official station Galey Zahal and Kol Yisrael, “Israel Radio’s” popular music channel Reshet Gimel. Each of these added a two-hour weekly Mizrahi segment to their shows.

By the 1980s, Ashkenazi and Mizrahi singers went so far as to meet together at Newsprint to create joint performances (Horowit, 1999). Thanks to Argov, Mizrahim music increased in celebrity.

Any Ashkenazi hesitancies that still existed were shattered when Yemenite Israeli singer Haim Moshe composed a new Mizrahi piece: Linda, Linda. Moshe’s melismatic vocal style, Arab lyrics, and non-Hebrew love object (Linda) attracted audience among Palestinians throughout Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank. This work transgressed even the borders of Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan. Eventually, Linda, Linda became the first Israeli Mediterranean song choreographed for Israeli folk dance (Horowit, 1999). By the late 1980s, Moshe’s mainstream successes included appearances on prime-time television, at the Arad Festival (the largest Hebrew music festival), and in official state and religious celebrations.

Another Arabic minority, Israeli Yemenites also achieved eventual success in the popular musical field. Specifically, the Ashkenazi Zionist leadership allowed Israeli Yemenite music a partial presence in the national culture since the Ashkenazi historically regarded Yemenites as associates in the Zionist project (Saada-Ophir, 2006). Between 1881 and 1908, Israel absorbed about 3,000 Jewish immigrants from Yemen. This was the largest number of Jewish immigrants to arrive from Arab or Islamic countries during this period.

The genre began during the 1960s, when Yemeni musicians spontaneously organized a type of party called the haflut. The party’s activities included music, singing, eating, and sometimes dancing. In the proletariat Arab Jewish neighborhood of Kerem Hatemanim, “The Yemenite Vineyard,” in south Tel Aviv, musicians inverted the dominant Zionist musical practice that had adapted Middle Eastern tunes to classical European models (Saada-Ophir, 2006). They interwove Songs of the Land of Israel with Yemenite Jewish traditional musical practices and played the music in an Arab Jewish style.

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With time, Israeli Yemenite musicians crystallized this genre by hybridizing several musical styles and blurring the musical differences between them. This new hybrid form included Songs of the Land of Israel, Yemenite music, Western pop and rock music, Arab music, Jewish religious chants and prayers, Greek pop music, and Latin music. The texts of these songs often dealt with romantic relationships and described the conditions of Arab Jews in Israeli society. They played modern Western instruments, such as the electric guitar and the keyboard, in addition to Middle Eastern instruments, such as the darbukka, “hand drum”; the bouzouki, “Greek guitar”; the ‘ud, “Arab lute”; and melodic instruments (Saada-Ophir, 2006). The commercialization process latched onto the Israeli Yemenite music genre much like it had done with the Mizrahim genre. Entrepreneurial skill of Yemeni Jews enlarged the potential audience for this style.

Interestingly, the success of the Lebanese facilitated the proliferation of the musical styles of other Arab Jewish ethnic groups such as the Israeli Moroccans.

The band Sfataim, “Lips,” formed by Moroccan Jews from Sderot in southern Israel (Saada-Ophir, 2007) consolidated the style in the 1970s. The musicians began their careers by translating Israeli pop songs into the Moroccan dialect of Arabic.

Later, they incorporated old Moroccan songs and pop songs such as North African rai (Saada-Ophir, 2007). The sound of this genre emerged as a blend of the electric guitar and keyboard, reinforced by the percussive elements of the darbukka and Cuban bongos. The melody was entrusted entirely to the accordion and violin (Saada-Ophir, 2006).

While the cassette characterized the success of the previous two minority genres, Israeli Moroccan music owed its success to a different factor. An unexpected cooperation surfaced between Sfataim and the local branch of a mainstream recording company called Fonokol. The company utilized the assistance of a successful Israeli Moroccan producer (Saada-Ophir, 2007). This cooperative venture allowed the band to bypass the cassette industry and attract artistic recognition.

Following the success of Sfataim, additional bands like Renaissance and Sahara adopted the Israeli Moroccan style (Saada-Ophir, 2007). Musicians Sushan and Amir Benaaiun developed a distinctive Israeli Moroccan subgenre. Each added unique elements to the Israeli Moroccan style: Sushan through the creation of dance music in the Moroccan dialect of Arabic, and Benaaiun through the addition of melancholic compositions and impressive vocal qualities (Saada-Ophir, 2006).

