Resistance in Syria

In early 2011, protests broke out against Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria as part of the Arab Spring. The government responded to the protests - whose motto was ‘the people demand removal of the regime’ - with a violent crackdown. The attempted suppression of the protests quickly backfired, with many Syrians beginning to call for a revolution and taking up arms against the regime. The resulting violence quickly escalated into the Syrian Civil War. For years, the civil war has had the attention of the world as the Syrian people struggled against the dictatorial Assad. The Ghouta chemical attacks in 2013 horrified the world, as the regime killed 1,429 people (426 of whom were children) with sarin gas. This blatant massacre prompted the first, of many, foreign interventions in the civil war, as the United States and its allies threatened to retaliate against the regime if all chemical weapons were not turned over. A few years later, ISIS emerged from the power vacuum and conflict in eastern Syria, fighting both the regime and the rebel opposition. This prompted another foreign intervention, as much of the world cooperated to combat the rise of ISIS’ caliphate. The most significant intervention of the entire war though began in 2015, when Russia began a mass bombing campaign in order to support its ally Assad and keep him in power, which has been tragically effective and deadly.

The Syrian Civil War is still ongoing today and has been marked by intense violence, different factions, and the presence and interventions of multiple foreign powers, each with their own proxies. Today the civil war is far from settled, though the Assad regime has conquered, or pacified, large parts of the country - largely as a result of the brutal bombing campaign by its Russian ally. Despite the fact that the conflict is still ongoing, the international community has inexplicably moved on, acting as if the war had been won by Assad’s government. It seems that much of the world, and now recently even the Biden administration, is treating the Syrian Civil War as solved, and is now considering rapprochement towards the regime. This is a gross rehabilitation of a vicious regime. One that has utilized chemical weapons to kill thousands of its own people, and developed horrific new weapons of war, such as barrel bombs. It also ignores and downplays the conflict and continued resistance that occurs within Syria today in cities like Daara and Idlib, and the Kurdish northeast.

The city of Daara in southwestern Syria has been called the ‘birthplace of the Syrian revolution.’ The arrest of two teenagers in 2011 for anti-Assad graffiti led to an outbreak of protests, to which the regime had a brutal and deadly response. This incident was one of the opening salvos of the civil war. Only after seven long years of fighting was Daara largely captured during a Russian-led offensive in 2018. The remaining areas of the city soon came to an agreement with the Assad regime, brokered and guaranteed by Russia.

Disgruntled and dissatisfied by the lack of good faith shown by the regime in honoring their side of the deal, protests broke out in Daara in late July. Assad’s forces responded swiftly in their usual manner - an indiscriminate bombing campaign and siege of the city. The regime specifically targeted the neighborhood of Daara Al-Bahad, whose representative Central Committee has begged for a ceasefire to solve the water and food shortages. To date the regime’s bombings have killed at least 15 people, with some estimates rising to four times that number.

Yet the bombing of Daara has attracted little to no international attention or support. Daraa represents not only the birth of the struggle against Bashar Al-Assad’s regime, but also that it is ongoing. The regime’s ‘control’ of much of its claimed territory is tenuous at best, and fresh resistance is still taking place.

Similarly, fighting has intensified in and around the city of Idlib in northwestern Syria. A Russian bombing campaign seeks to displace the opposition forces that control most of the governorate. This campaign carries additional risks as well - the situation in Idlib is not as straightforward as in Daara. The city of Idlib and much of the governorate is controlled by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an Islamist group. But a significant portion of the governorate is controlled by the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army, an opposition group, which risks a larger regional conflict between Turkey and Russia. Russia’s bombing campaign in Northern Syria also extends to areas firmly in control of the Syrian National Army, deep within the so-called Turkish ‘safe zones’ like Afrin.

But the most significant remaining opposition to Assad’s government is the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria - better known as Rojava. To the east of the Euphrates river, Rojava is a self-governing democratic region of Syria. While dominated by the Kurds, Rojava is notably multi-ethnic, especially in the wake of the influx of refugees and internally displaced persons created in the civil war. With its own armed wing - the Syrian Democratic Forces - Rojava has enjoyed great success combating not only Assad’s forces, but ISIS as well. In fact it was the SDF who led much of the ground fighting against ISIS in Syria.

But for the moment, it is not Assad’s regime that poses the greatest threat against the continued existence and independence of Rojava. Ever since President Trump pulled American troops from their supportive role in Rojava, Turkey has carried out a number of operations against Rojava, invading from the north and seizing territory - making the largest remaining resistance to Assad’s rule fight on two fronts. Turkey sees the existence of an independent Kurdish state as a threat, as they harshly oppress and persecute their own Kurdish minority. The threat posed by Turkey to Rojava is so great, the government of Rojava has indicated they would be open to some form of alliance with Assad’s government against Turkey. Yet despite all these challenges, Rojava has maintained its independence, making the recent attitudes towards Assad all the more strange.

Despite the fact that continued resistance to the regime is still ongoing throughout Syria, the last few months have seen a shocking movement towards acceptance of Assad’s regime. The governments of Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar have all sent emissaries to meet with Assad in the past year, a stunning change of policy when most of these states have previously harshly opposed him. Interpol, the international police organisation, announced in October that Syria - as in Assad’s government - would be readmitted to the body. Not only is this an immoral recognition of the regime, but in time the government will have access to red notices  - the international equivalent of an arrest warrant, allowing the regime to target and harrass dissenters and critics abroad. Recently, even the Biden administration has begun to open negotiations with the regime. Washington is in the early stages of a deal to transport Egyptian natural gas through Jordan and Syria to energy deprived Lebanon - with Assad’s government getting a cut in the process. 

This deal would be a betrayal of those who continue to struggle against the regime and would be a disgusting acceptance of someone who has butchered those who protested against him. Worse, it would make the United States complicit in the crimes of Assad’s regime. Supplying Assad with resources like natural gas only makes it easier for him to keep his grip on a country that rejected his rule. The attempt to alleviate Lebanon’s energy crisis is laudable and humanitarian, and doubtlessly would do much in the way of reducing suffering there. But there has to be another way in which Lebanon’s crisis can be relieved without tying the solution to Assad. This deal would not only help legitimize his rule - recognizing him as the power in Syria - it will provide him with material assets to continue his oppression. The money and energy that the regime will gain from this deal could go straight to propagating the security forces that terrorize the Syrian people.

The United States should reject cooperation and recognition with the Assad regime. It is wrong to ignore the continued resistance towards his regime, and to abandon the allies that we have supported in Syria - especially the bastion of resistance that is Rojava in the Northeast. It is wrong for the international community as well to wash their hands of what is happening in Syria, to pretend that the war is over when the humanitarian crisis is still ongoing. The international community should not seek diplomatic rapprochement with Bashar al-Assad, should not let him and his cronies out from the cold. To do so would be an insult to all the Syrians that he has slaughtered and those that continue to languish under his rule.

Women's Rights and Gender Inequality in Haiti

Haitian women face a number of challenges under the umbrella of gender inequality: gender-based violence, a lower employment rate, the inability to support themselves financially or have ownership over property, and an overall absence of representation. These issues can be traced to way back in the nation’s history, but they have only been exacerbated by instability stemming from the devastating earthquake in August of this year. As explained by the Chr. Michelsen Institute, “Since women are more often socioeconomically disadvantaged than men, they become more vulnerable to the consequences of such disasters,” and ignoring elements of gender inequality hidden throughout the structures of a country can lead to major consequences regarding economic development and more. However, much of the international community’s contributions has been about “sidelining” the long-term efforts of Haiti’s women’s movement and instead throwing money behind short-term projects that appear to some as meeting the urgency compelled by the earthquake. People must think ahead in terms of women’s rights and gender inequality, and these issues must be addressed in the long-term as well. Studying other countries, small actions that made a big difference, shortcomings in past policies, and specific overall goals can help alleviate the problem of gender inequality in Haiti.

