NUPR Spring 2019

northeastern university political review The Myth of Equal Opportunity GARRY CANEPA

The Qatar– Gulf Crisis in Context AKSHAT DHANKHER

All About Incivility: An Interview with Candice Delmas ELENA KURAN & GABRIEL MORRIS

Letter from the Editor & the Co-Presidents Dear Reader, We share our Spring 2019 publication with a continued sense of conditional optimism. We believe strongly that the future holds a more just, fair, equal, and safe world for all, but that only our collective efforts will bring such a world into existence.

Therefore, we cannot and should not stop demanding more, from both our institutions and ourselves. We must remember that we can always control how we respond to injustice.

This semester, our writers responded. They demanded more: a living wage, real equality in opportunity, a robust defense of the environment, basic resources for Northeastern students, and a serious consideration of protests that break from deceptions of liberal civility.

These demands and critical analyses are almost always supplemented with solutions and offers of ways to increase justice in the world. This is the kind of thinking and writing that the Political Review will continue to encourage and facilitate on our campus as we enter our 10th year of existence.

Our organization saw unprecedented growth this semester, including the appointment of one of our most dedicated and long-time editors, Jillian, to share the growing role of the presidency with Gabriel. We also welcomed a new Creative Director, Jamie, along with her team of talented designers. We were thrilled to welcome Bryan to oversee the Political Review’s first podcast, Up for Discussion. New members joined our weekly meetings, bringing with them fresh perspectives and ideas that enrich our discussions and collective identity.

We are continually proud to offer this publication and space on campus for bright thinkers and leaders to do what they do best. We thank our writers, club members, editorial and executive boards, and the Political Science and International Affairs Departments, without whose support this edition would not exist.

Thank you for picking up this issue of the Northeastern University Political Review.

Sincerely, Elena Kuran, Editor-in-Chief Gabriel Morris, Co-President Jillian Wrigley, Co-President

Meet the Team Executive Board Gabriel Morris Co-President Jillian Wrigley Co-President Elena Kuran Editor-in-Chief Jamie D'Amato Creative Director Reshma Rapeta Treasurer Ellie MacLean Digital Director Bryan Bonnett Podcast Director Alexandra Jacobs Communications Director

Editorial Board

Mission Statement The Northeastern University Political Review seeks to be a non-affiliated platform for students to publish essays and articles of the highest possible caliber on contemporary domestic and international politics, as well as critical reviews of political books, film, and events. The Political Review aspires to foster a culture of intelligent political discourse among interested individuals while promoting awareness of political issues in the campus community. The organization envisions itself as a place where students with a common interest in politics and world affairs may come together to discuss and develop their views and refine their opinions. The Political Review hopes to reflect the diversity of thought and spirit at Northeastern, including the dual ethic of academic and experiential education our school embodies.

Jared Hirschfield Managing Editor Milton Posner Columns Editor Garry Canepa Magazine Editor Chantal Cheung Magazine Editor Kamran Parsa Magazine Editor Claire McHugh Magazine Editor Alex Frandsen Magazine Editor

For More Information Check out our website at nupoliticalreview.com Want to write for NUPR? Email us at nupoliticalreview@gmail.com Magazines printed by Puritan Capital

Design & Illustration Aileen Farrell May Perez Jessica Chen

Table of Contents National 6

The Good Kind of Popularity Contest Milton Posner

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Rethinking the Fight for $15 Chantal Cheung & Maxwell Huber

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White House, Black Mark: Trump’s Shutdown Evan Crystal

Global 14

Ending the Okinawa Conflict: A Challenge for Democracy Rintaro Nishimura

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Defending the Undefended: The Rights of Nature in the Age of Humans Ismini Tsakiri

Campus 19

The Cost of the Most Beautiful Building in Boston: How Northeastern Is Failing Its Students Elena Kuran & Jillian Wrigley

Featured 22

The Myth of Equal Opportunity Garry Canepa

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The Qatar-Gulf Crisis in Context Akshat Dhankher

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All About Incivility: An Interview with Candice Delmas Elena Kuran & Gabriel Morris

Columns 32

Sports as a Mirror to Society Meredith McCleary

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Policy Platform(s): The Dangers of Political Discourse through Social Media Nikki Naquin

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The Good Kind of Popularity Contest

By Milton Posner / Journalism & Political Science 2021

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s the year 2000 drew to a close, two presidential candidates fought vehemently to claim the most powerful position in the world. Democratic candidate Al Gore called for a manual recount in Florida, where Republican candidate George W. Bush led by 0.5% in the initial tally.[1] They battled over how the votes should be recounted, which ones should be recounted, and who should count them. Eventually, after an unprecedented intervention by the United States Supreme Court, Bush claimed the election over Gore by just 537 votes.[2] And all of this took place a state representing just 5% of the U.S. population.

The Electoral College—the mechanism that prompted the fiasco—is an inheritance from founding statesmen wary of the popular will. It’s undemocratic, complicated, and outdated. It’s also fixable.

The Electoral College remains in spite of public opinion, which indicates that two-thirds of Americans support electing the president via popular vote.[3] A majority consensus has existed around the popular vote for some time; 55% even support amending the Constitution to achieve this goal.[4] But this problem has an easier solution: the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC).[5] The compact was first proposed in 2006.

[6] In 2007, Maryland became the first state to sign on, and the compact gained at least one new signatory each year until 2014. The group pushing the legislation is National Popular Vote Inc., a non-profit corporation led by professors, lawyers, businessmen, politicians,

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and other political figures.[7] When a state joins the NPVIC—that is, the state legislature passes it and governor signs it—they are pledging to cast the state’s electoral votes for the winner of the national popular vote. The compact takes effect when states representing a majority of the country’s electoral votes (at least 270) sign on. Once the minimum number of electoral votes is reached, it won’t matter whether the remaining states join; the popular vote winner will always have enough electoral votes to claim the presidency.

be chosen in a particular way.[11] The following year, in 1893’s Virginia v. Tennessee, the Court noted that Congressional approval is required only when the interstate compact increases state power at the federal government’s expense.[12] Under the NPVIC, the states wouldn’t usurp federal power; the compact is state legislation that replaces state laws.

The compact can remedy many deficiencies in our presidential elections, beginning with the notion of basic fairness. California, the nation’s most populous state, has one elector for every 712,000 residents. Wyoming, the nation’s least populous state, has one elector for every 192,000 residents. California has 55 electoral votes; Wyoming has three.[13] But this is true only because a state’s number of electoral votes is equal to its combined number of senators and representatives in Congress. Because each state is guaranteed two senators and one representative regardless of population, each state must have at least three electoral votes.

The upshot is that a Wyomingite’s vote is worth 3.7 times more than a Californian’s.

For the citizens of these two states to have equal presidential voting power, California would have to have 65 electoral votes, not 55.

Wyoming, instead of three, would have one.

Compare any large state with a small state and you’ll find similar power disparities.

Considering registered voters as a percentage of each state’s population, as well as the percentage of registered voters that actually vote in a given election, does impact some of the

The popular vote doesn’t empower large states.

By definition, it doesn’t empower any state. It makes everyone’s vote equal.

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Article II, Section I of the Constitution empowers state legislatures to select their electors as they see fit.[8] Whether the NPVIC will be ruled unconstitutional as a violation of Article I, Section X’s prohibition of agreements and compacts between states—as some have argued—remains to be seen.[9][10] But it shouldn’t be.

In 1892’s McPherson v. Blacker, the Supreme Court ruled that state legislatures “have exclusive power to direct the manner in which the electors of President and Vice President shall be appointed” and that the Constitution does not mandate the electors

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Rural America is right to feel ignored; its population is dwindling, its economic growth lags behind large urban areas, and public policy hasn’t always kept its interests in mind.[22] But all of that has happened with the Electoral College in place, so to credit the College with boosting rural priorities is to ignore the present imbalance. Rural America is largely ignored in presidential elections not because politicians don’t care about it, but because the battleground states the Electoral College creates aren’t rural.[23]

A leader with this sort of unchecked power should be elected as directly as possible by the people.

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Besides, the country’s 100 biggest cities account for just one-sixth of its population.

[24] The rural dwellers—people living outside metropolitan statistical areas—also account for one-sixth of the population. That, plus the fact that candidates pay roughly equal attention to urban and rural areas within battleground states, indicates that a national popular vote would increase the attention politicians give to rural voters and issues.

Concerns that the country’s largest states, cities, or counties could form an insurmountable voting bloc and decide elections by themselves aren’t founded, either. It assumes that the country’s largest states, cities, and counties vote overwhelmingly for one candidate over another; they don’t.[25] The geographical distribution of voters with certain ideologies renders that outcome virtually impossible.

As for the NPVIC, 13 states and the District of Columbia have signed on.[26] California—55 electoral votes New York—29 Illinois—20 New Jersey—14 Washington—12 Massachusetts—11 Maryland—10 Colorado—9 Connecticut—7 Hawaii—4 Rhode Island—4 District of Columbia—3 Vermont—3 Delaware—3 Together they total 184 of the necessary 270 electoral votes to trigger the compact’s terms. The New Mexico legislature has passed the bill; if their governor signs it, the total will jump to 189.[27] From there the NPVIC’s path to 270 becomes trickier. The remaining states where the bill is most likely to pass are small,

left-leaning states that won’t boost the vote total very much.[28] Larger swing states likely won’t forfeit their important role in presidential elections, while large Republican-leaning states will preserve the valuable electoral advantage the Electoral College gives them.

But that doesn’t mean we should stop trying. The president has a number of unilateral powers (see Trump’s national emergency, Barack Obama’s DACA, and Bush’s Middle East military maneuvers). A leader with this sort of unchecked power should be elected as directly as possible by the people, not by a group of largely unknown electors that can, legally, disregard the people’s vote and cast their ballots for whomever they choose.

The popular vote winner has lost the election five times. Three of those elections took place before 1890, then it didn’t happen for 110 years.[29] Now we’ve had two in the last two decades. Besides 2000 and 2016, it almost happened in 2004; had John Kerry received 60,000 more votes in Ohio, he would have claimed the White House despite losing the popular vote by three million. Clinton beat Trump by almost three million votes, but lost the Electoral College by 74.[30] According to Hundt, for the first time in U.S. history, one of every three non-landslide presidential elections will end with the popular vote winner watching their opponent sworn in on January 20.[31] This anachronistic, inequitable election scheme has long overstayed its welcome. It’s time we championed simplicity by making the presidential election process easier for voters to understand. It’s time we made the presidency like every other elected office in the United States. It’s time we turned the presidential election into a popularity contest.

Because that’s what democracy should be.

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comparisons. But the larger point stands: how much your vote matters depends on where you live.

The Electoral College produces tens of millions of meaningless votes in each election. California and Texas, the country’s most populous states, wield a combined 93 electoral votes. We don’t have to wait until election night to know which way they’ll swing: California hasn’t voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 1988, while Texas hasn’t chosen a Democratic contender since 1976.[14][15] Texas Democrats and California Republicans always garner some House representation, but for presidential elections they might as well not show up. In 2016, almost 3.9 million Texans voted for Hillary Clinton and almost 4.5 million Californians cast ballots for Donald Trump.[16] In these two states, and in 46 others, a vote cast for the candidate who loses the state is a vote that doesn’t count at all. (Nebraska and Maine use a congressional district method that allows candidates to split electoral votes, but even then it usually doesn’t happen).[17] The United States’ 56% turnout for the 2016 presidential election was a slight increase from the 2012 election, but was lower than the turnout rate of most developed democracies.

[18] There are many factors behind this, including perceptions of political corruption and the significance of a single vote. But research led by Reed Hundt, the former director of the Federal Election Commission and chairman of a pro-popular vote nonprofit, shows that a national popular vote would likely increase turnout by 20 to 80 million voters.[19] This isn’t just about bringing those Texas Democrats and California Republicans to the polls. It’s about bringing the California Democrats and Texas Republicans who thought, rightly, that they didn’t need to vote because their preferred candidate would win anyway.

Candidates have little incentive to campaign in states where they’re so far ahead or behind that the result is a foregone conclusion, meaning they don’t have to prioritize issues important to those voters. They can focus their time, energy, and resources on perennial swing states.[20] In 2012, presidential candidates held general election campaign events in just 12 states. Ninety-six percent of those events were concentrated in only eight states, and two-thirds came in Ohio, Florida, Virginia, and Iowa.

Proponents of the current winner-takeall method used by 48 states frequently argue that a presidential popular vote would empower large states at the expense of smaller ones, that candidates would focus all of their energy on big-city interests, and that smalltown, rural America would be ignored.[21] But the popular vote doesn’t empower large states. By definition, it doesn’t empower any state. It makes everyone’s vote equal.

[1] NCC Staff. “On this day, Bush v. Gore settles 2000 presidential race.”

National Constitution Center. December 12, 2018. [2] “Bush v. Gore.” Oyez.

Accessed March 13, 2019. [3] Vandermass-Peeler, Alex, Daniel Cox, Molly Fisch-Friedman, Rob Griffin, Robert P. Jones. “American Democracy in Crisis: The Challenges of Voter Knowledge, Participation, and Polarization.” Public Religion Research Institute. July 17, 2018. [4] “5. The Electoral College, Congress, and representation.” Pew Research Center. April 26, 2018. [5] “Agreement Among the States to Elect the President by National Popular Vote.” National Popular Vote. Accessed March 13, 2019. [6] “News History.” National Popular Vote. Accessed March 13, 2019. [7] “About.”

National Popular Vote. Accessed March 13, 2019. [8] “U.S. Electoral College: Who Are the Electors? How Do They Vote?” National Archives and and Records Administration: Electoral College. Accessed March 13, 2019. [9] U.S. Constitution. Article I, Section X. [10] Valencia, Patrick C. “Combination Among the States: Why the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is an Unconstitutional Attempt to Reform the Electoral College.” Harvard Journal on Legislation. October 26, 2018. [11] “McPherson v. Blacker, 146 U.S. 1 (1892).” U.S. Supreme Court. Accessed March 13, 2019. [12] “Virginia v. Tennessee, 148 U.S. 503 (1893).” U.S. Supreme Court.

Accessed March 13, 2019. [13] Lu, Denise. “The electoral college misrepresents every state, but not as much as you may think.” The Washington Post. December 06, 2016. [14] “California Presidential Election Voting History.” 270 To Win. Accessed March 23, 2019. [15] “Texas Presidential Election Voting History.” 270 To Win. Accessed March 23, 2019. [16] “Presidential Election Results: Donald J. Trump Wins.” The New York Times. Updated August 09, 2017. [17] “Split Electoral Votes in Maine and Nebraska.” 270 To Win. Accessed March 16, 2019. [18] Desilver, Drew. “U.S. trails most developed countries in voter turnout.” Pew Research Center.

May 21, 2018. [19] Paul, Deanna. “The popular vote could decide the 2020 presidential election, if these states get their way.” The Washington Post.

February 26, 2019. [20] National Popular Vote. “Introduction What It Is - Why It’s Needed.” February 26, 2016. Youtube Video. [21] Posner, Richard A. “In Defense of the Electoral College.” Slate. November 12, 2012.

[22] Cramer, Katherine J. “The great American fallout: how small towns came to resent cities.” The Guardian. June 19, 2017. [23] “Myths About Big Cities.” National Popular Vote. December 29, 2015. Youtube Video. [24] Ibid. [25] “Myths About Big Cities and Big Countries.” National Popular Vote. February 06, 2016. Youtube Video. [26] “Status.” National Popular Vote. Accessed March 23, 2019. [27] Fischler, Jacob. “Colorado joins effort to elect presidents by popular vote, go around Electoral College.” Roll Call. March 18, 2019. [28] Paul, Deanna. “The popular vote could decide the 2020 presidential election, if these states get their way.” [29] Ibid. [30] “Presidential Election Results: Donald J. Trump Wins.” [31] Paul, Deanna.

“The popular vote could decide the 2020 presidential election, if these states get their way.”

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Rethinking the Fight for $15

By Chantal Cheung / Political Science & Economics 2021 & Maxwell Huber / Politics, Philosophy & Economics 2021 8

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ongressional Democrats have renewed the fight to give working Americans a raise. In January, they proposed the Raise the Wage Act, which would gradually increase the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 an hour by 2024. The bill is already supported by 181 Democratic sponsors in House and 31 in the Senate.[1] The proposal comes at a time when many states and cities have not only set their minimum wage above the federal limit, but are pushing for further increases.[2] Raising the minimum wage is also popular with the general public. According to a poll from Pew Research Center, 58% of Americans support increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

[3] While popular opinion alone should make Congress consider raising the minimum wage, Congress should also consider the minimum wage’s role in combating poverty and ensuring workers a decent standard of living.

The real value of the minimum wage has been in decline since 1968, when it peaked at $1.60 (equivalent to $9.08 in today's dollars).[4] This depreciation means that minimum wage workers have been experiencing declining quality of life over the past fifty years. The fall in workers’ real earnings has also come during a period of rising worker productivity across occupations.[5] While minimum wage workers are producing more, they are receiving less.

The federal minimum wage we recommend is $12.87 in 2018 dollars. This figure was calculated by using MIT’s Living Wage Calculator to find the living wage of the nation’s cheapest city to live in: McAllen, Texas.[6] We

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incorporated a multiplier that accounts for vacation time, enables savings, and assumed a work year of 40 hours per week for 50 weeks, allowing workers to take up to two weeks off per year for personal or vacation days. This wage would also allow workers to save up to 20% of their income, helping them to avoid living paycheck to paycheck. These savings can act as a buffer for emergencies, such as unemployment, healthcare-related expenses, and parental leave, and allow people to save up for large purchases or investments. Basing the minimum wage on the cheapest city in the U.S. would also help prevent businesses

Labor Standards Act (FLSA) of 1938.[8] Such regulations, however, were originally defined to exclude workers of color by purposely excluding occupations in which they were disproportionately employed, such as farm and domestic work.[9] The exclusion of farm workers is inherently racist and perpetuates racial inequality.[10] This is also true for tipped workers. Research has shown that the practice of tipping is often discriminatory, with white workers receiving more tips than black workers for the same work.[11] Forcing people to rely on tips to make up for a lower minimum wage creates unstable income flows, making it harder for people to budget or manage financial emergencies.[12]

In addition to raising the minimum wage, there have also been multiple anti-poverty proposals put forward by 2020 Democratic presidential candidates. These include Senator Kamala Harris’s Livable Incomes for Families Today (LIFT) the Middle Class Act and Senator Cory Booker’s Housing, Opportunity, Mobility, and Equity (HOME) Act. These bills would supplement wages through the tax code and subsidize renters respectively, and both are designed to reduce poverty in the U.S.[13] An increased minimum wage combined with any of the proposed legislation would likely lead to a dramatic increase in workers’ living standards.