In conclusion, minority Arabic genres have gained momentum in Israel be-

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cause Israeli and Palestinian Arabs have learned to musically express their experiences through combining elements of Eastern and Western styles. Five influences procure the future of Palestinian music: colonization, globalization, Islamization, Arabization, and Western participation. Some of these factors have proven helpful for minority Arab-Israeli people groups such as Mizrahim, Israeli Yemenites, and Israeli Moroccans. Unfortunately, other Arabic-Jew minorities, such as Israeli Libyans, are continually barred from entering Israel’s music industry (Saada-Ophir, 2006). Perhaps they too must utilize more aspects of Western musical styles before Israeli listeners embrace the genre.

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Reference List 1.

Al-Taee, Nasser. (2002). Voices of peace and the legacy of reconciliation: Popular music,

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nationalism, and the quest for peace in the Middle East. Popular Music 21(1), 41. Accessed October 18, 2016. http://search.proquest.com/docview/195171831?accountid=13113.

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Bursheh, Heather, David A. McDonald, Muṣliḥ Kanāʻinah, and Stig-Magnus Thorsén.

(2013).

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Palestinian Music and Song: Expression and Resistance Since 1900. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 2013. Accessed October 18, 2016. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost).

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Burkhalter, Thomas, Benjamin J. Harbert, and Kay Dickinson. (2013). The Arab Avant-Garde:

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Music, Politics, Modernity. Middletown: Wesleyan. Accessed October 18, 2016. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost).

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Horowit, Amy. (1999). Israeli Mediterranean Music: Straddling Disputed Territories. The Journal of American Folklore 112(445), 450-463. Accessed October 18, 2016. http://www. jstor.org/stable/541372.

8.

Saada-Ophir, Galit. (2006). Borderland Pop: Arab Jewish Musicians and the Politics of Performance. Cultural Anthropology 21(2), 205-233. Accessed October 18, 2016. http:// www.jstor.org/stable/3651603.

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Saada-Ophir, Galit. (2007). Mizrahi Subaltern Counterpoints: Sderot’s Alternative Bands.

Anthropological Quarterly 80(3), 711-736. Accessed October 18, 2016. http://search.proquest.com/docview/216478804?accountid=13113.

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I nternational T rade : F ree O ur M arkets or P rotect T hem ?

ucceeding at

Manus Churchill “The free market has been sorting it out and America’s been losing,” said Vice President-elect Pence. Mr. Pence made this statement in support of the Trump Administration’s efforts to pressure Carrier Corp. into keeping certain manufacturing operations in the United States. Mr. Pence’s criticism of the free market was followed by strong verbal agreement from President-elect Trump—“Every time.

Every time” (Pethokoukis, 2016).

Distrust of the markets is nothing new, but coming from a Republican administration it does mark something of a departure from traditional economic conservatism, which is typically suspicious of government-led attempts to enter the market and choose economic winners and losers. At stake in Carrier’s decision to move certain operations to Mexico were approximately 1,000 American jobs, but Carrier is just one case out of many. The immediate impact of a foreign trade policy on the job market should certainly be considered, but there are other longterm economic ramifications to consider.

Scholars have debated the relative merits and demerits of government intervention in the economy for decades, but the broad question of government intervention in the economy is beyond the scope of this study. Thus, this study will focus on considering whether the American economy benefits by being protected from foreign competition. This paper will consider existing theoretical models concerning protectionism and international trade, as well as historical economic data resulting from differing policies on the matter.

Should America allow international manufacturers to compete directly with its domestic manufacturers? Successfully answering this question and implementing concurring policies has a significant impact on both the economy, and countless lives across the country and around the globe.

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This study hypothesizes that the answer is generally yes— allowing the international market to freely compete with domestic manufacturers benefits the domestic economy. Trade policies should generally avoid protectionism and encourage free trade.

Literature Review

The question of using tariffs to protect a nation’s economy is a highly politicized one. While the majority of economic literature on protectionism focuses on the general economic benefits of free trade, some literature does highlight specific situations where the benefits of free trade may be negated by its costs.