Gender-Based Violence

“One in three Haitian women between the ages of 15 and 49 has experienced some form of gender-based violence,” yet legal protection tends to fall through when it comes to women and girls. Rape and domestic violence were non-punishable offenses in Haiti until 2005. No laws were in place to help survivors beforehand. While the changes all those years ago were cause to celebrate, it was the bare minimum, and efforts must not relax now. 

After the events that occurred in August, it is all the more important to stay vigilant. This is exemplified through the Haiti earthquake of 2010, a disaster causing many issues including a considerable amount of gender-based violence. This was as women resigned to living on the streets, internally displaced person (IDP) camps were created, and resources continued to be allocated to other areas of concern.

 It has been noted that initiatives are too reactive and not sufficiently preventative. There are ways to fix this. For example, after women had been attacked while they were headed to the toilet at a camp, the American Jewish World Service spread street lamps to make them feel safer, and even safety patrols to guide women to the public washing areas were established. Many places have implemented simple approaches to addressing gender-based violence, such as lighting. The road to success requires the inclusion of women’s voices and representation as security plans are concocted.

Clearly, although punishment for gender-based violence has improved, this is an ongoing issue easily furthered by special events—like an earthquake—and more must be done to prevent it, not just react to it. This would help not only women, but the whole population. Women “make up 85 percent of the victims of violence registered in hospitals and health centers,” so of course “the health-care costs and productivity loss due to violence is undoubtedly large.” Violence against women has harsh immediate and long-term effects, and small steps as aforementioned may work wonders.

The Informal Sector

Another gender issue is discrimination in hiring practices. Reportedly, women have a twenty percent higher chance of unemployment than men. The majority of women work in the informal sector of the economy, a branch that has been described as “unregulated, unsupervised, and unstable,” and three-quarters of people working in that sector are women. Given that the informal sector includes “makeshift markets, petty trade, home-based businesses and restaurants,” women are the primary victims of lost livelihood. 

Going forward, Haiti must pay special attention to women’s job loss. There are many ways to do so, as evidenced through the example of Liberia. After Liberia’s civil war, the new president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf made an attempt to improve informal markets. This effort led to the creation of the Market Women’s Fund, and the board has since raised millions of dollars to enhance market infrastructure. At the same time, the fund has supported causes such as child care, issues more directly tied to women. The lesson learned from Liberia is that a country can help these two causes for women and the economy simultaneously. In the end, two birds were killed with one stone.

Financial Mechanisms for Women

While “women earn less than half of men’s wages” in Haiti, they tend to have little power or background regarding finances. A forefront problem is with control, and that is a two-pronged idea. First, women tend to be caregivers in Haiti, and therefore they are seen as responsible for emergencies like health issues. Short-term emergencies can cause extreme instability, and the recent earthquake is no help. Since women are placed as heads of households, they are the ones who end up in charge of taking care of short-term situations like these, and they often end up pulling funds from their business savings. It is difficult to get a whole demographic of people to succeed in their employment when they are also riddled with other people’s expectations. Second, women are often not listed on accounts and property titles. This may interfere with their ability to receive government assistance, make the best decisions for their businesses, and more.

One way that Haiti can kill two birds—women’s and economic issues—is through Microfinance Institutions. Currently, wages that are not used immediately often do not meet their full potential as an investment, and access to financial services targeted towards women could make a major difference. Additionally, MFIs would allow women to keep money under their own names, therefore maintaining control of their assets. Along with these perks could come financial literacy programs like the ones in the Dominican Republic, teaching women how to succeed in an already existing system.

Another clear way to move forward is to create joint property titles; creating a fair system to establish ownership of property can have ripple effects, like in Tamil Nadu. After the terrible tsunami that hit India, the push for joint land titles reportedly led to an increase in women’s participation in the community and leadership roles. On top of that, status, income, and employment stability were all positively affected due to this update. Increasing women’s control of their finances will, over time, help shrink the gender gap in multiple facets.

Women’s Representation

Haiti is ranked 187th out of 190 countries on the topic of political representation of women, and this is representative of a broader problem. Following the earthquake, there is an opportunity. It is one of the only positive side effects of such a catastrophic event, but there is an opportunity for change in terms of gender inequality in the country. From a past one of Haiti’s earthquakes, the post-disaster needs assessment (PDNA) said that women have been “left out of the equation when it comes to rebuilding the country’s judicial, administrative, legislative and democratic systems.” In order to create a country where women are treated like and able to be equals, the structures must support that goal. 

Haiti has actually previously acknowledged the lack of women in leadership roles. In 2012, a constitutional amendment was put in place that said that 30 percent of all public positions must be filled by women, for example. However, the gender quota has not been met because policy is ineffective without a method for implementation plus accountability. The details were not there in the decision making. It is critical to include women in the rebuilding and development process in order to create a Haiti free of gender inequality.

A Long-Term Solution

Gender-based violence, unemployment, a lack of financial control, and insufficient representation in decision-making are some of the main issues facing women in Haiti. While these issues have been clear for quite some time, the instability caused by the earthquake from August of this year only further exposed the challenges women face in the country. As the economy suffers, women—those who are already the most economically underprivileged—are being hit the hardest, and a multitude of systemic flaws are on full display. These gender-based challenges are not just due to social problems; they are generated and maintained as a result of the structures and institutions that governments build, and the very people most affected by these structures are those who are excluded from positions of power. What should be done now is an examination of the holes in major prior policies as well as the smaller, quicker changes that worked, the creation of specific, long-term strategies, and an evidence-based evaluation of other programs, using other countries as case studies. Other countries should resist the urge to throw money solely behind rapid emergency response programs and plan for investing in thorough solutions. Alleviating the issue of gender inequality and ensuring women’s rights in Haiti requires strong social and economic infrastructure. It is time to start looking at women’s issues holistically and in the context of all policy decisions.

The Era of Desalination: Israel’s Success & The Future of Water in the Middle East

The Water Crisis in the Middle East

For many living in the developed world, a day spent thinking about where their next glass of water will be coming from is an oddity. Although many countries in Europe suffer from issues concerning water scarcity, these are more exceptions to the rule. The issue of water stress and scarcity primarily concerns the developing world, especially the Middle East and North Africa, where access to potable drinking water (or any water at all for that matter) is extremely limited. For instance, while 8% of France and 10% of the Netherlands reside in water-scarce areas, more than 49% of Egypt and 63% of Saudi Arabia lack this essential resource, due to a variety of factors both natural and man-made. Climate change aside, the environment of the Middle East—hot, arid, and seldom rainy—makes for a harsh lifestyle devoid of water. More importantly though is the overuse of water for agricultural purposes. Close to 85% of the region’s water is allocated for irrigation, and often inefficiently. Even wealthier Arab countries find themselves confronted with this issue. As awe-inspiring as the infrastructural marvels of Dubai may appear; even the UAE is close to the breaking point, with groundwater scarcity and water reuse mismanagement creating a deadly storm on the horizon. Combining these aforementioned points with rising populations and increasing water sanitation costs, it is no wonder that so many suffer from this emergency.

Understandably, the question must be asked: How can the governments of these countries provide enough water for the needs and wants of their populations? As the water crisis of the Middle East has become increasingly dire, countries have developed a slew of solutions to the problem, along with mixed results. Initiative include repairing piping infrastructure and water trading, and many countries have focused on sequential water management, which involves sanitizing wastewater for industrial or domestic purposes. Even still, the numbers don’t lie; swaths of the Middle East rely on insufficient water resources. While water reserves continue to plunge and water quality issues constantly spring up, water conflicts—armed and otherwise—are on the horizon.

The answer to this devastating issue lies with Israel’s success. Reeling from its water crisis of the late-2000s, Israel has developed techniques in desalination, water treatment, and drip-irrigation that may aid the entire region. How is it that a country which once teetered on the brink of full-scale collapse from water shortages is now the only country which doesn’t suffer from acute water shortages? And how can we apply these lessons of success in confronting the water crisis of the region as a whole?