So what is a living wage? While many policymakers usually compare income to the federal poverty threshold to determine an individual’s standard of life, using that measurement to determine poverty is flawed.

The role of the federal minimum wage should not be to prescribe a one-size-fits-all policy, but to set a foundation so that each state and locality can set an appropriate minimum wage policy for their region while still ensuring livable earnings for workers. in cities with low costs of living from being burdened by an unnecessarily high minimum wage. To avoid erosion of its purchasing power through inflation, the minimum wage should be linked to the consumer price index (CPI), the official inflation level, as 17 states have already done.[7] The definition of workers eligible for minimum wage should also be expanded.

Current federal regulations regarding minimum wage were established under the Fair

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The official poverty measure is defined as “three times the ‘subsistence food budget’” for a given family size, which was first calculated in 1963 using 1955 data. It has been adjusted only to account for inflation.[14] Clearly, it’s about time this was changed, as food costs have risen substantially, not to mention rising rent, health care, and education costs as well.

The minimum wage should be based off of a living wage, rather than the poverty line, to take into account not only monetary costs, but also costs that affect people’s work and life balance.[15] Tying the minimum wage to a dynamic living wage calculation would drastically increase the minimum wage by 78%, but it doesn’t quite yield the $15/hour figure supported by many progressives. There are two main reasons why. First, the federal minimum wage should exist as part of a system where state and local governments take on the primary responsibility for looking after their own minimum wages, with the federal minimum existing as a backstop in the event of political neglect or gridlock on the minimum wage. The role of the federal minimum wage should not be to prescribe a one-size-fits-all policy, but to set a foundation so that each state and locality can set an appropriate minimum wage policy for their region while still ensuring livable earnings for workers. Localizing the minimum wage would not only cause state and local governments to be more accountable to their constituents on this issue, but they can also pass the necessary legislation more swiftly than the federal government since they are smaller with fewer stakeholders.

Tying the federal minimum to inflation and other apolitical economic indicators would effectively alleviate Congress of the responsibility to continually raise the minimum

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wage, allowing it to occur automatically. As Congress would become more detached from setting the minimum wage, states and local governments would necessarily and preferably become the critical political pathway for minimum wage increases.

While ideally, states and local governments should take the lead in setting the minimum wage, the federal minimum wage still maintains an important role. In addition to serving as a backstop, the federal minimum would also serve as a reference point for policymakers and advocates when

increase, the Democratic proposal fails to change the paradigm through which we view the minimum wage and sticks to the archaic practice of Congress selecting a new, seemingly arbitrary number every few years.

A popular argument against raising the minimum wage is that it would translate to higher unemployment by creating greater costs for businesses. But according to the evidence, that’s not necessarily true. The federal minimum wage, adjusted for 2018 dollars, peaked in 1968 at $9.08, yet the unemployment rate was at 3.6%, a historic low.[16][17] Several case studies have failed to find any association between the minimum wage and unemployment. In one famous 1994 study, economists David Card and Alan B. Krueger reviewed the effects of a higher minimum wage by comparing 410 nearby fast-food restaurants in New Jersey and Pennsylvania before and after New Jersey's minimum wage increase. This increase in the minimum wage across similar areas allowed Card and Krueger to observe what is known as a “natural experiment,” as it controls for other factors that can affect employment. Finding that an increase in New Jersey’s minimum wage had been associated with stronger employment growth, contrary to the theoretical literature, they concluded that their “empirical findings challenge the prediction that a rise in the minimum reduces employment.”[18] More recently, Seattle’s minimum wage increase to $15 per hour “is within the range of increases that other research has found to have had little to no effect on employment,” as economists Ben Zipperer and John Schmitt have noted.[19] While other studies have found raising the minimum wage to be associated with greater unemployment, economists David Neumark and William Wascher have reviewed a multitude of papers to gauge the overall conclusion

Tying the federal minimum to inflation and other apolitical economic indicators would effectively alleviate Congress of the responsibility to continually raise the minimum wage, allowing it to occur automatically.

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determining regional minimum wages. The second reason to set the minimum wage at our suggested level rather than $15 is to contextualize the role that a federal minimum wage should play in combating poverty and ensuring workers a decent standard of living.

A simple policy like a minimum wage should not be seen as a stand-alone fix for issues such as housing, food insecurity, wealth inequality, healthcare, childcare, and other economic challenges. Rather, the minimum wage should be accompanied by more targeted, nuanced programs meant to address these issues, such as single -payer healthcare and subsidized parental leave. Despite being the largest proposed minimum wage

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of the literature. They found that there is “a lack of consensus about the overall effects on low-wage employment of an increase in the minimum wage,” although “a sizable majority of the studies surveyed… give a relatively consistent (although not always statistically significant) indication of negative employment effects of minimum wages.”[20] Ultimately, there is no definitive evidence that a modest increase in the minimum wage would significantly increase unemployment.[21] There are a few explanations for why the real world doesn’t work the way the theory predicts.

While it’s argued that a higher minimum wage would mean layoffs, with businesses replacing workers with technology, labor-saving technologies may not be affordable or realistic. Smaller companies in particular may not be able to afford the high start-up costs of technologies to replace workers. Furthermore, there are many jobs that still require at least some people working along with the technologies. Certain companies cannot lay off workers even if the minimum wage rises. For example, even if a restaurant becomes mostly automated, such as Boston’s Spyce Kitchen, it is still necessary to have at least one worker on-hand to provide customer assistance.[22] There are also concerns that a minimum wage increase could lead to cuts in hours or even businesses shutting down completely.

Our proposed federal minimum wage

accounts for a workweek of 40 hours per week for 50 weeks. For workers who are unable to work the full 40 hours per week, other government programs, such as wage supplements, are needed. Concerns about businesses shutting down completely come predominantly from smaller businesses, who may or may not be exempt from the federal minimum wage depending on their size and annual sales.

Most importantly, increasing the minimum wage would increase the purchasing power of the working poor. By raising the minimum wage, people will be able to afford to spend more and thereby stimulate the businesses that are facing higher costs. An increase in consumer spending could boost the economy in the short run, leading to faster job growth.

[23] An increase in the minimum wage could also boost worker productivity, as employee morale and work ethic increase when employees believe that they are being paid a wage that makes poor performance costlier, what is known in economics literature as the “efficiency wage hypothesis.”[24] Moreover, if wages increase, labor participation may increase as well, as the opportunity cost of being out of the labor force naturally increases.

Even if the minimum wage does increase unemployment, that cost is more than offset by the benefits of those still employed after the wage increase. According to a 2014 study by the Congressional Budget Office, if the

minimum wage were to increase to $10.10 per hour, total employment was predicted to decrease by about 500,000 workers.[25] While that may sound like a lot, in an economy where about twenty million people are laid off annually, the effects of a $10.10 minimum wage on total employment would be negligible.[26] And this would be more than offset by the 24.5 million people who would benefit from higher wages, serving as part of the remedy for widening wage inequality.[27][28] Ultimately, the benefits to raising minimum wage outweigh the costs. In fact, seven Nobel Prize-winning economists agree that the minimum wage should be raised to at least $10.10.[29] An increased minimum wage is crucial to improving the lives of American workers, with the ideal minimum wage being a living wage linked to inflation and one that would give subnational governments a greater role in setting region-specific minimum wages. There are certainly those who will argue that the number we put forward is lacking and fails to address the myriad of economic woes. However, it’s important to keep in mind that the minimum wage is only one policy tool for addressing systemic poverty and wealth inequality. A more robust scheme to address these issues will require more than just an appropriate minimum wage. Until that happens, all we’re really doing is passing the buck to the next generation.

[1] Pramuk, Jacob. “Democrats introduce bill to hike federal minimum wage to $15 per hour.” CNBC. January 16, 2019. [2] Herron, Janna. “From California to New York, states are raising minimum wages in 2019 for 17 million workers.”

USA Today. December 27, 2018. [3] “Would you favor or oppose an increase in the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to $15 an hour?” Pew Research Center for the People & the Press Poll Database. Last modified August 2016.

[4] DeSilver, Drew. “5 facts about the minimum wage.” Pew Research Center. January 04, 2017. [5] The New York Times Editorial Board. “The Case for a Higher Minimum Wage.” The New York Times. February 08, 2014. [6] Carter, Shawn M. “These are the top 5 most affordable US cities.” CNBC. January 18, 2018. [7] Brainerd, Jackson. “State Minimum Wages.” National Conference of State Legislatures. 2018. Accessed March 15, 2019. [8] U.S. Department of Labor. “Handy Reference Guide to the Fair Labor Standards Act.” U.S. Department of Labor. Last modified September 2016. [9] Perea, Juan F. “The Echoes of Slavery: Recognizing the Racist Origins of the Agricultural and Domestic Worker Exclusion from the National Labor Relations Act.” Ohio State Law Journal 72. no. 1 (2011): 95-138. [10] Liu, Yvonne Yen. "Food Workers—Wages and Race." Race, Poverty & the Environment. 18, no. 1 (2011): 10-12. [11] Lynn, Michael, Michael Sturman, Christie Ganley, Elizabeth Adams, Mathew Douglas, and Jessica McNeil. “Consumer Racial Discrimination in Tipping: A Replication and Extension.” Journal of Applied Social Psychology 38, no. 4 (March 19, 2008.): 1045-1060. [12] Gould, Elise, and David Cooper. “Seven facts about tipped workers and the tipped minimum wage.” Economic Policy Institute. 2018. [13] Matthews, Dylan. “5 anti-poverty plans from 2020 Democratic presidential contenders, explained.” Vox. January 30, 2019. [14] Matthews, Dylan. “The official poverty measure is garbage. The census has found a better way.” Vox. September 12, 2017. [15] Glasmeier, Amy K. “LIVING WAGE CALCULATOR: User’s Guide / Technical Notes.” Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 2017. [16] DeSilver, Drew. “5 facts about the minimum wage.” [17] Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey.”

U.S. Department of Labor. Accessed Feb 11, 2019. [18] Card, David, and Alan B. Krueger. “Minimum Wages and Employment: A Case Study of the Fast Food Industry in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.” American Economic Review 84, no. 4 (September 1994): 772-793. [19] Zipperer, Ben, and John Schmitt. “The “high road” Seattle labor market and the effects of the minimum wage increase.” Economic Policy Institute. 2017. [20] Neumark, David, and William Wascher. “MINIMUM WAGES AND EMPLOYMENT: A REVIEW OF EVIDENCE FROM THE NEW MINIMUM WAGE RESEARCH.” Foundations and Trends in Microeconomics 3, no. 1 + 2 (November 2006): 1-182. [21] Doucouliagos, Hristos, and T.D. Standley. “Publication Selection Bias in Minimum Wage Research? A Meta Regression Analysis.” British Journal of Industrial Relations 47, no. 2 (June 2009): 406-428. [22] Kim, Irene, and Exa Zim. “Four MIT graduates created a restaurant with a robotic kitchen that cooks your food in three minutes or less.” Business Insider. May 28, 2018. [23] Cooper, David, and Douglas Hall. “How raising the federal minimum wage would help working families and give the economy a boost.” Economic Policy Institute. 2012. [24] Akerloft, George A., and Janet L. Yellen. “THE FAIR WAGE-EFFORT HYPOTHESIS AND UNEMPLOYMENT*.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 105, no. 2 (May 1990.): 255-283. [25] Congressional Budget Office. “The Effects of a Minimum-Wage Increase on Employment and Family Income.” Congressional Budget Office. 2014. [26] “Layoffs and Discharges: Total Nonfarm.” U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis). Accessed March 05, 2019. [27] Bernstein, Jared. “The Minimum Wage Increase and the CBO’s Job Loss Estimate.” On The Economy: Jared Bernstein Blog. 2014. [28] DePillis, Lydia. “The case for raising the minimum wage keeps getting stronger.” CNN Business. April 27, 2018. [29] Coy, Peter. “Seven Nobel Economists Endorse a $10.10 Minimum Wage.” Bloomberg Businessweek. January 14, 2014.

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White House, Black Mark: Trump's Shutdown

By Evan Crystal / International Affairs 2021

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here is very little a government can do to frustrate and anger its population more than shut down. Citizens pay taxes and abide by laws—even those with which they don’t agree—and in return, the government abdicates much of its responsibility and ceases to function over issues that do not necessitate such drastic measures.[1] Indeed, this lack of action is nothing new.

In total, there have been 21 shutdowns since 1976, under both Democratic and Republican presidents.[2] Yet, the most recent shutdown is arguably unlike any of its predecessors.

Its protracted nature, combined with the Republican hold on power and frivolous politics resulting in great economic damage, renders it an indelible black mark unlike any other before it.

The most recent government shutdown was Donald Trump’s third of 2018 and, at 35 days, the longest ever in history. It surpasses the second longest shutdown—under Bill Clinton in 1995—by two whole weeks. Trump’s most recent shutdown was more than twice as long as the median shutdown length and

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accordingly resulted in significant economic damages.[3] In addition to the protracted nature of the shutdown, another damming aspect of Trump’s shutdown is who held political power in Washington: Republicans held the presidency and both chambers of Congress.[4] Due to filibuster rules, Republican power was not completely unilateral. But with majorities in

inexorably the more culpable, as they were ultimately the only party that could put an end to the shutdown.

In negotiations broadcast live on December 11th between the president, thenHouse Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, President Trump even offered to take ownership of the shutdown, saying he was “proud to shut down the government” in order to get his wall.[6] Thus he made clear his opposition to the other, more diplomatic option available to him: negotiating for wall funding only once a spending bill had been passed, a strategy that would have prevented thousands of government employees and contractors from going without pay.

The particular issue that sparked the political gridlock further serves to cement the shutdown as a black mark on Trump’s presidency. Because a shutdown causes major economic damage, the issues over which a government is shut down should be of commensurate importance to the damage caused to the population.[7] Trump’s wall, with a disapproval rating of over 60%, miserably failed to meet that mark.[8] In contrast, the

Trump's shutdown over the wall resulted in $11 billion in monetary losses—or nearly twice as much as he had requested for the wall.

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the House and Senate, they controlled which bills could be heard; they controlled the presidency, so any bill that passed would need a veto-proof majority in the Senate. Senate Democrats could not introduce their own bills; they needed to resist political pressure and maintain an unwavering caucus to block Republican legislation from going through the Senate.[5] If blame can be assigned for this shutdown, then the Republicans are

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Three of those eight were during the Trump Administration and the other five were under Carter.[17] While the five shutdowns under Carter naturally draw attention, they were not as attributable to the president as it may initially seem. Carter’s shutdowns were primarily traced to congressional fights over federal funding for abortions.[18] Federal workers were not furloughed and the government did not close because there was only a technical funding gap, meaning the government did not fully shut down.[19] Shutdowns like the one in 2018–19, in which entire sections of the government were closed, did not start until the government began enforcing the Antideficiency Act, which happened after the Carter administration.[20] The Carter shutdowns of the late 1970s and early 1980s are largely incomparable to more recent shutdowns, including Trump’s, in that they simply did not result in massive furloughs.[21] Early in the Trump shutdown, the Senate passed a spending bill that would have kept the government open. The House modified the bill to include wall funding which was not passed when sent back to the Senate, something then-Speaker of the House Paul Ryan surely knew would happen.[22]

At first, President Trump said he would sign a bill that opened the government without wall funding, but he later changed his mind, insisting that he receive the funds to carry out his most significant campaign promise. Many saw this shift as a capitulation to right-wing commentators, such as Ann Coulter, who had aggressively attacked him in the media when he was willing to negotiate, calling him “gutless” and declaring his leadership “a joke presidency.”[23] Through a combination of intense public pressure, public disgust for the Republicanled government closure, and Democratic stubbornness and unity, Congress was able to pass a bill that would temporarily open the government for three weeks, thus putting an end to what should be remembered as the most shameful shutdown in U.S. history.

[24][25] The magnitude of the shutdown (both in terms of length and economic damage), its unpopular political origin, and uniform Republican governance make for a lasting black mark on Donald Trump’s presidency, permanently tarnishing the legacy of the past two years of the administration and the GOP Congress.

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previous longest shutdown happened over a comparatively reasonable issue: Clinton was fighting with then House Speaker Newt Gingrich and a Republican-controlled Congress over Medicare and Medicaid budget cuts—healthcare issues that have routinely polled as some of the most important issues for voters.[9] During that shutdown, Gingrich and the Republicans eventually capitulated to Clinton after facing public pressure over their unpopular cuts.[10] Each day of a shutdown causes grave economic harm, and the longer a shutdown goes on, the more lasting the damage. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, Trump’s shutdown over the wall resulted in $11 billion in economic losses—or nearly twice as much as he had requested for the wall itself.

[11] Many government employees and contractors, particularly single-parent families or those who require government assistance, were forced to take short-term loans with very high interest rates just to feed their families or avoid missing their mortgage or car payments.

[12] While government workers, such as TSA agents, received back pay for hours worked during the shutdown, recouping at least some of their economic losses, thousands of government contractors did not receive any back pay.

[13] The 35-day shutdown was two weeks longer than the previous longest under Clinton, causing an extra cycle of missed paychecks and proving more economically disastrous than any of the previous shutdowns.

From a macroeconomic perspective, the shutdown reduced the country’s GDP by $3 billion for the final quarter of 2018 and by another $8 billion for 2019.[14] Even worse, the shutdown came at a time when the Congressional Budget Office predicts an economic slowdown, as the boom that began during Obama’s second term begins to wane.

[15] Additionally, as the new tax law comes into effect, government debt will also balloon, likely reaching the highest levels since the end of World War II.[16] Although there is never a good time, this was clearly a particularly bad time to have a government shutdown.

