When Art Imitates Death: A Look At Contemporary Aestheticized Politics

In a world that prides itself on the values of democracy, why are people all too willing to acquiesce their freedom to the state abandoning democracy with relatively little resistance? One might ask themselves such a question while observing Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi “effectively [bypassing] parliamentary [requirements]” to prematurely annex Kashmir whilst also maintaining a relatively high approval rating of 64 percent. One might also face such a dilemma when observing the apathy of the Filipino people to the “12,000 extrajudicial killings” under President Duterte, another strongman enjoying “record-high approval.” The key to understanding this cognitive dissonance might lie in a key phenomenon behind the historical rise of populist authoritarianism: the aestheticization of politics.

The aestheticization of politics is a concept first explored by political philosopher and cultural critic Walter Benjamin, who used it to serve as an explanation “for the seductive fascination of fascism.” The aestheticization of politics shifts the focus of politics to artistic expression rather than effective governance. The underlying danger behind the existence of this phenomenon is that it is more often than not abused by authoritarian regimes to apply “the grotesque impropriety of applying criteria of beauty to the deaths of human beings,” presenting any deaths as a result of injustice or tyranny as a small contribution to a profoundly artistic and pure national struggle in which suffering is appreciated as a normal and reasonable means to an end. Examples of aestheticized politics can be found being used to significant success in propaganda such as Leni Riefenstahl’s Nazi propaganda film, Triumph of the Will, as well as the various works of the fascist-sponsored Italian futurist movement, both of which detail a great struggle in which the purity of the human spirit is shown to be recognized through violent struggle against all that is degenerate, leaving its viewer feeling “threatened by extinction by images and a simulacra of reality.” It is then only a matter of time as repeated exposure to such media leads to death being seen as a mere fact of theatrics, and a society experiencing an “inhumane indifference to ethical... and moral considerations” of political action. 

Though the ideologies espoused by the societies Benjamin referred to when formulating his theory, Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, are by no means widely accepted today, the aestheticized political process that underpins their allure is just as present as ever: A blatant abuse of the aestheticization of politics is occurring within the Indian political sphere through Bollywood, the Indian film industry. For example, in the 2018 Bollywood film Baaghi 2, the protagonist, a stoic military man Ronny, grabs a man and “ties him to the front of his jeep and uses him as a human shield to get through a lane full of stone-pelters.” By this point in the film, viewers are more likely to see Ronny and his goal of rescuing his lover’s daughter in a noble light, leading them to glance over this ignobility. Viewers might recall, however, an event one year before the movie’s release, in which Kashmiri civilian Farooq Ahmed Dar was apprehended by the Indian military and subsequently “tied to the front bumper of a military jeep as it patrolled villages… serving as a human shield against stone-throwing crowds.” One must ask themselves if, by being shown a dramatized facsimile of the real atrocity in which the perpetrators are displayed as heroes, they would still view the event as a blatant abuse of human rights or as much of an inconsequential artistic display as the film, which went on to gross over $2 billion. 

President Duterte of the Philippines, another strongman often accused of demagogy, is equally as adept in aestheticizing politics, with the basis of his successful campaign being rooted in promises of keeping the streets safe and clean of drug lords. In this case, the aestheticization of politics is heavily facilitated due to the promise of visible benefits without the ethical violations that were the means to reach this end. While an outsider may observe the clean and drug-free streets of Manila and think well of Duterte, it is all to easy for the 12 to 20 thousand victims of violent police and paramilitary action in this pursuit to slip out of mind. 

The dangers of viewing the ramifications caused by political action as a mere byproduct of artistic expression has also taken its toll on the American political landscape, albeit not to a lethal degree. No words can provoke a more vivid image than “Build That Wall”, a long-running popular chant expressing support for the expansion and renovation of the US-Mexican border wall. Glaring problems with such a feat, such as the fact that over two thirds of illegal immigration comes from visa overstays as opposed to border crossings and the rapidly climbing estimates of the construction expenses reaching over $20 billion, are undermined by the aesthetic of an “immigration invasion” prevented only by an immovable wall protecting a rejuvenated nation. The preference of emotional appeal to pragmatic action is blatant in this aspect, and it is apparent that this political narrative of invasion is fueled by an all too human desire to gravitate towards struggle and redemption. One must not underestimate President Trump’s experience in conveying the appeal of such aesthetic struggles, as his past experience in the television industry ensures that he is seasoned in the art of subjugating reality for the purpose of media consumption. Benjamin noted in his observations of 20th century authoritarianism that much of the aesthetic appeal of a government comes from its film industry. With this in mind, one must take note of how President Trump’s allies within the film industry portray him. In the promotional image for his film Death of a Nation, Dinesh D’Souza presents an amalgam of the faces of both President Trump and President Lincoln. The association of Lincoln and his deeds to that of Trump are of great significance, as it has been theorized by Benjamin’s contemporaries that the conflation of an aesthetic conflation of a modern struggle to a previous one is a commonly used tactic in aestheticized politics. 

With the very real implications of a politics aestheticized posing a threat to the ero of modern democracy, it is apparent that the free nations of the world must take measures to ensure that it does not find its democratic foundations eroded by deceiving theatrics. To prevent a reality of harmful political action from being non-differentiable from media, the film industry is urged to avoid contracts entailing an artistic interpretation of violence for political means solicited by aspiring authoritarian entities. The film industry, often complicit in pushing the narratives of demagogues, must reevaluate this relationship lest they risk eroding the independent nature of the film industry, losing their autonomous nature, and resulting in both the producer and consumer being negatively impacted whilst their democracy is undermined. Individuals sympathetic to the democratic way of life must be mindful of the policies proposed by their legislators, ensuring that there is no hidden suffering masked by grand narratives of prosperity. The aestheticization of politics is, ultimately, unavoidable, and the burden lies on the citizens of their nation to remain mindful about separating the violent and political from the aesthetic and the abstract.

Playing God: An Evaluation of the Ethicality of Gene Editing Technology

One of the most exciting things about scientific research is the way in which it allows us to transcend current understandings of the human potential. Genetic engineering exemplifies this power, as it often involves questions of what a human ought to be. Put simply, genetic engineering is “the direct manipulation of DNA to alter an organism’s characteristics in a particular way.” This practice, while holding a large place in modern-day discussions of bioethics, has a long history rooted in scientific exploration. Beginning during the early 1950s with the discovery of the double helix DNA structure by Rosalind Franklin, James Watson, and Francis Crick, the study of genetics became a recognized topic within scientific circles. Shortly after, geneticist Arthur Kornberg performed the first DNA synthesis, marking the official birth of genetic engineering as we know it. It wasn’t until the seventies that the field really began to take off, with the introduction of new technologies, like gene splicing and DNA mapping techniques. These innovative methods served as the early foundation for modern genetic engineering practices, as they allowed for unprecedented ease of manipulation of genomes. In the succeeding decades, substantial innovations were made in vaccines and synthetic drugs, as well as an investigation into the prospect of cloning and genetic modifications for organic plant life. With the turn of the century, the genetics community began to center their focus on the study of the human genome. It wasn’t long after this transition that renowned biochemists Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier developed the first CRISPR mechanism, a tool that would offer unprecedented potential in a variety of fields yet pose an equally momentous challenge to the ethical foundations of modern science. 

CRISPR-CAS9, more commonly referred to simply as CRISPR, is a biochemical technology that allows for cheap and easy gene editing. Utilizing what is known as “clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats,” CRISPR gives scientists the ability to combine endonucleases or proteins that cleave DNA at specific sites along the molecule, to pieces of RNA to add, delete, or turn off a certain sequence in the DNA. This means that, theoretically, biologists could harness CRISPR to make fine-tuned changes to an individual’s genetic makeup, whether it be curing a formerly incurable inherited disease, or enhancing certain traits, such as strength or intelligence. The most recent use of this technology among the scientific community was by a Chinese scientist named He Jiankui. On the last Monday of November 2018, Jiankui announced that he had created what would instantly become known as “CRISPR babies,” by editing the genomes of two unborn twins and altering their DNA sequences using CRISPR. The goal of this experimentation was to use CRISPR to delete a genetic mutation from the twins’ genomes that has been known to increase the probability of contracting HIV. The news of Jiankui’s work was met with overwhelming condemnation from the scientific community and society writ large. Experts called his work “sloppy” and its application “unnecessary,” citing a failure of Jiankui to meet germline editing requirements, a set of ethical and moral guidelines established by the 2017 National Academies of Science Report. However, the ultimate criticism of Jiankui’s attempt to edit the human genome stemmed from accusations of a lack of moral conscience. While Jiankui can be seen as noble in his attempt to remove the gene that causes HIV from the twins, the effect of his tampering was an overall decrease in life expectancy, something that was neither foreseen nor acknowledged by Jiankui himself. In light of the uproar over Jiankui’s perceived callousness, a host of important questions have arisen regarding both the feasibility and moral efficacy of gene editing as a practice. 

Despite the outcry over Jiankui’s irresponsible use of CRISPR technology, the larger conversation regarding the benefits and drawbacks of genetic engineering, gene-editing technology in particular, demands an analysis that accounts for the industry’s multitude of different potential applications. Many ardent supporters of gene-editing technologies argue that technologies/innovations like CRISPR could cure medical conditions and ailments that substantially reduce the quality of life, offering an enormous boost to modern medicine’s ability to address genetic diseases that result from mutations, like cancer or HIV. Some experts even assert such technology has the potential to cure sickle-cell anemia, a genetic blood disorder that--until now--has been believed to be incurable. Additionally, gene-editing technology bears another, potentially less intuitive application: agriculture. Since CRISPR allows precise and efficient modification of genomes, scientists could use it to improve certain agricultural traits, like crop resiliency, adaptation, and end-usage. Since agriculture is crucial to the advancement of the United States (U.S.) economy, it’s essential that we use the technology available to us to improve farming practices however we can. 

In light of these potential advancements, it may seem difficult to understand why so many within the scientific community were so starkly opposed to Jiankui's application of CRISPR technology to human embryos. After all, he was trying to help them, albeit in an irresponsible and unnecessarily hasty way. The question of how we ought to judge Jiankui’s use of gene editing practices begs inquiry into how capable we, as a society, are in controlling the potential negative side-effects of such a technology. Framed in this manner, it becomes less a question of the intrinsic features of the technology, and more so one of technical feasibility. Tied up in the debate over the feasibility of gene-editing technology are philosophical questions of future value since any use of CRISPR runs the risk of harming future generations in unknown ways. In this sense, it becomes clear why an expert consensus was opposed to Jiankui’s use of CRISPR: although his intentions may have been good, the state of the technology was such that Jiankui was incapable of preventing the negative side effects of meddling with the human genome. 

Independent of determining whether or not the technology is ready for responsible use, some, such as theology and ethics professor Ted Peters, argue that gene-editing practices are unethical since they create the risk of using the technology for eugenics. As is evidenced by the current state of CRISPR technology, gene-editing tools are not widely accessible to the public yet. Since the development of such advanced technologies is expensive, tools like CRISPR are likely to become available to those who are higher on the socio-economic ladder first. This poses a massive threat to the fairness of society; since wealthy people will be the first customers of gene editing, genetically enhanced people can form a distinct socioeconomic class, raising the specter of inequality. According to Peters, the difference between a world of ethical gene editing and the much darker, socially stratified scenario laid out above lies in the distinction between therapy and enhancement. The therapy model for understanding gene-editing is one that emphasizes the potential for technologies like CRISPR to materially improve the lives of those suffering from genetic diseases. The enhancement model, on the other hand, sees CRISPR as a means to raise the standard for human genetic makeup in hopes of elevating the status of the human race as a whole, often resulting in class-based stratification of human worth. The line between these two interpretations is admittedly blurry, and the difference between therapy and enhancement is a hard line for bioethicists to draw. As a result, it’s likely that a world with CRISPR would be one in which certain castes of society are seen as more fit to reproduce than others, justifying mass oppression of those at a lower genetic “tier.” 

How can one reconcile the relative advantages and disadvantages of using something so transformative as gene-editing technology? First, it’s important to distinguish between various degrees of relevance when considering the drawbacks of CRISPR. The uncertainty tied to the readiness of these technologies is by no means intrinsic to its use since our ability to effectively operate on the human genome is purely a matter of empirical circumstance. The potential for serving as the foundation of a modern eugenics’ movement, however, is not something that can be separated from the moral quality of gene-editing technology. This concern, while merely hypothetical, is inherent to the technology itself. In fact, it’s undergirded the entire field of genetic engineering since its conception in the 1950s. 

Given that CRISPR poses an imminent threat to the equity of our society, what should we do about its proliferation? Maybe He Jiankui’s lapse in moral judgment was, in retrospect, a good thing. After all, his error did, at the very least, make clear to the scientific community and the world how unprepared we are as a society for things like CRISPR, potentially delaying widespread acceptance of the technology. No matter the answer to this question, gene-editing is undeniably unethical due to its propensity to increase inequality within a society, and thus anyone who willingly pushes the development of the technology would be making a mistake. While those who parade the potential benefits of CRISPR do so out of good intentions, their advocacy is dangerously short-sighted and could contribute to a path of development that is neither safe nor equitable.

China's Belt and Road Initiative: Is it Truly Neocolonialist?

During a visit to Kazakhstan in 2013, President Xi Jinping proudly announced the launch of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure project seeks to create an economic belt and maritime "silk road" that connects China to over sixty countries in Eurasia and Africa. The BRI aims to fund infrastructure projects such as highways, railways, seaports, airports, and oil refineries. Since its launch, China has been accused of enforcing neocolonialism through the BRI. By using the Hambantota Port and Colombo Port City project in Sri Lanka, I will argue that although China may have demonstrated neocolonialist intentions, partnering countries are equally responsible when making BRI project deals and can combat neocolonialism through negotiation. To expand off that, this piece argues that the BRI is not so much an example of neocolonialism as it is economic regionalism. 

The Belt and Road Initiative could potentially economically integrate several developing countries in the Asian region and beyond. But what's in it for China? The policy goals of the initiative include enhancing communication between foreign governments, implementing hard and soft infrastructure, strengthening cultural ties, and promoting regional cooperation. Hard infrastructure includes building transportation, networks and power grids, while soft infrastructure includes creating regulatory standards and trade deals. Cultural ties refer to sustaining intellectual and cultural exchanges, as well as tourism. The BRI would economically integrate countries within the Asian region by having fewer trade tariffs and standards for China when trading goods with partnering countries.

Because the concept of neocolonialism is interpreted in numerous ways, it is essential to first define it. The first Prime Minister and President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, argues that neocolonialism has emerged as a substitute for traditional colonialism, where hegemonic powers exploit developing countries as colonies. Neocolonialism occurs when the economic and/or political system of an independent state is manipulated by another state. In other words, an outside state gains control over another state through "economic and monetary means," In neocolonialism, a state gaining economic control through the banking system or private industry is the start of foreign control over government policy. Nkrumah claims that because of this, the outside state uses the neocolonial state for exploitation rather than genuinely developing the state.

It is widely discussed that the BRI is neocolonialist because of its infamous "debt trap." A debt trap is a form of predatory lending in which a borrower is not able to pay their debts, so they continue to borrow until it becomes a cycle. It is often caused by high-interest rates. Akshan DeAlwis, John Jay Scholar at Columbia University, argues that the economic goals of the BRI are a facade, and by using the debt trap, China would be able to establish a military presence in the Asian region. DeAlwis further discusses non-economic factors of the BRI. He argues that China is trying to exert dominance through this opportunity to destroy local economies. DeAlwis also mentions the "String of Pearls" theory, which proposes that China is planning to develop overseas naval bases along the Indian Ocean to expand military forces in order to become a regional global power quicker than its rival power, India. 

China has made several deals with Sri Lanka through the BRI, and the two most prominent projects are the Hambantota Port and the Colombo Port City Project. These projects have demonstrated that partnering countries are equally responsible when making deals with China.

It is important to acknowledge that the host country is also responsible for its actions when making deals with BRI projects. In China's Asian Dream, author Tom Miller visited Sri Lanka to discuss China's involvement in projects under the government of Mahinda Rajapaksa, who went out of power by the January 2015 election. From 2009 to 2014, China financed almost $5 billion in ports, roads, bridges, railways, an international airport, and a coal-fired power station. This $5 billion loan, however, came at a high interest rate. Other multilateral banks and national banks, such as Japan's, typically offered lower interest rates. Ravi Karunanayake, Sri Lanka's Minister of Finance, stated that the high-interest rates by China's banks came from corruption on China's part, but also Mahinda Rajapaksa's corrupt regime of the past. Once Maithripala Sirisena's administration took over in 2015, it made sure to hold China accountable for its actions by suspending the Colombo Port City project. The project was suspended due to legal issues over land, the project's financing, and environmental effects. Karunanayake clearly states "'We mean business when we say we want clean, transparent, good governance... perhaps Chinese companies had to be corrupt in the past, but if they do that now they will be disqualified.'" When current President Sirisena visited Beijing, he blamed the previous regime for the issues that Chinese banks faced with the projects. Sirisena's administration renegotiated loan repayments with Chinese banks, lowering the interest rate and including additional environmental protections. 

China's neocolonialist intentions and the String of Pearls theory can be disproved by Sri Lanka's Hambantota Port project on the southeast coast of Sri Lanka. Dr. Natalie Klein, author of Maritime Security and the Law of the Sea, states that the Hambantota port is a commercial port and that BRI deals are commercial deals and loans, emphasizing that there is a difference between a commercial port and a military base. Klein continues to argue that the coastal state in which the port resides in is the one who has authority, regardless of who operates the port. This law has been established by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). China cannot move forward with its projects without the acceptance of the host country. Therefore, Klein believes that no matter how big foreign investment is in a port, the coastal state still has control. 

The Hambantota Port project has sparked controversy within Sri Lanka because of China's debt trap and the fear of China using the port for military purposes. Hambantota was historically a Sri Lankan naval base but has switched into a port that has been built and now controlled by China. The port is under a 99-year lease to China Merchants Port Holdings for $1.12 billion. Because of this, there have been rallies conducted by the Sri Lankan public, fearing that China would use the port for their military to gain more influence on Sri Lanka as well as get closer to India, China's rival. Despite popular fears, the port deal has a clause that clearly states that the port cannot be used for military purposes. Additionally, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's office stated that the Sri Lankan government has informed China that they are prohibited from using the port militarily, as the port is still under the control of the Sri Lankan navy.

 Sri Lanka has planned to create economic opportunity and jobs back to Colombo, its capital city. Through the BRI, the Sri Lankan government made a deal with the China Harbour Engineering Company to construct a $1.4 billion Port City development. The Colombo Port City would be used as an urban center for residential and commercial use. Bendix further explains that the China Harbour Engineering Company aims to add about 17 billion gallons of sand along the coast of the city, which has sparked concern from the Sri Lankan government due to environmental issues. Because of this concern, the project was suspended in 2014 by Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe. Though this angered the China Communications Construction Company, the project's investor, the Sri Lankan government, and the China Communications Construction Company were able to continue the project after new environmental protections were implemented. The China Harbour Engineering Company had to obtain a permit to dredge about 3 miles out the coastline and at a depth of slightly less than a mile, and the company was not allowed to dredge near reefs and fishing grounds. Last, the company had to put aside $7 million in reparations to fishing associations considering the project's economic cost to local fishermen.

Stepping aside from Sri Lanka, the BRI has demonstrated a sense of cooperation when creating policies for the initiative. Many of the BRI's core tenants are consistent with international rules that have been written into the United Nations (UN), Group of Twenty (G20), the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), and other international and regional organizations. Additionally, China signed about 170 cooperation documents with 150 countries and international organizations. The BRI also promotes financial connectivity by supporting the Guiding Principles on Financing the Development of the Belt and Road with 27 countries. Lastly, the People's Bank of China co-financed more than 100 projects in 70 countries and multilateral development institutions, which involves numerous nations acting together. 

After analyzing two of Sri Lanka's significant BRI projects, it can be concluded that the BRI is not so much neocolonialism, rather it is economic regionalism. Economic regionalism pertains to the liberalization of trade between neighboring countries in the same geographic region. The most important tenet of trade liberalization is economic interdependence, which intertwines national markets, making countries wealthier and raising the cost of war with their trade partners. Amitav Acharya, a scholar and author of The End of American World Order, discusses the emergence of regionalism within the changing international system. He states that emerging powers, such as China, take part in the world of interconnectedness and interdependence by focusing on initiatives based on infrastructure and economic strategy rather than trade and political strategy. Local and regional initiatives like the BRI are the future to this international system. 

China's President Xi Jinping spoke against protectionism in a 2017 speech in Davos, and Chinese policymakers, such as current Vice-Minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs He Yafei, have also spoken in favor of globalization. Additionally, in a 2016 Pew Survey, 60 percent of the Chinese public thought that being involved in the global economy is positive. On April 25 to 27 of 2019, President Xi Jinping held the second Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, welcoming leaders from 37 countries and delegates from 150 countries. President Xi Jinping discussed concerns raised by the United States over the BRI, trade, and infrastructure. He additionally addressed China's commitment to open its economy, enhance the interests of partnering countries, and implement environmental protection to BRI projects. China has made an effort to calm the fears of nations like Sri Lanka and the United States, advocating for economic liberalization and more particularly regionalism, as it would most strongly connect the Asian region. After decades of being closed off from the world, China has opened itself up to connect with neighboring countries and promote trade and infrastructure development, which benefits not only China but its neighbors as well. 

National Security Concerns in Outer Space: The Dawn of a Space Force?

On August 29, 2019, the Trump administration officially reestablished the United States (U.S.) Space Command. The endgame of the Trump administration is to ultimately create a sixth branch of the military: the Space Force. This objective was best illustrated by Secretary of Defense Dr. Mark T. Esper when he said the following: 

“Establishing the United States Space Command as a unified combatant command is the next critical step towards the creation of an independent Space Force as the sixth branch of the armed forces.”

Upon hearing the words “Space Force,” it’s difficult not to initially laugh at such an absurd sounding idea. One conjures images of starships from science fiction movies and thinks about how ridiculous it would be to create a new military force dedicated to military affairs in space. However, upon closer examination, such a proposal may prove to be both pragmatic and even overdue. The intention of the Trump Administration raises an important question: is the creation of a Space Force needed?

The Militarization of Space: Recent Developments in Satellite Technology

As costs for spaceflight have drastically been cut in the last decade, the frequency of satellite launches by both corporate and state actors has substantially increased. At the same time, innovations have been made in technology that has the potential to interfere or effectively ruin existing satellites in orbit. 

The National Air and Space Intelligence Center recently released a report highlighting how both the Russian Federation (Russia) and the People’s Republic of China (China) continue to “develop, test, and proliferate sophisticated anti-satellite weapons to hold U.S. allied space assets at risk.” Those weapons have the capacity to jam or completely destroy satellites used for both global navigation systems and military reconnaissance purposes. The aforementioned countries have simultaneously been “developing new space capabilities to achieve military goals and reduce their reliance on U.S. space systems.” Such developments provide a legitimate cause for concern given that attacks on existing satellites have the potential to be incredibly disruptive to location services, such as GPS, relied on by both military and civilian purposes alike. Therefore, an analysis of the current situation in outer space affairs and determination of what efforts the US could take to secure its position in outer space for itself and its allies is warranted.

China’s Strategic Support Force

In December 2015, China established an independent branch of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) called the Strategic Support Force (SSF). The SSF was designed to centralize Chinese military efforts in “space, cyberspace, and the electromagnetic domain.” In 2007, China demonstrated that it could use an anti-satellite missile to destroy its own weather satellite.