What is Desalination?

Before jumping into the specifics, it is important to identify what exactly “desalination” means and what constructing desalination plants actually entails. As the word implies, desalination involves the removal of salt (as well as other minerals and potential inorganic and organic contaminants) from water to make it potable. Desalinated water is most often processed from seawater, although desalination sites might be erected as salt interception schemes (SIS) along irrigation lines to desalinate agricultural runoff or as temporary infrastructure to desalinate waterways along desertified areas. Likewise, the purpose of the desalinated water can vary by context. While a majority of desalination plants are used for drinking water or auxilliary uses (showering, dishwashing, latrines, etc.), the aforementioned salt interception schemes are used to desalinate water to be piped back into natural rivers and waterways as “blue water” for ecological purposes. After all, freshwater fish need water too.

Two primary desalination methods exist: reverse osmosis and thermal distillation. The former works on the science of “water equalization”, whereby the natural properties of water demand equal volumes of water in two separate spaces if divided by a semi-permeable membrane. In layman’s terms: A container is divided in two by a wall of microscopic netting, one half empty and the other half with water. The netting selectively allows water to pass through while leaving salt, minerals, and other contaminants behind. In the case of reverse osmosis, the benefit is its increased thoroughness, especially in separating organic contaminants from the water. Unfortunately, the process remains extremely expensive and energy-intensive—leaving reverse osmosis a strategy that has popularized in Europe and the United States rather than elsewhere in the world.

As for thermal distillation, one can derive the basic premise from the word as well. Rapidly heated water produces steam, which in turn—having separated the water from the leftover compounds—can be recondensed into distilled water for drinking or other various uses. Thermal desalination has become popular in the greater Middle East and North Africa, mostly for the lower energy requirements and the simplicity of design. Admittedly, in contrast to other desalination plants in the area, a majority of Israeli sites utilize reverse osmosis technology, which may not be appropriate for the bulk of Middle Eastern countries which suffer from debt and frequent budget misallocations. However, by taking advanatage of the simplicity and the lower energy requirement associated with thermal desalination technology, it is possible for the region to harness the same wealth of water that Israel enjoys.

Timeline of the Water Crisis in Israel

Not so long ago, Israel itself was another unfortunate example of the rampant water crisis afflicting the Middle East. Historically, Israel’s water was provided from a variety of sources like groundwater spots, natural bodies of water like the Sea of Galilee and Lake Kinneret, and wastewater reuse systems. Further sources, like personal wells and runoff from Mount Camel, provide Israelis with the water they need on a day-to-day basis. Israel’s water politics are heavily influenced by its 1959 Water Law, which designated water as a national public good. This not only confirmed the government’s responsibility in providing safe water to all citizens of Israel, but also the government’s monopoly of power concerning the handling and allocation of water.

At the turn of the 21st century, Israel was in the midst of one of the greatest droughts the country had seen since its founding (lasting from 1998-2002). Israel’s government acknowledged the problem by encouraging water conservation, but continued to distribute water arbitrarily to industry, pollute waterways, and over-sanitize non-drinking water. Much of this misallocation can be attributed to Mekorot: the nationalized water company of Israel. In the absence of competition, Mekorot remained a poorly-managed government monopoly which substantially undercut the price of water to levels that did not meet operation costs. Further mismanagement and lack of attention to the growing crisis from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development meant that the crisis only worsened. Attempts were made to compensate with water conservation efforts; installation of low-flow toilets and showerheads and investment into innovative water treatment systems. Israeli officials even advised their constituents to take “zionist showers”, or shared family showers. Still, the nation was struggling more than it ever had in providing adequate water.

It was not until 2005 that the government finally built its salvation: the Ashkelon desalination plant. Then-providing over 101 million cubic meters of water to the state of Israel, the Ashkelon plant’s success transformed the state of the Israeli water crisis. Since then, Israel has constructed five more desalination plants, with a bid for a seventh plant in northern Israel to provide >100 million more cubic meters of water. Overall, more than 585 million cubic meters of water are provided by desalination plants in Israel. Today, desalination is an essential part of day-to-day life for a near-majority of Israelis, with 35% of Israel having received their water through desalination channels in 2014, and a projected 70% to be drinking desalinated water by 2050.

Challenges to the Israeli Model

Of course, a solution which seems too good to be true is, quite often, simply that. Plenty of evidence exists to support desalination’s promise for the Middle East, but plenty also exists to point out the risks that come with feverishly constructing desalination plants. Two primary concerns lie with expanding desalination: cost and environmental impact.

With regard to the first, it cannot be overstated how expensive a desalination plan can often become. Projections vary, but according to a survey from the Texas Water Development Board, construction of a 2.5 million gallon per day plant (equivalent to ~100,000 cubic meters per day, less than half the daily production of Israel’s planned seventh desalination plant) would cost more than $32 million. Combine this with supply-chain problems, corruption, and a host of other barriers, and it is little wonder why countries in the Middle East are so unwilling to throw money at a problem which could yield very little. Low returns on desalinated water further dissuade most companies or national agencies even willing to look into desalination.

As for environmental impact, this itself can be further broken down into concern over the power source and the ramifications for sea life because of wastewater. Powering desalination plants can be a heavy undertaking—estimates for the carbon output of Australia’s construction of desalination plants alone in 2015 are around 1,200 kt of carbon dioxide, a number which skyrockets when accounting for year-by-year emissions once the plant goes into operation. Effects on marine life also remain a concern as the amount of wastewater pumped back into the environment increases. Desalination is not a zero-waste process; the contents removed from the salinated water have to go somewhere, which very often means right back into the ocean. Dozens of desalination sites, all pumping gallons of warm, brackish water back into the coastal waterways, could seal the fate of innumerable species of sealife.

All of this is certainly a concern, and few reasonable people would argue that these issues should be ignored in favor of securing freshwater for humans alone. Much of humanity’s mission today involves securing the environment for future generations and not plunging them into unpayable debt. But there are alternatives; desalination sites can easily be powered via renewable energy sources like solar or geothermal power. Studies have shown the positive yields from reverse osmosis plants coupled with renewable energy sources, not only in reducing carbon outputs but in reducing future energy costs too. Additionally, as new processes develop, the outlook on brine treatement techniques has become optimistic. Instead of simply pumping wastewater directly back into the environment, water treatment can further purify water bound for the sea and dispose of contaminants elsewhere (repurposing salt and minerals, etc.).

The Future of Water in the Middle East

At this very moment, more than 66 million people in the Middle East lack basic sanitation. Of the 17 most water-stressed countries in the world, 11 of them lie in the Middle East and North Africa. Water provided a catalyst for conflict when ISIS threatened to take over the entire region (such as when the Islamic State captured the Taqba Dam in Iraq in 2013 which was only reclaimed in 2017) and it continues to provide a spark for political disputes and military clashes alike. In Yemen, where potable water stores have reached a mere 198 cubic meters per capita, widespread water shortage contributes heavily to the famine and in-fighting amongst rebel groups. In northeastern Africa, Ethiopia’s construction of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam—which would greatly restrict the already-lessening upstream flow of the Nile which provides for Egypt’s and Sudan’s agro-economies—threatens to spark war between these countries and others upstream. As has become increasingly evident, awareness campaigns and changes to individual consumption are not enough. Macro-problems demand macro-solutions, and desalination could be just the answer the Middle East is looking for.

Some scholars have suggested promoting the synergystic relationship between water and other resources like food and energy (hydroelectricity). Part of the impasse with politicians may be the fact that water may be a necessity, but it’s difficult to profit off of in our existing economic system. If we then expand water’s necessity to include agricultural production and hydropower production, we could expand the interest in powerful groups to secure wider access to water resources. 