Looking back, there never should have been a shutdown in the first place. Only eight shutdowns since the Ford Administration started the same way as Trump’s—with both chambers of Congress and the presidency controlled by the same political party.

[1] Agiesta, Jennifer, and Grace Sparks. “Polls Agree: Americans Don’t like Shutdown and They Blame Trump.” CNN. January 18, 2019. Accessed February 03, 2019.[2] Frazee, Gretchen, and Lisa Desjardins. “How the Government Shutdown Compared to Every Other since 1976.” PBS. Last updated January 25, 2019. Accessed February 03, 2019. [3] Ibid. [4] Hayes, Christal. “Government Shutdowns Are Rare When One Party Controls White House, Congress.

President Trump Is on His Third.” USA Today. December 23, 2018. Accessed March 07, 2019. [5] Frazee, Gretchen and Lisa Desjardins. “How the Government Shutdown Compared to Every Other since 1976.” [6] “‘I Am Proud to Shut down the Government’, Trump Tells Schumer – Video.” The Guardian. December 11, 2018. Accessed February 04, 2019. [7] Zaveri, Mihir. “Shutdowns Are ‘All Games of Chicken.’ Here’s How They’ve Evolved.” The New York Times.

December 23, 2018. Accessed February 04, 2019. [8] Cohn, Nate. “The Wall Is Not Popular. (And Neither Is Trump.).” The New York Times. January 12, 2019. Accessed February 14, 2019. [9] Pearl, Robert, M.D. “Healthcare Is The No. 1 Issue For Voters; A New Poll Reveals Which Healthcare Issue Matters Most.” Forbes. August 13, 2018. Accessed February 14, 2019. [10] Davidson, Joe. “Lasting Damage Remains from Trump’s Shutdown Folly.” The Washington Post. January 28, 2019. Accessed February 09, 2019. [11] Cohn, Nate. “The Wall Is Not Popular. (And Neither Is Trump.).” [12] Rappeport, Alan, and Binyamin Appelbaum. “Government Shutdown Cost U.S. Economy $11 Billion, C.B.O. Says.” The New York Times. January 28, 2019. Accessed February 10, 2019. [13] Davidson, Joe. “Lasting Damage Remains from Trump’s Shutdown Folly.” [14] United States Congress. Congressional Budget Office. The Budget and Economic Outlook: 2019 to 2029. January 28, 2019. Accessed February 10, 2019. [15] Ibid.[16] Rappeport, Alan, and Binyamin Appelbaum. “Government Shutdown Cost U.S. Economy $11 Billion, C.B.O. Says.”[17] Struyk, Ryan, and Joyce Tseng. “The History of Government Shutdowns in 1 Chart.” CNN. January 13, 2018. Accessed February 03, 2019. [18] “Before 1980 the Federal Government Did Not Shut down.” The Economist. January 10, 2019. Accessed February 10, 2019. [19] Frazee, Gretchen, and Lisa Desjardins. “How the Government Shutdown Compared to Every Other since 1976.”[20] Puckett, Jason. “Verify: Here’s a Timeline of Previous Government Shutdowns in the U.S.” KGW. January 03, 2019. Accessed February 13, 2019. [21] Frazee, Gretchen, and Lisa Desjardins. “How the Government Shutdown Compared to Every Other since 1976.” [22] Hayes, Christal. “Government Shutdowns Are Rare When One Party Controls White House, Congress. President Trump Is on His Third.” [23] Collins, Kaitlan. “Trump Sensitive to Criticism about So-far Failed Border Wall Promise.” CNN. December 19, 2018. Accessed February 10, 2019. [24] Agiesta, Jennifer. “CNN Poll: Trump Bears Most Blame for Shutdown.” CNN. January 14, 2019. Accessed February 10, 2019. [25] Fandos, Nicholas, Sheryl Gay Stolberg, and Peter Baker. “Trump Signs Bill Reopening Government for 3 Weeks in Surprise Retreat From Wall.” The New York Times. January 25, 2019. Accessed February 10, 2019.

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Ending the Okinawa Conflict: A Challenge for Democracy

By Rintaro Nishimura / Political Science 2022

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hat happened on February 24th should not be regarded as just another day in Japanese politics. It was the day 70% of Okinawans voted to oppose plans to relocate the Futenma Air Station to Henoko, a remote location in the prefecture with endangered coral reefs.[1] As the central government plans to move forward with the relocation, it is worth noting the irony of a democratic nation choosing to ignore its citizens. Although it was a non-binding referendum, meaning the results were not directly going to influence the relocation plans, the results clearly suggest a need for lawmakers to persuade voters on this costly and controversial decision that will impact many generations to come.[2] While it does not seem reasonable to push American bases out of Okinawa immediately, this referendum provides ample reason to weigh the options available and evaluate what each would entail.

At the moment, appeasing all sides seems impossible. The Okinawa prefectural government has been feuding with the central government for more than 10 years now. The arrival of anti-base governor Denny Tamaki last year ensures this rift will persist. As aforementioned, the result of the referendum in February suggests that over 70% of Okinawans (with a 53% turnout) agree with the governor and oppose the transfer of the base.[3] However, Prime Minister Abe has not been overly enthusiastic about making comments on the referendum. Instead, it seems he has his sights set on the provincial elections in April and the upper house elections

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in July.[4] Coming out strong against a group of constituents would certainly harm the Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) chances of maintaining the majority necessary to pass the resolution to revise Article 9, one of Abe’s chief goals.[5] According to a Kyodo news survey conducted on March 10th, public support for the Prime Minister’s cabinet has fallen 2.3% from the previous survey to 43.3%, and 69% of respondents want the referendum results to be respected.[6] This sheds light on how poorly the government has explained the ordeal throughout the years, and how the implications of this referendum may spread nationwide—perhaps even to the point where the LDP’s majority is threatened.

This was not the first prefectural referendum regarding the U.S. bases. This February referendum was the fifth base-related referendum, the fourth to be held in Okinawa, and the first referendum held specifically regarding the Henoko relocation.[7] In a 1996 referendum, 53% of voters supported a reduction of U.S. bases in Okinawa.[8] While the results and issue at hand were notably different from this year’s referendum, it shows that Okinawans have consistently supported removal of U.S. presence in the prefecture. Okinawans argue that the new site will destroy the area’s delicate marine ecosystem and threaten the livelihood of 2,000 local citizens.[9] This threat comes in the form of crime and noise pollution deemed as direct results of U.S. presence in Okinawa, especially after a 12-year-old girl was abducted and raped in 1995 by three American servicemen.[10] As a result, there is bitter resentment

toward the American bases. Coupled with the lingering effects of the Pacific War and such incidents, many Okinawans have a staunch anti-base view that persists to this day.

It is true that it is not realistic to completely remove U.S. bases immediately, as Japan is heavily invested in them for national security.[11] However, the utter lack of a formal justification by the central government hasn’t helped. Throughout the years, the government has consistently presented the situation as if it were out of Okinawans’ hands from the beginning, with Prime Minister Abe claiming, “We cannot avoid the necessity of moving Futenma [air base]. We can’t put this off any longer.”[12] To add salt to the wound, President Trump is drawing up preposterous plans to make Japan pay the full price for American soldiers on their soil, for the “privilege” of hosting them.[13] This would mean that despite ongoing opposition to U.S. military presence, Okinawans and Japanese citizens nationwide would be required to pay for their presence in the form of tax revenues.

While it is easy to criticize the government for largely ignoring the referendum, it is also worth considering the negative implications of removing American presence from Okinawa. The most immediate consequence that comes to mind is the loss of deterrence from imminent threats to national security, such as incursions by North Korea and China.

However, the presence of American soldiers likely won’t protect citizens in the event of missile attacks on the mainland (as argued in a previous piece).[14] There are also concerns

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that the economic benefits from hosting the U.S. bases may be lost when the base is removed. Okinawans, on the other hand, would argue that the ratio of revenue from hosting the bases has dropped from 15.5% in 1972 to 5.3% in 2015.[15] Furthermore, their economy does well enough without the bases through tourism, which accounts for approximately 16% of the economy and has yielded 700 billion yen in fiscal year 2017, growing steadily at almost 5% a year.[16][17] This seems to counter the claim that the bases are an absolute necessity for Okinawa’s economy.

One must also consider how unrealistic and costly the process of removal would be. To put it bluntly, there is no real plan for what would happen after the removal of U.S. bases. This is evident from the fact that the prefectural government has only succeeded in delaying relocations and removals, rather than providing an alternative plan.[18] While it may seem undemocratic to ignore the pleas of Japanese citizens, U.S. presence in Japan has helped to mitigate any real conflict with neighboring countries.

It can also be argued that the prefectural

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government has not considered this issue at the foreign policy level. In some ways, U.S.– Japan relations are symbolized by the bases as signs of the strong relationship cultivated after World War II. However, they are also symbols of defeat and horror for Okinawans, many of whom experienced the bloody battles themselves. It is a delicate issue that cannot be delayed any longer. If Japan decides to remove U.S. bases, the process could take up to 15 years, during which they would then have to renegotiate their security pact with the U.S.[19] This costly and arduous process would undoubtedly impact security

end it once and for all. While they do hold the upper hand in that they may proceed with the base’s relocation regardless of the results of any referendum, the government should still hold a national referendum. A nationwide referendum would bring clarity to the situation and provide an opportunity for the government to more firmly establish its claim. Furthermore, a national referendum may help the government uphold its legacy as a democratic nation.

Domestically, it would provide solid justification for proceeding with the relocation, while simultaneously securing victory in the elections. Internationally, Japan would uphold its legacy as a liberal democracy.

For this to be a “proper” referendum, however, Japan should not follow in the footsteps of Britain, who failed miserably in their 2016 Brexit referendum. Before bringing the issue to a vote, the government must provide substantial platforms for discussion on the issue and actually explain what the relocation would mean for the nation. People must educate themselves and recognize the dire nature of the situation, as well as consider how this decision will impact future generations. Only then can this issue finally be brought to a close in a democratic and just manner, treating Japanese citizens with the respect they deserve and cementing Japan’s standing as one of the world’s strongest democratic nations.

A nationwide referendum would bring clarity to the situation and provide an opportunity for the government to more firmly establish its claim. Furthermore, a national referendum may help the government uphold its legacy as a democratic nation. in Asia and possibly lead to deteriorating relations between the U.S. and Japan. Either way, much more convincing arguments on both sides of the issue must be made before making this consequential decision.

So is there a way to appease all parties in this strenuous ordeal? Is it too late to make any major moves? The government has the choice to either allow the bickering to continue or

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[1] Sieg, Linda. "Japan to push ahead with U.S. base relocation despite Okinawa referendum result." Reuters. February 25, 2019. [2] Ibid. [3] Ibid. [4] Ibid. [5] Iizuka, Satoshi. "Okinawa Base Referendum Could Deal Nationwide Electoral Blow to Abe." The Japan Times. February 28, 2019. [6] Kyodo News. "Abe Support Rate Falls; 69% Want Okinawa Vote on Base Issue Respected." The Japan Times. March 10, 2019. [7] Eldridge, Robert D. "Okinawa Referendum Could Bring Clarity." The Japan Times. August 19, 2018. [8] Pollack, Andrew. "Okinawans Send Message to Tokyo and U.S. to Cut Bases." The New York Times. September 09, 1996. [9] McCurry, Justin. "Okinawa Referendum: Everything You Need to Know." The Guardian. February 22, 2019. [10] Ibid. [11] Eldridge, Robert D. “Okinawa Referendum Could Bring Clarity.” [12] Sieg, Linda. “Japan to push ahead with U.S. base relocation despite Okinawa referendum result.” [13] Wadhams, Nick, and Jennifer Jacobs. "Trump Seeks Huge Premium From Allies Hosting U.S. Troops." Bloomberg. March 08, 2019. [14] Nishimura, Rintaro. “The Thorn in Japan’s Side: Okinawa & The Relocation of the Futenma Base.” Northeastern University Political Review. September 30, 2018. [14] Nakamura, Keita. "Okinawa Sees Path to Economic Independence without U.S. Bases." The Japan Times. October 27, 2018. [15] Prefectural Government of Okinawa. "Summary of Tourism." September 2018. [16] Bank of Okinawa. "The Business Environment in Okinawa Prefecture." 2011. [17] Eldridge, Robert D. “Okinawa Referendum Could Bring Clarity.” [18] Terehov, Vladimir.

"Consequences of Okinawa Referendum." New Age. March 12, 2019. Accessed March 13, 2019.

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Defending the Undefended: The Rights of Nature during the Age of Humans

By Ismini Tsakiri / Environmental Studies & Political Science 2018

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serious risk.[7] Often overlooked is the fact that GCC stretches far beyond the issue of CO2 emissions and a warming planet. GCC is the byproduct of the way we function and structure our societies—from poverty, water scarcity, and biodiversity loss to capitalistic ideals, social justice, and systematic oppression. It is a physical manifestation of the social norms

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Defining the Problem

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lobal Climate Change (GCC) is the most prevalent and systematic threat facing mankind.[2] The year 2018 marked a major milestone as the fourth warmest year on record, following 2017, 2016, and 2015.[3] For the past 30 years, our world has seen global temperatures increase at an unprecedented rate, global species fall victim to a sixth mass extinction, and natural resources depleted beyond restoration due to deforestation and disruption of the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles.[4] Overconsumption, overpopulation, and pollution threaten the health not only of our oceans, atmosphere, and land, but also of our global social structure through GCC-related social, political, and economic tensions.

Currently, GCC is exacerbated through the energy trapped by man-made pollution, the level of which is now equivalent to exploding 400,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs per day.[5] Pollution is constantly spewed into the thin shell of our atmosphere as if it were an open sewer.[6] The recent Sixth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that we will need to take rapid and unprecedented action to stay within 1.5 degrees celsius of pre-industrial levels, beyond which global health, livelihood, food, and basic human security are at

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While the Anthropocene epoch signals a threat to the existence of our species, it also signals a sense of hope—hope for potential solutions, change, and a new enlightenment. The drastic consequences we face provide us with an opportunity to move away from this destructive era and into a new generation of thinking and living based soundly in environmental ethics.

that govern our nations. To address GCC, humanity must change the way we structure our globalized world by adopting a new social paradigm. We can no longer view the planet in a linear way, where spewing millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere is believed to have zero consequences. It’s the essence of the First Law of Thermodynamics that matter cannot be created nor destroyed, and so it logically follows that man-made environmental pollution has tangible consequences that are either disseminated to other parts of the world (as seen with plastic pollution) or other ecosystems (as seen with agricultural runoff pollution).

Because GCC affects nearly all aspects of life, if we have any chance of solving this existential threat, we need to reshape our social norms.

How Did We Get Here?

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hile scholars have put forward several explanations for GCC, including failure of governmental coordination and laissez-faire capitalism, the one thing that these arguments all have in common is human behavior.[8] And it is a change in human behavior—an acknowledgement, empathization, and understanding of

the intrinsic value of all living things— that is advocated by the philosophies of environmental ethics.

Human behavior is the underlying force driving our global society. This is illuminated through Talacott Parson’s sociological theory of human behavior, known as structural functionalism.[9] This theory considers values to be the core of culture because values give meaning and direction to people’s actions and how they treat themselves and others. These values produce cultural traits that shape social norms and become institutionalized patterns.

Our current norms have taken a toll on Earth’s environmental integrity, leading us to GCC. These damaging values have been passed down through generations and continue to manifest in dangerous ways. These social norms have, for the most part, been based in traditional ethical thinking that is anthropocentric (i.e. human-centered)—the worldview responsible for GCC. Our current social norms concerning the environment can be revealed through Aristotle’s view on nature, where he maintains that “nature has made all things for the sake of man” and that the value of non-human things in nature is merely instrumental, for human-use only.[10] Western philosophy has been fundamentally concerned with the controlling of nature to achieve progress in a capitalistic, over-consuming world. This has positioned humans to adopt the principle of basic human chauvinism.[11] Environmental philosopher Richard Sylvan defines basic human chauvinism as a core principle of Western ethical systems, under which our collective species is seen as coming first and all other beings as only tangible for the sake of their instrumental use to humanity. With such an undertaking, nature and all other life forms have been destroyed, altered, or depleted for human purposes in the name of “development and progress.”

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uman activities are on path to destroy the only known environment capable of sustaining life. Our consumption and depletion rate of natural resources will lead us to a point where there will be no resources to trade, no need for economies to develop, no need for society to progress or for politics to rule—in essence, no need for us. Our species is entering a new domain: a new geological epoch known as Anthropocene, in which human activities detrimentally impact Earth’s geology and ecosystems. We are literally entering the age of humans.

While the Anthropocene epoch signals a threat to the existence of our species, it also signals a sense of hope— hope for potential solutions, change, and a new enlightenment. The drastic consequences we face provide us with an opportunity to move away from this destructive era and into a new generation of thinking and living based soundly in environmental ethics. This philosophy seeks to recognize humans and planet Earth as a cohesive, living ecosystem that works in balance, towards sustainability and the maintenance of the natural ecological cycle.[1] For the sake of the Earth and all its biological inhabitants, we must shift the global social norms that govern our societies towards the ideology of environmental ethics.

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A Hope for the Future

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ackling global climate change will come down to reshaping the norms underlying human behavior and our relationship with nature. Environmental ethics seeks to do just that by providing the moral case for sustainability by bestowing rights to nature. Yet just as it required generations to implement moral philosophy through international human rights and humanitarian law, success in developing seemingly utopian ideals of environmental ethics for the natural world will pose its own challenges.

Sylvan and John O’Neill argue for environmental ethics that consider our current conduct towards the natural environment to be morally wrong, in the same way inflicting Spring 2019

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harm on other human beings is considered morally wrong. In O’Neill’s The Varieties of Intrinsic Value, he states that environmental ethics require that “non-human beings and states of affairs in the natural world have intrinsic value.”[12] Thus, assigning intrinsic value to the natural world would make it morally wrong for our behavior to damage or cause the environment harm. By placing intrinsic value on ecosystems and non-human beings, we create a systematic orientation in which the flourishing of ecosystems is inseparable from the flourishing of mankind.[13] These philosophies of environmental ethics, including the Deep Ecology Movement (DEM), propose to do the same for the natural world as philosophies of natural rights did for human society (with the adoption of current human rights laws)—on perhaps an even larger, life-saving scale. In this way, future generations will look back at our time of resource exploitation and planetary destruction as a relic of a less-advanced and immoral age.