Protectionism may be popular in the political realm, but it faces markedly more resistance in the field of economics (Sowell, 2015). Adam Smith, a Scottish philosopher and economist, is often seen as the forefather of modern free-market literature (Hazlitt, 2014). Smith’s ideas in Wealth of Nations of the many benefits of free trade have been met with widespread support in the field of economics (Smith, 2003). In the centuries that have followed Smith’s writing on protectionism there has been a distinct departure from the theories of mercantilism, which had previously dominated international trade theory (Dougherty & Pfaltzgraff, 2001).

Currently there is academic consensus that restricting free trade is a bad economic idea, but some economists are concerned with the trade deficit and believe that the U.S. economy needs to be protected from foreign manufacturers (Fletcher, 2011). Those concerned blame America’s proportionately large imports for an array of economic woes including unemployment, deindustrialization, and a significant reduction of gross domestic product (Ferry, 2017). Free market economics may enjoy the upper hand among economists today, but protectionism is far from a bankrupt ideology. There does exist literature that vigorously defends protectionism as not only beneficial to but necessary for a strong and functioning economy (Batra, 1996).

Literature that considers exceptions to the benefits of free trade often focuses on the importance of protecting sensitive information (Sibley, 2003). A prime example of this is the danger of jeopardizing national security by outsourcing the production of sensitive defense-related goods to enemy nations (Dougherty & Pfaltzgraff, 2001). The concern is that while other countries may be able to supply defense-related goods such as weapons more cheaply than American manufacturers, the technology for the manufacture of those weapons now also rests outside of America (International Traffic in Arms Regulations [ITAR], 2017).

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Concern with information leakage is not, however, limited to the defense industry. Many non-defense industries must also contend with the problem of international information leakage. American companies are faced with limited ways to prosecute international information theft, and much literature is devoted to how nations should collectively work together to address international information theft (Thompson, 1922).

Literature on free trade may differ in its final policy recommendation on specific issues, but two common themes emerge. First, trade policies have a large impact on the economy. Second, the exceptions to the benefits of free trade call for some limitations. This paper will explore these ideas in order to test its hypothesis that allowing the international market to compete directly against domestic manufacturers is generally beneficial to the domestic economy and that trade policies should thus generally support the freeing of trade.

Research Methods

This paper will employ both qualitative and quantitative methods in its testing of the study’s hypothesis. On the qualitative side it will consider three theories of international trade and engage in historical analysis of whether free-market policies are generally beneficial. A qualitative approach is helpful given America’s extensive history with tariffs and because the hypothesis itself is normative in nature. A qualitative approach promises to shed much light on the issue.

While qualitative analysis will certainly help to illuminate the issue, some degree of quantitative analysis is necessary as well. Trade policy is inherently economic, and thus a study of trade policy must employ the quantitative tools of economics to some degree at least. If there is one thing that economists on both sides of the debate agree upon, it is that trade policies have a tangible impact on the economy; that economic impact is necessarily measured in numbers. This study operates from the idea that both the qualitative and the quantitative approaches will prove informative as we ultimately seek to discover how America should shape its foreign trade policy.

Considering this approach, this study will examine economic theories of trade as they have appeared and proven influential in American history. The opinion among economists of the importance of avoiding trade deficits and protecting domestic manufacturers has changed significantly over time. This change has not, however, been so readily apparent in the realm of politics. There is little change in

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policies relative to the large changes in purely economic circles over time.

This study will examine three trade policy proposals as well as the literature supporting and critiquing each. An influential historical model is mercantilism.

Mercantilism was practiced through much of the developed world around the time of America’s founding, and to some degree influences popular thought to this day. Smith’s response to mercantilism in Wealth of Nations did not take long to become popular among economists. The phrases “free trade” and “free market” in this study refer to policies that tend toward relaxing regulations and increasing trade. The last main model considered is New Trade Theory, a relatively recent voice in the debate that defends protectionism and severely critiques free trade.

While this study will consider each of these proposed models from qualitative and historical perspective, some degree of quantitative analysis is necessary.

This is true of politically accepted models, because the historical analysis of real-world results must contain some mention of their relative efficacy. However, given the limited scope of this study, this quantitative analysis will support a more qualitatively-oriented analysis of several of the models that have proved most influential through American history. This mixed approach strives to test the study’s hypothesis and come to its final policy proposal from a holistic vantage point using primary data, secondary data, and analysis.