Given such a development on the Chinese side, it logically follows that the Trump administration might seek similar consolidation of its space and cyber operations to at least match the level of organization of the PLA. However, as Elsa Kania and John Costello from the China Cyber and Intelligence Studies Institute point out, the U.S. Strategic Command is already quite similar in that it is “…responsible for space, cyber operation, and strategic C4ISR support.” However, it differs from both the U.S. Strategic Command and the U.S. Cyber Command in that it is its own military branch. As it currently stands, “there is no true military space career path and Air Force officers with no space background are often shifted into space work,” as noted by Associate Director of the Aerospace Security Project of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Kaitlyn Johnson. The creation of a new military branch dedicated to space would also serve to create a career path specifically for those interested in that field. This may prove useful for the U.S. military in attracting talented personnel. 

What Would the Space Force Be?

Before determining whether or not a “Space Force” is needed, it is important to define what such an entity would look like. Under the Trump administration’s proposal, the Space Force would be a separate and sixth branch of the U.S. military that ultimately reports to the Secretary of Defense. The Space Force proposed by the Trump administration would not-- at least for now-- be focused on pouring resources into the development of battleships for outer space. Rather, it would be primarily focused on protecting one of the military’s greatest assets that also impacts most of our lives directly: satellites. Satellite technology has been utilized by the United States military for decades and has applications ranging from GPS location technology to imagery production that is used to determine the location of foreign weapons systems. If such technology were to be lost or intentionally destroyed, the U.S. would lose some of its best ‘eyes in the sky’ that it relies on to make informed decisions. Put simply, inadequate protection of precious satellite technology makes the U.S. and its allies vulnerable. The protection of satellite technology should therefore be taken very seriously.

The United States previously had a Space Command that was established under the Department of Defense (DoD) in 1985. However, post-9/11, the major command then merged into the larger U.S. Strategic Command, where the main focus became the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan. However, recent developments in the proliferation of anti-satellite capabilities among rivals of the U.S. have convinced the Trump administration officials that greater consolidation of and attention to military capabilities in space is necessary. 

The federal website does not provide much further information for how the U.S. Space Command is currently organized. However, the DoD did release a report detailing a proposal for how the Space Force would be brought into existence and how the Space Command would continue to play a role. According to the report, the following three components would be created: first, the Space Development Agency, which would be tasked with “capabilities development and fielding” and suggests that part of this process includes transformation of the Air Force’s Space and Missile Center; second, the Space Operations Force, which will “develop the Space Operations force to support the Combatant Commands”; and third, the support and services functions that will be assisting the Space Force and developed by the Department of Defense. The Space Command, led by a four-star general, would be included in the process as it would provide direction to the use of the Space Force’s combined assets during times of military conflict. 

The U.S. Space Command is currently led by General John W. Raymond and is comprised of two main parts: the Combined Force Space Component Command (CFSCC) and the Joint Task Force Space Defense (JTF-SD). The former serves as more of a center of planning, assessment, and integration of space capabilities. The latter, the JTF-SD, is responsible for deterring aggression and defeating adversaries in conflicts. 

Current Agreements in Outer Space

During and after the Cold War, the United States signed a number of treaties with the Soviet Union and other world powers to set rules on what kind of activity would be tolerated in space. One such treaty is the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies, otherwise known as the Outer Space Treaty. Among other things, the treaty states that signatory parties agree to not militarize outer space and celestial bodies beyond Earth. This includes a prohibition on the placement of nuclear weapons and military bases on celestial bodies other than Earth. It also requires that a base built on any celestial body be open for use by other nations, provided that advanced notice is given to the nation that built the base The United States, the Soviet Union, and over a hundred other countries signed this treaty, with some even ratifying it in their respective national legislatures. One such participant was China, who signed the treaty in 1967.

While the Outer Space Treaty has proven useful in discouraging the construction of military bases beyond Earth, it does not mention the use of satellite interference or destruction technology that now poses a greater threat as cyber warfare strategies continue to develop. A separate treaty called the Convention on International Liability for Damage Caused by Space Objects lays the groundwork for determining liability in scenarios in which another one state’s assets are damaged by another state and claims that the state whose assets have been damaged shall be entitled to compensation. Again, this treaty does not prohibit the use of anti-satellite technology to damage another state’s satellites outright.

Conclusion

In order to be adequately prepared for potential conflicts in outer space, the U.S. will need to take strategic action to reorganize and consolidate its capabilities in the protection of its satellites. The creation of a permanent branch of the military to fulfill this need, such as the proposed Space Force, is a reasonable solution to this challenge and provides the additional benefit of creating a true military career path and mechanism for recruiting talent.

In the 21st century, China has emerged as a formidable rival on the world stage. From its demonstrated capability in outer space to its signature Belt and Road Initiative, it is safe to say that protecting U.S. interests in foreign and defense policy includes greater consideration of China’s actions. Furthermore, the example of the Strategic Support Force may provide a useful example in determining how the U.S. should go about this task. The SSF’s combination of outer space and cyberwarfare expertise in this branch of the military could provide a framework for the U.S. military for how to go about combining those capabilities.

While the effort of restructuring U.S. capabilities in outer space has been undertaken to some extent with the reintroduction of the Space Command, future developments and threats to U.S. interests would likely be better addressed if there were a permanent organization with outer space affairs as its area of expertise. As of 2016, the Government Accountability Office concluded that there were over 60 organizations “strewn across the Department of Defense and intelligence community with responsibility for space acquisitions,” which will likely prove unacceptable in future as greater centralized authority is needed in the future. This fact coupled with the reality that a command dedicated to this issue was gotten rid of in the past in order to focus on another international conflict further supports the conclusion that the permanence of the proposed Space Force would greatly support U.S. goals.

The long-term objectives of the U.S. should also include a reexamination of current applicable international law, specifically as it applies to the proliferation and usage of anti-satellite technology. The Trump administration should seek greater dialogue and new treaties with China and Russia to avoid escalation of the militarization of outer space. Chances of positive diplomatic outcomes on this issue with China may seem slim given the current state of affairs between the two nations in the ongoing trade war, however diplomacy should nevertheless be utilized to the fullest extent possible in outer space affairs.

Ultimately, the U.S. has a full plate with regards to how it should be acting with regards to the rise of China and others. In the realm of outer space affairs, a number of solutions exist to strengthen the position of the U.S. and its allies in outer space. Among these, the Space Force proposal presents a reasonable step in the direction of achieving U.S. defense and foreign policy objectives and should therefore be seriously considered.

Putin vs. the People: The Next Generation of Russian Activism

Since June of 2019, thousands of young Russians have been detained for participating in unsanctioned protests in Moscow. These protests aren’t like the Women’s March or the school strikes in the United States; they are generally unauthorized, meaning every individual who attends the demonstration can lawfully be arrested by the authorities. The stakes are higher, and desperation emanates from the massive, chanting crowds. The very air crackles with anticipation as thousands of Russian citizens all collectively think the same life-changing thoughts: the authorities are no longer our friends, and revolution is near. 

Although these protests seem to have sprung out of nowhere, the tensions in Russia have been mounting for a long time due to the changing political climate. One of President Vladimir Putin’s most outspoken political opponents, Alexei Navalny, has been railing against corruption and political repression since 2008. He often spends short amounts of time in prison for arranging and attending unsanctioned protests. He has attempted to run for elected positions numerous times, including the Presidency, but has been prohibited from candidacy on several occasions due to convictions related to his activism. He has also, like many of President Vladimir Putin’s other political rivals, fallen mysteriously ill while in custody. As a political activist he is known for criticizing the authorities on various social media platforms, like Twitter and YouTube, and has been named one of the “most influential people on the internet” by Time magazine for his massive following, which has allowed him to connect with and mobilize young activists throughout Russia.

These young activists are the basis for the anti-government protests happening in Russia. They hail from the generation that was born during or after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Some of them are students as young as sixteen years old, while the majority are college students and young professionals who, wanting to have a say in the future of their country, walked into a voting booth and were faced with the realization that their votes and their voices are being ignored by the authorities. 

According to a federal law passed in 1999, “On the Election of Deputies of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation,” candidates do not have to be affiliated with a recognized political party, such as United Russia (Putin’s party) or the Communist Party (the second largest party in the Federal Assembly, Russia’s legislative body), in order to run for elected positions. However, many candidates who have attempted to run for positions both at the local and presidential level as independents or affiliates of one of United Russia’s opposing parties have had their registration rejected. In order to be registered for the election, candidates must petition for signatures from their constituencies. Once they have received the correct number of signatures, they must register their petition with the authorities, who verify the signatures and declare the candidate’s legitimacy. Despite collecting the minimum number of signatures, most of the candidates running in opposition to United Russia have had their registration denied on the alleged grounds that the signatures had been “faked.” 

These incidents of alleged corruption are also occurring during a time of political change. The approval ratings of the current ruling party, United Russia, have dropped to a historic low: just 32 percent of Russians stated that they approved of the party in 2018. Many pro-government candidates chose not to run under the United Russia banner, afraid that affiliating with the party would negatively affect their chances of winning the election. Additionally, a Russian media startup “Proekt” reported that opposition and independent candidates were slated to win nine of the 45 Moscow districts in the local elections on September 9, according to polls. United Russia has been accused of outright corruption by many critics, including Navalny, and their image as the ruling party continues to worsen as wages stagnate, the middle class shrinks, the retirement age increases, and more Russians fall below the poverty line.

Although the younger generation of Russians have been outspoken in their desire for change, the corruption of the ruling party doesn’t just hurt the youth: older Russians feel the political and economic strain as well. According to an international Pew Research study, older generations are more likely to vote in elections than younger generations. They are, however, less likely to protest and become politically active than their younger counterparts. The study also links social media usage and political activism, stating that social media users are more likely to speak out on a broad range of political issues than people who do not use social media. The new generation of Russian activists support these findings, as growing up with the internet and cell phones has made it easier for them to utilize social media.

Many of the young Russians protesting and making their voices heard do not remember the fall of the Soviet Union, and they resent the fear and hesitation that older Russians feel when it comes to political change. It isn’t uncommon for older Russians, when asked about changing the leadership of the current administration, to reply, “If not Putin, then who?” They remember the time that immediately followed the dissolution of the Soviet Union (often referred to colloquially as “The Crazy Nineties”) in which the crime and unemployment rates skyrocketed as corruption and gangs gained control of the new country’s fledgling economy. They were surprised on New Year’s Eve in 1999 by former Russian President Boris Yeltsin announcing that he was leaving and was to be replaced with a young man that hardly anybody knew: Vladimir Putin. They recall how, after Putin took office, the economy started flourishing again and the crime rates started falling as more and more people found decent-paying jobs. Most importantly, older Russians remember the tendency for political activism and opposition to be crushed under the heel of the authorities, both before and after the fall of the Soviet Union.

Perhaps that’s why, despite being their age, the young Russian activists aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty in the fight for democratic freedoms. In a late-July protest in 2019, hundreds of protesters were arrested for participating in an unsanctioned demonstration. Dozens of others were brutalized by the police force, who had stood idly by until the climax of the protest. Live videos of the protest were streamed on Twitter, and video footage of the brutality and arrests have been seen by millions of people internationally. Two parents were threatened to have their children taken away by the authorities after being photographed and recognized at a protest, with “child endangerment” being cited as the primary cause of concern. Yet the younger generation continues to protest and put their lives and safety on the line. By ignoring the will of the authorities and showing up en masse to demonstrate their rights, young Russians are testing the boundaries of the permissible use of violence and stating their dedication to individual rights and democracy.

The very presence of state violence is nonetheless disconcerting, especially because the amount of protests and backlash from authorities is disproportionate to the importance of the most recent elections. Local councils have little power, and the elections for these positions are less important than elections for the Federal Assembly or the presidency. As such, the authorities should not be as concerned about the candidates and the protests as their actions have indicated. The authorities’ uneasiness may manifest from their slipping grasp on power as evidence of their corruption leaves United Russia’s approval ratings lower than ever. Consequently, this struggle to retain power over Russian citizens will, over time, result in a change in the way authorities respond to protests and demonstrations: either the demonstrations will have the intended effect and liberal reform will be put in place or conservative reforms will result in more and more people being arrested for speaking their minds. Should the latter outcome transpire, then United Russia will have an even more difficult time convincing Russian citizens--and the rest of the world--of their legitimacy.

Moreover, Vladimir Putin’s own approval rating is at risk if he allows any kind of conservative reforms to repress the rights of Russian citizens. Once at an all-time-high of 89 percent in the summer of 2015, his approval rating has since taken the plunge down to 68 percent. This number is still quite high, but the rather large dip in approval indicates the Russian public’s frustration with the government’s decisions. If he is able to quell the angry public, distance himself from United Russia and retain his approval rating, then Vladimir Putin could be in power for a long time. However, to do so, he’d have to ensure that the authorities’ response to protests and demonstrations remains proportionate, if unfair and illiberal. 

Should Vladimir Putin lose his control of Russia’s political sphere, then he wouldn’t be the first Eastern European leader to be deposed in this millenium. After all, Russia isn’t the only post-Soviet state experiencing massive protests and political upsets. Anti-government protests and activism have been sweeping through much of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, including Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Georgia, and Moldova. Just like the protests in Russia, most of the activists are students and young adults who came of age after the fall of the Soviet Union. Furthermore, the activism in these countries has been majoritively successful. After the violent regime change in 2014, young Ukrainians created powerful political networks, and now Ukraine has the youngest government in Europe. Activists in Kazakhstan, previously having their right to assembly deeply oppressed by authorities, now openly and loudly gather for unsanctioned anti-government demonstrations. Little by little, the young, post-Soviet generation of political activists are changing the political landscape in their own countries.

It’s difficult to say where the new surge of political activism in Russia will lead, as there are many groups that all want different things. Some simply want to wrestle power away from corruption and place it back into safe hands; others want the entire political system dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up. As more young people begin to realize that they can turn their discontentment into action, the latter option seems less and less far-fetched. Although nobody can say for certain what the future holds for Vladimir Putin and his ruling party, it’s possible that, once the political atmosphere in Russia has reached its highest intensity, something very small could lead to the upheaval of Russia’s longest-standing president. The old, Soviet generations will no longer be leading the Russian Federation--the young, tired, angry, educated, politically active young people will.

Social Media and Guerrilla Warfare Make for a Lethal Insurgent Mix in Somalia

In the midst of the twenty-first century, it is arguable that the greatest threat to the international community is that of transnational terrorism. Defined as “such action when carried out by basically autonomous non-state actors, whether or not they enjoy some degree of support from sympathetic states,” transnational terrorism spans national boundaries and presents itself as a formidable challenge to nation-states. While the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is still a prominent threat, they have slightly faded from international media attention in the past few years and their recent loss of territory has pushed them out of the bigger picture, making way for a new focus group: Al-Shabaab. Known in Arabic as “the Youth” or “the Guys,” al-Shabaab is a jihadist insurgency group based in Somalia that largely operates in many states throughout East Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, and Yemen, with occasional violent activity in Ethiopia and Uganda. Active since 2006, al-Shabaab’s main objectives are to replace the current Somali federal republic that is supported by the United Nations (UN) with an Islamic government. As part of their efforts to achieve that, the group’s distinctive mobilization schemes, including their use of guerrilla warfare and sophisticated public relations arm, allows them to target disadvantaged populations, recruit fighters on both the domestic and global scale, and ultimately elevate their status to one of the most dangerous insurgent groups capable of largely impacting East Africa.

Public Relations Arm

While al-Shabaab is based in Somalia, its online presence makes it just as much of a threat as its physical presence does to nearby states in East Africa. After the devastating events that transpired in September 2001, the term “terrorism” has become synonymous with social media, particularly interactive platforms such as Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. However, while al-Qaeda was the first extremist group to truly capitalize on the use of social media, al-Shabaab is no stranger to online recruitment and cyberterrorism. 

Al-Shabaab’s use of “electronic jihad” is extensive as their public relations arm is extremely sophisticated, utilizing a particular pro-Muslim framework in order to appeal to a certain religious group and identity that people hold. In actuality, this framework helps explain why al-Shabaab’s recruitment efforts are so effective. Starting in 2007, Al-Kataib, the group’s media branch, has produced propaganda aimed at recruiting new fighters, as well as enhanced its audio-visual production in order to produce “polished films” alongside written, radio, and photographic content. But the internet’s inadvertent allyship also extends to Twitter. In 2011, al-Shabaab created its Twitter account under the username “@HSMPress,” which it uses to coordinate information and mobilize its members as a form of collective action. For example, the account attempted to appeal to the interests of all Muslims as seen by a tweet stating that “To propound, propagate and promote the forgotten obligation of Jihad among the Muslims around the globe is the essence of #JihadPhilosophy,” adding that “Sheikh; Jihad is an individual obligation; so all Muslims, and Somalis in particular, must march forth for Jihad.” This call to action specifically used an “obligatory” anti-Western jihadist framework in order to try and appeal to the greater Islamic community and their inherent responsibilities as Muslims to fight back against those who try to oppress them and all that they stand for.

The group’s Twitter account also serves as a platform where they can regularly confront foreigners and opposing forces and denounce intervention efforts by primarily Western states. In one instance, @HSMPress tweeted a link to an article and captioned it “Decades of interference-and not a single success… Foreign interventions have never succeeded in Somalia.” In a later response to a follower, the account wrote that “Western Media has spent years inculcating derogatory anti-Islami views into ur minds.” The group’s overall decision to focus on decades of failed Western interventionism allows them to highlight the strength and resiliency of the Somali people. It also serves as some sort of justification for al-Shabaab’s violent behavior. They are not simply acting out against enemies of Allah, but also in response to numerous attempts to, as they view it, infiltrate Somalia.

However, despite their online presence, al-Shabaab’s recruitment efforts generally focus on nobody and everybody all at once. Their multifaceted social media campaigns and their “construction of specific media operations narratives” allow them to have multiple target audiences, demonstrating their ability to interact with others on both a domestic and international scale. However, certain populations are targeted to a higher degree than others. As part of the diaspora, approximately 145,000 Somalis have settled in the United States as of 2017, particularly in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area of Minnesota. While the group has not outright mentioned them, the mass assembly of Somalis in the state makes it far easier to implement recruitment methods there. In fact, Somali-American’s feelings of marginalization and homesickness make them the most susceptible targets to al-Shabaab’s framing efforts. 

Furthermore, al-Shabaab’s media apparatus has also continued to try and attract foreign fighters from the East Africa region, particularly those who speak a local language such as Swahili. And, because they are primarily a group with a large number of youth, al-Shabaab has been known to target orphans and abandoned children in Mogadishu, the state’s capital city. Not only does social media increase an organization’s ability to reach people online, but its usability and reachability make it easier to employ selective recruitment efforts where al-Shabaab is able to openly recruit foreign fighters from specific communities. While al-Shabaab is relinquishing a lot of its territorial hold in Somalia, its online presence is as strong as ever.

Warfare Tactics

Composed of several thousand members, al-Shabaab relies on guerrilla warfare fighting techniques rather than a traditional combat approach because the group is unable to match the power of pro-government forces in Somalia and elsewhere. A form of irregular warfare, guerrilla warfare is when a small group of rebel combatants is dispatched to confront government forces, often utilizing ambushes, raids, and hit-and-run tactics. Al-Shabaab’s structure is also more decentralized in nature, meaning that responsibilities and tasks are delineated to lower-level members by upper management, making it easier to instruct members. Furthermore, despite its transnational rhetoric and affiliation with the larger, more prestigious al-Qaeda, al-Shabaab’s domestic focus on the Somali government and local clan issues enables them to carry out successful high-profile attacks. 

With guerrilla warfare as one of their staple battlefield strategies, al-Shabaab has been extremely successful in making a name and reputation for themselves through a few well-executed attacks. In September 2013, armed militants killed 67 people and injured more than 200 during a four-day siege at the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya. Then in 2015, Garissa University College in northeastern Kenya was the site of another major attack orchestrated by the group. A number of gunmen entered the campus and murdered 147 people after separating students by religion, immediately killing Christians while releasing Muslims in the deadliest terror attack on Kenyan soil since the U.S. embassy was bombed in Nairobi in 1998. Kenya was, yet again, the target of another shooting in early 2019 as five al-Shabaab members struck the DusitD2 hotel in Nairobi. Three vehicles were bombed in a bank parking lot inside the hotel complex while a suicide bomber detonated inside the hotel lobby, resulting in a 20-hour siege and the deaths of 14 people. These are but a few of al-Shabaab’s deadlier attacks, and while none come close to the impact that al-Qaeda’s September 2001 attack had, they still illustrate the group’s attempts to show both African and American military forces that they are a formidable threat and should be taken seriously.

By bypassing conventional fighting techniques in favor of low risk, small-group attacks, al-Shabaab is relying more on the use of tactics such as improvised explosive devices, patrol ambushes, and assassinations to demonstrate to both the region and the world that they are still able to inflict significant damage. In fact, al-Shabaab was reportedly responsible for over 1,457 deaths in 2017 alone, and their success can be attributed to their rigorous training process. Currently, recruits go through a six-month training program that includes “reading and interpreting the Koran, physical exercise, and weapons handling.”  This process is aided by the group’s impressive adaptability as they employ a hybridization of violent attacks, which helps ensure their sustainability as an organization. Utilization of such methods means the group is unpredictable, making it more difficult for their adversaries to defeat them.

And while al-Shabaab did not form until 2006, their homeland of Somalia is well-known in the American psyche. Somali guerrilla fighters were instrumental actors in the infamous “Black Hawk Down” incident of 1993 which killed 18 American troops in Mogadishu. Somalia, in general, has been a target of American presidents for years, and only recently with the increased risk posed by al-Shabaab has the United States reiterated their commitment to the eradication of terrorism in the state. However, al-Shabaab’s attack history is unlike anything the area has experienced before. While al-Qaeda is known for its use of explosives, usually in the form of car bombs and suicide bombers in front of government buildings, al-Shabaab’s fighting methods center around close-quarter attacks, such as mass shootings at highly populated locations. Whether this makes them more or less deadly than their al-Qaeda affiliate is subjective, but it does indicate the diversity with which these types of groups carry out attacks, as well as the diversity of their targets.

However, despite the group’s sophisticated use of social media and employment of guerrilla warfare tactics, those are but two puzzle pieces in the greater picture that explains why al-Shabaab is a dangerous insurgency movement. While this piece touched upon the fighting tactics and the recruitment strategies utilized by al-Shabaab, there are a number of counterarguments that could be made regarding the limitations of this evidence. First, because al-Shabaab is based out of Somalia, there is very little information available concerning the group’s current numbers and mobilization plans. Insurgency groups tend to be so successful because they remain private, secretive, and often act without warning or notice. While some may argue that this piece fails to provide more concrete evidence and case study examples, it does so to the best of its ability due to a lack of available data and information online. 

Going forth, more research should be conducted on the new era of al-Shabaab because insurgency groups tend to morph over time and through generations. Around the time of their 2013 attack on the Westgate Shopping Mall, the group had endured a reformation and resurgence of sorts under the new Amir, Ahmed Abdi aw-Mohamud Godane. This “reformation” essentially made the group more asymmetrical in design in regards to their fighting strategy, as well as more extremist in nature, as they are now considered “an al-Qaeda franchise in Somalia, imbued with the ‘takfiri’ ethos that legitimizes the killing of other Muslims, and a recommitment to the cause of international jihad.” Further researching this fundamental shift in the way in which the group operates and thinks, as well as their values and goals, may better help scholars understand their behavior and be able to counter it. The international community as a whole must also change the way in which they examine al-Shabaab as an organization. Currently, the international community views al-Shabaab through an “international terrorism” frame, but they fail to acknowledge their “transition toward a greater governing role” in the region. In addition, studying the various elements of transnational terrorist organizations in a general sense allows for an analysis and foundational understanding that can apply to other fields of work that pertain to al-Shabaab, such as rebel governance and state collapse. 