Assigning intrinsic value to the environment led conservationist Aldo Leopold to his most enduring idea: the land ethic, which seeks to establish humans’ moral responsibility to the natural world.[14] Currently, there is no ethic that addresses humans’ relation to Earth’s environment. The land ethic seeks to help us judge whether human behavior is “right” or “wrong” with respect to humanity’s impact on nature. It is thus affirmed that it is “right” to allow nature to continue to exist in its natural state, and “wrong” to change or degrade this natural state through human action. For example, Leopold states that “a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”[15] This focuses on humanity’s duty to sustain the ecological community, not degrade it. With current trends of environmental degradation and GCC, humans have clearly missed this mark.

The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries we place on human responsibility to include Earth’s collective ecosystems.

Establishing previously unacknowledged rights to nature, the land ethic forces humans to reimagine their role as conquerors of the natural world and to recognize that we are merely fellow members within it. With this perspective, it becomes virtually impossible to view acts of environmental degradation as anything other than morally and ethically wrong—finally conferring rights to nature.[16] This reasoning leads to the Deep Ecology Movement (DEM), a more radical ideology of the philosophy of environmental ethics pioneered by Arne Naess. The DEM seeks to spread awareness of these ideas to include the world as a whole, known as an ecocentric viewpoint. Ecocentrism places intrinsic value in all aspects of nature, not just humanity, and Spring 2019

adopts a broader view of the world than the current global thinking of anthropocentrism.

[17]

Earth relies on the stability of complex and interconnected ecosystems, about which we continue to learn more through scientific discoveries, satellite imagery, and technological innovations. For example, in the context of the DEM, a honeybee’s responsibility and purpose for living is fulfilled by performing its duty to provide for the needs of itself and its ecosystem, the forest. This creates a natural cycle that provides the forest with the necessary structure to flourish, which enables the trees in the forest to perform their duty: to provide oxygen for all living beings. This is only a small picture in the larger context of ecosystems, but it presents how even a small part of an ecosystem holds value against the whole. It would be immoral to deny any part of an ecosystem intrinsic rights, as each part plays a role in life’s functionality.

[1] Whitman, Walt. “Ecosystems and how it relates to Sustainability.”

University of Michigan. October 20, 2017. [2] Sengupta, Somini. "Biggest Threat to Humanity? Climate Change, U.N. Chief Says." The New York Times. March 29, 2018. [3] Hausfather, Zeke. “State of the Climate: 2018 set to be fourth warmest year despite cooler start.” Carbon Brief, Clear on Climate. August 1, 2018. [4] Jamail, Dahr. "Sixth Mass Extinction Ushers In Record-Breaking Wildfires and Heat." Truthout. August 20, 2018. [5] Gore, Albert Arnold, Jr. "The Climate Reality Project." Speech, The Climate Reality Project Leadership Training Corps, California, United States of America, Los Angeles, August 24, 2018. [6] Ibid. [7] Allen, Myles, Babiker Mustafa, et al. “Global Warming of 1.5°C, Summary for Policymakers.” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. October 6, 2018.

[8] Klein, Naomi. “This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate.”

New York: Simon & Schuster, 2014. [9] Parsons, Talcott. The Structure of Social Action. McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc, 1937. [10] Aristotle. "Politics." The Internet Classics Archive. 350 b.c.e. [11] Keller, David R. Environmental ethics: the big questions. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell. 2010. Pg 100. [12] Ibid, pg 120. [13] Ibid, pg 230. [14] Leopold, Aldo. "The Land Ethic." A Sand County Almanac. New York: Oxford University Press, 1949. [15] Ibid. [16] Ibid. [17] Cryer, Paul. Kopnina, Helena, et al. “Why ecocentrism is the key pathway to sustainability.” The Millennium Alliance for Humanity and the Biosphere. July 4, 2017. [18] Keller, David R. Environmental ethics: the big questions. Pg 265-270. [19] Gore, Albert Arnold, Jr. "The Climate Reality Project."

Humanity Is in This Together

I

f society were to establish this ethical eco-consciousness, a new social norm would be adopted that provides an appreciation of all life. This change can only be accomplished through education, which plays a key role in developing social norms.

Through an educational framework of environmental ethics, humanity will be able to take the necessary steps to ensure that international action properly addresses the state of environmental degradation in the 21st century.[18] By doing so, society will acknowledge the fact that human beings are not dominant, Earth is not for homo-sapiens alone, and that the protection of natural environments serves the interests of all living species, including— but not restricted to—our own. It may finally put aside cultural and political differences and set an agenda that brings civilization together in harmony, fighting for one common goal: the existence of life as we know it.

The world is running out of time, and eco-conscious individuals are running out of patience. Ultimately, this existential crisis comes down to three exceptionally important questions, as expressed by former Vice President of the United States, Al Gore: Must we change? Can we change? Will we change?[19] And to all three, I would answer a resounding yes.

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The Cost of the Most Beautiful Building in Boston How Northeastern Is Failing Its Students

By Elena Kuran / International Affairs 2020 & Jillian Wrigley / Marketing & Political Science 2020

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ortheastern University is now home to the “single most beautiful building” in Boston.[1] Last month, the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex (ISEC) received the 2018 Harleston Parker Medal, the highest honor from the Boston Society of Architects.[2] The $225 million “innovation ecosystem” opened in 2017 and has been described by Northeastern President Joseph E. Aoun as a “research village.”[3][4] The 234,000 square-foot complex accommodates 700 faculty and graduate nupoliticalreview.com

students whose research receives funding from over 65 private and government organizations, including the U.S. Department of Defense and National Security Agency.[5] ISEC "signifies a major shift in the culture, history, and trajectory” of Northeastern.

[6] It is a testament to the aggressive efforts Northeastern has taken in recent years to shape its public image into one of global collaboration, innovation, and experiential learning—qualities that have also been cited as factors in the school’s unique and rapid rise

in the rankings. Northeastern’s success story is intriguing to students and academics alike: how does a school ranked 127th on U.S. News & World Report’s list of Best Colleges rise to 44th in a little over a decade?[7][8] Evidently, both the success of ISEC and the school’s rapid climb in rankings are products of the administration's increased focus on attracting and conducting external research.

Between 2006 and 2016, Northeastern grew its external research funding by 168%, to $130 million.[9] In 2015, Northeastern joined a group Spring 2019

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of around 100 universities denoted as “R1,” a lesser-known but equally influential list.[10] Every five years, the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education categorizes colleges and universities in the U.S. into “moderate” (R3), “higher” (R2), and “highest” (R1) levels of research activity. For many academics, R1 is considered to be “the pinnacle of higher education… a shorthand for institutions to identify themselves.”[11] The Carnegie classifications are also used as the basis of the Best Colleges ranking category systems.[12] “This is an affirmation of our strategy,” said Northeastern President Joseph E. Aoun in a 2016 interview with the Washington Post.

He said the private university has invested heavily in faculty scholarship in health, security, and sustainability.[13] Northeastern’s uncompromising drive to grow and orient itself towards external research is showing no signs of slowing. In fact, at his annual address to the Faculty Senate last October, President Aoun hinted at a second ISEC. “We have ISEC one, and we are starting to think about an ISEC two,” he said.

“By 2022, research space on campus will be completely occupied.”[14] President Aoun’s prediction and ambitious plans to expand ISEC may come as a surprise to many students, ourselves included, who often pace the four floors of Snell Library in search of an open seat. For the many students who aren’t working in ISEC labs, research and study space have been completely occupied for a long time.

“Northeastern has been so geared towards admitting more students, but has struggled to maintain any decent form of upkeep in terms of keeping our resources and spaces accessible,” said Michael Mendez, a fifth-year Media and Screen Studies and Theatre major.[15] While the external research taking place in ISEC is different from the research and studying students undertake in Snell for their classes, this disjunction lays bare a worsening issue on campus: Northeastern’s failure to balance its responsibilities to students with its external research agenda and relentless pursuit of higher rankings. While ISEC represents Northeastern’s research- and rankings-driven agenda, an overburdened Snell, brimming with students but very few books, represents Northeastern’s failed commitment to providing students with the most basic resources every student deserves. That President Aoun would hint at building a second ISEC with no plans for major renovations to our primary library is unacceptable.

The library has long represented an institution’s commitment to academics.[16] “The library is the heart of the university, and nowhere is that more so than at Northeastern,” said Dan Cohen, Director of Libraries.[17] As strong supporters of physical libraries in the age of digital resources, we agree with Mr. Cohen—which is why we are demanding

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more from the administration. Snell should be the heart of the university because students gather there to use its many resources for individual and collaborative study—not because we have nowhere else to go.

Besides the graduate school’s Law Library, Snell is Northeastern’s only library. In 2015, the average number of visits to Snell exceeded 5,400 per day.[18] That number is sure to have gone up, as enrollment has increased by over 2,000 students since 2015, yet the building still has just 2,800 seats for group and individual study, making private and quiet studying spaces increasingly scarce.[19][20][21] In comparison, Boston College, a nationally ranked university with just over 13,000 undergraduate and graduate students, has seven distinct libraries complete with quiet studying spaces, group seating, and over three million volumes of books on site.[22] Despite a growing student body of over 25,000, Northeastern currently has no large-scale plans to expand Snell or add additional library space to its campus.[23] The administration has attempted to meet changing student needs and remedy the demands for more space through less expensive restructuring initiatives.[24] At the beginning of this semester, students returned to campus to find the fourth floor completely free of books and dotted with bright new furniture. Many physical materials are now housed in an offsite location in Connecticut, and requested materials are dropped off at Snell twice a week.[25][26] Although Snell staff report relatively low usage of the books relocated to the annex, they recognize that some students may not request books from the annex due to the inconvenience. The relocation of books has created one more step in the already stressful research process required of many students for class papers and projects, causing frustration for students such as Mendez. “I needed some biographies to read for my senior capstone project, and I was not worried about having to procure them, seeing that the Northeastern library had them. However, when I went to find them in the library, I was told that it could take anywhere from one to three days to get them in from the annex. I was on a time crunch to work on the project, and I had to venture to Boston University's library to pick up books that Northeastern has. Something that could have easily taken 30 minutes turned into a multi-hour ordeal.”[28] To remedy this new problem, Snell administration is working to get daily delivery of books from the annex to replace the current twice-weekly schedule.[29] The space freed from relocating books to the annex has been repurposed as study space. The most drastic visible renovation took place on the fourth floor; colorful new furniture replaced the heavy wooden furniture that had filled Snell since its 1990 opening.[30] Although Snell’s website reports nupoliticalreview.com

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even more costly solutions like LightView.

LightView, a new high-rise housing development owned and managed by American Campus Communities, looms over Roxbury at the intersection of Columbus Ave and Burke Street.[36] The 20-story building opens in August 2019 and aims to relieve housing pressures in Roxbury and Mission Hill by housing 825 Northeastern students. However, there is concern that LightView isn’t doing enough.

Many students cannot afford the exorbitant prices—the cheapest option is $1,334 per

Campus

that fourth-floor seating increased by 10%, the lack of bookshelves and sparsely arranged furniture (due to fire codes) have left some students confused and wishing they had more options.[31] Furthermore, the fourth floor was previously the only silent floor in Snell. Along with the furniture renovations, it has been newly designated as “quiet study,” configured into zones for both quiet group study and silent individual study. There is now just one corner on one floor of our only library where students can study in peace.

While we agree with Northeastern’s sentiment that the world’s biggest challenges will be solved through collaboration, we urge the administration not to undervalue the role of silent spaces in students’ success. As students, we are lucky and grateful for the wide range of services Snell provides (3D printing, research help, the recording studio), but they are completely separate from our need for more study space. A 2015 report by a major architecture firm on the future of libraries found that the primary reason students visit libraries is still to study or work alone, followed by group work and access to digital resources.

The report warned institutions not to sacrifice quiet in pursuit of collaboration.[32] The worsening issue of inadequate study space is just one example of how Northeastern is failing to meet the basic needs of its students. In order to help students “transition into college life,” Northeastern requires underclassmen to live in on-campus housing.

[33] But due to overcrowded dorms, many transfer and N.U.in students have been assigned housing in 1110 Commonwealth Ave, former Boston University housing that Northeastern now leases. The building is a 50-minute walk from Boston’s main campus, and students have reported concerns of isolation and detriment stemming from living so far from campus.[34] Students living in residence halls closer to campus don’t always fare better. They are stuck between expensive new housing and old dorms constantly in need of repair.[35] Rather than expanding affordable on-campus housing and lessening its contribution to local gentrification, Northeastern has come up with

the next four years is as costly as LightView, there is concern that many students will still have to seek housing in the surrounding neighborhoods. Northeastern is well-situated to be the institutional leader it purports to be, but chooses once again to pursue flashy measures that do not hold up to further scrutiny.

These issues—lack of study space and affordable on-campus housing—don’t stem from the individuals working to keep Snell, the housing office, or other Northeastern programs functioning every day. We are deeply grateful for the support that faculty and staff show us as students and young people. These issues are instead a result of poor budget allocation on the part of an administration that has allowed for the compromise of basic student needs in favor of more innovation, research, and higher rankings.

This is not to say that we oppose the external research being conducted at Northeastern; we undoubtedly recognize its importance and contribution to the world outside of our campus. And we draw attention to these issues not for the sake of criticizing a school that has provided us with invaluable opportunities, but because we want to see Northeastern be the best version of itself it can be. We recognize that as students who pay over $50,000 in tuition each academic year, we deserve a quiet place to study, affordable on-campus housing, and to feel that we are more than pawns in a game of rise-in-the-rankings.[40] We deserve better from Northeastern.

While ISEC represents Northeastern’s research- and rankings-driven agenda, an overburdened Snell, brimming with students but very few books, represents Northeastern’s failed commitment to providing students with the most basic resources every student deserves. month—and some community members are wary of the massive new building.[37][38] Northeastern faces unique housing challenges: in the last 50 years, it has evolved from a commuter campus to a more residential one and must balance a student body that cycles on and off campus due to co-op, study abroad programs, and Dialogue of Civilizations. We recognize that Northeastern has attempted to address student housing concerns in its Institutional Master Plan (IMP): a 546-page document that details all of the changes Northeastern will pursue between 2013, when the IMP was approved by the Boston Development Authority, and 2023. “Northeastern is committed to meeting the housing demand for its undergraduates who seek housing,” the IMP reports, thereby reducing neighborhood impact.[39] But if the housing Northeastern offers over

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[1] “Harleston Parker Medal.” Boston Society of Architects/AIA. Accessed February 27, 2019. [2] St. Martin, Greg. “Northeastern Has The ‘Most Beautiful’ Building in Boston.” News @ Northeastern. February 11, 2019. [3] Young, Colin A. “Northeastern University formally opens $225 million science, engineering facility.” The Boston Globe. April 04, 2017. [4] St. Martin, Greg. “ISEC Opening Ushers in New Era of Discovery at Northeastern.” News @ Northeastern.

April 04, 2017. [5] “Critical Funding Sources.” Interdisciplinary Engineering and Research Complex - Northeastern University. Accessed February 27, 2018. [6] “About the ISEC.” Empower ISEC - Northeastern University. Accessed February 27, 2019. [7] Kutner, Max. “How to Game the College Rankings.” Boston Magazine. August 26, 2014. [8] “National University Rankings 2019.” U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges. Accessed February 27, 2019. [9] “A Research Powerhouse.” Interdisciplinary Engineering and Research Complex - Northeastern University. Accessed February 27, 2018. [10] St. Martin, Greg. “Northeastern Achieves Highest Classification for Research Activity.” News @ Northeastern. February 02, 2016. [11] Anderson, Nick. “In new sorting of colleges, Dartmouth falls out of an exclusive group.” The Washington Post. February 04, 2016. [12] Morse, Robert, Matt Mason, and Eric Brooks. “Best Colleges Ranking Category Definitions.” U.S. News & World Report. September 09, 2018. [13] Anderson, Nick. “In new sorting of colleges, Dartmouth falls out of an exclusive group.” [14] Shen, Dylan C. “Aoun teases second ISEC building at Faculty Senate meeting.” The Huntington News. November 01, 2018. [15] Mendez, Michael. “Snell Annex Interview Questions - (NUPR).” Email to Jillian Wrigley. March 14, 2019. [16] Thaler, Mark, Christine Barber, and Tim Pittman.

“How do students envision the present and future academic library?” Gensler. 2015. [17] “Snell Library: Collaborating Without Borders.” Northeastern University. Spring 2018. [18] Price, Elana. “A Gift of Study Space.” Northeastern University Library. October 19, 2015. [19] “Common Data Set 2015-2016.” University Decision Support - Northeastern University. Accessed March 04, 2019. [20] “Common Data Set 2017-2018.” University Decision Support - Northeastern University. Accessed March 04, 2019. [21] Price, Elana. “A Gift of Study Space.” [22] “Libraries.” Boston College Academics. Accessed March 04, 2019. [23] “Institutional Master Plan.” Northeastern University. Accessed March 04, 2019. [24] Corbett, Hillary. “A New Look For the 4th Floor.” Northeastern University Library News. January 11, 2019. [25] Corbett, Hillary. “Questions about Snell renovations.” Email to Elena Kuran and Jillian Wrigley. March 01, 2019.

[26] “Request an item from the Annex.” Northeastern University Library. Accessed March 04, 2019. [27] Corbett, Hillary. “Questions about Snell renovations.” [28] Mendez, Michael. “Snell Annex Interview Questions - (NUPR).” [29] Corbett, Hillary. “Questions about Snell renovations.” [30] Corbett, Hillary. “A New Look For the 4th Floor.” [31] Kim, Yunkyo. “It’s not what it looks like: Snell renovations add seats to 4th floor.” The Huntington News. January 16, 2019. [32] Thaler, Mark, Christine Barber, and Tim Pittman. “How do students envision the present and future academic library?” [33] “First-Year University Housing.” Northeastern University Housing and Residential Life. Accessed March 04, 2019. [34] Clark, Jenna. “N.U.in and transfer students dismayed by housing assignment far from campus.” The Huntington News. February 14, 2019. [35] Billman, Glenn. “Willis Hall apartment ceiling collapses.” The Huntington News. September 06, 2017. [36] “FAQ - Individual Leases.” LightView. Accessed March 04, 2019. [37] “Floor Plans.” LightView. Accessed March 04, 2019. [38] Rodriguez, Laura. “LightView towers over Roxbury, bringing mixed reactions.” The Huntington News. February 20, 2019. [39] “Institutional Master Plan.” Northeastern University. Page 1-3. Accessed March 04, 2019. [40] Cost and Financial Aid.” Northeastern University Undergraduate Admissions." Accessed March 04, 2019.