The reality is that increasing access to water in the Middle East will involve more than internal solutions; a problem that transcends borders such as this demands collaboration and diplomacy between states. Arab-Israeli hydropolitics are complicated, and it’s unfortunately unlikely that the inevitable catastrophe that would come with remaining politically-unilateral would mean Arabs and Israelis finally seeing each other as more than enemies. Perhaps there will come a day when people of Muslim and Jewish faith can live harmoniously in their respective homelands, and perhaps the water crisis will not be that watershed event. But the present and growing problem does provide an opportunity for interstate relations that rises above differences in identity or ideology. We cannot continue to ignore the suffering of those experiencing this crisis, just as we cannot continue to ignore the opportunity that this creates for diplomacy and greater peace in the Middle East.

Private Property is Antithetical to Human Rights

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was the foremost document of its kind. When it was ratified by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948, it was the first international standard for human rights. It enshrined the idea of universality, which proclaims that every individual has innate rights that must be protected by and from various institutions that are both private and public in nature. However, while the UDHR is a significant accomplishment, it is very much a product of its post-WWII era. The Cold War was in its early stages and the need to protect the ideals of Western capitalism against the various strains of socialism and communism was paramount. Furthermore, the process of formal decolonization had just begun; governments representing formally colonized peoples were just beginning to have a modicum of power within the newly formed United Nations (UN). This historical context is arguably of the utmost importance when considering the contents of the UDHR: Western countries, who were formative in the creation of the UN and its mission, were interested in upholding settler-colonialism and capitalism in order to protect their economic and political interests which were threatened by decolonization and the rise in anti-capitalist ideology. Nowhere is this more evident than in Article 17 which states: “Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.” Private property is arguably antithetical to the human rights project as not only is it inherently exclusionary, it explicitly violates the rights of Indigenous peoples and creates the basis for extractive relationships with the land that are ultimately harmful. 

What is Property?

It should be noted that the contemporary understanding of property is rooted in the microcosm of Western philosophy. The West’s conceptualization of property deliberately occludes the reciprocal relationship to land that is an inherent part of Indigenous beliefs and customs. Property, as is currently understood, is a fairly general term- it typically connotes ownership over something tangible or intangible. For the purposes of this article, property will be used to refer to land and its material resources. Private property specifically refers to a “system that allocates particular objects, like pieces of land, to particular individuals to use and manage as they please, to the exclusion of others and to the exclusion of any detail controlled by society.”  It is worth mentioning that private ownership in Western countries does not directly translate to total ownership over the land; it typically entails rights to the land. However, these rights still have extensive consequences. Ownerships may entail the following: exclusion of others, renting, leasing, or selling land, and the decision to use or not to use it. Private property also does not exist in isolation; its existence still depends on public justification; without the acknowledgment of public institutions, it would be difficult to enforce laws pertaining to private property rights. 

While private property is currently the predominant system, it is not the only iteration of property that has been implemented. Common property is used to govern resources that are available to all; any sort of restriction on its use is meant to guarantee fair access to everyone. This idea of common property is deliberately meant to prevent any sort of exclusion. In a similar vein, collective property is where the whole community determines how important resources are to be utilized; such determinations are based on social interest and are meant to ensure the well-being of the community. While common and collective property differ in their specific mechanisms, they are both rooted in democratic processes that consider the interests of the community rather than the individual. 

The History of Private Property: How Did We Get Here?

Early agricultural societies “concentrated” the relationship between land and people as farming necessitated permanent settlements thus meaning that communities had to directly invest in the care and maintenance of the land. However, property was not seen as a private entity that is used to extract natural resources and accumulate capital; these early settlements cultivated intimate relationships to the land. In many Western cultural contexts, the land was seen as a “sacred mother.” The idea of land being utilized as a source of wealth and power simultaneously arose with the emergence of the nobility, who pushed for greater legal recognition of their land rights. Given this general overview, it is important to consider its particular evolution as a philosophical concept. Ancient philosophers in the Hellenistic tradition speculated on the relationship between property and virtue. Plato espoused the idea that collective ownership promoted common pursuit of the common interest; he believed that organizing property in a collective manner would prevent social division. Aristotle was in direct opposition with this idea- he suggested and defended the idea that private ownership would help cultivate virtues such as “prudence and responsibility.”  Additionally, Aristotle’s ideas would lay the foundation for the notion that private property has an inherent relationship to liberty and freedom. This supposed relationship between private property and freedom was very much a product of Aristotle’s historical circumstances: freedom was defined in contrast with slavery. In other words, to be free meant that one exercised ownership, while the opposite was natural enslavement. In the Medieval period that followed, Thomas Aquinas believed that virtue and property have a relationship. Yet Aquinas further argued that the rich have a moral obligation to be generous with their wealth, while the poor have rights against the rich. While Aquinas’ approach to private property differs from typical attitudes, it can arguably be seen throughout strains of “progressive” approaches to property, albeit they still operate within the framework of capitalism. 

The early modern period, which includes the Enlightenment, is where one begins to see the inception of contemporary notions of private property. While Hobbes and Hume promoted the idea that property is the creation of the state, it was Locke who formulated the most widely-accepted ideas related to private property. Whereas Hobbes and Hume believed that private property existed solely within the context of a sovereign state, Locke propagated the idea that property could also exist in a state of nature without any political decisions cementing its conception. Locke essentially believed that private property is a naturally occurring phenomenon and due to its existence within nature, it stands to further reason that to claim ownership over it is an inherent right- thus one can clearly recognize the lineage of Article 17 in the UDHR. Furthermore, Locke did not adhere to the idea of universal consent; unlike common or collective property, which emphasizes democratic procedures, Lockesian private property defends the idea of  “unilateral appropriation.”  Additionally, it was important to Locke that land be used in a productive manner; considering that he did not believe that Indigenous or nomadic peoples could be regarded as owners in this capacity, one can assume that “productive” relates to industry. 

A Rebuttal Against Locke’s Private Property

Firstly, it should be noted that, by definition, private property is exclusionary. This is harmful for multiple reasons. The dividing of land between individual actors for private control inevitably produces a barrier to accessing resources. Privatization of land often leads to the privatization of natural resources on said land thus turning them into commodities to be bought and sold. The specific issue is that some within the proverbial “community,” though this occurs on both a local and global scale, are not able to afford the commodification of these resources. The exclusivity of resources inherently produces inequality- some will be able to access these resources through a monetary exchange, while (many) others will struggle. Furthermore, turning land into an exclusive entity, i.e. property, creates a distorted mainstream relationship to nature. The parcelling up and division of land eclipses the idea that we can have a reciprocal relationship where the land takes care of us and we take care of the land. Instead it becomes another object where its primary purpose is to extract natural resources and produce commodities. 

The justification for exclusionary practices is that people are “better off” when resources are governed by a private entity. It is believed that under private property, resources can be utilized to satisfy a greater set of needs than under any alternative system, such as common or collective property. This is commonly referred to as the “Tragedy of the Commons,” an idea proposed by Garret Hardin. However, the “Tragedy of the Commons” is arguably more of a personal projection on Hardin’s part than it is an accurate reflection of reality as it operates on the basis that everyone is motivated by personal greed or self-interest. The problem with this position is that the privatization of resources has not been able to satisfy “the greater set of needs;” in fact, 72 percent of people currently do not have access to the resources they need. Additionally, the “Tragedy of the Commons” completely ignores the Indigenous ways of life which ensure that resources are respected and well-distributed to satisfy everyone’s needs. Ultimately, the exclusionary nature of private property is antithetical to the human rights project, especially as it contradicts other articles within the UDHR. For example, Article 3 states: “Everyone has the right to life, liberty, and security of person.” Yet if we operate under the supremacy of private property, how can everyone fulfill their right to life and security when marginalized cannot access the necessary resources to survive? How can Indigenous peoples fulfill their right to life when their land has been divided for capitalist modes of production? 