Finally, even though they have only existed for the last 13 years, al-Shabaab has managed to climb the ranks and situate themselves towards the top of the terrorist threat ladder. While ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Boko Haram continue to reign supreme in the world of transnational terrorism, al-Shabaab’s unique fighting tactics and multifaceted recruitment strategies elevate them far above the rest, increasing their threat potential in East Africa. Their sophisticated use of guerrilla warfare and social media, as well as their employment of certain frameworks and rhetoric, demonstrate that al-Shabaab is a transnational terrorist organization that should not be taken lightly. They ultimately pose a serious threat to not only East Africa and the African Union, but also the international community as a whole due to the success of their online outreach efforts.

The Future for Democratic Freedoms and Human Rights in the Gambia

In 2016, Yahya Jammeh, the authoritarian leader of the Gambia for 23 years, was ousted. Since then, democratic freedoms and human rights have begun to return. Under newly elected President Adama Barrow, a sense of democracy has returned to the country. However, in 2019, after analyzing election processes, civilian participation in government, governmental functions, and civil liberties in the Gambia, Freedom House labeled the country "Partly Free," a designation that, while certainly better from previous years under former President Jammeh, still leaves room for improvement. The Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) was created in a 2017 Act to “investigate and establish an impartial historical record of the nature, causes and extent of violations and abuses of human rights committed” during former President Jammeh’s time in office. This is an important step in the right direction. However, human rights activists must continue to defend issues now supported by President Barrow and others in the Gambia, such as LGBTQIA issues and women's rights.

The Truth, Reconciliation and Repatriation Commission 

The Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) covers the Jammeh era from 1994-2017 and possible human rights abuses that occurred during that time. According to the Commission’s mandate, the Commission aims to “investigate and establish an impartial historical record of human rights violations, but to also consider reparations for the victims of abuses, promote reconciliation and promote non-recurrence.” The Commission is also working to look into the hundreds of millions of dollars of public money that had been embezzled by President Jammeh. According to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, over $975 million had been misappropriated from various governmental agencies and state-run entities by President Jammeh, who exerted total control over his government and diverting funds as a retaliatory measure on those who questioned his motivations and actions.  Held at the Dunes Resort, the Commission holds public hearings that are broadcast live on state television, radio, and across social media. This, by all means, is by Gambians and for Gambians. 

Many of the victims under Jammeh’s administration were extrajudicial killings, with the Junglers as the main paramilitary force behind them. Other victims testified to sexual violence, threats to their livelihoods, unfair imprisonment and other rights abuses. Additionally, a number of people who were involved in killings have willingly testified to the TRRC. After the latest session, 21 of 104 witnesses were perpetrators and included the first confirmed Junglers to testify. The Commission has also pledged to take a victim-centered approach, and this has proven effective as victims, particularly those of sexual abuse by former President Jammeh, have come forward. This empowers not only the victims themselves, but civil society, as it shows that truth-telling is an action clearly rewarded.

 As the Commission continues to reach out to the rest of the nation, ensuring all who wish to speak are able to remotely or in-person, this victim-centered approach will continue to be effective as hearings conclude and findings are being finalized. Prosecution of former President Jammeh is still to be determined, but his connection to murders of African migrants, members of the Gambian diaspora, and news media critical of him provide evidence in an ever-growing case against him. 

Public opinion presents a clear goal from the people. According to a survey conducted by AfroBarometer on Gambian’s expectations for the TRRC’s results, “the most frequently cited expected results from the TRRC’s work are national peace, reconciliation, forgiveness, and healing (34%); accurate records of human-rights abuses of the past regime (30%); and prosecution and punishment of persons found guilty of crimes against humanity (28%).” 

Changes Ahead

While efforts to bring back journalists, freedom of speech and expression, and other rights are being conducted, human rights in the Gambia still has room for progress- and President Barrow knows that. The socioeconomic conditions that led to the voting out of President Jammeh were dire, with youth unemployment rising as economic activity continued to slow and knowledge of Jammeh’s excessive spending began to come to light. State media, the main outlet for information dissemination, was a government mouthpiece. Now, social media is one of the main outlets used to broadcast and report on the TRRC proceedings for Gambians domestically and abroad. The Gambian diaspora was instrumental in efforts to unseat Jammeh well before the 2016 election 

The TRRC’s focus on non-recurrence is notable: now that Gambians are able to reflect and see the impact of an authoritarian leader who relied on fear and charisma to get his way, ensuring that the country does not fall back into a similar situation is key. In their 2018 concluding observations, the UNHRC suggested that President Barrow “ensure that the rights enshrined in the Covenant are fully incorporated into the bill of rights of the new Constitution and other relevant domestic legislation and take all measures necessary to ensure that all laws, including customary and sharia laws, are articulated, interpreted and applied in full compliance with the Covenant.” Taking this step would show UN and international observers that the new Gambian government is taking serious steps to institutionalize human rights, and disseminate such practices throughout society using laws and governing documents as the vehicle to do so. 

The implications of the new Gambian government’s efforts for reconciliation are already being seen. While much of the international focus has been on the positive aspects of the TRRC and the new government, there continues to be controversy. One notable example of this is the case of “Operation 3 Years Jotna,” a group that was arrested after an anti-government protest calling on President Barrow to step down after his promised three years, and avoid the recurrence of authoritarianism that the TRRC, one of his most important attributes, is promoting. President Barrow is now seeking to fulfill the five-year term stipulated in the Constitution, rather than be the transitory President he first promised to be. The complexities of reforming an entire political and civil society will take many years, but public discourse is beginning to shift out of favor for President Barrow. Protest is continuing to be seen as a threat, rather than a part of democracy and its processes. 

As women’s and LGBTQ rights become more prominent in global human rights discourse, the Gambia is beginning to address these as well. The case of Fatou Jallow attracted international media attention. Winner of a state-sponsored beauty pageant, she detailed how she and other women became victims of President Jammeh. Human Rights Watch called the former President a “serial, sophisticated sexual predator.” International outcry has been effective in this case; Ms. Jallow is set to appear before the TRRC, and the government has renewed its commitment to equality between the sexes. In the government’s National Development Plan, “Empowering the Gambian Woman to Reach Her Full Potential” is listed as one of the goals of the plan, laid out for the next three years. Media coverage and actions of individuals, such as petitions, have helped NGOs to better serve Gambian women in the beginnings of the post-Jammeh era. However, LGBT Gambians continue to face threats, a result of cultural norms combined with legal discrimination. Former President Jammeh was vocally homophobic throughout his administration, going so far as to call them “anti-human”. President Barrow has simply stated that it is a “non-issue,” since other issues are more pressing at this time. Ambivalence still equals complicity- the case of Modou, a Gambian refugee who had his ear cut off after coming out as gay to his parents, shows that any progress made legally must also be effective in the conservative Gambian society. 

Ensuring Lasting and Effective Action

Changes being made under the Barrow administration, like re-joining the ICC and releasing political prisoners, are indicators that the Gambia can become an exemplary example of a nation that peacefully and effectively transitioned from a dictatorship to a democracy. In bringing awareness to the true extent of injustices committed under President Jammeh, Gambians are increasingly optimistic about justice and a sense of progress. While former President Jammeh is now in exile in Equatorial Guinea, his presence is still felt strongly today.

One area of rights and freedoms where the Gambia can make significant progress is in freedom of the press and expression. Now confirmed through testimonies in the TRRC, journalists were killed for speaking out in opposition against former President Jammeh. As the Gambian journalism industry begins to freely expand once again, and independent media restarts, the transition from self-censorship and fear to more freedoms and expression is an ongoing but incredibly significant process. With laws being revised to promote democratic values, the freedom of the Gambian press is entering a crucial point that can either progress towards democratic ideals or regress into former practices. States and international organizations must work together with the Gambian government and independent news media in the country to help facilitate the training of journalists, and grow the infrastructure for news media outlets and for the public. Improving access to sources such as television, radio, and the internet will allow more Gambians to be aware not only of TRRC proceedings, but also of news across all of the Gambia in a newly free and open media environment.

Additionally, the international community must be aware of the issues around cultural imposition. Regarding LGBT rights, Musu Bakoto Sawo, an anti-FGM activist and member on the TRRC, said in the Mail & Guardian that “For a long time the situation will remain as it is [and] Gambians generally are not going to take LGBT issues easily.” Former President Jammeh framed these issues as ones brought in by the West, and Gambian sentiments around the TRRC reflect a broader desire for self-determination in society; activist Madi Jobarteh said that “Gambians will take offence if foreigners want to promote gay rights in the Gambia.” The international community must ensure that future governmental discourse includes LGBTQ issues as an area for progress. Inclusivity is a focal point of the TRRC and the main reason for its effectiveness. This notion can translate into discussions on the rights of LGBTQ Gambians. 

The TRRC is ultimately working towards the broader goal of creating new values in society. After a generation of dictatorship, fear, and atrocities committed in the name of the government, the proceedings are helping create a new sense of peace and empowerment. Victims are continuing to come forward and the Commission will continue to hold hearings until the end of its two-year mandate. However, issues are arising in how the TRRC is helping facilitate broader political reform. Attila Lajos, EU Ambassador to the Gambia, said in a statement to The Guardian that “if the average Gambian doesn’t feel there’s anything better about this change, I think democracy in this country will not really prevail.” The TRRC will not solve all problems, but it is merely one action that has been taken to begin further, lasting societal change.

Framing this as a “national conversation,” the Commission has set up a Never Again campaign to carry out community-level initiatives. International organizations can help support these initiatives, without overstepping or resorting to neo-colonial practices. The effectiveness of the TRRC can continue though these initiatives, shifting societal mindsets to ones that embrace all the freedoms granted under a new democracy. From literacy and awareness campaigns to ones addressing AIDS and mental health for victims under the Jammeh era, there are many ways that reconciliation can occur far beyond the Dunes Resort. According to the government’s National Development Plan, the EU has pledged 11 million euros to youth employment training, addressing issues of massive youth unemployment and a large, growing diaspora. 

Only time will tell how the TRRC and related actions have affected Gambian society. Unraveling twenty-two years of dictatorship and the atrocities committed is a complex process that will, even with its initial successes, be flawed. As indicated through surveys and actions both supporting and going against the many new changes being introduced by the TRRC and President Barrow’s government, Gambians expect justice for those involved in human rights abuses, and a clear path for the future. The international community has appropriately taken a step back as Gambians themselves are working to learn the truths of--and beginning to move on from--the Jammeh dictatorship. 

The Flaming Lungs of the Earth

Since the beginning of August, international media outlets have been perplexed with the recent fires in the Amazon rainforest, circulating the hashtag “PrayforAmazonia” all over social media. Known as the “lungs of the Earth,” the Amazon rainforest is the world’s largest tropical rainforest, covering much of northwestern Brazil and extending into various other South American countries. The importance of the Amazon rainforest is colossal, however, its recent fires have made people realize the extent to which the human impact of deforestation is threatening the rainforest that produces up to 20 percent of the world’s oxygen. 

David Sirota, a political speechwriter for Bernie Sanders, refers to the Amazon rainforest as “our spaceship's life support system,” and this spaceship's life support system is on fire. In just 2019 alone, Brazil has experienced a breakout of more than 74,000 fires. In 2018, there were about 40,000 fires, and the reason rests solely on human impact, as there is a direct relationship between the outbreak of fires and deforestation. As put forth by the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), the ten municipalities that had the most outbreaks of forest fires in 2019 also had the highest deforestation rates. Unfortunately, a deforested area is worth more in the market than a forested area. During deforestation, the trees are cut down and the land is burned so that it can be cleaned and prepared to house either livestock or be the site of agricultural practices. According to experts, a natural fire would not spread at the rate it currently is. In between the months of January and August, the number of fires has increased by 82 percent. As a matter of fact, forest fires can arise due to a few reasons, yet Ricardo Mello, manager of the Amazon Program of the "World Wide Fund for Nature" in Brazil, states that in the case of the Amazon, almost all of the fires are associated with human activity: “It's the men setting fire. There is no other scenario.” Deforestation happens year-round, however, in the driest months of June, July and August, the fires spread and increase to international proportions.

The fires in the Amazon also pose a serious threat to the populations that depend on it, both human and non-human. Fire spots in indigenous lands, for example, have doubled from 2018 to 2019. There were 5,242 fire spots detected by INPE in 2019, against 2,544 in 2018. In the case of the Karipuna tribe, the fires found at its border are a consequence of the farms surrounding the territory which are deforested and burned to house pasture for livestock. Besides, the Karipuna tribe consists of just about twenty individuals, and as they live in an area threatened by loggers, the tribe is actually under the threat of genocide, according to the Public Ministry. Moreover, indigenous lands make up 7 percent of the burnings, and 23 percent of the Amazon as a whole. On the subject of indigenous tribes, it is a fact that indigenous peoples have the habit of burning fields in the land, however, according to Ane Alencar of the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), this has been going on for thousands of years. Therefore, the increase in outbreaks in these lands can only be explained by the invaders and/or strong periods of drought.

Brazil's Legal Amazon (BLA) is the largest socio-geographic division in Brazil, containing all nine states in the Amazon basin. Created in 1948 it seeks to plan the economic and social development of the Amazon region. Domestically, six of the nine states of the BLA said they had taken new measures in 2019 to curb deforestation and burning, including decreeing a state of emergency, internalizing inspection bases, and setting up their own geoprocessing bodies and local monitoring. In two states, Acre and Amazonas, governments even declared an emergency because of the burning. But even so, it is an extremely difficult task to monitor all sites of deforestation given the dimension of the forest.

Nevertheless, deforestation isn’t a new or modern practice. Why then has  this issue only just become regarded as “important?” The truth lies in the fact that people started to understand the complexity and consequences of deforestation once it affected the richest Brazilian state, São Paulo. On August 19, the population in the Southeast region of the country saw the sky turn black at about 3 PM. Talk of the incident quickly became one of the most trending topics online. At the same time, the black smoke reaches the rain clouds and residents began collecting dark-colored rainwater, which also rapidly spread all over social media. The Institute of Chemistry of the University of São Paulo (USP) tested that rainwater, and identified the presence of “reteno,” a substance derived from biomass burning and considered a burn marker. Consequently, with São Paulo being affected, the fires in the Amazon were noticed quicker by the international community and became an international topic as world leaders manifested themselves and started pressing Brazil on acting upon it.

“The fire that devastates the Amazon rainforest is not only sad, but also an international crisis,” stated United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson. “The magnitude of the fires is worrying and threatens not only Brazil and the other affected countries, but also the whole world,” said Steffen Seibert, Merkel's representative. Protests at Brazilian embassies all around the world took place, celebrities and spokespersons cried out for action, yet Brazil’s President, Jair Bolsonaro, isn’t facilitating change to happen at the pace that it needs to. Due to a personal feud with French President Emmanuel Macron and allegations that all international support is an attack on Brazil’s sovereignty, Brazil has rejected the $22.2 million package from the G-7 nations to help fight the fires. The feud escalated to a point where President Macron has threatened to block the free-trade agreement, Mercosur-E.U., due to President Bolsonaro’s policies. Despite the aid rejection, President Bolsonaro has been open to receiving support from Israel with their airplanes and pilots experienced in fighting fires, as well as complying with President Trump’s willingness to help. This ambivalence shows how rising nationalism, alongside President Bolsonaro’s new government, is hindering international responses to global issues like climate change.

The fires in the Amazon demonstrate a multitude of things about the current global system. First, while it is known how globalization facilitates the spread of information at an increasingly fast pace, as soon as the information reaches a few nations, responsive actions are not that quick. Furthermore, the fires in the Amazon showed the international community that even weeks after multiple fires were taking place, the world’s richest nations pledged to give $22 million, however, in less than 24 hours after the Notre-Dame caught on fire, $945 million have been pledged. The Amazon fires are just an example of how man-made tragedies which directly affect the global population, aren’t dealt with with the same vigor as other devastations. They have shown that pride over sovereignty seems to be more important than the survival of the world’s largest forest.

Prosperous for Whom? Development as a Vehicle of Foreign Policy

In April 2019, the United States’ (U.S.) development finance institution (DFI), the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), signed a memorandum of understanding with the European DFIs and FinDev Canada. In it, they promised to provide viable “alternative[s] to unsustainable state-led models.” That same day, the Malaysian government revived the Chinese rail project with the state-owned China Communications Construction Company, fueling criticisms against China’s “debt-trap diplomacy.” 

Similarly, the U.S. recently unveiled a new strategy towards African countries with the announcement of “Prosper Africa,” an initiative designed to increase two-way trade and investment between the U.S. and Africa. Former National Security Advisor John Bolton remarked that the policy was a national security strategy to ensure that “all U.S aid on the continent will advance U.S. interests” and counter “the predatory practices pursued by China and Russia.” The U.S. has since downplayed such comments, instead focusing on the ‘mutual benefits’ the initiative advances, from expanding trade and investments to support the region’s information and communications technology sector. 

It might be a familiar sight to some: a humanitarian jostle where leaders praise each other for their compassion, foreign aid inflows increase, and politicians accuse each other of using aid for strategic gains. This might appear to be a description of the new geopolitical landscape, but the dynamics observed today are deeply rooted in Cold War development practices, when the Soviet Union (USSR) and the U.S. attempted to gain international prominence and influence countries with the usage of foreign aid. 

Some argue that the Prosper Africa initiative may be promising for U.S. agencies attempting to escape the institutional silos surrounding trade and international development. However, beyond it being an oblique attempt to use Development* as a vehicle for foreign policy, it is an earnest and flawed response to surging competition within the region from actors such as China and the E.U. 

China’s Presence in Africa

Unlike Western constructions of modern development geographies, China has actually been present in the region since the 1950s, when it signed its first bilateral trade agreement with Algeria, Egypt, Guinea, Somalia, and Sudan. It wasn’t until the 2000s, however, that stronger alliances began to emerge: China’s growth created demand for natural resources and employment while a resource-rich Africa offered a plethora of commodities and a need for infrastructure. China has since become Africa’s largest trading partner in 2012, surpassing the U.S. and traditional European partners. Between 2000 and 2014, Chinese financiers provided $86.3 billion to African governments and state-owned enterprises, becoming the largest creditor in the region. This dynamic has led some to criticize China as a rogue donor enticing African nations into “dept-trap diplomacy.” 

In the face of stagnating U.S. involvement in Africa, Chinese investment has increased exponentially. As a McKinsey report on China-African relations found, China has catapulted itself to the regional stage, becoming the top partner for Africa in trade, investment stock and growth, infrastructure financing, and aid. China’s presence in the region has become even more pronounced since the unveiling of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), an unprecedented policy initiative to connect China to Central Asia and Europe through infrastructure, trade, and investment links. 

Despite China insisting that its development partnerships are “mutually beneficial,” Chinese aid is often tied—China’s foreign aid often requires governments to use Chinese goods, services and labor for infrastructure projects—and has followed political motivations similar to that of the U.S. and Soviet Union during the Cold War. As researchers Andreas Fuchs and Marina Rudyak find, Chinese foreign aid is often used as a political tool to advance domestic and foreign policy goals. Using data from 2000 to 2012, research lab AidData claim that if African countries in the United Nations voted with China an extra 10 percent of the time, they would on average get an 86 percent increase in official aid. In the context of “common development,” Chinese foreign aid can instead perhaps be best interpreted as an effort to establish a more favorable environment for China’s own development and support the country’s ascension as a global power. 

E.U. Presence in Africa

As the United States Trade Representatives (USTR) commented on in its 2019 National Trade Competitiveness report, E.U. agreements (EPAs) have been challenging the competitiveness of U.S. investment and trade with African countries. Importantly, as Brookings’ Witney Schneidman and Jay Ireland note, “the proliferation of the [EPAs] provide E.U. goods, services, and companies with tariff advantages with more than 40 African countries.” 

E.U.-Africa relations are at a crossroads; the Cotonou Agreement—a treaty between the E.U. and African, Caribbean, and Pacific groups—expires in 2020 and leaves a unique space for the E.U. and African nations to renegotiate their positions. Such an opportunity aligning with the renewed interest in investment and trade within Africa marks an important turning point to which the E.U. will likely attempt to ‘push’ out its competitors, such as the U.S. and China. 

U.S. Presence in Africa

Foreign aid programs emerged in response to the Cold War and were based on motives that were what scholar Keith Griffin calls “always more political than economic.” The USSR and the U.S. used international development assistance as a tool to encourage political alliances. In the middle of the U.S.’s competition with the USSR, countries would leverage their newfound power to benefit from ideologically driven foreign aid. While the USSR may have disappeared from the world stage, international development as a practice of perpetuating a nation’s objectives has not. 

The U.S. has suspiciously looked at China’s BRI and involvement in Africa as a thinly veiled attempt to expand China’s geopolitical presence. As the relationship between China and the U.S. is tinged with trade tensions and accusations that both are attaching political significance to their development assistance programs, it’s predictable that cooperation between the U.S. and China in the region will be limited. But China only highlights a waning U.S. presence in an increasingly important region. 

Since the 2000s, U.S. foreign aid has focused primarily on the health and education sectors while proving inconsequential in Chinese-dominated sectors. While previous endeavors, such as PEPFAR, had a substantial impact in the region, other dimensions of U.S.-African cooperation have diminished. For example, despite the U.S.’s enactment of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, commercial engagement with African nations resulted in only $39 billion in trade in 2017, while trade between China and Africa amounted to $148 billion. Because the U.S. is the continent’s largest investor, its trade presence should be substantial, but it has found itself unable—or unwilling—to fully leverage its financial presence. Parallel to this, the U.S.’s diplomatic presence has weakened, as European and Asian nations attempt to penetrate the continent with diplomacy, holding countless summits while President Trump has yet to set foot on a single African nation. 

While U.S. investment in Africa since 2017 has been on an upward trend, there has been long-term competitive issues for U.S. trade in Africa as nations such as Russia, China, and notably the European Union’s Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs), have begun to intensify.

Prosperous for Who?

By the end of the century, Africa will be home to 40 percent of the world’s population and provide 42 percent of the global working-age population. In testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations, Brahima Coulibaly testified that “as healthy and productive members of the global economy, the [African] workforce will significantly expand global economic opportunities” and is incredibly important to the success of all nations. 

The inauguration of the Prosper Africa initiative marks a significant policy shift intended to perpetuate neoliberal market mechanisms using development as a vehicle to do so. Such a strategy is additionally borrowing from Cold War policies to counter what the U.S. considers its global competitors. Attaching geopolitical significance to development initiatives while engaging in a larger global contest for power is a common tactic obscured by benevolent narratives of ‘development’ and ‘cooperation’ and one that must be either be deconstructed or rightfully ignored. 

The success of Prosper Africa is, as some suggest, dependent upon its ability to ‘unleash’ the potential of the region through its commercial policies and the project’s ability to increase the magnitude of commercial flows between the U.S. and African nations. 