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The Myth of Equal Opportunity

By Garry Canepa / Political Science & Economics 2019

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y parents peddled three myths to me as a child: the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, and American meritocracy.

The “American Dream,” our national ethos of opportunity and success based on hard work, has been a mainstay of many immigrant parents, including mine, who come to the U.S. seeking a better life for themselves and their children. While the U.S. is certainly far from the social hierarchies of my father’s Peru or the bureaucratic corruption of my mother’s Soviet Ukraine, we are still far from our ideal of equal opportunity.[1] In the wake of the college admissions scandal, we should ask ourselves how equal opportunity truly is.[2] How different is bribing admissions committees compared to hiring college admission consultants? The principle is the same: merit-based opportunities are wrongly determined by wealth. This can take place through outright fraudulent SAT scores or getting your child the best SAT tutor in town. Both are instances of unequal opportunity and it would be hypocritical to address one and not the other. Do we really think there is any sort of fair competition between the child attending a renowned public school and the child whose school has been recently shut down for lack of funding? The appeal of articles focused on the scandal certainly stem from its gross crookedness but also, I believe, from the will of readers to discharge their sense of obvious advantage.

Pundits and politicians, on both the right and left, describe the U.S. as the land of opportunity, but neglect or actively oppose policies that would give their words meaning.

[3][4] This is also true for the 90% of Americans who agree that our society should ensure that everyone has an equal chance to succeed.[5] While ensuring complete equal opportunity for everyone would necessitate absurd measures such as genetic intervention, Americans

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are still far less supportive of even modest policy interventions to equalize opportunity, such as the estate tax (56% support) and universal healthcare (62% support). [6][7][8][9] Rising inequality has even made Americans more skeptical of state intervention; over half favor a smaller government, despite the role a larger government can play in expanding opportunity.[10] We may not be able to eradicate all differences in starting positions, but we can use policy to make the playing field fairer. For instance, while we may not be able to eliminate dyslexia (or ensure dyslexia for everyone) we can provide the necessary additional resources to those who do have the learning impairment to ensure them a fair chance in life.

A just society requires confronting the injustices of unequal opportunity with sensible public policy to turn rhetoric into reality. Yet to pursue self-improvement over self-deception, we also must come to terms with inconvenient truths, including the link between our achievements and the privileges we were gifted.

While my family praised the U.S. as a land of equal opportunity, they also ensured that opportunity for me and my brother was, to borrow from George Orwell’s Animal Farm, “more equal than others,” from providing child care to summer internships.[11] This gap between beliefs and behavior is undoubtedly representative of millions of American families who view our socio-economic system optimistically, but whose devotion to their own children undermines this view. This pervasive cognitive dissonance makes assigning moral weight to economic outcomes, which legitimizes inequality, even easier, since we’re less critical of the top 1% if they started with the same chances as everyone else.[12] Americans are unique in believing that individuals, not circumstance, primarily

determine outcomes.[13] However, we have no qualms with transmitting all possible advantages to our children, particularly in education. We believe in a fair game, but rig it for our kids. The gap in spending on educational enrichment (standardized test preparation, private tutoring, extracurriculars, etc.) between high-income and low-income families increased almost twofold between 1972 and 2005.[14] Parents recognize educational investment’s role in their children’s success, and rising inequality increases both the rewards for these investments and the penalties for not making them.

These investments are detached from desert-based success since no child deserves advantages over others. While the investments we make derive from love for our children, they perversely tilt the playing field in their favor, giving them an unfair competitive edge in the labor market at the particular expense of the least fortunate.

The government can make enrichment expenditures that low-income parents can’t, reducing the competitive advantage of more fortunate children. While opportunity involves a range of issues, such as family structure, healthcare, criminal justice, and inheritance, this article focuses on education: preschool, K–12, and college.[15] While these areas reveal some of our inequalities in opportunity, they also reveal our ability to enhance opportunity through pragmatic policy reform.

Defining Opportunity

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ome may consider equal opportunity as simply ensuring no groups or individuals are explicitly forbidden from pursuing their goals, called the “Formal Equality of Opportunity.”[16] On paper, without a caste system or explicit discrimination, all have the same chance to succeed. But this grievously nupoliticalreview.com

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ignores underlying inequalities through birth lottery and social circumstances.

A better conception of opportunity is philosopher John Rawls’ idea of “Fair Equality of Opportunity,” which holds that “those who have the same level of talent and ability and the same willingness to use these gifts should have the same prospect of success regardless of their social class origin.”[17] Meeting this ideal requires an active government, as the morally arbitrary market can’t achieve fair starting points and outcomes. If we uphold equal opportunity as a principle of a just society, we must endorse policies to make this a reality, starting in the earliest years of life.

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We believe in a fair game, but rig it for our kids.

Preschool

W

e may look back on our preschool years as just a time of play and socializing. But neuroscience has revealed that the first five years of life are the most crucial for development, with the child’s environment having far-reaching consequences.[18] This may explain why preschool factors heavily in school readiness and early language development.[19] Particularly in low-income households and households where English is not the first language, preschool can play a large role in bridging the “word gap,” the inequality in early vocabulary skills.[20][21] This gap is especially influenced by socio-economic status. Unequal school readiness for students entering kindergarten can lead to worsening academic outcomes, increased high-school dropout rates, and lower future earnings for less-ready students, making equality in learning important even before a child’s first day of school.[22][23]

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A famous study on the Perry Preschool Program helped to reveal preschool’s benefits.[24] It found that a treatment group which participated in the preschool program had improved long-term cognitive, economic, and social outcomes over the control group that did not. These benefits even persisted far into adulthood.

While this is only a single study and the jury is still out on early education’s long-term benefits, a review of several preschool programs revealed that preschool attendance clearly improved academic outcomes for low-income students as far as eighth grade.[25][26] Preschool attendance also increased female labor participation and parental involvement in child development for low-income households.

Despite these benefits, only 43% of American three-year-olds and 66% of four-year-olds are enrolled in preschool.

[27] Conversely, the averages for OECD (Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development) nations, the club of rich countries, are 73% and 87% respectively, ranking the U.S. among the lowest for member countries. This may also help to explain our relatively poor performance in primary and secondary education.

Our attendance rate is especially marked across socio-economic status.[28] The cost of preschool ($4,000-13,000 depending on location), similar to the cost of college tuition, explains this class-based gradient of preschool attendance.[29][30] A commitment to opportunity would make preschool affordable for parents of all income groups, which was proposed by former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.[31] A federal subsidy to make preschool universally accessible for

four-year-olds would cost $2 to $4 billion dollars annually, negligible in a budget of nearly $4.5 trillion.[32] This preschool subsidy should also be met with expansion of the number of licensed child care centers, as over half of Americans live in areas with undersupplied child care slots.[33][34] Good quality preschool is particularly scarce in low-income areas. This highlights a need to expand supply by investing in child care providers through government subsidies, which would include raising the low wages of child care workers and creating more jobs in this sector, jobs that are currently disproportionality performed by women and people of color.[35][36] Fair equality of opportunity, like a fair race, requires that everyone has the same start to ensure that outcomes are determined by individual achievements rather than social circumstances. Preschool can be that equalizer, ensuring level school readiness so that grades in primary and secondary school can better reflect students’ own achievement.

However, public schools are an additional source of disparity, where gaps in success become even more linked to advantages from birth.[37]

K­–12

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hich grade school students attend may matter more than, and can affect, student performance. With this in mind, my family moved out of East Boston and its Samuel Adams Elementary (ranked 860th among 934 Massachusetts schools) to Pembroke and its North Pembroke Elementary (ranked 212th)[38][39]. Without that move I might not have attended Northeastern or written this article.[40] While K–12 education may appear egalitarian, educating all children regardless of location, this conception hides a deep and Spring 2019

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perverse truth about the relationship between geography and opportunity.[41] Opportunity, or economic mobility, is sharply unequal across geographical boundaries.[42] The ZIP code a child is raised in is a major determinant of their life prospects. Among the primary culprits for this relationship are public schools.[43] Public schools are primarily financed by local property taxes, making a town’s property values a key determinant of a school district’s education quality, an obvious source of inequality which states often fail to adequately address.[44] This revenue can fund extracurriculars, classroom technology, and, most i m p o r t a n t l y, good teachers.

One study helps reveal teachers’ significant and long-term impacts on their students, finding that if teachers in the bottom 5% of performance are replaced by teachers with just average performance, a typical student’s lifetime income would increase by over $250,000.[45] Yet wealthier students are more likely than low-income students and students of color to be taught by effective teachers, exacerbating the already unequal educational enrichment spending cited earlier.[46] This is the exact opposite of justice, which would have more qualified teachers teach the least fortunate children. Inequality in public school financing also doesn’t reveal the inequities created by parent involvement in schools, donations to public schools in affluent areas, and private schools.[47][48][49][50] Additional spending, particularly in low-income school districts, has been shown to improve educational outcomes, indicating a role for the federal government to equalize per-pupil spending according to need, as in other economically developed countries.[51][52] In the U.S., 53% of funds for public education

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spending come from local sources and only 13% from our federal government, while the average across OECD nations are 27% and 52% respectively, nearly the reverse.[53] Subnational governments’ significance in financing education prevents poorer school districts from obtaining the resources they need to compete with more fortunate districts. U.S. states have sharply unequal per-pupil spending across their localities, a source of decades of lawsuits.[54][55] It’s shameful that more is invested in more fortunate children, while children who would benefit most from additional resources are denied adequate investment.

Our structure of public school financing leads prospects being largely determined before adulthood. Additional investment in education may allow underfunded schools to better replicate the best practices of charter schools and nations with superior educational outcomes, including longer hours and more school days.[56][57] The positive effects of the above two proposals can even offset their costs, as shown by the higher earnings and educational attainment associated with Head Start, the subsidized preschool program, paired with better-funded public schools.[58] Education reform in general and investment in low-income areas in particular would also benefit more-privileged areas by raising the overall value of a high school degree. As college graduates land jobs that don’t require college degrees and employers look for college graduates for jobs that don’t need one, we can reduce dependence on costly higher education by increasing the value of a high school degree.[59][60]

If we uphold equal opportunity as a principle of a just society, we must endorse policies to make this a reality, starting in the earliest years of life.

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College

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owever, a college degree has become increasingly important for achieving the American Dream, as the premium for a degree in the U.S. is particularly high, as is the penalty for lacking one.[61] Assuming the school is of minimum quality, pursuing higher education is almost always worth the cost.[62] Unfortunately, completion rates and access to higher education are defined less by merit and more by the financial circumstances of one’s parents.[63] Rather than serving as a romantic ladder of opportunity, college serves more to transmit socioeconomic status from parents to children, exacerbating inequality.[64] One study revealed that among high-achieving high school math students, 74% of students from the top income quartile earned a college degree by their late 20s while only 41% of the bottom quartile did, showing different potential for success based on social class despite similar talents.[65] Besides wealthy parents’ ability to afford a college education for their children, parents’ investments can better prepare their own children for college. Another study revealed that affluent students who perform poorly in eighth grade have a better chance at college completion than poor students who perform well.[66] The evidence points to a clear violation of Rawls’ Fair Equality of Opportunity principle owing to disparate chances among similarly talented individuals, which can and should be corrected.

For students like me who are fortunate enough to have parents with high credit scores, large 401k packages, and collateral through homeownership, financing college is far easier than for students whose parents lack the same access to credit.[67][68] High-income parents can also assist students in repaying loans, allowing graduates to inherit their parents’ high credit scores and making financing college easier for the next generation.

Even if low-income students obtain the necessary credit, excessive debt negatively

[1] Arneson, Richard. 2015. “Equality of Opportunity.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. March 25, 2015. [2] Lieber, Chavie. 2019. “Olivia Jade, the Influencer at the Center of the College Admissions Scandal, Explained.” Vox. March 15, 2019. [3] Roy, Avik. “Marco Rubio: 'Equal Opportunity...Defines The American People'.” FREOPP.org. May 25, 2018. [4] Office of the Press Secretary. “Inaugural Address by President Barack Obama.” National Archives and Records Administration. National Archives and Records Administration. January 21, 2013. [5] Rosentiel, Tom. 2014. “The Elusive 90% Solution.” Pew Research Center. Pew Research Center. February 6, 2014. [6] Buchanan, Allen. 1995. “Equal Opportunity and Genetic Intervention.” Social Philosophy and Policy 12 (02): 105–35. [7] Stantcheva, Ilyana Kuziemko and Stefanie. 2013. “Our Feelings About Inequality: It's Complicated.” The New York Times. April 21, 2013. [8] CNN Poll conducted by SSRS. 2019. “Budget, Taxes, Economic Policy.” Polling Report. January 30, 2019. [9] Alonso-Zaldivar, Ricardo, and Laurie Kellman. 2017. “62 Percent of U.S. Want Federal Government to Ensure Health Care for All, Poll Says.” PBS. Public Broadcasting Service. July 20, 2017. [10] Rasmussen_Poll. 2017. “Voters Favor Smaller Government Over Larger, More Involved One.” Rasmussen Reports. July 17, 2017. [11] Chronicle of Higher Education. “The Role of Higher Education in Career Development: Employer Perceptions.” VOCEDplus. Chronicle of Higher Education. 2012. [12] Canepa, Garry. “Is the Market Moral?” Northeastern University Political Review. October 18, 2018. [13] Gao, George. 2015. “How Do Americans Stand out from the Rest of the World?” Pew Research Center. Pew Research Center. March 12, 2015. [14] Murnane, Richard J., and Greg J. Duncan. Whither Opportunity?: Rising Inequality, Schools, and Children's’ Life Chances. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 2011. [15] Shields, Liam, Anne Newman, and Debra Satz. 2017. “Equality of Educational Opportunity.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. May 31, 2017. [16] “Formal Equality of Opportunity.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. May 31, 2017. [17] “Fair Equality of Opportunity” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. May 31, 2017. [18] “Brain Development.” n.d. First Things First. Accessed March 23, 2019. [19] Isaacs, Julia B., and Emily Roessel. “Impacts of Early Childhood Programs.” Brookings Institute. July 28, 2016. [20] Hoff, Erika. 2013. “Interpreting the Early Language Trajectories of Children from Low-SES and Language Minority Homes: Implications for Closing Achievement Gaps.” Developmental Psychology 49 (1): 4–14. [21] Lahey, Jessica. 2014. “Poor Kids and the 'Word Gap'.” The Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company. October 30, 2014. [22] Isaacs, Julia B. 2016. “Starting School at a Disadvantage: The School Readiness of Poor Children.” Brookings Institute. July 28, 2016. [23] Garcia, Emma. “Inequalities at the Starting Gate: Cognitive and Noncognitive Skills Gaps between 2010–2011 Kindergarten Classmates.” Economic Policy Institute. June 17, 2015. [24] Heckman, James, Seong Hyeok Moon, Rodrigo Pinto, Peter Savelyev, and Adam Yavitz. “The Rate of Return to the High/Scope Perry Preschool Program.” Journal of Public Economics 94 (1-2): 114–28. [25] Ferrarello, Molli. “Does Pre-K Work? Brookings Experts Weigh in on America's Early Childhood Education Debate.” Brookings Institute. May 26, 2017. [26] Cascio, Elizabeth, and Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach. “The Impacts of Expanding Access to High-Quality Preschool Education.”

National Bureau of Economic Research. [27] Jackson, Abby. 2017. “America's Poor Performance on International Tests Could Be Traced All the Way Back to Preschool.” Business Insider. September 12, 2017. [28] Executive Office of the President of the United States. 2015. The Economics of Early Childhood Investments. [29] “The US and the High Cost of Child Care: 2018.” Child Care Aware of America. 2018. [30] Zarya, Valentina. 2016. “Think College Is Expensive? In Most States, Child Care Costs Even More.” Fortune. September 28, 2016. [31] The Office of Hillary Rodham Clinton. n.d. “Early Childhood Education.” The Office of Hillary Rodham Clinton. Accessed March 23, 2019. [32] Klein, Ellie and Grover J. "Russ" Whitehurst. “Do We Already Have Universal Preschool?” Brookings Institute. May 10, 2017. [33] Cohn, Jonathan. “Finding Decent Child Care Is A Huge Struggle For Some Families, New Report Shows.” The Huffington Post. December 07, 2018. [34] Malik, Rasheed, Katie Hamm, Leila Schochet, Cristina Novoa, Simon Workman, and Steven Jessen-Howard. “America's Child Care Deserts in 2018.” Center for American Progress. December 06, 2018. [35] Hamm, Katie, and Julie Kashen. n.d. “A Blueprint for Child Care Reform.” Center for American Progress. Accessed March 23, 2019. [36] Ullrich, Rebecca, Katie Hamm, and Leila Schochet. “6 Policies to Support the Early Childhood Workforce.” Center for American Progress. February 06, 2017. [37] Sawhill, Isabel, Scott Winship, and Kerry Searle Grannis. “Pathways to the Middle Class: Balancing Personal and Public Responsibilities.” Brookings Institute. September 20, 2012. [38] “Samuel Adams.” 2018. SchoolDigger. September 27, 2018. [39] “North Pembroke Elementary.” SchoolDigger. September 27, 2018. [40] Chetty, Raj, and Nathaniel Hendren. “The Impacts of Neighborhoods on Intergenerational Mobility I: Childhood Exposure Effects.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 133 (3): 1107–62. [41]Chetty, Raj, Nathaniel Hendren, Patrick Kline, and Emmanuel Saez. “Where Is the Land of Opportunity?