Lockesian private property is arguably another tool for settler-colonialism which is defined as “an ongoing system of power that perpetuates the genocide and repression of indigenous peoples and cultures.” Firstly, Locke’s idea that land should be unilaterally appropriated is explicit support for colonialism. Not only does it undermine basic democratic governance over land, it violates the sovereignty of Indigenous nations as it condones the violent seizure of land by settlers. This violence is not only wrought upon Indigenous peoples, but also on the land itself which is exemplified by contemporary ecological degradation. Secondly, Locke’s concept of productivity is an unimaginative way of life that is very much rooted in racism. Locke argued that land must be cultivated to be productive i.e. it had to conform to a sedentary agricultural standard to be legitimate; he voiced his doubts that Indigenous peoples could be regarded as owners since his definition of productivity is related to industry. Productivity in Lockesian terms denigrates Indigenous ways of life. However, it should also be noted that something does not have to be productive to be useful. The land is useful, not because of Western notions of productivity, but because it is the land: it is abundant in life, including human life. 

A New Approach?

Private property is contradictory to human rights: it perpetuates settler-colonialism and is part of exclusionary economic practices. It is necessary to reorient ourselves and implement an approach that respects the land, especially in the face of worsening ecological conditions and climate change, and its people. Common and collective property models are worth considering, however it is always possible to conceive of new ideas, new paths, and new futures. In order to create a new world free of settler-colonialism and exploitative economic models, we should look to Indigenous communities. Indigenous beliefs are diverse, however there seems to be a common theme: life is sacred and must be protected. It is important to cultivate a relationship with the land that is based on reciprocity and respect. The land can sustain us and we can sustain it. The needs of both must be met; abundance must be shared between both.

The People of Myanmar: Resilience and Action Amidst the Ongoing Political Crisis

On the 1st of February 2021, the world awoke to a military coup occurring in the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Myanmar’s military, known as Tatmadaw and now calling itself the State Administration Council, cited alleged fraudulent elections in November of 2020 as the primary reason for the coup and detained the country’s leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Laureate and an icon of peace and democracy of the National League for Democracy (NDL) elected party, who is also a daughter of Aung San, widely regarded as the founder of the modern Myanmar state. Prior to the coup, Aung San Suu Kyi held the title of State Counsellor of Myanmar, allocating her powers alike to that of a prime minister, and she also served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2016 until 2021. Tatmadaw accused Aung San Suu Kyi and her administration of fraud, corruption, mishandling of the pandemic situation, and a number of other charges that she is yet to face in court amidst concerns for her health. Meanwhile, the military maintains its grip on power within the country in spite of constant civilian protests ranging from peaceful street demonstrations to forceful attempts on behalf of evolving regional civilian militias joining established ethnic insurgent groups to remove the military junta. The number of civilians killed as a consequence of violent response on behalf of the military is believed to currently surpass 1,000 with numbers of those detained surpassing 8,000, with sometimes hundreds of people killed and tortured on a single day as a consequence of military crackdowns on civilians. 

The people of Myanmar, however, have never ceased to fight for their rights and continue to find inspiration and resilience, determined to stand up to the current military government. What is particularly impressive is the way the people decide to protest and find ways to organize in spite of the ongoing challenges, with efforts initiated by Myanmar’s women and local and religious leaders being among leading examples of a witty, united, and persistent approach to modern-day protests that can serve as inspiration for future civilian struggle. Shedding more light on these efforts and reminding of the importance of civilian organization and courage is of particular importance. It is important both as a way to draw attention to the ongoing political crisis in Myanmar, as well as to support civilians worldwide in navigating the increasingly authoritarian global setting. 

Historical Overview  

As alarming as the current violence in Myanmar is, this is not the first time Myanmar has experienced a military coup and rule by a military junta. After gaining its independence from the United Kingdom in 1948, Myanmar established a bicameral parliamentary government, and the democratic regime was somewhat uninterrupted until 1962 when Tatmadaw, at the time led by General Ne Win, led a military coup that started decades of military rule. Academics largely agree that the previous democratic arrangement in post-independence Myanmar led to economic and sociopolitical instability which eventually resulted in people’s disillusionment with the government and presented a permissive factor for the establishment of the junta. The military rule was soon seen as oppressive and the people began to organize throughout the 1970s, with student protests and public gatherings, but these were largely suppressed and not as broadly organized as protests that were to follow - in 1988, precisely on August 8th of 1988 hence the name the 8888 Uprising, larger scale protests were organized following the strengthening of the military regime, with people taking to the streets en masse, organizing nationwide strikes, and civil servants, students, Buddhist monks, other religious and community leaders, and citizens in general were standing united in spite of oppressive and violent attempts by the military government to suppress the regime, resulting in thousands of death, with estimates ranging to as high as 10,000. 

The success of these protests, as impressive as they were, was still largely limited and the military largely maintained its grip on power. However, the courage and resilience of the people of Myanmar cannot be questioned. The Saffron Revolution of 2007 again challenged the military rule and this time, combined with pressure from the international community, resulted in major political change as it allowed for democratic elections, although the military still retained constitutional right to 25% of the parliament seats. Unfortunately, the democratic regime was never described as stable or truly implemented and, in fact, the military continued to augment its role and proceeded to limit State Chancellor Aung San Suu Kyi’s power, influence public policy, and deliberately attack Myanmar’s various ethnic minorities, triggering by 2017 one of the most scrutinized and tragic modern-day human rights crisis. However, this history proves the readiness of the people of Myanmar to take a stance for their rights in spite of such major political challenges, as well as that, no matter how difficult the situation, substantial progress can be achieved and has never been given up on. The ongoing events in Myanmar yet again put these claims to the test. 

Examples of Civilian Dissent from Present-Day Myanmar: Creativity, Unity, and Resilience

This time, the protests have started off as largely peaceful, though there are now some poorly armed and largely untrained groups in different areas, such as in Bago where a confrontation with the military resulted in deaths of at least 82 protesters that attempted to barricade the city. In both urban and rural areas, Myanmar police officers have sided with the protesters after being ordered by the military to shoot those protesting the coup and many were forced to flee the country because of disobeying the orders and denying the coup. The current violent developments in Myanmar have increased emigration and thousands of refugees, now suffering the combined effects of Tatmadaw’s systemic attacks on ethnic minorities for decades prior and the more recent violent clashes with protesters, are attempting to cross borders to surrounding countries with the situation still evolving and destinies of thousands of refugees remaining in question. The refugee influx is elevating Myanmar’s crisis to an international level.

As the situation continues to evolve and is becoming increasingly deadly for dissenting civilians and damaging for the future of Myanmar’s democracy, there is also a growing number of examples of civilian courage and brilliance amidst the chaos. A particularly curious case is the action on behalf of Myanmar’s women to contribute to the country-wide protest efforts. Ever since the first day of protests, women have been lining up by the thousands to take a stance for their rights and freedom, with even young women, many of whom are still students, being unafraid to join the front lines in spite of the danger. 

Women also looked for creative ways to show their dissent which includes women placing their undergarments and traditional htamein, symbols of femininity, around the streets. This slows military personnel down as these garments are considered to be stripping men of their masculinity prompting the military to spend time circumventing and removing such clothing from the streets. Furthermore, some groups decided to organize and strategically place pictures of General Min Aung Hlaing and other high ranking military officials who are now occupying the government on the ground, making soldiers reluctant to pass through and step on these images. Even though the military in some cases proceeded to burn the clothing and still pass through these images, this approach to protest showcases a creative and clever way to take a stance against the current regime while simultaneously avoiding direct confrontation and symbolically representing civilian defiance and an unquenching desire for stability and freedom. 