In examining initiatives such as Prosper Africa, it becomes obvious that the ‘scramble’ for African nations has become a salient instance of a global jostle for power. Importantly, similar to the non-aligned countries during the Cold War, the rivalry may allow nations to leverage their importance to improve their own socio-economic and political status. This premise is one that has been attached to Development for decades: by appropriating or accepting narratives and beliefs of what exactly a ‘successful’ country entails—from its institutions to its economic practices—nations can obtain resources offered by development actors attempting to improve their global influence. However, the continued injection of geopolitical considerations into the development sphere will likely result in projects similar to those that emerged from the Cold War: of dubious value. 

Development projects such as Prosper Africa, the EPAs, and the BRI are poorly veiled attempts to use Development as a vehicle of foreign policy. Development in this manner evokes a static image of nations evolving from ‘unproductive’ to ‘productive’ entities be included within the global system and its economic markets. As such, there can be no recommendations that derive from the premise of Development as it currently stands—a mechanism to create or perpetuate hegemonic norms of how an economy, nation, or people should function. This is, of course, a reality impossible to ignore in the current state of international development. 

As such, in a Foreign Policy article, J. Peter Pham and others argue that for nations, “Chinese loans are neither inherently good nor bad—they will be whatever…nations choose to make of them.” Similar to how they did during the Cold War, nations can take advantage of the recent entries to the development ‘market’ to create a better environment for themselves. 

Instead of projects designed for African nations by non-African countries, leaders and nations across the continent should take advantage of their renewed importance. Though necessary to institute internal mechanisms to prevent crystallization of inequality and despotism as seen during the Cold War, countries in Africa should use the renewed global competition in Development contexts to strengthen their institutions, economies, and own global presence in a manner conducive to their self-defined development. 

*To note, “little d-development” refers to social, economic, and political change occurring ‘naturally’ within a capitalistic model. Conversely, “capital D-Development” implies intentional or deliberate economic, social, and political projects and subsequently change as engineered by nations and development actors.

So Bountiful, So Little: The Paradox of Plenty in Iraq

One would commonly think that countries with an abundance of resources would be economically developed and have a large number of opportunities. This theory, however, is the complete opposite for many countries that have an abundance of high-value natural resources. The resource curse is a common economic theory used to describe the lack of economic development in a specific country despite the abundance of natural resources. Normally the exporting of these natural resources generates high levels of government revenues. Dating back to periods of colonialism, the resource curse is seen contemporarily in developing economies. The challenges to escape the resource curse prove that it is a multifaceted issue that must suffer through a long arduous process. 

Within developing countries, the resource curse is manifested through a country’s allocation of all resources towards the production of one particular good. Resources such as fossil fuels are a prime example of a natural resource where economies place all their efforts towards the production of one specific good. Given the high demand for oil globally, improper management of these natural resources could negatively impact nations politically and economically. Dependency on volatile markets such as oil transitively makes countries more vulnerable to any shift within the market. Economies with these characteristics, economic shocks will cause countries to be inept to face these challenges. Valued commodities like fossil fuels only perpetuate the resource curse in developing countries even further. With an abundance of these high valued commodities, countries commonly fall under revenue mismanagement, corruption or political instability. 

One way that citizens feel the burden of the resource curse is through the lack of economic mobility or opportunities. Other burdens citizens feel are undeveloped or non-diverse economies where job opportunities are concentrated on one specific country. Out of all parties which are affected by the resource curse, citizens arguably could be impacted the most. The lack of contribution citizens to have to better manage these natural resources results in citizens facing consequences made by national governments. In some instances, efforts made by governments to better manage their natural resources end up being more harmful than beneficial. It is for this reason escaping the resource curse could be so challenging or complex. 

While all countries experience unique forms of the resource curse, there are still fundamental qualities that can be seen throughout all of them. First, there is an abundance of a natural resource which generates a substantial amount of economic activity. Second, there is an immense dependency on one sector of the economy. Third, an identifying factor of the resource curse in countries is revenue mismanagement. Specific countries such as Iraq which have experienced extreme cases of these three factors make the country a balanced case study to show the harsh consequences of the resource curse and the many strategies which need to be met for the country to elevate themselves from the resource curse. 

Located within the Gulf region, Iraq is one of the highest fossil fuel producing countries in the world. As a founding member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Iraq has found itself to be in a position of great significance in the global oil market. This significant role however in the market as well as being one of the top exporters in the country has not benefited the country overall. Iraq’s economic strategy in their fossil fuel sector are examples of mistakes many countries who are under the resource curse take. More specifically, Iraq’s lack of economic diversity, historical problems with revenue management, and political instability intensify the effects that are felt by the citizens. 

Common to most countries who are caught under the resource, Iraq is completely dependent upon the revenues generated from the oil sector. More specifically, Iraq’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2017 was 89 percent reliant on the revenue of the oil sector. This dependency on the oil sector has caused Iraq to be economically vulnerable to any shock the economy faces. The lasting impacts of different political or economic shocks in Iraq’s society reflect its inability to recover from these shocks. Iraq’s lack of economic diversification and efficient revenue management has only negatively impacted its citizens. 

Iraq’s most impactful consequence of the resource curse is its historical process of revenue management. When countries have a significant amount of revenue from a single industry, revenue management will allocate any surplus of revenue into different parts of the economy for a sustainable economy. Iraq, however, has experienced extreme cases of revenue mismanagement. In 1995, Iraq was placed under harsh sanctions by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in light of their invasion into Kuwait. Noticing how impactful these sanctions were to Iraqis, the UNSC established Iraq’s “Oil for Food Program” which allowed Iraq to export oil and the revenues from these transactions would be used to increase the food supply and other necessary commodities for citizens. This ideal situation of revenue management, however, never occurred. The money generated from fossil fuel transactions were used by dictator Sadam Hussein to increase the country’s military capacity. Due to the lack of oversight of this program corruption surrounding the sales made from oil in Iraq and little of the sales made were allocated for resources for citizens. 

Another factor that stunts Iraq’s economic development is their dependency on the fossil fuel sector and the little which has been done to diversify their economy. Countries outside of Iraq, face similar situations where a significant amount of their GDP stems from one sector of the economy. To lessen the burden of this situation, countries have established different financial tools to mitigate the effects of economic shifts. One common tool used by countries in similar predicaments as Iraq is the establishment of sovereign wealth funds. Sovereign wealth funds are state-owned funds that are compiled through excess revenues of a flourishing economy. These funds could hold different purposes: social safety nets for citizens, pensions funds, or economic resilience usage. While the purposes are different, at the heart of it all, sovereign wealth funds allocate revenues from successful sectors and put aside for the betterment of the country in the long run. Despite the pattern neighboring countries have taken, Iraq has not established an official sovereign wealth fund. Without any form of safety net in place, it only makes Iraq more vulnerable to economic shocks. 

Policy Recommendation

Given Iraq’s history in the global oil market as well as the fundamental challenges which follow the resource curse, Iraq should reconsider the management of their revenues from their exports in trade. At the core of all recommended reforms are needed to cater to different policies towards the benefits of citizens rather than key elites or dominating sectors. Through the establishment of a sovereign wealth fund, it would ensure that future generations are given the necessary tools to be economically resilient. While the cost and process may be long and arduous, economic diversification will allow for Iraq to diversify its GDP., which will subsequently cause a positive ripple effect to spread out through different sectors of the economy and society. Reforming Iraq’s most powerful economic sector will harness the success generated and invest back into society to benefit citizens more than trading partners.

Republican Preservation in an Evolving Environment: A Review of Voter Suppression in Texas

At the start of the 21st century, Texas held the curious, if not bemused, attention of the national political establishment. As the state that launched George W. Bush’s political career, it became associated with the 44th president’s drawl, swagger, and occasional aloofness. During the Obama Administration, Texas gained a sort of ‘rebellious’ reputation with the rise of conservative hardliner Ted Cruz, the freshman senator responsible for shutting down the government, and lead state officials like Greg Abbott, who reportedly boasted, “I go into the office in the morning, I sue Barack Obama, and I go home.” To Republicans, Texas was a dreamy conservative promised land complete with fields of oil derricks and suburban megachurches. To Democrats, the Lone Star State was something to chuckle at.

Since 2016, however, Texas has taken on a more serious light in the eyes of both Democrats and Republicans alike. The former sees a purple-tinted jewel of 38 electoral votes, taking careful note of Hillary Clinton’s returns in suburban areas, flipped districts in Houston and Dallas, and of course, the ill-fated yet groundbreaking Senate campaign by Beto O’Rourke. The latter, on the other hand, sees a longtime conservative bastion becoming vulnerable to shifting demographics, charismatic Democrats, and dissatisfaction with the president.

In spite of the impending political threat, Texas Republican legislators maintain a comfortable hold on state and federal offices. They took note of the changing tide long before the rest of the country, and instead of gaping or griping, have largely secured their positions with effective, albeit unethical, measures. By passing restrictive voting laws and fighting the federal government at every turn, they have, in one progressive operator’s words, employed a “panoply of voter suppression” techniques in order to offset the effects of their evolving electorate. This article seeks to catalog such instances of suppression, examining their foundation in law and their efficacy in diminishing the value of or eliminating entirely, the votes of Texans.

Voter Identification Laws

Voting Rights Act of 1965

To understand Texas voting laws, one must first know the substance of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965 and how it has evolved over time. Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the VRA emerged as a culmination of decades of fighting for African-American suffrage. Although the 15th Amendment of the Constitution legally afforded African-American (males) the right to vote, discriminatory and restrictive measures began to flourish in northern and southern states alike, such as the implementation of poll taxes and literacy tests designed to bar black voters. Congressional measures and the 24th Amendment, which specifically prohibited poll taxes, only stalled voter suppression efforts as anti-suffragists discovered new tactics. The VRA served as a comprehensive assault on discrimination at the polls, and its subsequent reauthorizations and expansions have largely cemented its place as a powerful tool in supporting citizens in their right to vote.

Sections 2 and 5 are most pertinent to contemporary voting rights. Plain and simple, Section 2 enables the Attorney General as much as free citizens the right to challenge discriminatory voting practices, be they in regards to gerrymandering, voter identification laws, or the location of polling places. Under Section 2, plaintiffs must prove that state, district, or municipal voting practices are discriminatory in “a totality of circumstances,” essentially meaning that all known facts regarding historical discrimination and racial-based voting patterns can be included as evidence.

Whereas Section 2 acts as a kind of ‘opt-in’ procedure for challenging voting procedures and practices, Section 5 serves as an automatic check, establishing a federal review process for jurisdictions with histories of voter disenfranchisement. Section 4 of the VRA, now derelict, worked in tandem with Section 5, providing the formula to determine which jurisdictions were subject to Section 5 procedure. Those that were had to notify the Department of Justice (DOJ) of any alterations to voting policy, which then underwent a review process known as “preclearance.” Either the attorney general or a three-judge panel from the federal district court would then approve or disapprove of the changes submitted.

Shelby County v. Holder

Everything changed in 2013 following a decision handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court, Shelby County v. Holder. Declared by five votes to four, with Republican-appointed justices in the majority and Democratic-appointed justices dissenting, Shelby County repealed Section 4 of the VRA, effectively gutting Section 5’s mandate. Speaking for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts argued that the Section 4 formula was outdated, claiming that Congress had not reviewed it closely enough during the 2006 reauthorization. However, it should be noted that in 2006, both Sections 4 and 5 were reauthorized by Congress for 25 years with wide bipartisan support (390-33 in the House, 98-0 in the Senate). In her dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg compared the cessation of the functional preclearance procedures to “throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”

Texas Senate Bill 14

In 2011, the Texas State Legislature passed Senate Bill 14 (S.B. 14) requiring its citizens to display approved photo identification at the polls. If potential voters could not provide an approved ID, they would not be allowed to cast a ballot. Previously, Texans could sign an affidavit affirming to who they were and present forms of more informal identification, such as bills, paychecks, or expired IDs.

The problems with voter ID laws are well documented. For starters, the ACLU reports that 11% of Americans –that is, over 21 million– lack government-issued identification. In Texas specifically, roughly 600,000 people, or 4.5% of registered voters, do not possess the required ID under S.B. 11., a disproportionate number of which are African-American or Latino. 

What causes these racial disparities? The short answer is money and access. Forms of identification that may be considered common members of the middle and upper socioeconomic classes –driver’s licenses, passports, or Texas identification cards– are not necessary in the everyday lives of poorer citizens. Furthermore, not only do some forms of identification require a literal fee, but the time-consuming application process can take away from childcare or time at work.

This problem is exacerbated in rural areas of the state, where securing a driver’s license or Texas identification card could require a 100-mile round trip. Even in metropolitan areas, access to a Department of Public Safety (DPS) office can be difficult for low-income citizens. Public transportation is not as commonly used in the sprawling cities of Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio, as it might be in New York or Washington, D.C. This further disenfranchises citizens of color; according to an expert witness involved in S.B. 11-related litigation, the percentage of eligible-to-vote African-Americans and Latinos living in households without cars is greater than the percentage of eligible-to-vote whites living in households with a car. The specific forms of identification deemed acceptable by the Texas State Legislature seem to target older, white voters while excluding citizens of color; as one American Politics Research article observes, Texas concealed carry handgun licenses, the majority of which are owned by whites, are considered acceptable, while public university student IDs and social service cards are not.

S.B. 14 was immediately blocked and subject to federal review under Section 5 of the VRA, so the State of Texas filed for preclearance with Attorney General Eric Holder shortly after the bill’s passage. In 2012, Attorney General Holder concluded that Texas could not prove the bill did not have retrogressive effects, noting that “Hispanic registered voters are more than twice as likely as non-Hispanic registered voters to lack” an ID approved under the new law. He added that 81 of the state’s 254 counties lacked DPS offices, a sizeable obstacle for would-be voters seeking identification. The State of Texas pursued the alternative legal avenue under Section 5 only to meet the same fate when the federal district court concluded that S.B. 11 “imposes strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor.”

However, after the Shelby County decision in 2013, Texas no longer needed to submit new voting laws for federal review, and S.B. 14 was put into full force. Immediately after the announcement, multiple plaintiffs filed complaints under Section 2 of the VRA in Veasey v. Perry, basing their case in some of the aforementioned disparities. The State of Texas countered that S.B. 11 combatted voter fraud and actually had the potential of increasing turnout via popular faith in the electoral system. This battle waged back and forth through 2017, with the plaintiffs winning cases only to face appeals by Texas’ lawyers. Ultimately, having spent millions of dollars on litigation fees, Texas provided a legislative substitute for S.B. 11: S.B. 5. 

Texas Senate Bill 5

The revised bill won approval from the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in April of 2018, though the Veasey v. Perry plaintiffs noted that it made only “scant changes” and still carries “the discriminatory strain of its predecessor.” The changes, indeed, were few. “Passports,” defined by S.B. 11 as acceptable identification, would be clarified to include passbook cards and books as well. The permitted timespan of expiration for an ID was extended from 60 days to four years. Most notably, the bill created the Reasonable Impediment Declaration (RID), a concept somewhat reminiscent of the provisional ballot. A citizen without an acceptable form of identification first fills out a declaration, which requires a serious of informal identification documents (e.g. utility bill or bank statement) and an explanation as to why the citizen lacks permitted identification. Veasey v. Perry plaintiffs note that the form bears a threat of prosecution for perjury if the potential voter lies or misstates his or her information.

Although the RID appears to be a step in the right direction, it remains a cumbersome, unnecessary step in what should be an easy task for all registered voters. As 2018 was the first election in which RIDs played a role, future studies will have to evaluate the frequency of their usage and their overall effect on voter turnout. That said, the placement of a threat of felony outlined at the bottom of the application is likely a deliberate attempt to dissuade less-educated voters befuddled by the legalese and scared of the possibility of prosecution. All in all, voter ID laws, albeit watered-down, live on in Texas.

Voter Registration Laws

While voter ID laws play a major role in suppressing the vote, Texas’ anti-voting efforts start well before the polls. According to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR), Texas ranked 44th in voter registration in 2016, with only 68% of eligible voters registered. Not only is turnout prematurely doomed under these conditions, but the voting electorate –largely white and older– selects congressional and state delegates not representative of their districts.

Texas Election Code

The crux of the issue lies with Texas Election Code statutes that dictate who can legally register voters. Anyone who seeks to register voters must undergo Volunteer Deputy Registrar (VDR) training sessions, the availability of which varies from county to county. The USCCR notes that Harris County, made up of the ethnically diverse city of Houston, offers VDR sessions in both Spanish and English with regularity; however, Bexar County, which encompasses San Antonio, only offers training once a month during business hours, an inopportune time for working Texans. Likely as a result of this, Bexar County had roughly 1,000 VDRs registering voters in a city of 1.5 million during the 2016 election. Although Texas statutes require it, voter registration materials and VDR training sessions are not adequately provided in some counties, indicating a breakdown in enforcement of electoral law. Furthermore, The Nation observes that VDRs can only register potential voters from the county in which they were deputized, a problematic requirement considering that city limits typically stretch across state county lines. This, paired with a lack of standardized procedure from county to county, makes the large-scale voter registration campaigns seen in other parts of the country virtually impossible.

Abuse of Power

While the election law itself is problematic, the Texas government has also severely abused its authority in efforts to suppress registration numbers. In 2010, then-attorney general Abbott ordered the raid of Houston Votes, an organization dedicated to registering low-income voters in north Houston. State officers swarmed the group’s office in bulletproof vests and confiscated computers and documents. Abbott alleged that the group committed voter fraud, but following a year-long investigation, no charges were ever filed. Abbott’s office destroyed the computers and records it confiscated, and Houston Votes, having lost its funding during the controversy, was forced to close. Cases like this deter successful national organizations from working in Texas; the president of the now-defunct Project Vote –which registered over 5.5 million voters in two decades of operation– told The Nation that “there was no way that [Project Vote] could do voter-registration work [in Texas] without the risk of prosecution.” Texas Republican leaders learned that aggressive legal action, even without evidence of crime, drained the time and funding of registration groups, dissuading them from democratic participation.

In a similar vein, Texas officials have also attempted to purge voters from its electoral rolls. In 2012, two months before Election Day, state election officials sent over 80,000 notices to individuals who were “potentially deceased,” requiring them to submit proof they were alive within 30 days or be deregistered to vote. While there is no evidence the individuals were specifically targeted, NPR notes that people of color would face greater barriers to ensuring they remain registered. After four “deceased” voters sued, the State of Texas was forced to cease its efforts to purge voters, and the matter was put to rest – for the time being. In January of 2019, Texas Secretary of State David Whitley flagged nearly 100,000 registered voters under suspicions that they were not citizens, perhaps hoping to benefit off of the revived national discourse on voter fraud; indeed, President Donald Trump has repeatedly decried fraudulent voting despite the abundance of research that indicates its extreme rarity. Whitley was forced to rescind his list after it became clear it was issued in poor faith, but the case again exemplifies ignominious, self-serving conduct on the part of Texas’ so-called leaders. U.S. District Judge Fred Biery, who temporarily stayed Whitley’s purge in February, put it best in his scathing four-page opinion: 

…perfectly legal naturalized Americans were burdened with what the Court finds to be ham-handed and threatening correspondence from the state, which did not politely ask for information but rather exemplifies the power of government to strike fear and anxiety and to intimidate the least powerful among us. No native born Americans were subjected to such treatment.

It suffices to say that Texas could use more public servants like Judge Biery.

Partisan Redistricting

Nationally, gerrymandering is a technique used by both Democrats and Republicans depending on who holds the state legislature at the time of redistricting. As the Texas House and Senate have long been in Republican control, it should be no surprise as to what party is overwhelmingly guilty. For decades, Section 5 of the VRA served as a degree of oversight on Texas Republican leaders as redistricting qualifies as a change in voting practice, but since its repeal in 2013, Republicans have been brash in their attempts to favorably redraw district lines. One case stands above the rest in terms of both controversy and consequence, both for Texas and the rest of the United States.

Abbott v. Perez

Although the rate of Latino population growth in Texas is considerable, it has not yet been fully reflected in political representation. Some of this may do with barriers in registration and identification, but as the plaintiffs in Abbott v. Perez would contest, redistricting is also responsible for the suppression of Latino voters.

Following the 2010 census, an increase in population provided Texas with four additional seats in the House of Representatives and required it to redraw a handful of congressional and statehouse districts. In 2011 and 2013, the Texas Legislature passed these new maps into law. However, after the ratification of the maps in 2011, minority rights groups filed lawsuits citing violations of Section 2 of the VRA – later, the lawsuits were amended to take into account the maps from 2013. Although the cases differed in detail, the underlying theme was that Texas legislators had intentionally drawn the maps to devalue or discount minority votes. In some cases, this meant deftly and maliciously swapping high-turnout Latino voters with low-turnout Latino voters – that way, a claim of race-based voter discrimination could be tossed out.

Much like the litigation surrounding S.B. 11, the series of cases was drawn out over several years. In 2017, the majority of both the 2011 and 2013 maps were deemed unconstitutional and in violation of Section 2, a resounding victory for voting rights activists. However, Texas appealed the decision regarding the 2013 maps, ultimately taking the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Again, the justices fell in line by appointee party, and the court overturned the ruling. Writing for the dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned that the decision “comes at serious costs to our democracy.” She continued: “It means that, after years of litigation and undeniable proof of intentional discrimination, minority voters in Texas—despite constituting a majority of the population within the State—will continue to be underrepresented in the political process.” Only after the next redistricting period will we discover if she is right – for now, Texas Republicans will reap the benefits of their customized constituencies.

Conclusion

By limiting opposition at the polls with voter ID requirements, restrictive registration laws, and partisan redistricting, Republicans have maintained firm control of state and federal positions in spite of an evolving constituency. Regarding voter ID laws, they outlasted the oversight measures outlined in Section 5 of the VRA and now possess the liberty to further heighten barriers at the polls. Only congressional action to restore Section 4’s formula could revive preclearance proceedings, and without hold of the Senate or White House, Democrats do not possess the capability of doing so. Republican ability to restrict voter registration in Texas was never in doubt provided its grounding in state law; in order to combat it, Democrats would have to continue waging exciting grassroots campaigns in the style of Beto O’Rourke, creating an extensive network of registered voters and volunteers. Lastly, the future of gerrymandering remains unsure, but as redistricting nears, and the Supreme Court turns ever redder, Democrats should anticipate an even sharper turn for the worst. The environment may be changing, but Republicans have rewritten the rules, ensuring their political preservation for the near future.

A Look at Healthcare Infrastructure: Vaccination and Disease Prevention

Healthcare infrastructure is understood as the “nerve center of the public health system.” It encompasses the capacity of a governing system on the issues of disease prevention, health promotion, and the ability to respond to both acute and urgent emergencies. A solid infrastructure is imperative in evaluating health needs and appropriately delivering and improving the public health of a given area. Collectively, public health and various health systems work to achieve a higher standard for global health. Global health is important and impacts everyone, as global health is imperative for global security and the security of individual populations. Without a solid foundation, individual populations are susceptible to weak public health, which can have a domino effect in the greater scheme of global health and endanger the health of others. 

Healthcare is a hot-button issue, something that’s incredibly evident in the United States (U.S.) domestic politics; policymakers and concerned citizens often wrangle with conflicting ideas about what constitutes an adequate healthcare system. It is easy to scapegoat some forms of healthcare as socialism, but what is often ignored is the nuanced nature of healthcare systems. One of the primary issues posed to various healthcare systems is disease prevention and vaccination and in the time of anti-vaxxers, disease prevention is of paramount importance when considering public health risks. 