The independent variable is the degree imports are actively discouraged by government actions, and the dependent variable is economic health. A trade policy that discourages imports is be considered protectionist, and a trade policy that encourages imports—or, at least, does not discourage them— is to be considered leaning in a free-market direction.

There is almost universal agreement among economists that the independent variable does indeed have an impact on the dependent variable. Thus, while the extraordinarily complex nature of international economies puts isolating trade policies as a variable beyond the scope of this study, we feel confident in setting out upon this study with the abecedarian understanding that trade policies do indeed impact the economic health of a nation.

The hypothesis this study sets out to test is that free-market policies are generally economically beneficial. This would be confirmed if the free market policies of Smith and his ideological relatives prove beneficial, and would be disproved if it is shown that the protectionism of mercantilism or New Trade theory benefits the economy.

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Historical Theories on Trade Mercantilism Mercantilism dominated Western economic thought from the 1400s until waning in influence during the late 1700s. Economics as a discipline gained momentum during the European Renaissance, and the theory of mercantilism served as one of the earliest and most widely accepted theories to come out of this movement (Phillips, 1992). Mercantilist policies existed well before mercantilism was established as a theory, but mercantilism enjoyed the most widespread application in actual real-world economic policies between the 1500s and 1700s (Phillips, 1992).

Rich (2003, p. 133-134) argues that “mercantilism started as an elitist philosophy…[it] held that the state had the duty to impose its discipline on the atomic chaos of society.” He goes on, however, to point out that in the centuries since its inception, mercantilism “lost such aristocratic connotations and has just as easily been embraced by populists.” Mercantilism has never entirely died out. While its appeal may have morphed over the centuries from the aristocracy to the people, it impacted not only fifteenth century political thought but impacts political thought to this day (Phillips, 1992).

Mercantilism refers to a relatively broad package of economic ideas, perhaps the best known are those having to do with trade. Mercantilism holds that it is always beneficial for a nation to keep as much gold and silver within its borders as possible. Towards this end, exports should be maximized and imports minimized because imports involve paying outside manufacturers and thus reduce domestically-held currency. Tariffs are thus a central part of mercantilist economic policies. Tariffs are designed to raise the prices of imported goods, thus increasing the demand for domestically manufactured goods and minimizing money spent overseas. Central to mercantilism is not only the idea that domestic manufacturers should be protected from international manufacturers, but that this protection is beneficial to the entire nation’s economy (Ekelund, 2004).

Free Trade Free Trade Theory began to develop as a legitimate theory after the publication of Smith’s Wealth of Nations in 1776. As with mercantilism, free trade was practiced informally well before it was developed as a formal economic theory.

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Historically speaking, free trade was a response to mercantilism—a counter-theory that proposed fundamental changes to how states viewed trade (Rich, 2003).

Free trade has since grown to be by far the dominant theory in the field of international trade and economics and is practiced to varying degrees all around the world.

Free trade theory was formalized by two British economists, Smith and his contemporary David Ricardo (Irwin, 2009). Such early free-market economists used significant historical analysis to support their theories of trade, pointing to the successes of free-trade policies in places like Egypt, Greece, Rome, and Asia (Smith, 2003). Ricardo similarly used the historical success of free trade to make the case for policies that encourage trade (Ricardo, 2006). Aiding the cause of free market economists was the distinct economic prosperity of the Netherlands in the wake of Spanish imperialist rule and their pursuit of policies that encouraged both imports and exports (Appleby, 2011).

Free trade as an economic theory postulates that international trade is beneficial to the economy. It does not worry itself as does mercantilism with which direction the trade goes, whether in imports or exports, but rather focuses on the advantages inherent to specialization and voluntary exchange. In the mind of the free market economist, it is unavoidable that a given country will not be able to produce every good with maximum efficiency. The answer to this lack of efficiency, say free market economists, is to encourage trade between countries. Without artificial barriers, the most efficient producers of any given product should rise to the top internationally and create a maximally efficient international system.

New Trade Theory New Trade theory (NTT) is a relatively recent entrant to the debate on trade policy. As is the case with both mercantilism and free trade, NTT was practiced in some form long before it became a named economic theory (Black, 2002).

While NTT has various components, a central idea to NTT is the “infant industry� argument, which has been practiced in various forms since the mid-1800s (Black, 2002). Alexander Hamilton argued for the basics of NTT as early as the late 1700s.