In a situation in which protesters are increasingly forced to carry helmets and protective gear to the streets even for peaceful attempts at protest, medical professionals are not afraid to join the protesters and attend to those who have been hurt and wounded, even after the military leadership proclaimed such initiatives by local medical personnel to be treasonous. People are also largely uniting along previous divides, with wider society now being able to better empathize with warnings on behalf of Rohingya and Kachin leaders and activists, and recognizing the need for thorough change and widespread tolerance and peace. Buddhist monks, who traditionally have wielded most significant moral authority within the society and also played a key role and submitted great sacrifice during the Saffron Revolution that was even named after the color of their robes, are now again decidedly taking to the street in support of the people holding alms bowls traditionally used to collect food donations upside down as a sign of protest. These monks are standing against their counterparts that gave blessings to the generals in an attempt to protect their position, explaining that it is their duty to stand with well-meaning and truth-seeking people even if it means taking the risk that can cost them their frock and lives. Importantly, the sangha, or the Buddhist community, is by some accounts purposefully not taking the same level of publicity as in previous uprisings in order to make space for all groups and Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, and Christian leaders alike have shown support for protesters and provided shelter whenever possible. 

Conclusion 

In spite of a long, life-threatening struggle that participation in the protest in Myanmar currently entails, people from all walks of life are continuously taking to the streets, as well as finding creative ways to show their resistance to the regime and undermining further military advancements. The situation in Myanmar has been closely monitored by the international community since the first hours of the coup, and it is drawing continuous attention and motivating ongoing debates on the best course of action. Myanmar is a member of a number of supranational organizations, including the UN and ASEAN, and thus has a duty to protect its citizens and allow for a peaceful transition of power. As there is no guarantee, however, that the country will indeed act in accordance with organizational charters and proclamations, it is evident that the people are attentive to changes and ready to take action. The people of Myanmar are setting an example for modern civilian initiatives and protest and their efforts need to be better acknowledged and supported by the international community and civil society members everywhere in order to avoid more death and destruction and support basic civilian rights.

Is the United Nations Still a Relevant International Body?

The United Nations (UN), created in 1945, had the goal of actively maintaining peace within the international community. In the wake of World War II, the world was ready for calm and there was widespread motivation to create peace as a joint community. However, the world of international politics today is even more complex, thus calling into question the relevance of the United Nations as a governing international body. There are many arguments that highlight the shortcomings of the United Nations, deeming it irrelevant. However, since the UN is a long-standing institution that has facilitated beneficial actions, it is essential to implement structural revisions to adapt institutions for the modern day. 

The Ineffectiveness of the United Nations Security Council:

One of the arguments at the forefront in support for eliminating the United Nations is that the most powerful organ of the UN, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), is not relevant to the modern world. The main evidence for this claim is that the UNSC only has five permanent member states: USA, Russia, Britain, China, France) and 10 non-permanent member states. This structure results in misuse of veto power, often blocking key decisions that are needed by nations with little to no representation. It also prevents developing countries from being represented, which is necessary in the present day. 

Over the years, it has become clear that the Security Council’s permanent members have little interest in internal reform. Since this is the case, it is in the best interest of the other UN member states to continue to push for reform. With powerful countries moving to unilateralism, populism, and nationalism at the expense of multilateralism and collective action, a united and forward-looking Security Council capable of effectively driving the wider United Nations to achieve its goals is essential. 

Global Health and the Role of the UN:

Critics of the UN believe that the failure of the World Health Organization (WHO), during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and in its prevention, is another sign that the UN is irrelevant. With the occurrence of future global health crises rising, instead of creating a global approach, the WHO should simply be reformed. This can be done by creating an international antivirus consortium, protecting biodiversity, and strengthening warning protocols within UN agencies. 

The main priority should be to reform the WHO to create an international antivirus consortium. This would guarantee access to a COVID-19 vaccine for all countries, as well as access to future vaccines for new viruses. The consortium would be funded the same way the UN and peacekeeping budgets are - using a scale of quotas under which every member country financially contributes according to its payment capacities. The responsibility of the consortium would be to ensure the equitable distribution of vaccines and personal protective equipment to every country.

Second, a new international strategy for the protection of biodiversity is key. Neither the antivirus consortium nor future vaccines will be enough without other preventive measures. The preservation of biodiversity is one of the best ways to do that. New viruses emerge because human activities disturb ecosystems and undermine their biodiversity. Creating a global emergency plan to identify, safeguard, and protect biodiversity and the ecosystems of endangered species would help countries that cannot afford other protective measures themselves.

Lastly, due to the increase in likelihood of future pandemics, the likelihood of pandemic-adjacent threats is also increasing. Therefore, the world needs new information-sharing procedures between specialized agencies to take quick and preventive action to detect, prevent, and mitigate potential new threats that could undermine international security, national economies, sanitary and health conditions, and food security. Early warning protocols on international emergencies including famines and pandemics can help alert all UN members to take appropriate early and preventive action, such information-sharing procedures should be proposed as resolutions at the UN Security Council and General Assembly.

The Modern Role of the Indo-Pacific and its Recognition:

Since World War II, the pillars of global governance are rapidly changing. Institutional infirmities are being highlighted and a normative shift is becoming increasingly relevant. These changes show why another very important reform would be safeguarding the Indo-Pacific. 

India’s pursuit of permanent membership on the UN Security Council is evidence of its global ambitions. Additionally, it is equally important for New Delhi that global institutions better reflect contemporary global realities – like the reality of the economic and strategic strengths of India. 

The security dynamics in the immediate aftermath of World War II focused on managing a divided Europe and safeguarding its peripheries from the Soviet bloc. However, in the modern international political sphere, the Indo-Pacific is driving the global economic and political agenda. Because of this reality, global institutional frameworks should reflect this power shift, especially when a weakening United Nations is leading to a proliferation of self-selected groups. The issue of UN reform is also linked with that of ensuring proper resourcing. Discussing reforms without making provisions for adequate resources will lead nowhere; the flip side is that channeling more resources in the absence of genuine reforms only perpetuates the status quo. While some countries have gradually deemphasized the United Nations in favor of new frameworks to address their most pressing challenges, others have been gaming the UN system to further their narrow interests. For example, the danger in having UN officials and agencies champion China’s Belt and Road Initiative is immense. 

The Bigger Picture:

Unlike in 1945, the international community faces three common enemies: climate change, infectious diseases, and nuclear weapons. The existence of these threats also highlights their commonality: only global, multilateral efforts can reduce their destructive potential. The United Nations can prioritize these threats by debating and drafting a resolution identifying them as the core global challenges. A permanent coordinating platform should be set up to integrate the UN response across agencies, funds, and related organizations, and to act quickly, comprehensively, and efficiently in various fields, such as the International Atomic Energy Agency and the World Health Organization. Establishing such communication channels will bolster cohesiveness, which is fundamental when dealing with ongoing, multidimensional threats in a fragmented UN system.

This coordinating platform could be created through the existing Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB). The platform’s goal would be to link threat mitigation to all policy fields in the UN system when planning, deciding, and assessing results. Ideally, the Security Council should be stripped of veto power when a matter relating to these existential threats is on the agenda; such a move, however, is unfortunately unrealistic. More realistically, prioritizing this debate would lead to greater focus on what matters most. On its seventy-fifth birthday, the United Nations needs to think big if it is to see its one hundred and fiftieth.

Looking to the Future:

The United Nations is still relevant, especially since the world has become interconnected and where current global problems, such as hunger and climate change have emerged, thus the UN’s collective efforts are essential to tackle these modern challenges. The UN has attempted to improve its structure, however, the lack of willingness by member states has impeded the UN’s progress. The reform agenda should be directed towards strengthening the UN’s outstanding thinking and could be a solution that would encourage \ member states to be involved in building such a network which could ultimately lead to better adherence to the UN’s structural reform agenda. Clearly, it is relatively complicated to determine the measures that can generate the will and it is not going to be easy to design a new UN once these measures are discovered either. However, if the member states notice that the only alternative without the UN is to address the growing number of complicated interconnected and wide scope challenges by themselves. They will be left with no choice but to accept the fact that it might be better to collectively repair the UN rather than be left alone to face the dramatic challenges of today's world.