The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States.” National Bureau of Economic Research. June 2014. [42] Aisch, Gregor, Eric Buth, Matthew Bloch, Amanda Cox, and Kevin Quealy. “The Best and Worst Places to Grow Up: How Your Area Compares.” The New York Times. May 04, 2015. [43] Card, David, Ciprian Domnisoru, and Lowell Taylor. “The Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital: Evidence from the Golden Age of Upward Mobility.” National Bureau of Economic Research, September. [44] Semuels, Alana. 2016. “Good School, Rich School; Bad School, Poor School.” The Atlantic. August 25, 2016. [45] Chetty, Raj, John Friedman, and Jonah Rockoff. “The Long-Term Impacts of Teachers: Teacher Value-Added and Student Outcomes in Adulthood.” National Bureau of Economic Research. [46] DeMonte, Jenny, and Robert Hanna. “Looking at the Best Teachers and Who They Teach.”

Center for American Progress. April 11, 2014. [47] Barshay, Jill. 2015. “The Gap between Rich and Poor Schools Grew 44 Percent over a Decade.” The Hechinger Report. April 13, 2015. [48] Child Trends. “Parental Involvement in

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the amount paid would be determined by income, a more progressive payment system.

In the UK, tuition-free public universities, a progressive’s dream, eventually led to lower education quality and caps on students’ ability to enroll, favoring children of high-income parents.[79] In 1998, the UK replaced free college with tuitions and ICLs. This expanded enrollment for the least advantaged, improved school quality, and offered means-tested “maintenance loans” to help students meet college’s non-tuition costs. Australia’s student loan financing system also shows ICLs’ administrative efficiency; the program was executed inexpensively through the tax code rather than a multitude of private companies.

[80] The public sector can operate the student loan market more efficiently and equitably, ensuring debt burdens aren’t crippling and freeing graduates in choosing professions.

These proposals can be financed at least partly by eliminating subsidies in our tax code that distort opportunity by favoring children of high-income parents. These include 529 savings accounts, which grant tax-preferred savings for college and recently private school tuition, and tax-preferred revenue streams for the endowments of elite colleges, attended largely by the most advantaged students.[81][82][83][84][85] The charitable deduction, which can reduce taxable income for wealthy parents’ donations to their child’s public or private school, and can even be used provide a leg up in admission process for elite-colleges (see: Jared Kushner), should also be eliminated.[86][87][88] We should also create a direct tax on inheritances, as well as address loopholes which allow heirs to avoid inheritance taxation through trusts, foundations, and the “step-up basis” of the capital gains tax. [89][90][91][92] On his visit to the United States in 1832, the famed diplomat Alexis de Tocqueville described the “equality of conditions” which defined American life, rather than the class

and title descriptions that defined European nations at the time.[93] Nearly two centuries later, American observers look to the European model, where a child’s chance of success is defined less by their parents’ incomes than in the U.S.[94] The college admissions scandal is just a part, albeit a more unscrupulous one, of a deeply unfair system of opportunity cloaked under claims of merit. Yet while the U.S. may have lost its place as the land of opportunity to Scandinavian nations, nothing is stopping us from taking it back.

The idea of a uniquely American culture of opportunity, and the rhetoric which promotes it, must come to terms with existing disparate opportunities that advantage some over others. Our principles demand that we extend these opportunities to all children, rather than ask the less fortunate to play a rigged game. If we are to honestly pride ourselves as the land of opportunity, we must recognize and understand the advantages we receive and transfer, and pursue policies that ensure that everyone has a fair and equal chance of success.

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impacts future earnings and wealth.[69] This is further exacerbated if students fail to complete college, which is especially prevalent for first-generation and low-income college students.[70][71] Inability to make loan payments can hurt graduates’ access to credit, making college financing difficult for their children as well.

Excessive debt burdens may also lead students into high-paying but bloated, rent-seeking sectors like finance, law, and advertising rather than public service professions like education.[72][73][74][75] This drains our nation’s talent and constricts the supply of good teachers and child care workers, exacerbating inequalities in preschool and public education. Students from low-mobility communities who graduate college are less likely to return to their communities, creating a “brain drain” in underprivileged areas. To reform student loan financing and reduce the wasted potential our system creates, the private sector must be recognized as unable to efficiently serve this market. This provides a role for government intervention through income-contingent loans (ICLs), where loan payments are a fixed percentage of income rather than a fixed amount.

The private student loan market is inefficient.[76] First, unlike mortgages, banks can’t secure collateral on student loans (the 13th amendment outlaws slavery), making student loans more expensive. Second, the market fails to account for the positive externalities (public returns) of higher education, creating suboptimal financing.[77] As the private market over-prices and under-supplies student loans, signaling a “market failure,” government can and should correct it. Otherwise, the financial sector will continue to bloat and use its profits to attract more of our nation’s debt-burdened talent, a vicious cycle of excessive student debt and excessive finance.

ICLs, while not as attractive-sounding as free college, should be at the forefront of a progressive agenda.[78] ICLs allow college to be free at entry. Installments are paid after graduation, don’t accumulate interest, and

Schools.” 2013. [49] Nelson, Ashlyn Aiko, and Beth Gazley. The rise of school-supporting nonprofits. Education Finance and Policy 9(4): 541–566. [50] Wong, Alia. “Private Schools Are Becoming More Elite.” The Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company. July 27, 2018. [51] Lafortune, Julien, Jesse Rothstein, and Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach. 2016. “School Finance Reform and the Distribution of Student Achievement.” National Bureau of Economic Research. [52] Carey, Kevin, and Elizabeth A. Harris. 2016. “It Turns Out Spending More Probably Does Improve Education.” The New York Times. December 12, 2016. [53] OECD. “Education at a Glance 2013: OECD Indicators.” OECD Publishing.

2013. [54] Ejdemyr, Simon, and Kenneth Shores. “Pulling Back the Curtain: Intra-District School Spending Inequality and Its Correlates.” Working paper. California: Stanford University. 2017. [55] Goldstein, Dana. 2018. “How Do You Get Better Schools? Take the State to Court, More Advocates Say.” The New York Times. August 21, 2018. [56] Fryer, Roland G. “Injecting Charter School Best Practices into Traditional Public Schools: Evidence from Field Experiments *.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 129 (3): 1355–1407. 2014.[57] Rivkin, Steven, and Jeffrey Schiman. “Instruction Time, Classroom Quality, and Academic Achievement.” National Bureau of Economic Research, September. 2013.

[58] Rucker C Johnson and C. Kirabo Jackson. Reducing Inequality Through Dynamic Complementarity: Evidence from Head Start and Public School Spending. National Bureau of Economic Research. 2017. [59] “The Labor Market for Recent College Graduates.” Federal Reserve Bank of New York. February 06, 2019. [60] Fuller, Joseph and Manjari Raman. “Dismissed By Degrees: How degree inflation is undermining U.S. competitiveness and hurting America’s middle class.” Accenture, Grads of Life, Harvard Business School. 2017. [61] Rampell, Catherine. “The Return on College, Around the World.” The New York Times. The New York Times. June 28, 2013. [62] Hershbein, Brad, and Melissa Kearney. 2014. “Major Decisions: What Graduates Earn Over their Lifetimes.” The Hamilton Project, Brooking Institution. [63] Bailey, Martha, and Susan Dynarski. “Gains and Gaps: Changing Inequality in U.S. College Entry and Completion.” National Bureau of Economic Research. 2011. [64] Corak, Miles. “Income Inequality, Equality of Opportunity, and Intergenerational Mobility.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 27 (3): 79–102. 2013. [65] Dynarski, Susan. “For the Poor, the Graduation Gap Is Even Wider Than the Enrollment Gap.” The New York Times. June 2, 2015. [66] Roy, Joydeep. “Low Income Hinders College Attendance for Even the Highest Achieving Students.”

Economic Policy Institute. October 12, 2005. [67] “Pros and Cons of Borrowing from a 401k Retirement Plan to Pay for College.” n.d. Edvisors. Accessed March 24, 2019. [68] “Secured Versus Unsecured Loans for Higher Education.” n.d. Home Equity Loans. Accessed March 24, 2019. [69] Price, Derek V. “Educational Debt Burden Among Student Borrowers: An Analysis of the Baccalaureate & Beyond Panel, 1997 Follow-Up.” Research in Higher Education 45 (7): 701–37. 2004. [70] Smith, Ashley A. “New Research on First-Generation Students.” Inside Higher Ed. September 27, 2017. [71] Gewertz, Catherine. “Low-Income Students: More Going to College, But Few Earning Degrees.” Education Week - High School & Beyond. May 17, 2018. [72] Rothstein, Jesse, and Cecilia Elena Rouse. “Constrained After College: Student Loans and Early Career Occupational Choices.” Journal of Public Economics 95 (1-2): 149–63. 2011. [73] Shiller, Robert. “Should We Worry about 'Unproductive' Financial Sector Gobbling up Our Best?” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media. September 23, 2013. [74] Andrews, James H. “Do Too Many Lawyers Spoil The Economy?”

The Christian Science Monitor. February 15, 1994. [75] Schumpeter. “Something Doesn't Add up about America's Advertising Market.” The Economist. January 18, 2018. [76] Dynarski, Susan M. 2016. “The RNC Wants to Make Student Loans Competitive Again. They Never Were.” Brookings Institute. September 14, 2016. [77] Moretti, Enrico. “Human Capital Externalities in Cities.” National Bureau of Economic Research. 2013. [78] Baum, Sandy, and Martha C. Johnson. “Strengthening Federal Student Aid: Reforming the Student Loan Repayment System.” Urban Institute. December 24, 2018. [79] Murphy, Richard J., Judith Scott-Clayton, and Gillian Wyness. “Lessons from the End of Free College in England.” Brookings Institute. April 26, 2017. [80] Barr, Nicholas, Chapman, Bruce, Dearden, Lorraine, Dynarski, Susan. “Getting student financing right in the USA: Lessons from Australia and England.” Centre for Global Higher Education, Working Paper No. 16, University College London. 2017. [81] Reeves, Richard V., and Nathan Joo. “A Tax Break for 'Dream Hoarders': What to Do about 529 College Savings Plans.” Brookings Institute. January 29, 2018. [82] Malkus, Nat, Richard V. Reeves, and Nathan Joo. “The Costs, Opportunities, and Limitations of the Expansion of 529 Education Savings Accounts.” Brookings Institute. April 13, 2018. [83] Sirota, David, and Josh Keefe.

“How Tax Breaks Are Helping the Richest U.S. Colleges Get Richer.” Newsweek. May 23, 2017. [84] Grewal, Ryan. “Tax Exemptions and Public Goods in the Academy.” Northeastern University Political Review. November 15, 2018. [85] Aisch, Gregor, Larry Buchanan, Amanda Cox, and Kevin Quealy. “Some Colleges Have More Students From the Top 1 Percent Than the Bottom 60. Find Yours.” The New York Times. January 18, 2017. [86] Reich, Rob. “Not Very Giving.” The New York Times. September 5, 2013. [87] Green, Erica L. “In Some States, Donating to Private Schools Can Earn You a Profit.” The New York Times. May 17, 2017. [88] Golden, Daniel. “Jared Kushner Isn't Alone: How Wealthy Families Manipulate Admissions at Elite Universities.” Town & Country. November 21, 2016. [89] Batchelder, Lily. “The ‘Silver Spoon’ Tax: How to Strengthen Wealth Transfer Taxation.” Equitable Growth. October 31, 2016.

[90] Scheiber, Noam, and Patricia Cohen. “For the Wealthiest, a Private Tax System That Saves Them Billions.” The New York Times. December 29, 2015. [91] Shaxson, Nick. “The Deep Joy of Trusts and Foundations.” Tax Justice Network. April 22, 2015. [92] Madoff, Ray. “Trump and the Failure of the American Tax System.” The New York Times. October 11, 2018. [93] Wilsey, John. “Reading 'Democracy in America' (Part 2): What Did Tocqueville Mean by 'Equality of Condition'? | Acton PowerBlog.” Acton Institute PowerBlog. July 17, 2017. [94] Isaacs, Julia B. n.d. “International Comparisons of Economics Mobility” Brookings Institute. July 02, 2016.

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The Qatar-Gulf Crisis in Context

By Akshat Dhankher / Computer Science & Economics 2021 Akshat recently traveled to Doha as a member of the Qatar Exchange Fellowship, sponsored by the National Council on U.S.–Arab Relations and the Northeastern University International Relations Council. The content of this article is largely sourced from conversations with officials from the U.S. Departments of State and Defense, Qatar’s Foreign Affairs and Defence Ministries, Al Jazeera Network, and various other government and cultural institutions.

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n May of 2017, the four nations of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain declared a diplomatic blockade on the State of Qatar, thus commencing one of the longest-standing disputes among allies in the Gulf region. The so-called “Quartet” of blockading countries issued a list of 13 demands and statements regarding Qatar, including allegations of state support of terrorism and calls to shut down Qatari media agencies such as Al Jazeera.[1] Nearly two years later, the rift persists with no end in sight.

While the NUPR published an overview of the situation last October, the goal of this analysis is to provide a clearer and more comprehensive representation of this critical international crisis. Western reporting of the situation often over-emphasizes certain factors of the dispute or completely overlooks more important ones. For Americans to develop policy in the Middle East that is truly cognizant of the norms, intricacies, power structures, and regional specificities of those nations, we must be accurately informed. This article will aim to provide clarity on the motivations behind the current tensions in the Gulf, and why the rift has played out the way it has.

Qatar’s Foreign Policy as an Irritant

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n order to fully understand the Quartet’s gripes with Qatar, their motivations must be painted against the backdrop of Qatar’s international actions. Qatar’s foreign policy modus operandi has been to position itself as a diplomatic international actor through counter-terror and conflict mediation efforts.

The Qataris have built a sizeable CV of conflict mediation efforts, including an ongoing role in

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mediation between the U.S. and the Taliban, national mediation in Somalia, brokering of talks between Hamas and Fatah in Palestine, prevention of civil war in Lebanon, facilitation in the Darfur peace process negotiations, presence at the Ethiopia–Eritrea discussions—the list goes on.[2] Through these efforts, Qatar has actively tried to prevent conflicts and extremism through mediation, with the thought process being that conflict begets violence and the deterioration of public institutions, which often begets recruitment of dejected individuals to groups with extremist ideologies. In this fashion, mediation ultimately serves a counter-terror end-goal. With respect to self-gain out of these shows of diplomacy, the Qatari mentality is that they do not need a strong military if they have no enemies—a concept that held true until the Gulf rifts of this decade.

In contrast, the leaders of the Quartet, including the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the Emirati Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, maintain their power and influence through strong authoritarian rule. With the promotion of democratic ideals during and after the Arab Spring protests of the early 2010s and the state’s demonstrated conflict mediation capabilities, Qatar has become an irritant to these figures’ influence throughout the region. Qatar’s larger cousins, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, did not like that Qatar was punching above its weight as a foreign policy actor and sought to dispel the perceived threat by means of the blockade.

Subsequent Historical Tensions

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nder the lens of perceived threat to strong authoritarian rule, several of the blockading countries have some historical struggle with Qatar that have motivated them throughout this rift.

For Saudi Arabia, the Kingdom’s ability to maintain its regional power has been threatened. The Saudis want to remain in charge of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and derive power from major institutions such as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Seeing a burgeoning liquid

natural gas (LNG) economy in Qatar posed a threat to Saudi regional economic power.

Moreover, Qatar’s actions in brokering negotiations in the Middle East and North Africa region—such as those between Hamas and Fatah or previous talks in Yemen—have led the Saudis to feel their toes stepped on.

The UAE’s relationship with Qatar, meanwhile, is more complicated. The Emiratis often view Qatar as the “breakaway emirate,” and the leading families of these countries have historically been at odds due to lasting tribal rivalries.[3] For example, the current Emirati emir has bad relations with former Qatari Emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa (also known as the Father Emir).

This tenuous relationship culminated in 1996. Through secret meetings at the Intercontinental Hotel in Abu Dhabi, the ruling tribes of the UAE led an attempted coup of the Father Emir, in conjunction with the very same Quartet states.[4] This was largely motivated by the Father Emir’s inability to calm the Gulf neighbors, who were in their then-third attempt to topple the Qatari government.

Given the political history of this relationship, the current blockade is a continuation of anti-Qatar policy actions.

Additionally, much like Saudi Arabia, the UAE continues to face regional economic competition with the Qataris. Beyond its prosperous LNG economy, Qatar has also doubled down on diversification efforts through promotion of international business in Doha.

While the UAE has notably accomplished similar goals through Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the Emiratis fear Qatari competition and see Qatar as a major threat to their ability to establish the leading international business destination in the Gulf.[5] Lastly, Egypt’s motivations are directly stated in the Quartet’s 13 demands, which cite the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization and demand that Qatar cease its support of the group. It is important to clarify that the Brotherhood is not recognized as a terrorist group by the international community, but still played a pivotal role in promoting democratic ideals during the Arab Spring with Qatari support.[6] Even then, Egypt was a key battleground for Gulf countries vying

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The Role of External Actors

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n easy trap to fall into—as evidenced

by Western reporting—is to attribute the Gulf crisis to the ongoing regional power struggle between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran.

While notes of tensions with Iran are certainly involved, as evident in the first of the Quartet’s demands calling for severing diplomatic relations with Iran, to simply view this as another proxy play between these two powers overlooks decades of the aforementioned deeprooted, historical tensions between Qatar and the blockading countries. In truth, it is more so these tensions than Iran’s relations with Qatar that were the principle motivators of the Quartet’s actions.

Moreover, the Qataris are careful to walk a fine line in their relationship with Iran.

Qatar’s interactions with Iran are situationally induced more than anything else. The geography of the two states compels the Qataris to cooperate with the Iranians in accessing the North Field LNG repositories in the Persian Gulf.[9] In addition, the Qataris were vulnerable at the start of the blockade, and Iran’s assistance by way of food imports and airspace were certainly needed.

That being said, the relationship with the U.S.—whose leaders continue to have

disagreements with Iran—is the single most important bilateral relationship for Qatar, with those with the Gulf neighbors being a close second. It is not realistic for Qatar to have these allies in the daytime while courting the Iranians at night. Therefore, the Qatari leadership has been clear to separate Iranian relations for food trade from American and Gulf relations for everything else.