NTT is ideologically much closer to mercantilism than to the theories of Smith and Ricardo, and in many ways NTT should be understood as a resurrection of mercantilist thought (Rich, 2003). Rich (2003) argues that the modern-day resistance to free market thought, as small as it might be, must be seen in light of

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the mercantilist thought that proceeded it historically and begat it ideologically.

Both NTT and mercantilism propose that it is in the best interests of a country to protect certain domestic industries. Both would disagree vehemently with free market economists who argue that, almost without exception, it is beneficial in the long run to allow the most efficient producer unfettered access to consumers regardless of whether the producer is domestic or foreign.

A central concern of NTT theorists is trade deficit. Trade deficit can be represented by the equation D = IC – VE, where D is trade deficit, IC represents the cost of imports, and VE is the value of exports (Fletcher, 2011). The trade deficit issue is the modern-day way of communicating the older concerns of mercantilism. While concern with the American trade deficit is seen most often in the political rather than the academic realm, NTT economists look at it with concern.

Another tenant of NTT is that new domestic industries should be protected from established foreign competitors. Without some degree of protection, they argue, domestic “infant industries” will never have a chance to succeed and give America the chance to produce products on their own (Fletcher, 2011).

Theoretical Criticisms of Mercantilism, Free Trade, and New Trade Mercantilism A comprehensive critique of mercantilism is well beyond the scope of this paper, so we must be satisfied with a briefer survey. Towards that end, this section will consider the main argument of mercantilism—that international trade is a zero-sum game of wealth retention and that money should thus be kept within a nation’s borders—and some of the main critiques leveled against it over the years, especially regarding its implication that imports are necessarily harmful.

While Smith and Ricardo together provided what was probably the most comprehensive criticisms of mercantilism, they were not the first to question the economic prudence of placing a premium on keeping gold and silver within a country’s borders. Influential thinkers such as David Hume, Dudley North, and John Locke all contributed to anti-mercantilist thought and were part of its steady decline in the 1700s.

Locke spoke out against mercantilism as early as the 1600s in his Second Treatise on Civil Government, where he attacked the heart of mercantilist thought: the idea that international trade is a zero-sum game (Locke, 2002). Mercantilism holds that money is the measure of wealth, and so giving money to other nations,

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even in exchange for goods, reduces the wealth of the nation accepting the imports. Locke (2002) argued that mercantilism understands wealth too narrowly and misses the fact that the wealth of the world is not fixed. This fact severely undermines the foundation of mercantilism.

Ricardo came around over a century later and further developed Locke’s ideas, pointing out how a nation might actually benefit from trading with another nation if the other nation can produce the good more efficiently. A nation should not, Ricardo argued, be afraid of purchasing goods from other countries if those countries are capable of produce the goods more efficiently and delivering them more cheaply (Ricardo, 2006). This allows the raw resources of the country importing a good to be used in the production of other goods, which may be produced more efficiently. This idea of comparative or absolute advantage—the idea that the most efficient producer of a good should be allowed to market their goods internationally—served to significantly discredit mercantilism.

Free Trade Free trade enjoys overwhelming popular support among economists even if it suffers in the minds of politicians and the greater public. But its relative popularity among economists does not mean that there have not been attempts to disprove it over the years, and this section will consider several arguments against the benefits of free trade. This includes ex post facto criticisms from modern-day opponents of free trade, as well as applicable criticism from proponents of classic mercantilism.

While the principles of free trade theory are widely accepted by economists today, there are a handful of economists who beg to differ from the idea that the comparative or absolute advantages enjoyed by various nations are enough to justify allowing international manufacturers to compete directly with domestic manufacturers. These economists would likely align themselves most closely in the present day with those of the NTT, or neo-mercantilists (Rich, 2003).

Among the most famous critiques of free trade in the modern day is that offered by James Brander and Barbara Spencer in their joint paper Tariffs and the Extraction of Foreign Monopoly Rents under Potential Entry. Brander and Spencer suggested that tariffs are, in fact, an effective means of protecting domestic industries from the unnecessary encroachments of foreign manufacturers (Brander, 1981). Imposing tariffs could even be seen as something of a welfare strategy, because tariffs increase the price at which a domestic manufacturer can

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sell their goods. These higher prices create higher profits for these manufacturers, and consequently more wealth than would have been available to them under free trade policies (Brander, 1981).