One could examine countless cases and healthcare discourses in order to explore and understand the intricate manner in which healthcare systems exist and operate, but some particularly intriguing cases include Sweden, Brazil, the U.S., and Pakistan. These countries not only reflect regional healthcare differences but also highlight different ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ of each respective health system.

Sweden

Sweden’s healthcare system follows a decentralized model, which means that Sweden is broken down into 290 municipalities and 20 city councils. These city councils or other forms of local government are responsible for overseeing healthcare administration. Each city council has the ability to set the tax rates which fund the healthcare system in tandem with patient fees and selling services. 

Fortunately, Sweden currently sustains high vaccination rates, with approximately 97 percent of its citizens receiving three doses of two major vaccinations intended to prevent diphtheria, pertussis--also known as whooping cough--and tetanus, as well as measles, mumps, and rubella. While these vaccination rates seem high, there are still issues of individual cases and sporadic outbreaks of these vaccine-preventable diseases. Aside from vaccinations, Sweden has implemented a national standard for disease prevention, with three types of prevention exercises revolving around counseling: brief advice, counseling, and advances counseling. 

Sweden is typically revered for its high health standards. Sweden’s 97 percent major vaccination rate is high, and certainly worthy of praise. However, some consider Sweden’s healthcare system weak in their prevention methods, such as counseling. Counseling is seen as a method to mitigate the primary challenge around the world: health literacy. Health literacy is considered to be an adequate understanding of healthcare instruction and one’s ability to protect their health and wellness. While disease prevention counseling is useful, it doesn’t account for patients that are less proactive in relation to health, or for those patients that live in rural areas and face accessibility issues. Sweden can make improvements to their already solid health system by promoting more effective prevention tactics, to prevent outbreaks of preventable diseases. However, the country’s main area of concern, which can be seen in other nations, is addressing the issue of accessibility. Greater accessibility would allow rural populations to receive the same resources that more central locations are afforded. Without a greater awareness for people that live far from cities, nations like Sweden cannot achieve the highest standard of health, which is something all governments should strive for. 

While other healthcare systems, like those in Brazil, do not share the same high rates of vaccination, there have been more advances toward increasing these vaccine rates, which benefits the overall population of the nation. 

Brazil

Brazil’s healthcare infrastructure accounts for the largest healthcare market in all of Latin America. However, the vast majority of healthcare administration in Brazil is owned by private providers, which leaves most of Brazil with few public options. The public option in Brazil is typically regarded as underfunded and without adequate equipment, which motivates most Brazilian people to gravitate toward the private option. In order to bridge this issue, the public option has been receiving investments from private options. This privatizes healthcare and allows providers to operate regionally. 

Brazil, similar to many other countries, also has a mandate within its legal policy that requires citizens to receive specific vaccinations. However, due to their weak public health infrastructure,  many of these vaccinations are not easily obtainable. Most individuals must, therefore, seek these vaccinations by a private option. Many regions in Brazil are susceptible to yellow fever, rabies, typhoid fever, dengue fever, malaria, and Chagas Disease. There are also ongoing incidents of measles, mumps, rubella, hepatitis A/B, tetanus, and diphtheria. Some vaccinations, if deemed necessary, are mandated by the Brazilian government and parents that do not get their children vaccinated are susceptible to legal charges. These vaccinations are strongly recommended to tourists, contingent on where they are visiting, as certain areas are more susceptible to transmissible diseases than others. Though the Brazilian government is attempting to enforce these vaccinations, approximately 1 in 5 children in Brazil die from vaccine-preventable diseases. Regarding disease prevention, there has been a push for an increase in testing for HIV/AIDS, which remains as one of the top ten causes of death in Brazil. 

Brazil’s strengths can be seen in recent action toward increased testing and prevention measures for HIV/AIDS. Additionally, another strong element of Brazilian healthcare is its government-mandated vaccinations. The Brazilian government has the ability to charge parents who do not vaccinate their children with child abuse, which reaffirms the government’s commitment to disease prevention and eradication. The primary weaknesses of this system are a lack of an adequate of a public option, which leaves many people in Brazil with an inability to access vaccinations that are typically monopolized by the private sector. This reveals the undertone of power dynamics, and how that has contributed toward inequalities in Brazilian healthcare. 

Brazil has exemplified a strong implementation of better preventative measures, but the first step toward improvements in Brazil should be increasing health equity. This can be achieved by the Brazilian government promoting and improving public options for health, which would allow more people to access healthcare, rather than by exploring expensive private options that are unlikely to reach rural areas. If healthcare in Brazil were higher on the list of the government’s priorities, Brazil would be able to avoid future public health crises and begin to alleviate the issue of healthcare acting as a means to segregation. Unfortunately, inequality and power dynamics occur in many other health systems, like the United States. 

The United States

Currently, the United States operates under a market-based insurance system. This allows for high insurance prices, which leaves many people unable to obtain insurance or face high deductibles that disincentivize people from seeking care. While public options do exist, most resources come from private options, which are either purchased through an independent insurance agency or a benefit through certain jobs. Private options allow these private providers to curate their facilities in specific fashions, such as in specific locations or with specific deductibles. 

Approximately 90 percent of children in the United States have received vaccines that are responsible for the prevention of measles, mumps, and rubella, as well as tetanus and diphtheria. The American Academy of Pediatrics has also released guidelines intended to encourage parents to vaccinate their children and prevent sixteen easily preventable diseases. While vaccination methods are effective, there is still a portion of people against vaccinations, which counts for less than 10 percent of the U.S. population. Disease prevention is typically contingent on the primary care provider, but the Center for Disease Control, which is a federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services tasked with supporting health promotion, prevention/preparedness, and promoting public health, does make a conscious effort to release disease prevention guidelines. 

The United States has a strong ability to access vaccines and various technologies that make disease prevention and control feasible, as well as an adequate resource of vaccinations. The primary weakness exemplified in this healthcare system is the evident barriers between healthcare provision that leaves many both uninsured or underinsured. Additionally, free-market systems have the ability to allow private healthcare providers to be more selective about who they serve, and therefore perpetuate racial, gender, socioeconomic and other types of disparities that propagate discrimination in various forms. Similar to Brazil, the United States is responsible for utilizing healthcare as a means of segregation. Many populations are left marginalized by a free-market health system. The first step toward mending the health system in the United States would require limiting the drug lobby that is responsible for price gouging and pigeonholing many Americans into seeing healthcare as a privilege, rather than a right. The next step would be to break up private corporations that are responsible for hospital closures and inadequate healthcare in segregated areas. Overall, the United States has the means to achieve a high standard of healthcare, but the primary issues come from lobbyists that promote keeping prices high, and lowering the quality of care for patients. 

While the United States has generally well-developed health mechanisms, other nations like Pakistan face the issue of a shattered health workforce, which weakens the overall infrastructure and inhibits positive growth. 

Pakistan

Similar to Brazil, Pakistan has a large private health sector, with a dwindling public health sector. Public options and their regulations are handled by provincial governments, except for certain federally regulated areas. Healthcare is typically handled through disease-specific agencies, in some instances. However, healthcare in Pakistan is not easily accessible for certain regions or groups. Additionally, the healthcare system is becoming increasingly weak due to a shortage of healthcare professionals. 

Pakistan has one of the highest mortality rates among children in the world. This can be partially attributed to the vaccination system that has vaccinated between 56-88 percent of children vaccinated, depending on which vaccination. This is the same system that has been unable to eradicate certain diseases, such as polio, Most disease prevention tactics are left to a primary care provider. Therefore, there seems to be a lack of prevention measures taking place within the medical system, in both public and private options. This is likely due to health systems focusing more on increasing accessibility for healthcare in rural areas, promoting a better healthcare workforce, and increasing nutrition information. In order for Pakistan to achieve a stronger health system, Pakistan should prioritize education. By utilizing education as a means, more people will be inclined to be proactive when it comes to their health. This will create a stronger healthcare workforce, which will set the stage for a stronger health infrastructure at large. 

Pakistan’s stance on disease-specific agencies is a strength within its healthcare because it allows specialists to care for patients, based on their own specialties. Weaknesses include general disorganization and inconsistencies among the healthcare infrastructure, which has allowed easily preventable diseases to run rampant, a disparity of healthcare workers, and an extreme lack of health literacy. 

Concluding Remarks

While each case is vastly different and depends on the goals of governments, the status quo, and access to resources, the common trend of the weaknesses of each system has to do with the power dynamics in each respective nation. This goes to show that as much as various topics within the fabric of international relations and affairs that these topics are often tied to power dynamics that are responsible for the marginalization of certain groups. Therefore, at the global level, it is important to hold organizations that wield an unfair amount of power accountable for their actions. This can include, but is not limited to, private health corporations and policymakers. 

Additionally, global health can benefit from strengthening the relationship between health and education. By increasing health literacy, more people will be able to be self-sufficient regarding healthcare, as well as have a greater understanding of the variety of health practices and a stronger sense of prevention and preparedness in the face of various health threats, whether it be the common cold or HIV infections.

President Bukele’s Firm Rule: When Being Authoritative is Expected of You

When Nayib Bukele was sworn in as president of El Salvador on June 1, 2019, he knew he had a huge burden. He became a leader of a nation struggling with poverty and extreme gang violence. Of course, Bukele did not come into this position unprepared. He is prepared to continue tackling corruption and stabilizing the economy, a mission he began as a mayor of San Salvador, El Salvador’s capital, where he stood behind many urban development projects. His campaign was also unique and promising. Instead of engaging in traditional presidential debates and going on tours around the country, he chose to use social media like Facebook and Twitter to reach as many people as possible. Indeed, this approach gave him a large platform, making him the first president in the last 30 years to not come from one of the two parties associated with the civil war that occurred during the 1980s. No other president since the turbulent era of the civil war has had such an overwhelming majority in the polls; Bukele reached 53 percent. Bukele’s populist campaign, overwhelming public support, and belief that every citizen of El Salvador deserved security, parks, and a reliable income sounded like a dream come true to many individuals. More importantly, Bukele has been able to follow through on most of his promises by making a robust anti-corruption body, mercilessly combating the violence and horror brought by gangs, and strengthening ties with the United States (U.S.) and the Organization of American States (OAS). However, all of this was done through very firm, authoritarian-esque actions, which, though they seem to come from the best intentions, may easily push El Salvador into yet another dictatorial era.

Corruption is one of the strongest underlying issues within the Salvadoran government. There is a lengthy list of past presidents accused of corruption, with notable examples including Elias Antonio Saca who, as Al Jazeera observes, is still jailed serving a 10-year sentence for corruption, as well as an additional two years due to bribery during his court proceedings. Furthermore, Mauricio Funes, his successor, is in exile in Nicaragua due to corruption charges, which proves that El Salvador has faced substantial governance issues. As Bukele himself noted, things cannot get much worse, and striking down the ridiculous corruption levels must be a priority. Interestingly, Bukele has already involved the OAS in his effort to combat corruption in El Salvador. As the Americas Society/Council of the Americas explains, the executive branch of the Salvadoran government, in partnership with OAS, created the International Commission against Corruption and Impunity in El Salvador (CICIES), which will operate in a similar manner to bodies in both Honduras and Nicaragua and aims to include international efforts to stop corruption within the highest levels of government. While this will surely shed light on current malpractices, a United Nations (UN) High Commissioner for Human Rights has tweeted concerns about the fact that no journalists or media outlets were allowed in the room where the agreement was being signed. Additionally, Bukele has yet to involve the UN as a larger, more international body in the process, although this is certainly not a required step in the process seeing as how Bukele’s choice to involve the OAS is already a significant step considering the country’s governance history. Thus, while there are important steps being made, there are also some fairly concerning aspects regarding transparency and engagement given that the press and the UN are not as engaged in the agreement process.

Furthermore, there were similar trends of effective, determined actions taken by the president as he was arranging and rearranging key officials. More specifically, Bukele has fired a significant number of officials through Twitter. These are all relatives of the previous presidents, most notably Claudia Sanchez Villalta, daughter of former president Sanchez Ceren, which shows that the president is battling nepotism very well. However, the fact that all of these “orders” have been given out over Twitter and during the first week in his office could be red flags that the president’s office is preparing to normalize these sudden changes. If this is the case, then such actions can result in the banning of opposition and even more authoritative actions. Considering that he is barely past 100 days into his presidency, it would be difficult to predict the outcomes, but one can see that he is ready for bold strategic steps, which both aid the realization of his revolutionary projects and require independent decisions on his part, allowing him quite an authoritative position. 

Finally, there is the infamous problem of gangs in the country, and Bukele is as determined and effective in this field as in others. He has installed, as AS/COA notes, a $31 million Territorial Control Plan, which has awakened a greater sense of security among the population. While El Salvador rarely sees a day pass without a homicide, there is a slow but steady decline in the average number of homicides per day. This trend may not be related to Bukele’s administration alone as it has been ongoing since 2016, meaning that there is a greater chance that it is related to gang truces and gang behavior independent of the administration or police action. In any case, the fact that the public feels safer and that there are more patrols on the streets makes Bukele’s decision worthwhile. 

Continuing with this trend of taking bold action, Bukele has also appointed Mauricio Arriaza Chicas as the new director of the National Police. While Arriaza Chicas largely contributed to the revival of the armed forces post-civil war and is someone who is capable of getting the job done, it is worth noting that he is also accused of procedural fraud and human rights abuses. This naturally brings concerns as to how Bukele’s strict policy with gangs is going to play out. Given that gangs are born out of violence and that previous aggressive policies, such as Franciso Flores’s “Mano Dura,” have resulted in more violence, stronger responses from the youth population, and clogging of the courts, it is questionable whether such a strict stance and tackling violence with violence is even an effective solution. Of course, this is where President Bukele’s authoritarian behavior is best understood. Combating gangs and violence is obviously the most immediate issue to address, and it is not one that can be solved easily and without exerting greater control. However, the fact that the national force is so centralized and there is seemingly little regard for human rights in the process may not be the most sustainable solution.

Recommendations

To solve the immediate and overwhelming concerns such as corruption and gang violence, some authoritarian behavior is necessary as effective and immediate actions are preferred in that situation, but where the limit is to be set and how firmly the president’s actions need to be put in check is a sensitive question. What is true is that a healthy democracy often needs checks and balances to ensure the protection of minorities and prevent president-elects from turning dictatorial. El Salvador likely needs a president with firm principles and readiness for action, qualities that Bukele holds, but no nation needs a dictatorship with little regard for the processes of law and human dignity. This is why authoritarian behavior, even if welcomed in certain instances, needs to be carefully questioned and put in check. 

One way to address this issue is by focusing more attention on El Salvador’s Legislative Assembly and making sure that, while some more immediate concerns are left to the president’s discretion, it is a larger, representative collective that chooses the specific paths of action. The efficiency of such a body must also be increased, especially at times where there are extreme levels of corruption and violence, which may require creating separate chambers to address these issues. This would be similar to El Salvador’s CICIES that Bukele rushed to create and proudly put on display during the first 100 days in the office. However, CICIES, though currently still in the process of getting organized, is yet to show that it is not relying overwhelmingly on the executive branch. Current overalliance of the anti-corruption body on the executive branch puts the current administration in a position to act at its will and potentially overlook instances of its own corrupt officials and practices, thus encouraging the administration to spiral into an authoritarian regime. In order to ensure the transparency that the public deserves and that everyone, including the current administration, can be investigated, such body should rely on the legislative, elected body, not just the president and the national police. These new offices also have to be made up of skilled professionals and given some autonomy in order to produce effective results and be held accountable to the state rather than just be for political show. This way the government would increase its efficiency without relying so much on the presidential powers and checks and balances among the multiple government actors would be more effectively preserved, avoiding the establishment of an authoritarian regime. Even if the creation of such an investigative, anti-corruption body takes longer than the 100 days of the president’s office, it would surely be worthwhile if the result is a well-organized body, accountable to the public, and able to effectively tackle instances of corruption among politicians, not just the opposition to the current administration.

Will There Ever Be a Road to Reconciliation That Leads to Justice? An Examination on the Right to Land and Territory for Indigenous People

Following the United Nations (UN) Permanent Forum for Indigenous Peoples 17th session, ‘Indigenous Peoples’ Collective Right to Land, Territories and Resources,’ held in 2018, it is apparent that the connection between peoples and land continues to be at the center of conflict, hardship, and misunderstandings. The right to lands, territories, and resources is a focal point in indigenous peoples’ struggles across the globe. The lands held by indigenous peoples make up a key aspect of their collective identities and heritages and are therefore culturally inalienable. The territories they have traditionally occupied, and which have shaped their distinct identities, livelihood practices, and knowledge systems, have been submerged into nation-states in which land is allocated through a system of individual property rights. However, indigenous peoples’ land rights arguably comprise both individual and collective aspects. While indigenous peoples often have customary ways of recognizing land and resource rights of individual members or households, the collective aspects of their rights to lands derive from international conventions respecting the right of people to their property and United Nations declarations regarding indigenous people.

In the eyes of the international community, indigenous land titles are collectively rather than individually held. Ancestral lands are connected to indigenous peoples’ cultural, spiritual, and social identities, comprise a foundational aspect of their traditional knowledge systems, and inhere in their physical and financial well-being. Thus, the identity of indigenous peoples as distinct peoples depends on their rights to own, conserve, and manage their own lands, territories, and resources.

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNRIP) recognizes indigenous peoples’ rights to self-determination, participation in decision-making processes, free and informed consent in relation to any action or event that may impact their rights, and to own and manage their own lands and resources. Indigenous peoples’ rights are further defined in the 1989 International Labor Organization Convention for Indigenous and Tribal Peoples (ILO), which aims to protect their way of life and culture based on their own priorities. Articles 13 through 19 of Part Two of the ILO Conventions contain provisions on land rights for indigenous peoples.

The ideas espoused from UNRIP and the ILO are spreading and expanding through various human rights treaty bodies, such as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. These developments in international law and human rights standards support the rights of indigenous peoples to lands, territories, and resources. One example is the recent case of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the expulsion of Ogiek people, a hunter-gatherer community in Kenya, from the Mau forest. In finding violations of various rights, the court explicitly stated that the Ogiek had a communal right to their ancestral land.

In 2001, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) became the first human rights body to interpret the right to property to be understood as a people’s right to communal property, not merely private property. The following year, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights found that Nigeria had violated the right to property of the Ogoni people following violent attacks and destruction of Ogoni villages. The IACtHR also ruled that a person does not have to be indigenous to the territory they reside on to have right to the land. In Moiwana Community v. Suriname, the IACtHR upheld that the Moiwana Community was entitled to the land they inhabited even though it was undisputed that they were not indigenous to the region. This interpretation was reaffirmed in the case of Saramaka People v. Suriname a few years later.

Some states have recognized the collective rights to lands, territories, and resources with constitutional or legal protections, as well as through direct agreements with indigenous people. These countries include New Zealand, Canada, Norway, Ecuador, Denmark, Indonesia, and the Philippines. In some cases, such as the United States and Australia, land, and territories have been set aside for indigenous people. These developments are welcomed, but even in countries that recognize indigenous rights, there is still progress to be made to narrow the gap between formal recognition and full implementation of laws and policies that ensure these rights. In many countries where rights are recognized, they are not being implemented sufficiently. In some cases, there are contradictory laws and regulations that result in de facto denial of rights. States must be commended for recognizing the rights of indigenous peoples' lands, territories, and resources, yet states must also be pressured into implementing these rights fully.

However, despite advancements, many states have simply not provided official recognition of indigenous people. There are concerns regarding the lack of recognition, particularly in Africa and Asia. There are continuous concerns for the indigenous peoples residing in Central Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Chad, who continue to face violations of their rights to land, territories, and natural resources. They face many obstacles in terms of economic, social, political, and legal developments that are rooted in their lack of rights to land and natural resources. Violations include those connected to cultural rights, legal recognition, political representation and participation, and a lack of basic human rights. The violence committed against these individuals and communities includes rape, land conflicts, human rights abuses, and expulsion.

These violations are important to acknowledge because it is impossible to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that are laid out in the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development without fulfilling indigenous peoples’ rights to lands, territories, and resources. To achieve Sustainable Development Goal 2.3 on “secure and equal access to land,” states will need to include the customary rights of indigenous peoples to their lands and resources. To that end, states should work with indigenous peoples to establish a judicial institution within their national jurisdictions tasked to handle lands, waters, and other resources pertinent to indigenous peoples’ rights and ownership.

While there is still significant progress to be made, there are ways to improve indigenous rights to land, territories, and resources. For one, the UN Secretary-General should continuously collect information on abuses towards indigenous people. Building a platform for information and knowledge sharing will provide a basis for recommendations by UN member states that can transcend the rights discussion. Additionally, countries should provide information on the above developments in the collective rights of indigenous peoples and constructive agreements with indigenous people. As the “right to land, territories and resources” is getting further defined through precedent set by human rights courts, having a body of information of the variates of systems and changes would give the courts the opportunity to provide universally applicable answers and outcomes.

Moreover, the Expert Group in charge of SDG Indicators should monitor and report on any changes in land use and land tenure on indigenous peoples’ lands. The indicator currently has two facets to it: one, the percentage with documented or recognized evidence of tenure; and two, the percentage who perceive that their rights to land, property, or other productive resources are recognized and protected. The framework should have an additional indicator - surveying trends and usage of traditional land.

Furthermore, the World Bank is revising its safeguard system and there are acute concerns that their new Environmental and Social Safeguard 7 (ESS7) will allow lands to change ownership from indigenous peoples’ collective territories to individually held ownership rights, despite the World Bank’s recognition of the importance of protecting indigenous peoples’ land rights. Such conversion may generate conflicts, damage to livelihoods, and resource-management problems. The World Bank should make sufficient revisions to alleviate indigenous concerns. While the prospects may seem grim, small changes in policies may have a significant impact on the scope of international instruments.

In Defense of No First Use

Albert Einstein once wrote: “As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable. That is not an attempt to say when it will come, but only that it is sure to come. That was true before the atomic bomb was made. What has changed is the destructiveness of war.” The global nuclear arms race that ensued would come to define an era of international politics and media images of mushroom clouds and air raid sirens would be seared into the minds of many Americans. While the timetables and justifications vary, members of the foreign policy apparatus from both American political parties have stated their aspirations to forge a world without nuclear weapons. We find ourselves, therefore, at a crucial and paradoxical juncture in world history: a time in which the shared dream of a world without the possibility of nuclear war is within reach but political actors just cannot seem to agree on the proper first step.

Former President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden spent much of their second term agonizing over the United States (U.S.) strategic doctrine on nuclear weapons. Obama, who ran on reducing the military footprint of the United States and rebuilding American credibility in international affairs, weighed endorsing a nuclear “no first use” (NFU) policy. Such a policy is not complex: it dictates that the United States could only deploy nuclear weapons if the enemy deploys them first. Embracing this policy would have been a dramatic shift in American nuclear policy. However, the United States has always kept the option of a preemptive strike on the table.

While the Obama Administration ultimately declined to endorse NFU in its Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), the debate about the merits of NFU rages on. In the July 2019 Democratic primary debate, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Governor Steve Bullock (MT) sparred over the issue of NFU, with Warren endorsing restraint and Bullock dissenting, exclaiming that  “I don’t want to turn around and say, ‘Well, Detroit has to be gone before we would ever use that.’” Bullock’s statement captures the fears of many NFU skeptics, who believe that the policy will undermine American allies like Japan and NATO countries (by making them feel abandoned as a result of the U.S. ruling out a first strike against their regional allies North Korea, China, and Russia), that uncertainty is essential to deterrence, and that such a declaration would be interpreted as a show of weakness. 