Should the UN Deploy to Afghanistan?

In the immediate aftermath of the fall of Kabul and the Taliban’s takeover of the government, Afghanistan is facing several pressing crises. The delivery of vital humanitarian aid is in a state of logistical limbo, threatening the food security of millions. Furthermore, the human rights of women and members of the old government are under threat. In light of this crisis, several commentators have endorsed the idea of deploying a United Nations Peacekeeping Operation (or PKO) to the country. While noble, these efforts are misguided. Any PKO in Afghanistan would lack the ability to complete its objectives if the Taliban opposed them, and the resources required for such an operation would be better allocated elsewhere. 

The most prominent proposal for a PKO in Afghanistan comes from Georgetown professor Lise Howard, who laid out the case in an op-ed for the L.A. Times. In it, she proposes a PKO lead by China and Muslim nations with the objective of monitoring the situation and to“help the Taliban consolidate less radical control.” Another consistent source of advocacy has been from UMass Amherst professor Charli Carpenter, who argued in favor of a full-scale UN peace enforcement operation aimed at preventing a total Taliban takeover. 

Other proposals have supported the establishment of a PKO with the objective of preventing a possible civil war. Carpenter and Howard argue in Foreign Policy that “the Taliban have only a tenuous hold over the country” which has the potential to become a “multisided conflict that, unless checked, could metastasize and spread across borders, similar to the conflicts in Iraq, Syria, and Libya.” In their view, a small (5,000 strong) mission from Muslim countries could prevent the outbreak of conflict. US Army Major Ryan van Wie of West Point proposed a new type of peace operation, aimed at boosting Taliban legitimacy and moderating its human rights problems. He has also developed several different options, each with its own capabilities and price tag. 

In response to these arguments, GWU professor Paul D. Williams outlined several potential flaws in any such operation. He notes that no UN forces would be able to arrive for at least 60 days, as well as an inability to find willing troop contributors. He also highlights how the Taliban’s consolidation of control over the Afghan government contrasts with the situations in which peacekeepers excel, such as when “there’s a viable peace process to help implement and a host government to support.” Adam Day of the United Nations University highlights how much of this discourse ignores both the reality on the ground and the opinion of the Afghan people 

In response to this critique, Carpenter argues that much of the opposition to a PKO in Afghanistan comes from a sense of fatalism, the idea that the inability to deploy to Afghanistan is set in stone, so there is no real sense in debating over it. While I wouldn’t describe this attitude as fatalism, I believe this perspective is valid. The UN will not and should not deploy to Afghanistan, even if there are some potential benefits to doing so. The political will and financial resources allocated to any such operation would be better utilized elsewhere. Before we address if such a deployment would be viable, we must address whether such a deployment is likely. Will the UN go? 

At this point in time, it is highly unlikely that the UN Security Council will authorize a deployment to Afghanistan. The UNSC hasn’t debated the proposal and none of its recent resolutions or statements on the crisis in Afghanistan have mentioned the possibility of deployment. 

At a time where smaller budgets have already led to cuts in UN Peacekeeping missions (such as the end of UNAMID in Sudan), the idea of paying for another large-scale operation seems unlikely to attract much interest on the Security Council. Neither is the idea of deploying to such a politically charged situation. UN peacekeepers have traditionally stayed out of countries (such as Libya and Syria) where there is discord between the Permanent Members. Afghanistan is one such case. While some Permanent Members, such as China, have displayed a willingness to recognize and work with the Taliban other Permanent Members, namely the USA, have displayed far less willingness. 

Even if the Security Council were to authorize a mission to Afghanistan like the ones proposed, a mission would take time to deploy. The UNs rapid reaction force is the Vanguard Brigade units of several member states. It would take 60 days from when the Secretary-General requests deployment to when the first forces would arrive in Afghanistan if the member states consent to deployment. The arrival of additional specialized forces-such as trained observers, helicopter units, and permanent command staff-would take even longer. The Secretary-General can’t begin the 60-day countdown until authorized to do by the Security Council and the long debate and process for such authorization have yet to be considered. 

This means that, should a PKO be deployed, it won’t be effective for several months. By that time the full-scale civil war that proponents hope the PKO could prevent may have already begun. UN Peacekeepers have never worked well as a rapid reaction crisis response force, even though efforts have been made to improve that capability. PKOs work best when they deploy to deadlocked conflict areas with a solid framework for peacebuilding. For example, missions in Namibia, Liberia, and East Timor were all able to bring peace but only after there was an outlined peace agreement. In contrast, there is no such peace agreement between the Taliban and any of its potential opponents (such as ISIS-K). Thus, we must examine the several potential obstacles to mission effectiveness.

Is the Mission Viable? 

Even if the UNSC were to authorize deployment, and even if such a force could deploy in time to make a difference, the entire operation hinges on Taliban consent. While UN PKOs are military units, they are not capable of sustained counterinsurgent or offensive military operations. This is because they are drawn from dozens of different countries, each with its own language, equipment, procedures, and wartime doctrines. It also lacks unity of command or the idea that military units should be subordinate to a single commander because UN Peacekeepers take orders from both their national capitals and the UN Force Commander. Peacekeepers have traditionally overcome this military deficiency by operating with the consent of the (major) parties to the conflict. While Peacekeepers can undertake offensive operations against spoilers (smaller combatants who hope to disrupt the peace process), such as in the DRC, they lack the ability to fight major parties like the Taliban. 

Even ignoring the Taliban, other armed groups in the region would present a significant problem for any UN PKO. ISIS-K, for example, is highly unlikely to cooperate with any form of foreign intervention force. As the Kabul airport bombing tragically showed, ISIS-K has the ability to inflict significant casualties on any such force. Any large number of casualties would imperil the viability of the operation, as troop-contributing countries have been unwilling to contribute troops after taking casualties. The only way the threat of ISIS-K and other spoilers could be minimized is through potential military and intelligence cooperation with the Taliban. 

That means the Taliban must consent to the mission, which they have shown no indication of doing. The Taliban have spent twenty years fighting against a foreign military presence in Afghanistan, it’s unlikely they would consent to another. It also means that the prospective mission would have relatively few ways to reform the Taliban’s human rights abuses

if the Taliban refuse to cooperate. Many of the levers that the UNSC can use to effect Taliban behavior on human rights (such as humanitarian aid, sanctions, and diplomatic recognition) can be effected without the presence of a PKO. Which raises the question: what specific problems in Afghanistan would a PKO address? 

Is the Mission Needed? 

Besides improving the Taliban’s respect for human rights, proponents have identified two other major purposes for a PKO. They are first to Prevent the outbreak of civil war and second to ensure the safe delivery of humanitarian aid. At this point in time, it appears that both of these objectives are being met without the presence of a PKO. The last remaining resistance to the Taliban was in the northwestern Panjshir Province, which fell to the Taliban in early September. While the threat of civil war is still looming over Afghanistan, no armed groups have taken advantage of the uncertainty and chaos to directly challenge the Taliban. 

Furthermore, the Taliban have pledged to uphold the safety of humanitarian aid providers on the ground and have requested even more humanitarian aid from the UN. The Taliban realize that they need humanitarian aid to prevent starvation (and thus opposition to their rule) among the Afghan people. Furthermore, they realize that they need Western recognition for their long-term survival, and harming aid workers would complicate that effort. 