New Trade Theory NTT has not enjoyed the history that mercantilism and free trade theory have experienced, but that does not mean NTT has been immune from criticism of its own. This paper will consider critiques of the “infant industry” argument put forward by NTT theorists.

The free trade response to NTT is not greatly different from the free trade response to mercantilism. Thus, a study of the theoretical criticisms levied against NTT stretches from the 1600s all the way to the present day and the arguments of modern-day economists. While NTT is popular among politicians, it faces centuries of opposition in the field of economics.

Free trade theorists respond to the “infant industry” argument of NTT theorists by pointing out the dangers of an overly-narrow focus on the benefits afforded to a specific industry by a given policy. Henry Hazlitt, a prominent economist active in the 1900s, supported free trade but did not deny that protectionism is beneficial—to very specific persons: “[Protectionism] benefits them at the expense of everyone else.” He goes on to say that “in tracing the effects of tariffs… we should endeavor to see all the chief effects, in both the short run and the long run, on all groups” (Hazlitt, 2014, p. 83-84). Hazlitt’s criticism of NTT is this: tariffs do not benefit the protected manufacturer only at the cost of the international manufacturer, but also at the cost of the consumer who is now forced to purchase more expensive goods and participate in an economy that is burdened with inefficiency.

Economic Efficacy of Mercantilism, Free Trade, and New Trade Mercantilism Mercantilism enjoyed several hundred years of political favor, so it necessarily produced a substantial number of economic results. Economic record-keeping was not the same in the heyday of mercantilism as what it is today, but there is still ample evidence on which to judge the efficacy of mercantilism from an economic perspective.

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Even those who are most favorable towards mercantilism in the present day admit that it is widely seen as an ideological relic of less developed years past (Rich, 2003). This reputation is partly the result of other theories edging mercantilism out of the limelight, but the numerous real-world failures of mercantilism also contributed. This paper will specifically consider the impact of the Smoot-Hawley tariffs enacted in America in the 1930s. While the Smoot-Hawley tariffs were imposed well after the heyday of mercantilism, they represent a modern-day manifestation of mercantilist thought (Sowell, 2015).

The Smoot-Hawley tariffs were the largest tariffs imposed in a hundred years.

They were imposed on tens of thousands of imported goods in an attempt to bolster the American economy and create jobs. The unemployment rate in June 1930 when the Smoot-Hawley tariffs were passed was 6 percent, but that rose to 15 percent in the year after the tariffs were imposed and to 26 percent two years later.

There were clearly other factors at play, but it is interesting that at a macro level the implementation of the tariffs coincided with a marked increase in unemployment (Sowell, 2015).

Looking at a specific application of tariffs in America may be illuminating.

The American steel industry took a severe hit in the 1980s, losing over 200,000 jobs, or 60 percent of the steel industry in a decade. This led to an array of laws intended to discourage steel imports and protect the domestic steel industry. In this the laws were successful—tariffs significantly reduced steel imports from foreign countries, redirected $240 million of profits to domestic producers, and saved 5,000 jobs in the steel industry. But when one steps back, the larger picture is not so cheery—the artificially heightened prices of steel impacted other industries by reducing their profits a combined $600 million and sacrificing 26,000 jobs (Sowell, 2015). As predicted by free trade theory, the tariffs delivered a concentrated benefit to the protected industry and a much larger distributed cost to the economy as a whole (Hazlitt, 2014).

Free Trade Free trade as an economic theory was born out of the widespread historical success of free trade policies in nations around the world, and thus enjoyed a degree of real-world support even before it became a formal theory. Nevertheless, perhaps a more helpful question for the American policy maker to consider would be whether America itself has benefited from free trade policies historically

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speaking or whether free trade has weakened the American economy in the past.

It is worth noting that the phrase “free trade” is something of a misnomer because trade has never been entirely free. There is always some sort of regulation of trade. The term “freer trade” may be a more accurate way to describe what is actually being observed when referring to free trade, but for the sake of continuity with existing literature on the subject this paper will continue to use the phrase “free trade.” Even if America has never experienced completely free trade, it has nevertheless experienced periods of distinctly freer trade and the effect of those polies can be productively studied.