It is also important to understand the strategic, symbiotic relationship between the U.S. and Qatar. American military presence in Qatar by way of the Al Udeid Air Base, home to U.S. Central Command, has shaped the U.S. as the de facto guarantor of regional security for Qatar. By virtue of its central location in the region, Al Udeid has served as a home base for U.S.-led coalition forces, such as the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS in Syria and the NATO missions in Afghanistan.[10] In return, the presence of the American base has served a deterrent effect to Qatar’s Gulf neighbors, keeping the rift a diplomatic crisis rather than allowing it to become a military one as well.

Qatar’s Resilience

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he Qataris feel little need to make concessions, especially in response to the allegations of support for terrorist groups. The reports that Qatar’s Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani, denounced Al Jazeera and supported Hezbollah—a U.S.-designated terrorist group based in Lebanon—were proven to be planted by Saudi and Emirati hackers.[11] In fact, Saudi Arabia’s state-run news agency, Al Arabiya, already had guests in the studio when the story broke. In addition, the Qataris cite their counter-terror track record—including their mediation efforts and their role in the United Nations CounterTerrorism Committee—to demonstrate their clear interest in combating terrorism rather than supporting it.

In truth, the Quartet’s target was Qatar’s sovereignty, yet they made a fundamental miscalculation in believing that Qataris would turn against their Emir. The opposite has happened, as the rift has made Qatar stronger and wholly improved the nation’s internal resolve.

Within the last 22 months, there has been a heavy shift of focus towards developing Qatar’s self-reliance. Geopolitically, the government has been forced to build stronger trade logistics (particularly regarding food and materials transportation), re-assess and strengthen their trading partners at large, and refine their military operations. Outside of these adjustments, the economy backed by the state’s world-highest LNG shipments

has continued to prosper uninterrupted, with further LNG shipments to expand from 77 to 110 million tons per annum.[12] Looking within Qatar, this impetus for national resolve assuaged internal, pre-rift tensions as the nation united, with steps being taken towards the removal of the nation’s societal hierarchy in recognition of the fact that all within the nation had to cooperate. As such, the Emir has become exceedingly popular, with his public identity soaring to celebrity status.[13]

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for international influence, with the Qataris backing the Brotherhood, and the Saudis and Emiratis supporting the military regime of the current President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.[7] As such, Egypt’s allegations against Qatar were an act of public labelling for Qatar’s image, albeit misleading.

The current blockade is one of many phases of disagreements stemming from these tenuous relationships. In fact, in 2014, the Quartet brought forth similar concerns and briefly pulled diplomatic relations out of Doha.[8] The parties reached an agreement at the time that sought to limit Qatar’s sovereignty by allowing those states to monitor Qatar and forcing the Qataris to coordinate policy with its regional neighbors. That being said, the agreement itself was sparse and vague with scant mechanisms for enforcement, nor did any of the parties really adhere to it.

Come 2017, both the U.S. and Saudi Arabia came under new leadership, so the Emiratis used this window to bring back claims against Qatar. The Emiratis remain firm believers in Qatari misdeeds, and the current Saudi leadership—driven by the Crown Prince’s deeds of adventurism and political maneuvering—continue to support this belief.

Motivations for a Solution

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n reporting on this crisis, the social detriments tend to be overlooked. Given the interconnected nature of the GCC, there are many cross-border marriages and families.

However, with the restriction of travel and residency between the blockading countries and Qatar, many families have been separated as a result.[14] The blockade also began at the start of Ramadan, which meant that many families were prevented from traveling to be together for the holiday. Especially in Islamic cultures, where family is sacrosanct, this government-enforced separation continues to be unfathomable to citizens who ultimately bear the consequences of their leaders’ decisions.

In addition, Qataris are prevented from entering Saudi Arabia, and, therefore, from visiting Mecca and Medina: the two holy cities of Islam. This barrier to religious obligation, coupled with the social and family separation, remain the sorest spots for the Qataris throughout this rift.

The GCC has always been viewed as a family by the members of its constituent states—often in a literal sense—so the now 22-month-long diplomatic rift bodes poorly, not only for the mass of individuals that these states govern, but also for the broader image of GCC unity. Despite thriving in their own right, the Qataris still feel wounded on this level and consider the impacts on social, religious, and family life as a major impetus in maintaining their diplomacy with the Gulf neighbors throughout the blockade.

History has proved that a united GCC is in the best interest of all of its member nations.

The Gulf region remains geostrategically central to the conduct of international relations around the world, so it is in the best interest of not only the Qataris, but also the Saudis, Emiratis, and the rest of the world to seek a diplomatic resolution.

[1] “Arab States Issue 13 Demands to end Qatar-Gulf Crisis.” Al Jazeera. July 12, 2017. [2] Barakat, Sultan. “Qatari Mediation: Between Ambition and Achievement.” Brookings Doha Center Analysis Paper. November 2014. [3] Dhankher, Akshat. Conversations in Qatar. November 2017. [4] “New Details Revealed on 1996 Coup Attempt Against Qatar.” Al Jazeera. March 04, 2018. [5] Bohl, Ryan. “The Other Side of the Gulf Crisis: A Brand War Between Qatar and the UAE.” World Politics Review. June 30, 2017. [6] Hamid, Shadi. “Is the Muslim Brotherhood a Terrorist Organization?” The Brookings Institution. April 11, 2017. [7] Young, Karen E. "How Egypt Wound Up at the Center of a Gulf Cooperation Council Dispute on Qatar." In The Qatar Crisis. Project on Middle East Political Science. October 2017. [8] Ibish, Hussein. “Unfulfilled 2014 Riyadh Agreement Defines Current GCC Rift.” Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington. June 06, 2017. [9] Kurdli, Susan. “The Energy Factor in the GCC Crisis.” Al Jazeera. July 28, 2017. [10] U.S. Department of State. “Remarks at Opening Ceremony of the U.S.-Qatar Strategic Dialogue.” January 13, 2019. [11] DeYoung, Karen and Ellen Nakashima. “UAE Orchestrated Hacking of Qatari Government Sites.” The Washington Post. July 16, 2017. [12] Shoeb, Mohammad. “Qatar’s LNG Production to Reach 110 MTPA.” The Peninsula. September 27, 2018. [13] “Tamim the Glorious – An Emblem of Hope in Turbulent Times.” Qatar-America Institute. July 14, 2017. [14] “Why Gulf Countries are Feuding with Qatar.” The Economist. June 21, 2018.

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By Elena Kuran / International Affairs 2020 & Gabriel Morris / Politics, Philosophy & Economics & Communication Studies 2020

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All About Incivility: An Interview with Candice Delmas C

andice Delmas is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Political Science at Northeastern University, and the Associate Director of the Politics, Philosophy, and Economics Program. She will be a 2019-2020 Humanities Center Fellow and served as a Dworkin-Balzan Fellow at New York University School of Law in 20162017. She works in applied ethics, social and political philosophy, and philosophy of law.

NUPR met with Professor Delmas to discuss her most recent book, A Duty to Resist: When Disobedience Should Be Uncivil.

Whereas the philosophical debate usually centers on political obligation (the moral duty to obey the law) and on the circumstances under which engaging in civil disobedience is sometimes permissible, Delmas' book argues that the very grounds supporting a duty to obey the law—grounds such as the natural duty of justice, the principle of fairness, and the Samaritan duty—also impose obligations of resistance under unjust social conditions. Delmas therefore expands political obligation to include a duty to resist injustice and shows that under certain real-world conditions, this duty to resist demands principled disobedience. Against the mainstream in public, legal, and philosophical discourse, she argues that such disobedience need not always be civil. Sometimes, covert, violent, evasive, or offensive acts of lawbreaking can be justified, even required. Uncivil disobedience, Delmas shows, can do things that civil disobedience cannot do, such as calling out the bluff of societies that profess to treat everyone as an equal while effectively excluding some members from the realm of mutual concern.

NUPR: Your book begins by pointing out limitations of dominant perceptions of civil

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disobedience, and their role in “warp[ing] public understanding of liberation struggles” (34). Can you speak more to this issue?

CD: What is the ordinary understanding of civil disobedience? It is an unlawful protest designed to draw attention to some injustice and constrained in various, demanding ways in a democratic state (where some people think that because you can always protest lawfully, you should in fact never turn to civil disobedience, or else you need to have “exhausted” the available legal means). I call the set of constraints the “civil disobedience playbook” and it is frequently used to judge current social movements’ tactics.

First on the civil disobedience playbook, the lawbreaking act should be open and visible to all—the point, after all, is to communicate a message to the public; some theorists even demand agents give advance notice to authorities to prevent major disruption.

Second, it has to be nonviolent. Nonviolence overwhelmingly in Western neo-capitalist societies extends beyond persons to include property, both private and public. Third, the agent ought to always accept punishment.

This is important not only because it signals sincerity and one’s commitment to the cause, but also because it’s supposed to reconcile one’s breach of law with one’s respect for law.

That’s an important aspect for a lot of theorists: that agents must willingly endure jail or whatever comes to them as a result of their lawbreaking, to express their endorsement of the legal system’s legitimacy. There is a fourth mark of civility which is not always well-underlined by theorists, but which I think is very visible in the way we judge current protests: decorum, or the idea of abiding by socially accepted norms in one’s conduct, especially by acting respectfully towards others.

Because this set of constraints on civil disobedience is used as a benchmark to judge current social movements’ tactics, I think it often has the effect of deterring and delegitimizing all kinds of dissent. The calls for civility are, in a way, just policing protest and dissent.

NUPR: What issues do you see with recent, more inclusive frameworks to understanding civil disobedience, even when many include portions of your own argument?

CD: Many critics have noted that standard liberal accounts of civil disobedience, like the one John Rawls offered, are narrow because of those constraints. In response, some theorists say that we need to understand civil disobedience much more broadly as including radical, disruptive, violent, and defiant acts (think Greenpeace, Ferguson, or Standing Rock) because they are very much in the spirit of civil disobedience: fighting for democracy, expressing democratic popular sovereignty, or radically disrupting the status quo. These theorists see a much broader, more inclusive concept of civil disobedience as what we need today in order to be open to the justification of all these kinds of protests that seem not to fit the narrow understanding of the civil disobedience playbook.

I am actually sympathetic with these efforts, because if you can persuade some people that these radical, disruptive protests are acts of civil disobedience, then you have won part of the fight. Why? Because to call a disobedient act civil is to highlight the actor’s conscientious motivations and the communicative nature of the act; it’s to begin the work of legitimization. It’s great if you can do that, but I think it doesn’t work because it’s obvious for anyone who’s trying to compare iconic civil

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Featured disobedience campaigns like the “whites only” lunch counter sit-ins with disruptive actions like Anonymous’ distributed-denial-of-service attacks or Greenpeace’s sabotage operations, that the latter are a different beast altogether.

My view is that these broad and inclusive accounts lump together distinct phenomena that should be kept distinct. I also think that to some extent, these accounts fail to reflect activists’ self-understanding. For instance, the militant suffragettes of the early 20th century described themselves as “soldiers” waging a “civil war” against the state. Their tactics were uncivil—sometimes covert, violent, evasive, and defiant—and they deliberately failed to display the marks of civility.

NUPR: What is the significance of a deliberate departure from the traditional civil disobedience playbook?

Why do we have to conceptualize multiple categories of protests?

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act of principled disobedience is designed to reform the law. Yet uncivil disobedience can achieve very important things and sometimes better satisfy moral and political demands than either compliance with law or civil disobedience.

I look for instance at Sanctuary activism: the illegal provision of legal aid, shelter, clothing, and transportation to irregular migrants.

That’s something that is done necessarily covertly and evasively (without seeking legal sanctions), but that can be justified on the basis of moral duties like the Samaritan duty, which demands rescuing those in dire need, or the natural duty of justice, which requires supporting just institutions as well as frustrating ongoing wrongs. They consist of individual acts of humanitarian aid and rescue, in a context of structural injustice that gives rise to various perils for migrants.

Direct rescue operations by animal activists, Sanctuary work, or what is now called the new underground railroad, through which people help irregular migrants reach Canada—these are kinds of humanitarian work that are not well conceived of as civil disobedience, and yet they are clearly principled and justifiable.

By disobeying uncivilly, you may be able to point out the deception or false promises of these civic bonds—the fact that they fail to extend to everyone. Uncivil disobedience can mark political exclusion and social marginalization in a spectacular way, where a civil protest could not.

CD: Pluralizing the categories of principled disobedience is a good idea because each type of protest is going to call for a different lens for assessing it. One example is government whistleblowing. A lot of people who were sympathetic to Snowden’s leaks of classified information that exposed the NSA’s massive domestic and international surveillance programs called it “civil disobedience.” I think that government whistleblowing, to the contrary, is a very distinct type of phenomenon that needs its own approach for justification. Stealing and leaking classified information is a serious kind of thing. It involves agents taking the law into their own hands, unilaterally reversing state secrets, and posing risks to national security in the process. I conceive of it as “political vigilantism.” Government whistleblowing can be justified, but you need to look at it on its own terms.[2] I would say the same thing about uncivil protests that are offensive but nonviolent and public; they need their own framework of assessment. I think that uncivil protests can

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do something that civil disobedience cannot do, which is to call out the deceptions of liberal civility, where liberal civility is this idea that we’re all free and equal, we respect each other and we show it by speaking to each other in measured tones, and we’re all treated as equals before the law and so on. We are all political members of the same community, tied by these bonds of civic friendship and reciprocity.

Well, I think that by disobeying uncivilly, you may be able to point out the deception or false promises of these civic bonds—the fact that they fail to extend to everyone. Uncivil disobedience can mark political exclusion and social marginalization in a spectacular way, where a civil protest could not.

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These are some of the reasons why I think it’s important to pluralize the subsets of principled disobedience and think about them separately.

NUPR: Can uncivil disobedience can be justified even if it’s not a necessarily communicative act?

CD: I just talked about the kinds of things uncivil disobedience can communicate, but I think there’s a really important category of principled disobedience that is not communicative and so clearly does not abide by the civil disobedience playbook. Not every

NUPR: Is all uncivil disobedience justifiable? If not, where is the line between justifiable and unjustifiable uncivil disobedience?

CD: Absolutely not. There are a lot of impermissible acts that fall under uncivil disobedience.

That’s why in some ways, calling an act uncivil disobedience cannot begin to legitimize it in the way that calling it civil disobedience can.

Much uncivil disobedience is impermissible.

For instance, the Ku Klux Klan engaged in unjustified yet principled intimidation of and acts of terror against Blacks for the sake of white supremacy. Their violent uncivil disobedience is obviously abhorrent. Meanwhile, the use of self-defensive violence by African-Americans

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under Jim Crow can be justified.

The line between justified and unjustified uncivil disobedience will be drawn differently depending on the type of action (storming a restaurant and, say, leaking classified information involve different justificatory accounts) and the particular socio-political context. The disobedient agent must pursue a worthwhile, justifiable cause, through means that are reasonably related to it. So we need to look at the context and evaluate the severity of the injustice, how that shapes the goal, and the method chosen. The latter must be proportional or reasonably related to the goal. That doesn’t necessarily mean as minimal as possible. If you’re engaging in a guerilla theater protest, for instance, you’re not looking for minimal disruption. You’re looking for maximum spectacular effect.

But if you’re resorting to violence then “necessity” and “proportionality” are the right criteria (as in just war theory).

It’s always important to protect people’s fundamental interests in life and bodily integrity.

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NUPR: Your book appears to shy away from violence, as justifying violence can be a sensitive issue. Can violence be justified in your framework and conception?

CD: I’m mainly interested in violence undertaken in self-defense or defense of others in the book. Vigilante groups developed under Jim Crow because states and local police forces were utterly unwilling to help protect the basic rights to life and bodily integrity of African-American citizens. They formed groups that patrolled neighborhood and flexed their muscles, often in violation of gun display laws, sending the message that white supremacist violence would be met with violence.

And it worked, and these groups also provided security as bodyguards to civil rights leaders and organizers. This collective self-defensive violence was justified given the institutional context—southern states’ unwillingness to do what it takes to protect

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people from harm. It’s important to note that in many parts of the South, police were not just standing back idly and doing nothing, but often also participating in lynching and other racially motivated terror acts.

So many can accept those forms of self-defense, but then ask what about punching Nazis?

No, I do not think it’s justified. I’m all about incivility, but not all about violence! I think you can highlight political dangers through spectacular, radical, and disruptive protests that are inventive and tap into interesting political imaginary, without harming people.

We must take this task of resisting injustice as the collective task that it necessarily is.

the government’s claims to legitimacy.

NUPR: All of these factors push us toward an “imperfect duty” to resist. What does that look like in application, and what role can that play in America and around the world?

CD: To say that a duty is imperfect is to say that the agent has discretion as to how to discharge that duty. We have a strong, weighty duty to resist injustice, but what it is we have to do to fulfill our responsibility depends on our talents, opportunities, particular social position, and how we can relate to others in ways that will promote justice and awareness and so on. There’s not one thing that everyone ought to do all the time; we have lives to lead and not all of our lives can always be about resisting injustice.

That being said, how we’re going to responsibly discharge our duty to resist injustice involves something like critical self-reflection, due diligence in our reasoning about the social realities around us, and being well-informed about the world, and empathetic toward others.

I also think that as we go about these tasks of being informed, of being critical thinkers and seeing our moral blind spots and our predispositions that may contribute to some of the social problems, it’s really important that we talk to each other all the time. We must take this task of resisting injustice as the collective task that it necessarily is. So it isn’t a question of keeping your hands clean; it’s doing your part in an endeavor that we undertake together, as we try to repair and improve the social and political fabric of our lives. And we’ll each satisfy our political obligations better, more successfully, by working with other people. That’s still a little abstract, but it really matters to get together with other people and organize into social movements.

Which social movement you join depends on your own inclinations and that’s fine. But we all have much work ahead.

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NUPR: The traditional civil disobedience playbook holds that civil disobedience works in a near just society. Do you consider America a near just society?