This is a common, conventional take on this issue. But these are uncommon, unconventional times and uncommon, unconventional weapons. The Cold War may be over, but the risk of nuclear war is as real and horrific as ever. According to Harvard University’s Elaine Scarry, if even one percent of the world’s total nuclear arsenal was used in combat, over 44 million people (roughly the total population of Argentina or Ukraine) would be killed in a single hour and as many as one billion could be killed in the first month. Currently, the risk of the use of nuclear weapons cannot be completely mitigated, but an NFU policy followed by tangible and comprehensive steps to reduce nuclear proliferation would be an ideal first step.

The History of NFU, Globally and Domestically

Today, eight states acknowledge that nuclear weapons play at least some role in their defense policies. Each of these eight--the U.S., the United Kingdom (U.K.), France, Russia, the People’s Republic of China (China or PRC), North Korea, India, and Pakistan--have adopted an official nuclear policy that addresses their technical capabilities and the conditions under which they would launch a nuclear strike. Notably, Israel has not acknowledged that it possesses nuclear weapons but is generally regarded as a nuclear state.

China has consistently rejected the first use of nuclear strikes since they tested its first nuclear missile. For decades, China has taken steps to make its NFU pledge appear more credible, including separating its ballistic missile and nuclear warhead units, investing heavily in conventional military modernization (so as to make nuclear weapons an ever-unlikely and unnecessary escalation to conventional warfare), and encouraging nuclear weapons states to sign a multilateral NFU treaty. The only other nuclear state with a declared NFU pledge is India. India’s 1999 draft nuclear doctrine asserts that it “will not be the first to initiate a nuclear strike, but will respond with punitive retaliation should deterrence fail.” Yet India’s 2003 doctrine carves out two major exceptions regarding the use of chemical and biological weapons. In total, the 2003 doctrine states that India would build and maintain a credible minimum nuclear deterrent, adopt NFU, adopt a no-use posture towards non-nuclear weapons states, and reserve the right to retaliate with nuclear weapons if attacked by chemical or biological weapons. Due to the illegal and unconventional nature of chemical and biological weapons, other international nuclear actors like Russia recognize nuclear weapons as a proportionate response to an attack using chemical or biological weapons.

The other nuclear weapons states have carved out various first-use exceptions for themselves. Russia, the nation with the largest nuclear stockpile, argues that conventional attacks that threaten the survival of the country and chemical and biological weapons attacks are justifiable cause to ‘proportionally’ respond with nuclear weapons. Pakistan and North Korea have not ruled out first-use, especially in the event of a perceived imminent military threat from India or the United States, respectively. France, motivated by fears that the U.S. would renege on their alliance during the Cold War, has long maintained support for first-use and taken differing stances on nuclear issues from its Western allies (such as keeping its nuclear weapons separate from NATO defense coordination). The U.K. has adopted the most ambiguous stance, stating its commitment to using only the minimum nuclear capability necessary for deterrence (that is, the nuclear capability that is just enough to deter its enemies from striking first but not so aggressive as to make Britain the leading nuclear superpower). The British posture neither rules in or out first-use of nuclear weapons. NFU is still a minority position globally, but it should be a welcome sign to NFU advocates that several major nuclear actors have put restraints on the use of their nuclear weaponry.

The only time that nuclear weapons have ever been used in combat was by the U.S. in an attempt to end a conflict that was being fought with conventional weapons. Since then, nuclear weapons have been understood as being something more than just another big conventional bomb. During the 1960s, as political scientists and the public alike began to realize the existential threat that nuclear war presented to global security, NFU began to emerge on the fringes of political discourse in the United States. It remained on the margins of national security until the Obama Administration debated its inclusion in the NPR as what some in the administration saw as the next logical step beyond the mainstream view in the national security world--that the U.S. would use nuclear weapons only under extreme circumstances. This position is quite vague and different presidents have taken it to mean different things. More hawkish presidents have taken extreme circumstances to mean cyberattacks or the use of chemical or biological weapons against the U.S. Richard Nixon was brutally candid in his explanation of why the U.S. could sign bioweapons treaties: “We’ll never use the damn germs. So what good is biological warfare as a deterrent? If someone uses germs on us, we’ll nuke ’em.”

Why Would (and Should) the U.S. Adopt NFU?

Before making her plea for NFU at the Democratic debate, Warren introduced a bill to implement NFU in the U.S. Just 12 words and a single sentence long, the bill would state that the official policy of the United States would change to forbid the first-use of nuclear weapons. On its own, the proposed legislation would not do much. It would not stop the U.S. from continuing to build new nuclear weapons and could lack credibility absent other policy changes.

This is where the critics of NFU outline their fundamental break with NFU supporters. One never knows when a country is going to use nuclear weapons until they actually do. This uncertainty, they argue, means that states must both be prepared to retaliate in the event that another state strikes first and act swiftly in the event that nuclear force is desired for a first strike of their own. In an international system with actors capable of decimating life on the planet as we know it several times over, misplacing trust in a nuclear actor could be fatal. NFU critics, therefore, argue that American allies could be caught off guard by an NFU declaration or could lose trust in American commitment to taking military action to secure these allies from malign actors. To this point, NATO supports a policy of “flexible response,” which leaves open the possibility of the alliance to be the first to bring nuclear weapons into a conflict. Likewise, NFU critics argue that enemies of the U.S. would become emboldened not only to use nuclear weapons first, but also deploy chemical and biological weapons.

These criticisms all tend to rest on a single premise: that a decision to bar the first use of nuclear weapons is a symbol of weakness and a quixotic first step to full-scale pacifism. However, this premise ought to be rejected. NFU alone would not seek to end war or rule out the use of nuclear weapons. Instead, NFU reflects a desire to change the rules of war, as the world agreed to do at the Hague Conventions and the Geneva Conventions. In treaties resulting from those conventions, the international community, led by some of the most powerful states in the world, established limits on how states could conduct war. Having established rules reduced the uncertainty and strength of their regional and global rivals in the international system. NFU is no different in that regard.

Secondly, the assertion that states that adhere to NFU pledges are perceived as weak is not compatible with historical evidence. Countries that have adopted NFU policies have always been countries with conventional forces strong enough to win any conventional war. It is no coincidence that China is the most powerful country in East Asia and has disavowed first-use. Nor is it purely altruistic. Barring intervention by another major power, China would likely win a conventional war against South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, or Vietnam. But if one of these states were to acquire nuclear weapons, China’s relative strength and strategic advantage would be weakened. A regional nuclear arms race would weaken China’s regional hegemony as a result. China therefore has vowed to not even raise the possibility of a nuclear first strike to mitigate this possibility.

The dynamic is similar for India in South Asia. India has proven that it has the capability to defeat Pakistan in conventional conflicts and annually spends five times more than Pakistan on defense. While Pakistan also has nuclear weapons, India’s refusal to strike first means that Pakistan does not build an overwhelming second-strike capability. It’s in India’s best interest to therefore to issue an NFU maxim so as to maintain its strategic advantage in South Asia.

The United States is arguably an even better fit for NFU than its predecessors. The U.S. has one of the strongest economies in the world (like India and China), unparalleled diplomatic clout, powerful and numerous allies in every region of the world. The U.S. also faces no true threat to its power in its own hemisphere. Encouraging other states to capitalize on the uncertainty of a potential U.S. first strike and develop their own nuclear weapons in violation of international law would not only weaken the power of the U.S. as a responsible actor for the global normative goal of nuclear nonproliferation but could also weaken the U.S.’s military advantage.

It is possible that U.S allies such as Japan, South Korea, and NATO would feel less secure if the U.S. adopted NFU. However, those feelings of insecurity are much more preferable to the alternative: the U.S. deploying nuclear weapons first against China, Russia, or North Korea, which would encourage retaliation and put these allies’ very existence into question. At the same time, it is possible that nonnuclear countries and those with few nuclear weapons but a fear of the U.S. could be reassured by the fact that the U.S. viewed its nuclear weapons as instruments of deterrence, not aggression, and maybe those states would agree to collaborate on arms control and disarmament measures with the U.S. serving as a responsible partner. At the very least, it may decrease the likelihood of a first strike against the U.S. in the midst of a crisis, according to former defense leaders.

Barack Obama’s “world without nuclear weapons” is a lofty goal. While the immediate strategic benefits of an NFU policy are worth noting, it is this lofty, idealistic aspiration that is the true guiding principle of the NFU movement. Rebuilding the U.S.’s reputation as a nation that supports disarmament after President Donald Trump, who withdrew the U.S. from several arms control agreements, will not be achieved by NFU alone. However, rejecting the calculus of fear that permits the first-use of nuclear weapons is necessary to eventually get to a nuke-free world. 

This is why NFU is necessary. NFU’s political and military benefits extend beyond the United States to its allies and the international system that reflects their values. By alleviating opponents’ concerns about a nuclear first strike, a credible NFU pledge reduces the chance that nuclear weapons are used accidentally or intentionally in a crisis, thereby preventing escalation that would drag the entire world into a conflict arising from an unclear posture. Without any credible regional rivals-and thus any incentive to keep open the first strike option- the U.S. will retain regional military supremacy and prevent an arms race in its own backyard (benefiting its allies in the region and states committed to non-proliferation globally). Likewise, the political benefit of the U.S. recommitting itself to disarmament would be to restore the reputation of the U.S. as a credible partner (enhancing its leverage and legitimacy in the eyes of the world) and bolster the international non-proliferation regime. Once these arguments are read to American allies, these allies will likely recognize it as legitimate when faced with the grim alternative to accepting that U.S. conventional forces are sufficient to defend them: developing their own nuclear weapons in contravention of the NPT, which would undoubtedly isolate them from both the U.S. and the international community (from which the state would face strong condemnation, if not sanctions). The least bad option for them, therefore, is to accept an American NFU declaration. If the U.S. is serious about reducing the threat of nuclear war, NFU should be at the top of the list of changes to U.S. nuclear policy.

 Changing the world requires changing international politics. And changing international politics quite possibly requires changing the rules of war yet again. If this past century of arms races and world wars has taught the world anything, it is that without efforts to confront humanity’s unfortunate propensity to destroy and divide, humanity cannot build a better future and unite countries in cooperation and collective interests. Take it from Barack Obama:

For we see around the world today how even the crudest rifles and barrel bombs can serve up violence on a terrible scale. We must change our mind-set about war itself. To prevent conflict through diplomacy and strive to end conflicts after they’ve begun. To see our growing interdependence as a cause for peaceful cooperation and not violent competition. To define our nations not by our capacity to destroy but by what we build. And perhaps, above all, we must reimagine our connection to one another as members of one human race. For this, too, is what makes our species unique. We’re not bound by genetic code to repeat the mistakes of the past. We can learn. We can choose. We can tell our children a different story, one that describes a common humanity, one that makes war less likely and cruelty less easily accepted.”

There is a Stench: Detention Centers in the U.S. and India

In the past three decades, the international system has seen an upward trend in the criminalization of migration and border militarization as a result of xenophobia. A byproduct of these trends is the ever-increasing presence of detention centers. These facilities are meant to hold migrants while their applications for entry are being processed or they are awaiting deportation. International law has recognized that detention centers are meant to be used as a last resort, considering they are expensive and systemically subject migrants to unhygienic conditions. Nonetheless, the use of detention centers is “growing and endemic.” Many people are familiar with the detention centers at the US-southern border which have recently come under severe scrutiny for widespread abuse and poor conditions. However, these facilities are not unique to the United States; India, under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, plans to build ten detention facilities. The first one is currently being built in the northeastern state of Assam which has a fraught history of anti-immigrant sentiments and outright violence. While these countries have unique socio-politico issues, they are perversely united in the rise of nationalism and xenophobia- both of which are embodied by the utilization of detention centers. 

Over the summer, American television was flooded with reports and images of Central American migrants and asylum-seekers being subjected to horrendous conditions that point to trends throughout different facilities. There is the issue of dangerous overcrowding at Customer and Border Patrol (CBP) facilities; a Homeland Security report from May stated that there are 900 people crammed into a space designed to accommodate 125 people at most. Additionally, reports have highlighted a lack of access to hygienic products such as soap and toothpaste, basic necessities that most people would take for granted. However, many of the reports specifically shed light on the conditions that detained children are subjected to. Babies reportedly had to drink from unwashed bottles and children were forced to sleep on concrete floors in cold temperatures, with only a foil blanket to keep them warm. While migrants have certainly faced poor conditions under previous administrations, the abuse has become particularly acute under the Trump presidency which recently argued in federal court that child migrants do not need basic hygienic products. The neglectful nature of these detention facilities have reached critical points where migrants have died in CBP care; under the Trump administration,  24 migrants have died in government custody. 

President Donald Trump has made xenophobia a cornerstone of his presidency, which is reflected in the administration’s policies and the president’s rhetoric. The administration has made efforts to effectively end asylum for a large number of asylum-seekers and has attempted to severely debilitate the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program with setting lower ceilings each year. The president’s rhetoric has been inflammatory since the first day of his campaign when he characterized Mexican migrants as “rapists.” It is arguable that President Trump’s immigration policy is rooted in white nationalism as the president has demonstrated on numerous occasions- both through policies and rhetoric- that he views the United States’ national identity in “racial terms and seeks to preserve the nation’s predominantly white identity.” This is reflected in his defense of the neo-Nazis protestors in Charlottesville and his laments over the removal of Confederate statues which he seems to regard as an attack on the country’s culture. The president’s white nationalism was particularly exemplified in the administration’s decision to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and the Department of Justice’s heightened standards that asylum-seekers must meet in order to stay in the country. These standards target the women and children who have been coming to the southern border en masse. Under these new rules, individuals cannot claim asylum on the grounds of fleeing domestic or gang violence. 

Furthermore, it would not be too far off-base to argue that white nationalism and current federal immigration laws are deeply intertwined considering that there is a historical precedent of these laws being embedded in racism. Immigration statues have long “openly discriminated on the basis of race” starting in the late 19th century with the Chinese Exclusion laws. The white nationalism that the Trump administration espouses is detrimental in many regards, but especially when it comes to migrants and asylum-seekers arriving at the southern border. The majority of the people trying to enter the country are from the Northern Triangle in Central America which consists of El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. Those who are arriving no longer mainly consist of men trying to find work as it was in the latter half of the 20th century; today’s U.S.-bound migrants are families, often women and children, who are fleeing endemic violence in El Salvador and Honduras or poverty in Guatemala. President Trump bases the country’s identity off of being white and has made it clear that anyone who does not fit this racial standard will face significant barriers. Central American migrants undermine a racialized vision that President Trump has attempted to defend throughout his presidency. It is not hard to determine the particulars of this vision. The president’s rhetoric and policy proposals have demonstrated his desire for the US to be culturally, linguistically, and racially European. This foundation of white nationalism in federal immigration laws justifies the maltreatment of those being kept in detention centers. 

However, xenophobia and nationalism are not strictly staples of the Trump administration; India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made Hindu nationalism a popular mainstream ideology. Hindutva, the predominant form of Hindu nationalism, has been enshrined as the governing dogma. It aims to define Indian culture in terms of Hindu history and values. Prime Minister Modi’s nationalism has exacerbated India’s own problems with xenophobia and immigration which are not new and can be traced back to Great Britain’s colonial rule. According to Reece Jones in Violent Borders, the India-Bangladesh border has the highest number of deaths at the hands of the state police. The northeastern state of Assam, which borders Bangladesh, has historically been the destination for Bangladesh migrants. In the 19th century, the British created tea plantations in Assam which attracted many foreign migrants, thus planting a seed of anxiety among the native Assamese who feared cultural shifts. Resentment among natives continued to increase as millions fled into the state during the partition of 1947. One of the biggest cases of displacement was during the Bangladesh Liberation War in the early 1970s as Bangladesh sought to break away from Pakistan; millions of Bengali Muslims fled to Assam. Anti-immigrant sentiment reached a boiling point in 1983 when more than 1,800 Bengali Muslims were massacred in Assam. Immigrants continue to be marginalized, particularly in this area, especially with the ascendency of Hindu nationalism which has helped to legitimize xenophobia. 

As Prime Minister Modi ran for reelection, he made the expulsion of undocumented immigrants a pillar and has been making good on his promises. India is currently in the process of constructing ten detention centers with the first one being in Assam. Along with the construction of the detention facilities, which are said to be the size of seven football fields, the Indian government has established the National Register of Citizens (NRC) which is exactly as it sounds: a citizenship list meant to aid the government in expelling undocumented immigrants. Nearly two million people, the majority of whom are Muslims, are currently facing deportation because their names are not on the list; as of right now they are technically undocumented. To complicate matters, the burden of proof has been placed on the individuals.This is problematic because Assam is a rural state and its residents typically do not have paperwork; a quarter of the population in Assam is also illiterate which means that those who must prove their residency probably don’t even know how to discern any available documents. Potentially, if these individuals are not able to prove they were born in India, they will be placed in these detention centers while they wait to be deported to a country they have never been to. 

Since the detention centers have not been completed, there is no discussion to be had about the conditions. However, comparisons can be drawn between the U.S. and India’s nationalistic immigration policies. Prime Minister Modi, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and other proponents of Hindutva have made their animosity towards Muslims clear through their rhetoric and the outright violence that has been inflicted upon Muslims and other minorities. Since the prime minister was elected in 2014, communal violence has risen significantly with Muslims bearing the brunt of it. These attacks have consisted of lynching, threats, attacks on places of worship, and forced conversion. No one can also forget the Gujarat riots in 2002. As Chief Minister of Gujarat, it is argued that Modi was complicit in the violence that disproportionately targeted Muslims. Furthermore, the erasure of Jammu and Kashmir’s statehood (the only Muslim majority region) and their current occupation conceivably falls within the BJP’s vision of Hindutva. Prime Minister Modi has tried to reinvent his image as someone focused more on economic development, but his silence and inaction to prevent these crimes have emboldened extremists. The NRC, like so many other policies, is disproportionately affecting Muslims who have stated that they feel as though the rules are “arbitrary.”  While violence is one way to shape India into the purely Hindu nation that hardliners desire, the NRC is arguably a legal way of achieving this goal. 

The rhetoric and policies in India are eerily similar to that of the U.S. white nationalism and Hindu nationalism have strong historical ties to one another and share the same goals. Both share a history that can be traced to the construction of the Aryan race identity, one of the pillars of Nazism. Savitri Devi popularized the idea that civilization has its roots in the “master race” of Aryans in India and proceeded to integrate herself into India’s burgeoning movement of Hindu nationalism. The two ideologies also share the goal of finding an enemy in Muslims, a minority group within each state. It should not be a surprise then to know that the Republican Hindu Coalition, which has strong links to the Hindu nationalist movement in India, has been passionately rallying behind Trump’s controversial immigration policies. While President Trump has predominantly targeted non-white immigrants in an alleged attempt to protect his vision of white America, the president has also targeted Muslims through policy decisions such as the 2017 travel ban. The rhetoric and policy decisions of both leaders are sowing violence for these minority communities with attacks by extremists in both countries. 

It has been previously established that detention centers are considered to be extreme under international law. Furthermore, there are cheaper and more dignified ways to supervise undocumented immigrants or those who have been deemed as such with fraught evidence. Private detention centers in the U.S. cost taxpayers $149.58 to detain one person; costs are still expensive in CBP facilities. Additionally, these detention centers have been the sites of systemic abuse and horrifying treatment of individuals, many of whom are children. Alternatives to detention centers include supervised release, regular reporting requirements, and posting bail. Under these alternate plans, migrants and asylum-seekers could be self-sufficient while also promoting cost-effectiveness. These alternatives are not just for changing U.S. policy; these plans can be adapted by any government to help deal with migrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers. Instead of adopting a registry and constructing detention centers, India could also look into these alternatives. However, in order to maintain the dignity of immigrants, and other vulnerable groups, white and Hindu nationalism must be addressed and eradicated. The disadvantages of detention centers are clear, yet a large part of their existence is predicated on these ideologies. They are a tool of both President Trump and Prime Minister Modi to construct and protect their visions of identity and nationhood. Without the deconstruction of these dogmas, the humane treatment of undocumented immigrants, and other vulnerable groups will be hard to achieve.

Rogue Ally: Despite Turkish Aggression, the U.S. Should Support the SDF in Syria

On July 20, 2019, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu, to discuss the growing list of issues between the pair of longtime allies. While no transcript was provided, the State Department released a summary that, despite its brevity, managed to encapsulate the Trump Administration’s stance on Turkey and Syria: ever ambiguous and deficient in courage. As Turkish troops amassed on the Syrian border, threatening an invasion of territory liberated from the Islamic State (ISIL) by the U.S.-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), Secretary Pompeo “reaffirmed” U.S. commitment to Turkish national security while also “reiterating” its support of allied forces in Syria.

What these contradictory statements mean for said American allies –particularly the Kurds, who, in spite of their integral role defeating ISIL, are frequently labeled “terrorists” by Turkish pro-government media– is highly unclear. It is notable that since President Donald Trump’s abrupt call for a total withdrawal of American forces in Syria, then subsequent flip-flop two months later, Washington’s foremost think tanks have gone conspicuously silent on the issue of U.S.-Turkey relations as they relate to Syria, focusing instead on President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s apparent gravitation toward Russia following his government’s purchase of the S-400 missile systems. One can hardly blame them; it is, in fact, quite difficult to analyze a policy when the policy doesn’t appear to exist.

That isn’t to say that the U.S. has been entirely inactive. After Germany declined an American request to deploy ground troops to Syria, both France and the United Kingdom pledged 10 to 15 percent more soldiers, a victory for a president that campaigned on promises to lighten the burden on the U.S. military. However, one report notes that such an increase translates to only “several dozen” troops, an inadequate quantity considering the size of SDF-controlled territory. Additionally, top U.S. officials have visited SDF officials in Syria twice in the past two months, but discussions reportedly centered on counterterrorism strategy rather than political solutions to the Syrian conflict or the looming threat of a Turkish invasion. These are the questions that need answering. No one doubts U.S. desire to combat terrorism.

What the Trump Administration fails to realize –or at the very least, is too content with a tenuous status quo to do anything– is that good counterterrorism requires robust and lasting support, politically as well as militarily. The U.S. certainly desires the enduring defeat of ISIL, but its failure to develop tangible policy reflects a lackluster, fragile commitment to preventing the revival of an extremist safe haven. With multiple regional parties demonstrating aggression toward the SDF, the U.S. needs to act quickly and decisively in support of its ally by pressuring all parties involved into a fair, multilateral deal grounded in citizen security and civil liberties. Continuing down this path of inaction will only result in the perpetuation of conflict, the prolonging of the refugee crisis, and the potential for a revival of a territorial ISIL.

Current Threats to Stability in Northeastern Syria

Presently, the SDF-held territory in northeastern Syria –known as the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (NES)– rests in an extraordinarily precarious position. Its western border is shared with two parties, the Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army (TFSA) and Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian Arab Army (SAA), both of which –though in conflict with one another– oppose the SDF. The TFSA, in congruence with the anti-Kurdish sentiments of its patron, has launched two major operations that targeted Kurds, the latter of which resulted in “widespread human rights violations” and displaced over 150,000 people from Syria’s Afrin district. As for the Syrian regime forces, Assad has stated that he intends to retake all territory within Syria’s pre-war borders, an undertaking that would take years, but, considering his backing from Russia, is a credible threat nonetheless.