Perhaps the best-known free trade policy is the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Implemented in 1994, NAFTA is widely considered among economists to be a rousing economic success. While trade between the member countries—Mexico, the United States, and Canada—is relatively small relative to America’s GDP, NAFTA has nevertheless proven beneficial overall (Caliendo, 2015).

As might be expected, the freeing of trade negatively impacted specific industries that had enjoyed protection before NAFTA, but overall NAFTA created significant benefits for the American economy. Since NAFTA took effect in 1994, American trade with its North American neighbors has risen 350 percent and American exports tripled from $27 billion in 1993 to $82 billion in 2011 (U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 2014). In addition to the direct results of NAFTA on North American trade, studies have suggested that while NAFTA may have sent some jobs to Mexico, overall it has strengthened the American economy and aided America in its economic competition with China (McBride, 2017).

New Trade Theory NTT does not have the years of real-world testing under its belt that mercantilism and free trade do, but it is nevertheless possible to consider the practical effects of NTT. NTT as a holistic theory is relatively new, but the primary practices of NTT have been around for some time. Because of their close relation to mercantilism they can, in some cases, be considered in light of their application under mercantilism.

This paper will specifically consider the real-world impacts of protecting fledgling industries. Theoretically, these “infant industry” policies are to be im-

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plemented for short periods of time—just long enough for young domestic manufacturers to develop the experience and skills necessary to compete with foreign competitors. After this point, the protections would be removed, and the newly strengthened domestic industry would be released to compete freely on the international economic scene. Sowell (2015), however, argues that this does not happen in practice. There is simply not the political willpower to remove protections from specific industries.

In practice, then, the “infant industry” argument is subject to the same failings as more straightforward protectionism. Effective protectionism merely protects a less efficient producer from the competition of a more efficient producer, and while that inefficient producer may benefit, it is at the cost of both the consumer and the economy as a whole. A good example of this can be found in America’s protection of the steel industry in the 1980s and the way that the protectionism there created significantly harmed the American economy, even if it did produce some benefits for the steel industry. In one sense, infant industry protections are extremely effective in their limited goal—protecting specific industries—but their overall benefit to the economy is far more dubious.

America does not have a large number of infant industries as such, but an excellent case study in the impact of infant industry protections can be seen in 1980s Brazil. There, the government imposed heavy protections for the domestic computer industry. They heavily regulated the import of foreign computers in an effort to allow the domestic manufacturers a chance to catch up. These efforts backfired, however, when Brazil’s computer industry never matured, staying technologically stagnant and keeping Brazil far behind other nations (Chang, 2007).

The Importance of Information Security on the Issue of Free Trade Regardless of theoretical framework from which one approaches the issue of foreign trade, there is widespread support for the idea that at least some trade should be restricted. Mercantilists would argue that this “some trade” should be defined expansively to cover every good possible. NTT theorists would argue that at least those foreign goods that threaten fledgling domestic industries should be restricted. Free trade economists would provide the narrowest definition of all.

But all would likely agree that information security is an important good that makes the foreign manufacture of certain goods untenable.

The problem of international information theft is exacerbated by the fact that there does not exist an effective means of prosecuting the crime. This problem

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has been recognized for decades, but it continues nevertheless (Thompson, 1922).

Information theft is not restricted to our enemies—our allies and beneficiaries have also been accused of stealing information from American industries (Clarke, 1998).

Thomas Sowell (2015), a prominent free-trade economist, concedes that information theft may be a problem but at the same time argues that the information-security argument is overused. “Economists,” Sowell states, “have long recognized the national defense exception to free trade as valid where it applies, even though the national defense rationale has been used in many cases where it did not apply” (Sowell, 2015, p. 493). The threat of international information theft is a real threat that has to be addressed, but the threat is often exaggerated according to free-market economists (Thompson, 1922).

Conclusion This study set out to test the hypothesis that allowing the international market to compete against domestic manufacturers without the imposition of tariffs is generally beneficial to the domestic economy and that trade policies should thus generally avoid protectionism and encourage free trade. In the end, we believe that this hypothesis has been supported by our research.

Protectionism seems to provide concentrated benefits to the industry being protected and widespread harm to other industries. In taking this view, this paper joins with the vast majority of modern-day economists. The political benefits of bowing to the special interests of industries seeking protection are undeniable, but the economic cost to the nation as a whole are even harder to ignore.

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