CD: In the book, my approach is to say that even if you think that the U.S. of today is a legitimate, near just society, each of several philosophical arguments for the moral duty to obey the law actually supports a duty to resist injustice, including through principled—civil and uncivil—disobedience. I wanted the argument to work even for those who attribute a solid level of legitimacy to Western liberal societies, which are admittedly better than many of the alternatives. That being said, I believe that the injustices that mar American society at many levels (from police brutality to mass incarceration and from labor injustice to immigration restrictions) make the diagnosis of justice and legitimacy implausible. Matters of racial, sexual, and economic injustice, and America’s treatment of non-members (including undocumented immigrants and migrants at the borders, as well as citizens of countries with which America is at war) seriously taint

[1] Delmas, Candice. “A Duty to Resist: When Disobedience Should Be Uncivil.” Oxford University Press. 2018. [2] Delmas, Candice. “That Lonesome Whistle.” Boston Review. June 14, 2016.

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Sports as a Mirror to Society

By Meredith McCleary / International Affairs & Journalism 2020

S

ports in America have evolved similarly to the country itself: with slow, painful change pushed by minorities and women risking everything to stand up and demand the right to play. Waves of change in sports are reflected in trends throughout society; each step forward for women’s sports have aligned with the different waves of feminism, and racial integration in professional leagues came around the same time as the Civil Rights Movement.[1][2] Protesting and making political statements became synonymous with advancement within sports in the mid-twentieth century. Players including Billie Jean King, Jackie Robinson, and Bill Russell led the way by demanding integration, equal rights, and proper recognition for their talent.[3][4][5] Though integration and equality were, and are, slow trends, it often just took one individual to stand up and insist that they were right and immovable, breaking centuries-old traditions.

Throughout history, women were excluded from sports; even the most celebrated minds,

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such as Aristotle, believed that women were completely ruled by their reproductive systems and that too many unladylike activities would leave women infertile.[6] Similar comments were made in campaigns against education for women.[7] These sentiments continue today, with many claiming that women are too hormonal to be leaders.[8] It wasn’t until the late 1800s and early 1900s that women in America created informal sports clubs and participated in intra-

1920s, when the women’s suffrage movement reignited the emphasis on the freedom of movement for women.[10] It wasn’t until Second Wave Feminism, between the 1950s and 1980s, that the movement looked beyond enfranchisement and toward complete equality.[11] This extended to female athletes looking for more established professional leagues and equal prizes.

One of the most famous athletes leading the charge of gender equality was tennis player Billie Jean King, who fought for equal prize money for female athletes.

When King won Wimbledon in 1968, she took home 750 British pounds, while Rod Laver, the winner of the men’s competition, took home 2,000 pounds. King pushed for greater recognition and respect for women’s tennis, equal to that of men’s tennis.

[12] In a 2013 interview, she explained that it was “not about the money.

It’s about the equality message.”[13] In addition, King advocated for Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which stipulates that no person shall be excluded from educational opportunities, including sports scholarships, on the basis of

Waves of change in sports are reflected in trends throughout society; each step forward for women’s sports have aligned with the different waves of feminism, and racial integration in professional leagues came around the same time as the Civil Rights Movement. mural sports at colleges. Even with these outlets available to young women, they were only allowed to play a handful of approved sports, such as croquet.[9] Many physical educators for women at universities discouraged competition in women’s sports; as a result, women’s competitive sports declined until the

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sex.[14] This resulted in a boom in college athletics programs for women and greater access to scholarships for female athletes, making it easier for women to go to university while playing sports.

While the rise of women in sports coincided with Second Wave Feminism, the integration of major leagues coincided with the Civil Rights Movement. Until the late 1940s, minorities were expressly prohibited from joining any of the major athletic leagues in the U.S.[15] The National Football League (NFL) was the first major league to integrate in 1946, but it wasn’t until the following year, when Jackie Robinson signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers, that the nation paid attention.

It was a tumultuous few years for Robinson and Major League Baseball (MLB). Robinson played despite death threats, degrading racial slurs by coaches, and teams refusing to play against him. Writers and activists at the time

saw the integration of Robinson as the first step towards broader societal integration.[16] In 1950, Boston Celtics head coach Red Auerbach integrated the National Basketball Association (NBA) by drafting Chuck Cooper.

According to Auerbach, Cooper “had to go through hell” as the first black NBA player.

While Cooper and other early black NBA players helped make important strides, it was Bill Russell who changed the NBA forever, both on and off the court, while making it the most progressive of all the major sports leagues.[17] Russell pioneered airborne play by jumping to block the ball while on defense, something simple and inherent in today’s game, but unheard of when Russell entered the NBA. [18] Russell would not take anti-black discrimination sitting down.[19] In 1961, when he and black teammates were refused service at a restaurant in the South, they refused to play the upcoming exhibition game. Russell was an ardent and vocal supporter of the Civil Rights Movement, even appearing alongside Martin Luther King Jr. at the March on Washington.

[20] Russell voiced his displeasure with Boston’s bigotry and campaigned for civil rights for many years.

Because of Russell’s popularity, the NBA eventually allowed him and other black players to be politically vocal, giving the players a platform and support to express their opinions without fear of losing their positions. Recently, NBA commissioner Adam Silver expressed his pride in NBA players for taking active roles in their communities and using their power to

make a difference in the world.[21] Even in now-integrated sports, white men dominate ownership, front offices, and management of America’s most popular sports leagues. Over 70% of NFL players are black, while all team CEOs and presidents are white.

[22] Just 9% of managers in the league office are black. These racial disparities in the NFL have more significant implications for the future of protesting players such as Colin Kaepernick, as well as each team’s policy on protesting the national anthem. As these decisions will be made predominantly by wealthy white men, it’s likely that the league’s response will be divided on racial lines.[23] Sports clearly still have a long way to go.

Female athletes usually make less than their male counterparts, there are disparities in racial inclusion in the upper echelons of ownership and management, and athletes taking a social or political stand are treated as if they don’t have free speech rights.[24][25] But as society evolves, so do its sports.

Protesting in professional sports is nothing new. In fact, protesting is how some of history’s greatest players were able to grace the field and court, proving that leagues and fans should not only tolerate players’ protests, but give them the space to protest without fear of retribution. What would the NBA be without Russell? The MLB without Robinson?

The NBA has become a model for allowing players to be openly political. It’s time for the NFL and other major leagues to take a hint and follow suit.

[1] Volkow, Nora D, “America’s Addiction to Opioids: Heroin and Prescription Drug Abuse,” Presented at the Senate Caucus on international Narcotics Control, National Institute on Drug Abuse, May 14, 2014. [2] Korte, Gregory, “Obama enlists Macklemore as he calls for $1.1 billion to fight opioid abuse”, USA Today, May 14, 2016. [3] “Opioid Addiction 2016 Facts & Figures,” American Society of Addiction Medicine, 2016. [4] Jones, Susan, “46,471: Drug Overdoses Killed More Americans Than Car Crashes or Guns,” CNS News, November 5, 2015. [5] Seelye, Katharine Q., “In Heroin Crisis, White Families Seek Gentler War on Drugs,” The New York Times, October 30, 2015. [6] “The Numbers Behind America’s Heroin Epidemic,” The New York Times October 30, 2015. [7] Chris Amico and Dan Nolan, “How Bad is the Opioid Epidemic?,” PBS, February 23, 2016. [8] Kolata, Gina, “Death Rates Rising for Middle-Aged White Americans, Study Finds,” The New York Times, November 2, 2015. [9] Knox H. Todd, Christi Deaton, Anne P. D’Adamo, and Leon Goe, “Ethnicity and Analgesic Practice,“ Annals of Emergency Medicine 35:1 (2000) 11-16. [10] Kelly M. Hoffman, Sophie Trawalter, Jordan R. Axt, and M. Norman Oliver, “Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between blacks and whites,” PNAS 113 (2016) 4296-4301. [11] Augustine J. Kposowa and Glenn T. Tsunokai, “Searching for relief: racial differences in treatment of patients with back pain,” Race and Society 5 (2002) 193-223. [12] Hsien-Chang Lin, Steven R. Erickson, and Rajesh Balkrishnan, “Physician Prescribing Patterns of Innovative Antidepressants in the United States: The Case of MDD Patients 1993-2007,” Psychiatry in Medicine 42 (2011) 353-368. [13] “Four States Create Prescription Drug Task Force,” Join Together, August 25, 2011. [14] Opioid Task Force, 2016. [15] “State Plan to Prevent and Treat Prescription Drug Abuse,” South Carolina Office of the Governor, December, 2014. [16] “Governor’ Task Force on Prescription Drug and Heroin Abuse,” Virginia Department of Health Professions, 2016. [17] “Fact Sheet: Opioid Abuse in the United States,” Office of National Drug Control Policy, February 11, 2014. [18] “Nonpharmaceutical Fentanyl-Related Deaths,” Centers for DiseaseControl and Prevention, July 25, 2008. [19] Eleanor Erin Artigiani and Eric D. Wish, “Patterns and Trends of Drug Abuse in the Baltimore/Maryland/Washington, DC, Metropolitan Area,” National Institute on Drug Abuse, June, 2014. [20] Burling, Stacey. “Deaths from fentanyl-laced heroin soar in Philadelphia,” Philly.com, May 14, 2014. [21] “PCP Abuse Statistics,” Health Grove, 2012. [22] “Cocaine & Crack,” Drug War Facts, 2016. [23] “National Estimates of Drug-Related Emergency Department Visits,” Drug Abuse Warning Network, 2011. [24] Barker, Melanie, “PCP History and Statistics,” DrugAbuse.com, 2015. [25] MacLaren, Erik, “The Effects of PCP Use,” DrugAbuse.com, 2015. [26] Hugh R. Waters, Gerard F. Anderson, Jim Mays, “Measuring financial protection in health in the United States,” Health Policy 69 (2004) 339-349. [27] “Behind Bars II: Substance Abuse and America’s Prison Population,” The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, February, 2010. [28] Carson, E. Ann, “Prisoners in 2013,” Bureau of Justice Statistics, September 30, 2014. [29] “Bipartisan laws that went wrong,” CNN, March 22, 2013. [30] Utt, Jamle, “8 Thing White People Really Need to Understand About Race,” Everyday Feminism, July 23, 2014. [31] “The Crack Sentencing Disparity and the Road to 1:1,” United States Sentencing Commission, 2009. [32] LoBianco, Tom, “Report: Aide says Nixon’s war on drugs targeted blacks, hippies,” CNN, March 24, 2016.

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Policy Platform(s): The Dangers of Political Discourse through Social Media

By Nikki Naquin / Political Science 2021

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n February 10th, a month into her first term in Congress, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D–MN) posted on her public Twitter profile. In months prior, she used Twitter to garner support for her congressional campaign, to share her story as an up-and-coming progressive leader, and to celebrate becoming one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress and the first woman of color to represent Minnesota.[1] Other new political leaders are also taking to social media to share their experiences with their followers. Among them is Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–NY), a freshman Congresswoman and notoriously outspoken activist who famously uses her social media to expose the inner workings of Congress, such as how they select their office spaces and vote on congressional leadership.[2] This is clearly becoming common practice; modern technology is breaking long-standing barriers between government officials and their constituents.

Through social media networks, politicians can reach their followers directly, with no government formalities or media spin. It can add sincerity and personality to people who hold historically stoic public roles.

Rep. Omar’s February 10th Twitter post, however, cost her support from her followers and fellow representatives, and demonstrated how social media can be platforms for support or ridicule.

In a since-deleted tweet, Rep. Omar indirectly criticized the American Israel Public

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Affairs Committee (AIPAC), declaring that American support for Israel is “all about the Benjamins.”[3] Twitter exploded, with some arguing against her stance and others accusing her of being anti-Semitic. Omar claimed that her stance was purely political and lacked anti-Semitic undertones or intentions, but the brevity of the tweet makes it impossible to determine her true intent.[4] Therein lies the problem of using social media for political exchanges. Social media is creating new forms of political interaction, and though it may make politicians and information more accessible, it also makes

reliance on impersonal communication, and their restrictions on post length.

Often, controversies borne through online exchanges are caused by simple misunderstandings, or what are claimed to be misunderstandings, by one involved party.

Their arguments typically stand because it is nearly impossible to interpret a person’s tone through a text post. When interacting face-toface, people can better grasp a person’s intent through body language and tone of voice, and can ask for clarification if a person’s intent is still unclear. With no way to pick up on these non-verbal cues through a text post, social media users make less accurate conclusions on a post’s intended meaning.[5] These negative effects could be counteracted by well-researched arguments that fully explain a person’s stance and cite sources to support it. However, platforms don’t allow their users to formulate substantive arguments, since most platforms have word count restrictions for posts. Though word counts are meant to promote conciseness of thought, they prevent users from supporting their statements with evidence or fully fleshing out their ideas. This inability to present fully formed arguments forces users to shift their priorities, putting punch and shock value over structure and validity. Brevity begins to supersede accuracy, and convincing arguments fall to inflammatory rhetoric. This is the true danger of online political discussions—they promote

Social media is creating new forms of political interaction, and though it may make politicians and information more accessible, it also makes meaningful political discourse much harder to conduct. meaningful political discourse much harder to conduct. Too often, online political commentary leads to controversy simply because of the constraints inherent to social media platforms. Politicians should not use social media to incite discussion through inflammatory rhetoric, nor should the general public formulate hasty and unfounded conclusions on politicians’ casual social media posts.

Two integral characteristics of social media platforms prevent them from being good mediums for political discourse: their

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controversial arguments that often have little to no logical or empirical basis.

They need not be faulted for this, however; limited word counts foster the sort of quick, punchy content for which platforms such as Twitter, Snapchat, and Tumblr are optimized.

That these word counts are in place only further demonstrates how social media networks were not optimized for political debate, nor should they be used to make inflammatory comments that may require further explanation.

Rep. Omar’s tweet, though brief, incited fury with the general public and among her Congressional contemporaries. Some claimed that the tweet perpetuated historical stereotypes of Jewish people manipulating the government through closed-door deals.

[6] Accusations against her worsened when a tweet from 2012 was discovered, in which she stated that “Israel hypnotized the world.”[7] Omar’s tweets exacerbated tensions regarding anti-Semitism, which have run high since the mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue in October 2018.[8] This event inspired reexaminations of each party’s policy lines regarding anti-Semitism, with some accusing American politicians of using anti-Semitism as a political tool.[9][10] Rep. Omar’s actions even inspired the creation of a new House bill, which condemns bigotry and discrimination as a whole.[11] Rep. Omar responded by stating that her tweet was misinterpreted and blown out of proportion. She explained that her tweet aimed to criticize AIPAC and its lobbying efforts, and that her critique was wrongly extended to Judaism as a whole.[12] Much can be said about the public’s actions; many made assumptions and hasty conclusions about Rep. Omar’s opinion that could have been influenced by Omar’s background or faith.

[13] However, the fault of this miscommunication could be attributed to Rep. Omar for not stating her case more clearly. For the purpose of clarity, Rep. Omar should have written a tweet that clearly stated her idea and intent, especially when commenting on such a controversial topic.

Politicians should tailor their message to the communication platform they are using. Manifestos should not be published on a platform with a 280-character limit, nor should off-handed quips find their place in Senate hearings or other venues of similar importance. Social media platforms are optimized for the mass sharing of brief posts such as news articles or status updates.[14] Therefore nothing should be posted on them that may require further clarification or supporting documentation.

Those who really wish to engage in meaningful political debate can easily do so through websites built for that purpose. A

quick Google search renders multiple viable options, with the most prominent being procon.org.[15] Procon.org distinguishes itself from other debate sites by providing well-researched arguments on a variety of issues. Users simply select an issue that they would like to explore, and are presented with arguments made by industry professionals. Procon.org also allows readers to present their own arguments on topics and uses a ranking system to bolster the visibility of well-crafted arguments.

Forums such as the ones on procon.org present users with thoughtful perspectives from multiple sides, preventing the echo chamber effect that regularly occurs on social media. By using these platforms for political debate, people can do justice to the issues they discuss and can strip social media feeds of caustic political clutter.

Social media enables greater participation in political discourse; however, with greater breadth comes lesser depth. Users are not given the capacity to support their arguments or clarify statements that they make, and these restrictions can cause great misunderstandings. These platforms encourage interaction between politicians and the people, but these interactions can easily turn to controversy when platforms aren’t used for their intended purpose. Politicians should leave their arguments for the podium, and internet users should look elsewhere for insightful, research-backed political discussion.

[1] “About.” U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar. Accessed February 26, 2019. [2] Cheadle, Harry. “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Teaching Democrats How to Be Good at Twitter.” Vice. January 16, 2019. [3] Bowden, John. “Omar deletes tweets at center of anti-Semitism controversy.” The Hill. February 26, 2019. [4] Gay Stolberg, Sheryl. “Ilhan Omar Apologizes for Statements Condemned as Anti-Semitic.” The New York Times. February 11, 2019. [5] Junco, Reynol and Arthur W. Chickering. “Civil Discourse in the Age of Social Media.” Wiley Online Library. September 01, 2010. [6] Burack, Emily. “Ilhan Omar’s anti-Semitic controversy, explained.” Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

February 14, 2019. [7] Weiss, Bari. “Ilhan Omar and the Myth of Jewish Hypnosis.” The New York Times.

January 21, 2019. [8] Robertson, Campbell, Christopher Mele, and Sabrina Tavernise. “11 Killed in Synagogue Massacre; Suspect Charged With 29 Counts.”

October 27, 2018. [9] Green, Emma. “The Fight Over Ilhan Omar is a Fight Over the Identity of the Democratic Party.” The Atlantic. March 07, 2019. [10] Leifer, Joshua. “Ilhan Omar and the weaponisation of antisemitism.” The Guardian. March 06. 2019. [11] Davis, Susan. “House Votes to Condemn Anti-Semitism After Rep. Omar’s Comments.” NPR. March 07, 2019. [12] Omar, Ilhan. (@IlhanMN). “Listening and learning, but standing strong.” February 11, 2019.

Tweet. [13] Gay Stolberg, Sheryl and Glenn Thrush.

“Democrats Put Off Anti-Semitism Resolution After Fierce Backlash.” The New York Times. March 06, 2019. [14] Kapko, Matt. ‘Twitter CMO finally explains the purpose of Twitter.” CIO. January 09, 2017. [15] “Pros & Cons of Current Issues. Reliable. Nonpartisan. Empowering.” Procon.

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