Internally, the SDF struggles against remnants of ISIL. Having been territorially defeated in March, its militants now resort to asymmetrical warfare in the form of urban bombings and rural arson; the former disrupts a sense of rare, cherished stability in a region engulfed by conflict, while the latter destabilizes an already feeble economy. ISIL cells have destroyed some 50,000 acres of NES land since May, reportedly costing the nascent governing administrations $50 million worth in crops.

Turkey’s Historical Oppression of the Kurds and its Contemporary Relevance

While the TFSA, Assad regime, and ISIL cells make for pressing threats, the NES’ greatest challenge emanates from its northern neighbor. Since the decline of the Ottoman Empire and the founding of the Republic of Turkey, Turkish authorities have sought national unity through societal homogeneity, or Turkification. This policy essentially criminalizes cultural diversity; from the Armenian Genocide in the early 20th century to today’s ongoing anti-Semitism, minorities in Turkey have long faced persecution at the hands of the government. In Turkey’s Kurdish Question, a 1998 book by Graham E. Fuller and Henri J. Barkey, the authors point out that the government’s anti-Kurdish sentiment was not just rhetoric, but law:

In the 1924 [Republic of Turkey] constitution, the terms “citizenship” and “citizen” had been equated with Turkishness. Accordingly, the document stated that one had to be a Turk to become a member of parliament and the like. Certainly Kurds could qualify as “Turks,” but only at the expense of denying their own ethnic identity.

Rather than do so, Kurds organized and revolted, most notably in the form of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). In 1984, after years of preparation and intra-Kurdish strife, the PKK launched its insurgency against the Turkish state, striking military checkpoints and barracks in the towns of Semdinli and Eruh. It was the start of a decades-long conflict that, despite the 1999 capture of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan and the occasional ceasefire, endures today.

Herein lies Turkey’s issue with American partnerships in Syria. The SDF is a pluralistic organization consisting of Arabs, Syriac Christians, and Yazidis, among others, but it is predominantly Kurdish, having originated from the People’s Protection Units (YPG), a well-organized Syrian Kurdish militia dating back to 2004. The U.S. listed the PKK as a terrorist organization in 1997 but never extended its designation toward the YPG. Turkey, on the other hand, views the YPG as an extension of the PKK, and given its proximity to Turkey’s southeastern borders, as a viable threat to its national security. 

The Case for the SDF

I suppose this is the world we live in: one in which a state can spend nearly a century attempting to erase the identities of its indigenous ethnic groups, then throw a tantrum when one of them decides to revolt. The only catch here is that the SDF, unlike the PKK, does not aspire to harm Turkey, its well-armed bully of a neighbor; in fact, the U.S. formed its alliance with the SDF on the condition that it would not target Turkish state forces, as such an attack would require an American response under the North Atlantic Treaty Organization charter. All NES residents want is for the Assad regime, ISIL, and Turkey to leave it alone.

Why should the U.S. stand by the SDF? For one, the U.S. is safer with a stable Levant. ISIL’s rise was only possible because of the vacuum created by the Syrian Civil War. With a well-governed political entity positioned in its former territory, the vacuum closes, and the region is less susceptible to extremist violence. This is especially critical given the SDF’s protection of the al-Hol camp, a facility holding some 70,000 displaced individuals, many of whom are family members of former ISIL militants. Deputy major commander of the U.S.-led coalition called inhabitants of al-Hol the “next generation” of ISIL, but the international community has taken no major steps to resolve the problem. The U.S. could take the lead by assisting the SDF and human rights organizations in maintaining and securing the camps while administering rehabilitation programs and returning foreign fighters to their native countries for trial.

Secondly, U.S. presence in the region acts as another theater to indirectly confront Iran. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s government has real influence in Syria and Iraq via its support of the Assad regime, its regional militias, and the transnational shipping route often referred to as the “land bridge.” A capable, U.S.-supported SDF can deter the Assad regime and Iranian militias from encroaching in northeastern Syria, and its presence also inhibits Iranian arms, supplies, and fighters from reaching the Syrian regime or Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy force in Lebanon and a principal threat to Israel.

Lastly, the SDF’s territories is the antithesis of its enemies. NES is a multiethnic, religiously diverse entity operating on principles of feminism, secularism, and local governance, all of which are in sharp contrast to Erdogan’s nationalism, ISIL’s extremism, and Assad’s autocracy. It is rare that the U.S. arms militants whose values reflect a fervent interest in human rights and democracy.

Reevaluating the U.S.-Turkey Relationship

Whereas the SDF has proven itself as an accountable ally, Turkey’s domestic political trends and ties to Syrian-based extremist groups suggest that its relationship with the U.S. is not what it used to be. The U.S. cannot afford to be sclerotic in its foreign policy –realizing and adapting to changing realities is requisite to being a positive global force– and at the present, it must respond to Turkey’s gross incompetence in combatting terrorism and clear democratic backsliding. 

Known as the “gateway to Jihad,” the Turkish-Syrian border became a port for the 40,000 foreign fighters that traveled to participate in the conflict. With ISIL recruits pouring over the Turkish border into Syria, the Erdogan government played dumb, refusing to implement even basic measures that would stem the flow of fighters. Scant oversight at the border allowed active militants to retreat into Turkey for health services. “We used to have some fighters — even high-level members of the Islamic State — getting treated in Turkish hospitals,” an ISIL commander told the Washington Post in 2014.  “And also, most of the fighters who joined us in the beginning of the war came via Turkey, and so did our equipment and supplies.”

Turkey stood to gain from an extremist insurgency in Syria in the most cynical of senses; the republic shares two common enemies with Da’esh and like-minded groups, the Alawi government in Damascus and the majority Kurdish population in the northeast. Now that its initial strategy to defeat Kurdish-led forces via extremist proxies has failed, President Erdogan’s government is transitioning to plan B, applying significant political and military pressure on the SDF in an effort to bring the U.S. to a detrimental agreement. The aforementioned TFSA invasion of Afrin in 2018 was not a direct threat to American ground forces, but it drew Kurdish SDF militias out of NES territory who wanted to protect Kurdish civilians, weakening the region’s security. In early July, Turkey began amassing troops along the NES border, and shortly after, Foreign Minister Cavusoglu warned of an attack if his government’s proposed “safe zone” was not established. As of today, Turkey’s aggression has met little U.S. resistance.

Recommendations: Robust Military, Economic, and Political Support for the SDF

Turkey hopes that its acts of aggression will force the U.S. to accept its proposed “safe zone,” a plan that roughly translates to Turkey unilaterally annexing of a large portion of SDF-controlled territory. This is a nonstarter for Syria’s Kurds, who justifiably expect persecution under a Turkish occupation. Thus, the U.S. needs to move quickly and definitively against Turkish pressure by supporting the NES with increased military presence, as well as valuable economic and political assistance.

In regards to military support, the U.S. and coalition members should increase the number of ground troops in the NES. While thousands of Turkish troops are gathering on the border, U.S. coalition forces are said to only number in the hundreds. This is not an endorsement of armed conflict with our NATO ally. The issue is that Turkey believes the U.S. is susceptible to persuasion, and with good reason; after all, President Trump’s decision to withdraw forces in December came immediately after a phone call with President Erdogan. By succumbing to pressure, President Trump demonstrated uncertainty about supporting the SDF, an uncertainty that Turkey is currently exploiting. An increase in troops would signal firm commitment to the SDF, robbing Turkey of its diplomatic leverage and granting NES residents peace of mind.

Economic well-being is closely related to citizen security Northeastern Syria, with its sprawling agricultural fields and oil reserves, has unique potential to thrive economically, but it lacks the adequate technology to do so; currently, Syrian farmers use antiquated methods to harvest their wheat and have no way to effectively fight the crop fires ignited by Da’esh arsonists. Destroyed roads can inhibit the transportation of goods and aid, and damaged sewers create sanitation problems. The U.S. should formally declare its backing of the SDC and provide it with the resources it needs to develop sustainably.

Political recognition and assistance would permit the SDC a seat at the negotiating table, giving northeastern Syria a say in its future. As of the publication of this article, Syrian opposition parties have not allowed SDC representatives to participate in talks with the Assad regime and its international backers. Demonstrations of international support for the SDC, such as a Swedish delegation visit in early July, have reportedly warmed opposition parties to the idea of inviting SDC representatives to talks. A clear demonstration of American support would influence them further.

Final Thoughts: Support of SDF is Worth the Diplomatic Rift

In April, I wrote that the U.S. should revise its policy toward Saudi Arabia given its perpetration of human rights abuses and continued failure to curb extremism. The U.S.-Saudi relationship runs deep, but American policymakers are too keen to turn a blind eye to the Kingdom’s transgressions for the sake of the relationship. Turkey’s case is similar; as with the Saudi regime, we could bend to its wishes, defer to the judgment of its leaders, and dismiss undemocratic and harmful policies as irrelevant or untrue. President Erdogan’s behavior in his region is his prerogative, the thinking goes; as an ally, we trust him to act broadly in our interest.

However, this is clearly not the case, and it’s time to turn a new page in U.S.-Turkey relations. Its faults are egregious and well-documented, and its enemies are our friends. The U.S. should not fear divergence from an ally if that ally diverges from American values and goals.

The Fight for Equal Pay in the Land of Opportunity

Every year, a myriad of migrants make their way to America and cross its borders in search of their own Dream, enshrining our nation as the land of opportunity. The truth, however, is that America has failed to live up to its democratic standards, using a fake mask of patriotism in the hopes of hiding the real inequities that persist today. 

Whether it was during the fight for suffrage or the current ongoing fight for equal pay, women are constantly reminded of their second-class status. It’s not hard to decipher the root cause of these vestigial prejudices. In Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England, he espoused that at the time, voting requirements existed to exclude “persons [that] are in no means [or] situation [such] that they are esteemed to have no will of their own.” Though written in 1765, his subversive words have rung true time and time again. In fact, many women did not enter the workforce, let alone gain the right to suffrage, until the outbreak of World War II. While the men were away at battle, the women were left to tend to both of their households and family businesses. As a result, the rate of female employment rapidly proliferated, and by 1960, 23.3 million women made up over thirty-two percent of the American labor force.

In spite of the unprecedented rise in female employment, the struggle for equality has not not ended. Since a capitalist society is rooted in power and monetary gain, men found themselves threatened by the sudden female success, facing the risks of job insecurity as a so-called “inferior” woman could replace them at any time. To paraphrase sociology Professors Barbara F. Reskin and Denise D. Bielby of the University of Washington and University of California Santa Barbara in the 2005 Issue of the Journal of Economic Perspectives, sex is a means of social differentiation. Society through its principles then further perpetuates such differences, eventually leading to a severe systemic inequality based on group membership and the social stratification of “their members across virtually all domains.” This subtle sexism stemming from gender stereotypes and unconscious biases among male employers and employees alike leads to the unequal treatment of women, ultimately benefiting men. 

The labels placed on a masculine or feminine job further segregates the labor force. In a 2012 Pew Research Study, when asked what is best for young children, only 16 percent of respondents agreed that having a mother who works full time is the most ideal, and 33 percent said that a mother of young children should not work at all. With this perspective, it is increasingly difficult for women to advance in the workplace as employers tend to prefer men--because they will not, for example, take a 12-week-long maternity leave--despite women’s equal working capability. Patriarchy and its pious devotees will do anything to maintain the status quo; the insidious nature of entrenched gender norms in the professional sphere continue to underpin the constant discrimination faced by women today. 

In light of the recent U.S. Women's National Team’s victory at the 2019 World Cup, unparalleled chants for equal pay have reignited. The women’s team worked tirelessly and brought much pride to our country but were not even rewarded with equal--or more than equal--pay based on their merit. As they say, history repeats itself. This phenomenon of unequal pay is nothing new as revealed by the discriminatory treatment endured by women soccer players back in 2015, after their defeat over Japan in the World Cup. A post-cup analysis from a 2016 FiveThirtyEight study of U.S. soccer players Hope Solo and Carli Lloyd’s salaries uncovered a gross total income of $480,038 in contrast to male players Clint Dempsey and Tim Howard’s total of $826,517. That amounts to an astounding difference of $364,479, even with the men's team's poor finish at the CONCACAF Gold Cup that year.

The female soccer players saved the dying American morale and brought much revenue with their undeniable excellence and victories, especially in juxtaposition with the men’s dismal and disheartening performances, and yet the women still faced unequal treatment. Although the Women’s Soccer team filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the outcome was meaningless: a simple formal apology and the Federation’s promise to bargain for better pay and the improvement of employment opportunities for women in the field. A promise that is yet to be fulfilled.

Women are being paid unfairly all across the board—not just in sports. According to data compiled by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research in 2017, though American women make up almost half of the workforce, they only received 80.5 cents for each dollar made by men, creating an unsettling wage gap of 20 percent. While this may not seem to be a very significant figure, it seems blasphemous that the land of opportunity is ridden with such inequities. Women are paid less than men for the same work or even when they accomplish more, as seen with the scenario of the United States (U.S.) Women's National Soccer Team. For women of color, the reality is worse: Latinas make 53 percent, African Americans make 61 percent, and Native Americans make 58 percent of their male counterparts’ salaries with Asian women being the only outliers earning 85 percent (but only 75.5 percent of Asian men’s earnings). 

But, is unequal pay legal? To put it simply: no. Section 206 (d)(1) from the Equal Pay Act of 1963 clearly states:

 No employer having employees subject to any provisions of this section shall discriminate…on the basis of sex by paying wages to employees in such establishment at a rate less than the rate at which he pays wages to employees of the opposite sex in such establishment for equal work on jobs the performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions, except where such payment is made pursuant to (i) a seniority system; (ii) a merit system; (iii) a system which measures earnings by quantity or quality of production; or (iv) a differential based on any other factor other than sex

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 serves to embolden these ideals by legislating protection against discrimination in the workplace based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Unfortunately, employers have found a loophole, constantly exploiting both the vagueness of the bill due to its lack of exploration through court cases and its lack of enforcement. For instance, the administrative interpretations of the EPA have defined skill as "experience, training, education, and ability" needed, effort as "the measurement of the physical or mental exertion needed for the performance of a job," and responsibility as "the degree of accountability required in the performance of the job, with emphasis on the importance of the job obligation." Wages have been interpreted to mean "all payments made to or on behalf of the employee as remuneration for employment," including most fringe benefits. Yet, the fact remains that these interpretations are simply words with no means of enforcement. Additionally, one cannot overlook the gray areas within the text itself--what “experience” and “effort” truly mean remains unclear as there is no objective test to determine the levels of each, ultimately leaving its discretion up to the employer.

Moreover, a man or a woman, who feels he or she have been subjected to equal pay discrimination, may sue his or her employer. However, our American justice system idolizes the presumption of innocence, or that one is “innocent until proven guilty.” While due process of law is necessary to maintain equal standards and to uphold our laws, it is often laborious and sometimes impossible for the employee or the Secretary of Labor to prove that the plaintiff was indeed performing the same work as a male-counterpart, which again becomes entrapped in the folly of subjectivity. On top of that, while a woman may indeed seek a lawsuit, there will always linger the stigma and fear of retaliation, and the fear of job security often binds women into silence.

That isn’t to say that the Equal Pay Act and subsequent acts have been futile; their impact has gradually narrowed the gender wage gap. However, women literally still pay the price for matters out of their own hands, still bearing the burden of such inequities despite their out-performance of men, something legislators recognize and continue to fight for. According to CNN reporter Caroline Kelly, West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin recently introduced a bill that would “withhold federal funding for the hosting of the 2026 men's World Cup until the men's and reigning champion women's national soccer teams receive equal pay.” Even just this year, the House in a 242-187 vote passed the H.R.7. - Paycheck Fairness Act of 2019, which would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to remedy discrimination in the payment of wages based on sex, yet the Senate continues to show no further action.

Although it has been proven many times that the gender pay gap exists in every country worldwide, the issue isn’t being taken seriously, partly due to misinterpretations of the data at hand. For example, according to Mark J. Perry of the American Enterprise Institute, the gender pay gap is at best a common misconception with no substantial evidence that men and women working in the same position with the same background receive unequal pay. Rather, a gender earnings gap exists due to many different factors. For example, men are more likely than women to have more years of uninterrupted experience due to women being more apt to take maternity leave or quit their job and relocate for their partners. 

What Perry seems to be suggesting here is that women truly do not deserve equal pay because their work is simply not equal. Again, however, it is important to consider the subjectivity within these observations, starting with the fact that women employees are present in all of the fields he lists as examples. Women have always been discriminated against within the typical household and being dependent on their husbands or fathers further restricts their freedom to pursue higher education, a trend that is beginning to change. In 2015 alone, 72.5 percent of females were enrolled in degree-seeking programs, compared to 65.8 percent of men paralleling similar increases among low-income and women of color. Such increasing opportunities for females in education and the fields of humanities and STEM will only serve to disprove Perry’s point—women are seeking change for themselves.

However, there is no magical antidote. Multiple plans have been discussed, like the one proposed by California Senator Kamala Harris, which would fine companies that fail to disclose their pay data. This is where the real trouble lies: the gender pay gap is a smaller issue in the grand scheme of things, and passing such narrow-scoped legislation simply does not go far enough. Rather, the solution is to reinforce the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment under which all persons are guaranteed the equal protection of the laws, implicitly including the right to equal pay. The first step would be to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. Proposed in 1923, this would guarantee equal legal and civil rights for all American citizens regardless of gender. While the ERA has faced much political backlash, it has quietly been regaining support. According to Article V of the Constitution, one of the ways an amendment can be ratified is through the ratification by three-fourths of the states. In February of this year, Virginia became close to fulfilling the required number by becoming the 38th state. But while the amendment passed the Senate, the House vote rendered it moot with a tiebreaker vote. However, women refuse to be discouraged. Organizations such as the National Organization for Women (NOW) are one of many initiatives that continue to advocate for the ratification of the ERA. It will take a coalition of all women, akin to the recent #MeToo movement, for change to occur. This is necessary as it would ensure that when the ERA is ratified one day, its purpose does not become nullified or diluted, it would be properly enforced.

From the beginning, minorities and those in power in the United States have been at odds— the outcries for equal pay among the U.S. Women’s National Team are not the first nor will they be the last. When a significant part of the population is denied equal pay, equal rights, and equal opportunity, the oppressed are not the only ones affected. Rather, the entire basis of democracy is at risk. And that is something all of us equally have a stake in.

Hackers for Hire: Russian Hacktivism on the World Stage

After the 2016 U.S. presidential elections, every American became more aware of the importance of cybersecurity. More notably, they became aware that foreign actors were interfering in American politics. The country became more divided with every mention of Russia, and the effects of the Russian hack can still be felt in the polarized political environment to this day. What most Americans didn’t know was that a few months later, British cybersecurity authorities voiced their concerns that Russian bots and fake social media accounts had influenced the outcome of the Brexit referendum. After some examination, the link between the two situations became clear: both were information warfare operations conducted by Russian hacktivists.

“Hacktivist,” a term first used in 1989 by the hacker “Omega," defines an individual who conducts cyberattacks against private computer networks to further a political goal. They are generally unaffiliated with government entities and often use their skills to defy the actions of the state. Hackers first emerged in the late 1980s  to seek profit from their operations. Modern hackers are decidedly different, having arisen not from the desire for money, but the desire for change. They are activists that can have immense impacts upon a state or community. Hacktivists are credited with assisting the 2010 Arab Spring movement by attacking Tunisian government websites, and were an essential component to revealing the billions of dollars tied up in the “Panama Papers.” International coverage of these successful hacktivist operations has resulted in a noticeable rise in hacktivist activity all over the world. 

In addition to these cyber vigilantes, some hacktivist groups tend to operate in support of their state’s foreign policies. Some countries, such as Iran, North Korea, and China, have outsourced their cyber operations with limited success. Russia has also hired private actors to conduct cyber warfare against their cyber adversaries; unlike the groups in the other states mentioned, Russian hacktivists have been incredibly successful in their cyber operations, and are considered to be among the best hackers in the world. Where most hacktivist groups operate independently or receive some corollary funding from a discreet government agent, many Russian hacktivist groups are highly suspected to be associated with the security and information arm of the Russian government, the Federal Security Service (FSB).

According to Connell and Vogler in their paper “Russia’s Approach to Cyber Warfare”, Russia has specifically adjusted their cyber strategy so that independent hacktivist groups may play an incredibly large role in Russian information warfare. They are cost-effective (sometimes hackers will conduct operations free of charge, as long as the motivation or political goal aligns well with their interests), require little to no oversight (they operate independently and only require a target and desired effect), and have an incredibly high success rate. They can spread propaganda or disinformation, conduct a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack on a target website, create Trojans and malware, steal financial information, and store illegal or stolen information discreetly (learn more about these attacks here).

On numerous occasions, the Russian government has claimed that they played no part in cyber-attacks against other countries. The attribution problem, which has arisen from the tendency for cyber operations to be quick, discreet, and difficult to track, has prevented the international intelligence community from accurately finding the culprit of cyber attacks for many years. Hiring hacktivist groups to conduct operations for the FSB allows the Kremlin to order these attacks without repercussions on the international stage. When accused of actions of cyber warfare, they often assert that “patriotic hackers” were responsible. Although the international security community highly suspects the FSB has been contracting these hacktivists to conduct operations on their behalf, definitive proof of a connection is incredibly difficult to find. Communication with hacktivist groups is conducted through various platforms on the dark web, and payment can be completed through e-payment platforms such as Bitcoin. Thus, this tactic has proven to be incredibly effective. Hacktivists played a major role in the Russian attacks against Georgia, Ukraine, and the United States. The very first operation in which cyber attacks were a complementary component to a larger kinetic conflict would not have been so successful if Russia had not hired hacktivists.

The Georgian Conflict

The Russo-Ossetian war is well-known in the security community as the first conflict in which cyber operations were used to complement a larger kinetic conflict. The conflict began after years of negotiations regarding the sovereignty of the territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, both claimed by Georgia, broke down. This resulted in the armament of separatist groups, who received funding and weapons from Russia, and Russian military movement into both regions. Throughout the conflict, armed combat was accompanied by DDoS attacks against websites vital to the communications network of the Georgian government and military. Since the international security community was unable to discern the exact origin of the DDoS attacks, the Russian government denied responsibility for the actions and instead blamed the attacks on Russian hacktivists. Additionally, the hacktivists were employed to conduct an intensive disinformation campaign within the region; fake websites and social media accounts spread propaganda and misinformation regarding the nature of Georgia’s role in the conflict. As a result, the international community--and, more importantly, the citizens of the region--had no reliable account of what was happening until the conflict had already ended. A lack of definitive proof that the Russian government was involved in these cyber attacks and a general misunderstanding of the nature of the conflict allowed Russia to avoid punishment. Having witnessed the strain that Russian cyber attacks can have upon a government in a time of crisis, many Eastern European states began improving their cybersecurity strategies. Unfortunately, Ukraine realized in 2014 just how difficult it is to withstand attacks from Russian hacktivists when the government is in political turmoil.

The Crimean Crisis

After the Russo-Ossetian war, Ukraine began building up their cybersecurity in anticipation of a Russian attack. This attack eventually came during the 2014 Crimean crisis. Seizing the opportunity created by the Euromaidan protests, Russia employed an advanced disinformation and propaganda campaign. This campaign was accompanied by low-level espionage and disruption missions that targeted Ukrainian government officials through spear-phishing and malware. The propaganda was spread via bots and hackers on social media, much like the disinformation spread during the Russo-Ossetian war. A DDoS attack was also conducted against Ukrainian government websites, which resulted in the websites crashing for several hours before Ukrainian security officials were able to reject the bots from the servers. These operations ultimately undermined the 2014 Ukrainian elections as illegitimate and the Ukrainian military was blamed for numerous false-flag operations against various pro-Russia separatist groups. An investigation into the source of the hacks revealed that the attacks originated with Russian IP addresses; however, the Russian government once more claimed that Russian hacktivists unaffiliated with the government had been responsible for the information operations. Nevertheless, the international community refused to believe these claims, declared the Russian-sponsored referendum to be illegitimate, and denounced the Russian occupation of Crimea in a United Nations General Assembly resolution. Some actors, such as the United States and the European Union, recognized the threat that the Russian information warfare posed to their security, and placed sanctions on Russia. This further dissolved the already fragile tensions between Russia and the United States, and these tensions reached their lowest point since the end of the Cold War when Russian hacktivists hacked the 2016 U.S. Presidential Elections.

The Hacking of the United States Presidential Election

During the 2016 U.S. presidential election, several U.S. political entities, most notably the Democratic National Coalition (DNC), reported that they had been hacked. Soon after private information about Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign was published on websites such as WikiLeaks and DCLeaks.com. Targeted ads and articles also began appearing on various social media platforms during the election, with many of them focusing on divisive political and social issues. The hacks and the ads were both easily traced back to Russian hacking groups with known affiliations to the Kremlin. The U.S. intelligence community determined, with high confidence, that Vladimir Putin had ordered the hacks and the divisive disinformation campaign. The discovery and attribution of the hacks resulted in immediate outrage from the U.S. population and ultimately caused further polarization along party lines.

The software and tactics used to conduct espionage on U.S. political entities were both rather simple, though thorough. The hacktivists employed by the Kremlin belonged to the group that the U.S. intelligence community refers to as “the Dukes.” The Dukes are well-known by the U.S. intelligence community; they have spent countless hours trying to remove the hacker group from public and private email servers all over the country. The hacktivists sent targeted emails containing malware to members of the DNC and other organizations. This practice is known as spear-phishing and often results in the target unknowingly installing viruses or malware to their computers. Once the malware has been installed to the computer, it can search for files, see the computer’s history, and access the internet. The hackers secured files through malware that was downloaded to the computers at the DNC, then revised and released the files in a way that would intentionally discredit the members of the Democratic National Coalition. This practice was perfected by Russia through employing it against their population; any entity that opposed the Kremlin or its policies were infiltrated, prostrated, and publicly shamed by “hacktivists.” The US political atmosphere remains tense years after the hacks were discovered, causing people to worry about how truly devastating hacktivist involvement in international politics can be.

Moving Forward: International Response and Action

The investigation and confirmation by the U.S. intelligence community of interference by the Kremlin and their hired hacktivists severely polarized the U.S. population. The government’s reaction, a ban on several Russian companies and individuals from conducting business in the United States, has been considered by many to be a “slap on the wrist.” Lack of a vehement response or clear policy direction highlights just how extensive the problem is on an international scale. Without the ability to punish hacktivist groups or the entities that employ them, the frequency and severity of cyber attacks will continue to grow globally.

The number of hacktivist groups worldwide has already increased since 2014, according to Dan Lohrmann. As a form of response to the “civilian” hacker groups used by the Kremlin to further their political goals, hacktivist groups in countries such as Ukraine and the U.S. have been created. Some, such as the Ukranian group led by a hacker known as “RUH8” (or “Roo-hate,” expressing the group’s disposition towards the Russian government), were formed with the sole purpose of counteracting Russian influence in their country’s politics after the Crimean Crisis. Others, like the Western hacktivist group “Anonymous” claim that their activities are protesting injustice and corruption where they see it occurring. 

Though the cause supported by a hacktivist group may be noble, the strength and skill with which Russian hacktivist complete cyber operations has caused governments all over the world to take action against Russia and hackers in general. The international community has striven to address the growing concern that cybercrime and hacktivism pose through diplomacy and economic sanctions; however, creating resolute legislation or treaties has proven to be extremely difficult. NATO has reported that the sanctions placed upon Russia in response to the Crimean Crisis have been largely successful and have “inflicted damage on the Russian economy,” but Russian hacktivist activity and cybercrime continue to grow. As a new form of technological warfare, cyber warfare has no international norms that may govern the actions of actors. A lack of clear definitions, acceptable actions, and understood repercussions allow actors to continue using cyber warfare without punishment.

Experts have begun to fear that Russian hacktivism will extend beyond the borders of Russian foreign policy and cybercrime to become its own black market business. The U.S. security firm Taia Global has assessed that the 2014 hack of Sony Pictures by North Korea may have been conducted by paid Russian hacktivists. Documents leaked from the studio were traced to a Russian hacktivist with suspected ties to the FSB. This presents a harrowing possibility: states may, given the opportunity, hire Russian hacktivists to conduct cyber espionage missions on their behalf. Any situation in which states hire foreign nationals to conduct illegal activity in cyberspace would further complicate the attribution problem and make it much more difficult to stifle cybercrime across the globe.

If the international community truly wishes to combat cyber criminals and hacktivists on a global scale, then international laws, norms, and treaties must be set in place to govern the actions of cyber states. Although many experts such as Brian Mazanec assess that norms would be incredibly beneficial for all states suffering from hacktivist and cyber attacks, they also realize that the creation of these norms is highly unlikely under normal circumstances. Many of the worlds largest powers have no interest in creating constraining norms for cyber warfare, as the absence of these norms allows them to attack one another freely; however, the rise of state-sponsored hacktivism has brought the lawless free-for-all within cyberspace to a new turning point. Before hacktivists were deeply involved in international relations, the political and social climates of states were largely unaffected by its cybersecurity policies. After the 2016 election and the polarization of the United States population, a state’s cybersecurity policies became a priority for ordinary citizens in different countries all over the globe. The control over cyberspace that states once had is now threatened by hacktivism, and it is time to consider creating laws and norms that would constrain cyber activity for all actors. Although they may prevent the world’s largest cyber powers from using cyberspace to attack one another, it could also disrupt the startling trend of political polarity in democratic states by punishing the actors using bots and hacktivists to further their political goals. 

Hacktivism has arisen from the continued proliferation of cyber weapons internationally. Although the 2008 Russo-Ossetian War, the 2014 Crimean Crisis, and the interference in the 2016 U.S. elections were all examples of successful Russian hacktivist operations, they certainly are not the only ones. Great Britain continues to grapple with the effects that Russian hacktivists had upon their political climate, and leaders all over the globe worry that their next elections will be undermined by Russian influence. With no laws, norms, or treaties governing cyberspace, the world waits impatiently for another Russian hacktivist to strike. Only two questions remain: Who will be the next target, and when will Russia strike next?

The Immigration Battle: How the U.S. and Germany’s Respective Immigration Models Affect Immigrant Economic Participation

The 2015 migrant crisis was one of the worst in global history. As a result of the ongoing conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq, as well as the unbearable living conditions in Eritrea, Kosovo, Yemen, and other nearby states, over 19.5 million refugees fled their native countries, mostly in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, and arrived at Europe’s and Asia’s borders in unprecedented numbers. This sudden influx of people by both land and sea into the European Union (EU), Germany in particular, created deep divisions within society over how to best cope with the vast amount of incoming refugees, many of whom could not speak the local language and had no documented proof of their existence. In addition to Europe, the United States was another preferred destination for refugees, although reaching America’s borders was a greater logistical challenge. 

Nonetheless, with the highest immigration rate out of all 28 EU countries and another whose existence is essentially built on the backs of immigrants, Germany and the United States are two of the most salient states to examine when analyzing the impacts of the recent immigration crisis. Both of these respective nations pride themselves on their ability to serve as a beacon of hope, change, and freedom for all, and while they share a lot of the same immigration laws and issues, they also differ immensely in their long-term treatment and adjustment plans for immigrants. This disparity, despite their similar roles as two of the most popular migration destinations in the world, downplays the important role and potential impact that immigrants can have on the country that they move to, especially in the economic sector. Despite the popular claim that immigrants steal native jobs, the economic and employment sector is often analyzed to determine how prosperous a state is. As a result, understanding how immigrants are accepted into the employment division in Germany and the United States is crucial to understanding the complexities of the Western immigration debate.

Overview of American and German Immigration History

The United States

Often said to be a “nation of immigrants,” the United States has been a desirable destination for refugees and immigrants alike for hundreds of years due to its promises of change and the opportunity to achieve the coveted ‘American Dream.’ However, immigration to the United States really began to take flight when an 1850 census included questions regarding nativity for the first time. Data from that census revealed that there were 2.2 million immigrants residing in the United States at that time, making up about 10 percent of the overall population. In the next 60 years, those numbers increased as people began to leave Europe because of lack of employment, crop failure, rising taxes, and famine, with the majority coming from England, Ireland, and Germany. In that period of time, the percentage of foreign-born individuals in the United States stayed between 13 and 15 percent, eventually reaching a peak of 14.8 percent in 1890. 

However, the culmination of the Great Depression, World War II, and new restrictive immigration laws that only let in strictly northern and western Europeans significantly decreased the rate at which people were coming into the U.S., leading to a low of 9.6 million immigrants, or 4.7 percent of the total U.S. population in 1970. After 1970, the number of immigrants residing in the United States quickly increased as more and more people immigrated from Latin America and Asia primarily. New laws including the Immigration Act of 1965 that abolished admission quotas, paired with the nation’s growing economy, led to an all-time high of more than 44.4 million immigrants in the United States as of 2017.

Yet the United States is no stranger to restrictive immigration laws; in 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act suspending the immigration of Chinese workers for ten years, and in 1892, it passed the Act to Prohibit the Coming of Chinese Persons into the United States. Yet, despite those restrictions, which were later repealed, and the continuation of those social attitudes by many Americans today, the United States also made significant strides in welcoming immigrants and refugees alike in later years. The most notable ones were the Refugee Relief Act of 1953 which “authorized the admission of up to 205,000 non-quota immigrants fleeing Europe,” and the Refugee Act of 1980, which established a new system for “processing and admitting refugees from overseas” and formally defined a “refugee” as “any person… who is unable or unwilling to return to [a] country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution.”

Nonetheless, since the September 2001 attacks by al-Qaeda, there has been an increased focus on immigration, specifically on immigrants from the MENA region, as well as calls for a return to more restrictive immigration laws. During his 2016 presidential campaign and throughout his presidency, President Donald Trump continuously pushed for a crackdown on illegal immigration by enacting the ‘Muslim ban,’ which has been shot down in many states for being unconstitutional, and building a wall at the southern border. President Trump's anti-immigrant rhetoric is primarily targeted towards Mexicans and Muslims, although he recently called for increased visa restrictions on Chinese citizens as well. This rhetoric, although in opposition to the country’s global role as a beacon of hope and freedom, is strikingly similar to the country’s anti-immigrant behavior from over a hundred years ago.

Germany

Whereas the United States faced an unprecedented influx of immigrants in the 19th and 20th centuries, Germany battled the opposite; between 1820 and 1920, as a result of war, famine, and political upheaval, around 6 million Germans left their home country in search of opportunity. However, around 1890 the emigration rate slowed down considerably as the German Empire entered a period of industrialization, attracting both those who had left as well as foreign workers who saw the potential to make a big profit in the newfound coal and steel industries. 

Yet while Germany was a country made up of immigrants, it was not a country whose society was very welcoming towards those who were foreign-born. In fact, xenophobic attitudes manifested themselves drastically in the 1920s under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party who advocated for the creation of a “pure” and “superior” German race, who he referred to as the “Aryan race.” This translated into nationalistic and anti-Semitic world views and a strong hatred for those who were neither German nor white. This anti-immigrant behavior later manifested itself into a 1973 government act known as the “Recruitment Ban”; this ban essentially ended the “era of foreign labor recruitment” of “guest workers” to West Germany and prevented them from entering the country from states who were not part of the European Economic Community at the time. Post-1973, immigration rates in Germany actually increased when the Soviet Union fell and the situation in Yugoslavia turned bloody and violent. Yet with the new influx of immigrants, xenophobic behavior also grew and mob violence broke out across many Germany cities and towns. Another significant anti-immigrant act was also passed in 2005 and became known as The Immigration Act or the Residence Act; this act essentially established Germany as a “country of immigration” with a legal duty towards integration. Having experienced the extremist views under Hitler, this fundamentally changed the way in which Germany presented itself in the international community as an immigrant ally.

Since joining as a member of the EU in 1957, Germany has become the second most popular migration destination in the EU after the United Kingdom, with approximately 15.96 million immigrants living in the country by 2011, amounting to about 19 percent of the population. Yet with the 2015 migrant crisis and the influx of migrants from the Middle East in particular, the population in Germany rose to 82.2 million people, an increase of 978,000 or 1.2 percent. In that same year, immigration to Germany totaled 2.14 million people, a 46 percent increase from 2014. As a response to the immense wave of immigrants fleeing the Middle East, Africa, and Asia, German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for an open border migration policy that would allow Germany to welcome those from primarily Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq. While Merkel was alone in this decision and her popularity levels dropped significantly, immigration to Germany in recent years has slowed considerably, with most individuals originating from Turkey and Poland.

The United States: Geared Towards Permanent Residency

At present, the current discourse among scholars in the field of immigration is that the American immigration system is more exclusionary and geared toward permanent residency. For those immigrating to the United States, the process to become a U.S. citizen can be done one of four different ways: acquiring citizenship by birth, acquisition, derivation, or naturalization. Immigrants also have the option of obtaining a Green Card or a Permanent Resident Card, which would allow them to permanently live and work in the United States. While the process to become a U.S. citizen is a long and difficult one, it is a process and a system that is designed to grant someone permanent residency and not simply a temporary stay. While the United States does offer temporary work, school, and travel visas, those have a time limit, and after a certain amount of time, the individual must return to their home country unless they choose to overstay their visa and risk deportation. Obtaining permanent residency is the only way to live in the United States in the long-run without facing potential repercussions with immigration authorities.

Furthermore, the United States’s immigration system has an exclusionary design which is made more difficult due to the length of time that it takes to become a U.S. citizen, as well as the necessary documented proof and other government obstacles that must be overcome. The citizenship process tends to be a long and arduous one if citizenship by birth is not an option, and much like the vetting process for refugees, it can take up to 18-24 months including an array of comprehensive interviews and security checks that are completed by the Department of Homeland Security and the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. The entirety of this process first includes getting sponsored by a U.S. citizen, be it a relative or an employer. To even be considered for an immigrant visa, the immigrant must be sponsored, which then leads to the submission of a petition for citizenship. After the petition is filed, the immigrant must pay processing fees, submit financial and supporting documents, and go through an interview; if the immigrant passes the interview, he or she will then be granted their immigrant visa and legally be allowed to enter the United States. This process is exclusionary in nature because many immigrants either do not have the necessary documentation and proof of their existence, do not have the financial means to pay the processing fees, and/or do not have someone residing in the U.S. that will sponsor their visa. As a result, only a fraction of immigrants applying for visas are accepted.

Additionally, despite immigration being one of the most salient issues a country can face, misperceptions still persist, especially regarding how immigration affects a country’s economy and workforce. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the U.S. labor force, defined by the BLS as “all people age 16 and older who are classified as either employed and unemployed,” was approximately 160 million people in January 2018. There is also the Labor Force Participation Rate (LFPR), which is the percentage of people in the labor force who are either working or actively looking for work. Out of that 160 million in the labor force, immigrant laborers, mostly from Latin America, make up a record high of 17 percent as of 2019, amounting to roughly 27,200,000 people. With 2019, the economy is said to be on track to have the same success as it did in 2018, where output increased by $560 billion and grew by 3.1 percent.

Yet irregardless of the aforementioned data, many immigration critics argue that immigrants, regardless of their legal status or the percentage that they hold in the labor force, “steal American jobs” and “hurt the American economy.” President Trump is one such proponent of this belief; in November 2018, he stated that “Illegal immigration hurts American workers, burdens American taxpayers, and undermines public safety” in addition to them “taking precious resources away from the poorest Americans who need them most.'' However, while many stand behind that belief, the data reveals that the U.S. economy relies heavily on immigrant laborers and foreign-born workers in the labor force to contribute to national economic growth. A 2017 report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found that “immigration has an overall positive impact on long-run economic growth in the U.S.” Furthermore, the report revealed that second generation immigrants are “among the strongest fiscal and economic contributors” in the country, as they contribute around $1,700 annually per person. That data, paired with the fact that there has been a recent increase in more educated immigrants, demonstrates how immigrants are and will continue to be economically beneficial.

The immigrant assimilation process into the economic and employment sector is also aided by the infusion of their native cultures and the establishment of self-made enterprises or businesses, which assists with urban revitalization. While the popular claim is that immigrants steal jobs that are meant for American workers, many immigrants do not have the proper documentation, experience, or language skills to work in high-paying positions. In those cases, they often resort to working the jobs that American citizens do not want, particularly in the fast food and agricultural sectors, as well as many manual labor positions. The impact of immigrant work is seen by their ability to transform “desolate areas into thriving neighborhoods” by increasing the local population, expanding the tax base by setting up their own businesses, and bringing in more customers for both their own companies and domestic companies. The establishment of a business that hosts elements of the owners native culture not only normalizes that culture in an American context, but it draws in people and customers. For example, the beloved Chinatown sector that is found in many urban cities across the country, such as San Francisco and Chicago, is a product of Chinese immigration in the 19th century when Chinese-Americans wished to preserve their culture and surround themselves with similar people. In fact, despite gentrification efforts in many cities, Chinatown continues to survive on its promise of a strong restaurant culture with unique ethnic food.

All in all, while a large percentage of Americans may vehemently disagree, admitting immigrants and foreign-born workers into the country is an economically beneficial decision, regardless of their legal status. Now while there is also a link between immigration and crime rates, which is an aspect of the immigration debate that fuels anti-immigrant supporters, the overarching takeaway, as seen previously by the data presented, is that immigrants are helpful contributors to the U.S. economy. Without foreign-born workers, the United States’ labor force would decrease by 17 percent, amounting to a loss of over 27,000,000 workers. This would significantly damage the U.S. economy, potentially destroy certain industries that are immigrant-based and fun, and decrease the overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP), or the amount of economic activity within the country per year. While immigrants are not essential to the economic sector, the United States is much better off with the continued employment of foreign-born workers. 

Germany: Geared Towards Temporary Workers

In contrast to the United States, Germany’s immigration model is focused more on the temporary entry of foreign workers rather than the acquisition of permanent residents. However, much like the process to become a U.S. citizen, receiving admission to live or work in Germany is also a lengthy affair and has strict requirements that must be met. Admission into the country is further complicated by the fact that Germany is part of the EU, so there are different requirements depending on the status of the immigrant. If the applicant is a non-EU citizen, immigration is dependant on their skill level, as only those who are skilled or highly educated, as well as their family members, are accepted into the country. If the non-EU applicant plans to stay more than 90 days, then they must obtain a Residence Permit, otherwise their short-term visa will expire. 

There is also the option of getting an EU Blue Card, which is a temporary residence permit lasting up to four years, as well as a work permit for those who are highly-qualified as employees. The requirements for that particular permit include holding a college degree and making a salary of EUR 47,600 or more a year. Yet as of recent, those restrictions for non-EU citizens have lessened under a new German immigration act that permits non-EU citizens to work in the country if they have the “qualified vocational training” as well as an “employment contract.” However, if the immigrant in question is an EU citizen, then the process is significantly simplified. The applicant, if from one of the other 27 EU states or Switzerland, must only have a valid passport to enter Germany, but is required to change their address to match their new one in Germany within three months of their arrival. Otherwise, no extra steps are required for EU citizens.

Nonetheless, participating in the German economic and employment sector is not too difficult, no matter if the immigrant is an EU citizen or not, but it does hold more stringent requirements than the United States. Foreign-born workers in Germany must first have a job offer and then get a temporary residence permit which authorizes them to be in the country for work purposes. Next, immigrants tend to need to meet eligibility standards, such as being able to speak German and getting the approval to work that particular job by the Federal Employment Agency. Upon completion of all of that, the immigrant is then able to apply for a Residence Permit, with the length of stay determined by the immigrant’s employer.

This overall focus on the skill level and educational background of the immigrant relates back to the fact that the German immigration system is designed in a way that encourages the temporary entry of foreign workers rather than the acquisition of permanent residents. Because German birth rates significantly declined in the 19th century as well as most recently in 2015, leading to vacancies in jobs across the economic sector, Germany has actively tried to recruit foreign-born workers to fill those empty positions. Most of the individuals immigrating to Germany now are highly skilled and well-educated, and are taking jobs in high-paying positions where they can utilize their academic backgrounds.

The focus on temporary workers rather than permanent residents does not seem to have damaged Germany’s economy too much. In fact, with the recent surge of immigrants and asylum seekers from the Middle East and Africa in particular, Germany has experienced an economic boom. Data collected by the EU’s annual labor-force survey, which analyzes participation, employment, and unemployment rates for several demographics, reveals that between 2007 and 2017, the foreign-born employment rate in Germany for individuals aged 20 to 64 rose by 8 percent, increasing from 62 to 70 percent. Immigrants are not only coming to Germany in large numbers, but they are actively contributing to the economy by seeking jobs and earning an income. However, despite their economic success, immigration integration is not seamless and without complications. Created in 2005, the German government has utilized a nine-month integration course that attempts to “expedite the assimilation of approved asylees” and aid them in obtaining “needed linguistic skills, as well as softer cultural skills and understanding.” Because one of the requirements for a legal Residence Permit include the ability to speak the local language, that being German, this integration course assists with the acceleration of employment efforts.

Yet it is not just immigrants from other countries that have boosted the German economy. According to the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin), intra-migrants from other EU states have boosted Germany’s GDP growth by approximately 0.2 percent every year from 2011 to 2016. Since 2011, about 10 million immigrants have entered Germany, half of them coming from other places in the EU. With the influx of migrants, the labor participation rate has increased, with data showing that EU migrants participate more in the economy than German natives. In 2017, employment rates for native Germans was 70.6 percent while their immigrant counterparts was 74.6 percent. Because their focus is on temporary workers, migrants head to Germany with the primary objective of finding a job and making money. Per Marius Clemens, an economic researcher at DIW Berlin, “Germany’s GDP would have grown by 1.2 percent instead of 1.5 percent in 2015” had it not been for EU immigration rates, therefore showing that “EU immigration has made-and continues to make-a considerable contribution to the economy.”

Irregardless, while both the United States and Germany are both desirable destinations by immigrants and are two countries that not only share a history of immigration, but are also facing a large influx of immigrants in the present day, neither of their immigration models is without fault. Whichever model is deemed the “better one” is based entirely off of the immigrants’ objective purpose. If the applicant wishes to become a permanent resident in the United States, then it is advisable that they not only be prepared to endure a long and arduous application and screening process, but that they steel themselves against the awaiting xenophobic attitudes and anti-immigrant rhetoric that is perpetuated by many American citizens. However, if the applicant wishes to find work in an environment that has a less strict process (to a degree), then Germany’s immigration model would be the better option.

Regarding immigrant participation in a nation’s economic sector, both the United States and Germany rely on foreign-born workers to boost their economy and contribute to economic growth. In these two respective countries, immigrant laborers and immigrant-owned businesses are invaluable in their contributions to the national economy. The overall participation process for an immigrant in either of these states is a long process, as to be expected, but once admitted into the country on a permanent or temporary basis, there are numerous opportunities for an individual to participate in the economic and employment sector and contribute to the national economy.