Finally, we must consider not just the feasibility of success when considering an action, we must also consider the opportunity cost of undertaking such an action. Under Van Wie’s proposed options, the annual cost of a PKO in Afghanistan would be between $500 million and $2 billion, which would be between 8 to 31% of Peacekeeping’s current $6.47 billion budget. That is a substantial amount of resources either being raised by member states or taken from

other operations. Despite the large amount of money being allocated to peacekeeping, there are still several unmet budgetary requests in current peacekeeping operations. Many large-scale operations, such as the ones in South Sudan, Mali, the Central African Republic, and the DRC, lack the needed personnel to fully fulfill their mandate and lack a sufficient number of high-cost assets. As an April 2020 UN report notes, peacekeeping missions in Mali and the Central African Republic face “critical gaps” in their inventory of helicopters, UAVS, and medical units. These missions have already been established and have already proven capable of effecting meaningful change in their countries of operation. A 2019 Norwegian Institute of International Affairs report, for example, highlights how without the PKO in Mali “the security situation in Mali … would likely deteriorate significantly,” and could accomplish much more if additional capabilities are funded. It would be more prudent to allocate funds and assets to these existing missions instead of an unproven and possibly unnecessary mission in Afghanistan. 

Conclusion 

While the arguments in favor of deploying a UN PKO to Afghanistan have some validity, it would be unwise to deploy to such a mission. UN PKOs are largely effective at certain tasks, such as protecting civilians in active combat zones and implementing peace agreements. The current environment in Afghanistan, however, is not one where UN PKOs thrive. There is no large-scale active conflict to protect civilians in, or a peace agreement to help implement. Furthermore, The UN lacks the rapid reaction ability to prevent the outbreak of a new war, and it lacks either the Taliban consent or military power needed to improve the Taliban’s human rights situation.

It’s unclear if a PKO is even needed to prevent the outbreak of civil war or ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid. As it stands, without a PKO, a civil war has failed to materialize and humanitarian aid deliveries have continued undisrupted. Thus, any mission to Afghanistan would be costly, risky, and with limited upside. In the age of COVID and great power rivalry, the budget for peacekeeping is currently shrinking. Thus, the substantial resources needed for a potential Afghan mission would be better served by further funding other existing PKOs.

How Local Governments Help Afghan Refugees

Anti-immigration sentiment rings loudly throughout the American political scene. However, with a recent influx of refugees from Afghanistan, the United States has to pool together depleted resources in order to help those escaping the Taliban. Citizens of Afghanistan continue to face human rights abuses at the hands of the Taliban, exemplified by a deadly attack on a school in Kabul. Not only are civilians facing this terror, but so are thousands of Afghan citizens who assisted the United States military during the two decades of military occupation.

Immigration is a multilateral issue and pools resources from every level of the government, including local government. Municipal governments play an intricate role in integrating refugees with the communities they arrive in, and their role is often overlooked and under-funded.

What is Happening in Afghanistan?

After 20 years of United States military presence in Afghanistan, the United States pulled almost 60,000 troops out of the country in the summer of 2021. The aftermath left the nation of Afghanistan in shambles and vulnerable to the Taliban. The terrorist organization rapidly gained power, causing thousands to flee the nation. Over 122,000 people have evacuated Afghanistan including Afghan citizens, Afghan interpreters, and United States citizens. Those fleeing Afghanistan qualify for a Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) under U.S. law; however, the process of obtaining a SIV takes 14 steps over the span of months—keeping 65,000 applicants stuck in Afghanistan. The Biden administration is working to expand access to visas through means of work or humanitarian parole to allow more refugees into the United States in as swift a fashion as possible.

Refugee Resettlement in America

Whether an SIV is required, or a refugee is on humanitarian parole, those who come to America are sent to one of seven military bases for health screenings and work authorization. This process can take longer than one week, and as of October 3, 2021, there are 53,000 refugees waiting across the seven military bases. When the initial screenings are completed, refugees are placed with resettlement organizations, which help them obtain housing, utilities, furniture, food, work, and English literacy training. Marisol Girela, the Associate Vice President of social programs at RAICES in San Antonio, Texas, stated that their organization alone has seen a dramatic increase in refugees arriving over the summer. Many resettlement organizations, such as RAICES, work closely with local governments, but federal barriers block effective partnerships.

Federal Barriers to Effective Resettlement

The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) sued the Trump administration in November of 2020 over an executive order passed by President Trump. The goal of the executive order was to require municipal governments to obtain approval for refugee resettlement programs on the city, state, and federal level. This order put up more bureaucratic barriers when it comes to refugee resettlement, and HIAS, along with Church World Services and the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services, sued the administration on the basis of the undue burden that the executive order placed on resettlement agencies who are legally required to obtain formal city and state approval for their work.

The Trump administration’s anti-immigrant ideology strained refugee resettlement organizations, who do crucial work on the local level. Reuters acknowledged that the decrease in immigration caused resettlement groups to downsize, as they operate as nonprofits. With the current increase in refugees from Afghanistan, these groups are too under-funded and under-staffed to provide the best quality assistance to the refugees. They are left scrambling for resources, due to the quick and urgent demand for safety in America. As of September 2021, President Biden’s administration requested funding from Congress to resettle 65,000 Afghan refugees this fall and eventually 95,000 refugees by September 2022. The administration told state governors and refugee resettlement coordinators to prepare themselves for a sharp increase in demand, as refugees are coming to America whether Congress grants the administration funding or not.

Local Government’s Role in Resettling Afghan Refugees

The bulk of refugee resettlement is done at the local level with resettlement organizations. Cities across America such as Rochester, NY,  Buffalo, NY, Cleveland, OH,  Pittsburgh, PA, and Elizabeth, NJ have committed to welcoming refugees and actively push back against anti-immigrant rhetoric. Support for resettlement comes from all levels, from the U.N. to private citizens’ donations, but it is a city or town’s local government that gets into the intricacies of resettlement. Yet, due to aforementioned federal barriers, local authorities are isolated from policymaking on the topic of resettlement, but still placed with the majority of the responsibilities. Additionally, issues that face local governments in the wake of COVID-19 impact refugees particularly hard. Cities are currently struggling with a housing boom which makes finding a larger, family home increasingly difficult. These are the kinds of homes refugee families are in need of. Furthermore, there is a shortage of rental properties in cities across America, and landlords are hesitant to rent to those without credit as they are already losing out due to the economic impacts of COVID-19. Difficulties that municipal governments face are exacerbated when those strained resources are needed to help incoming refugees.

According to the German Marshall Fund of the United States, local governments play an essential role in coordinating medical appointments, English literacy courses, and job training. Community leaders know what resources are needed to effectively resettle in their unique location in terms of cost of living and neighborhood engagement. The federal government’s Afghan Placement and Assistance Program, while effectively expanding refugee assistance, does not take diverse housing costs across America into account which can lead to further fiscal difficulties. By processing a deep understanding of the municipality, local officials and organizations are equipped to know the intricacies of resettlement in their particular community. Additionally, people in a community tend to trust their local leaders, so when their mayor, town supervisor, or city council shows active support for refugees, it puts pressure on federal legislators to do the same by continuing to expand access to America.

Refugee Resettlement in the District of Columbia

Due to the sudden nature of increased violence in Afghanistan, those who flee are coming to America with incomplete documentation, a single bag of possessions, and barely any support system. Dire needs for necessities such as clothing, housing, and food prove the local government’s vital role in directly assisting refugees. The nation’s capital can serve as an example for how local governments aid in refugee resettlement, especially for those coming to America with little to no resources. The D.C. Office of Refugee Resettlement (DCORR) provides “temporary assistance for needy families, medical assistance and screenings, employment services, case management services, English language training, education assistance, and foster care placement.” Children accompanied by parents and unaccompanied children are eligible for the Children’s Health Insurance Program and Refugee Cash Assistance. Aside from gaining access to medical assistance and screenings, refugees settling in the District of Columbia also are eligible to receive health literacy in physical and emotional wellness services through the D.C. Department of Human Services. Refugees that come to the District of Columbia are commonly moved to the city from the military base for refugees in Fort Lee, Virginia and then, through the DCORR, placed with Catholic Charities Refugee Services or Lutheran Immigrant and Refugee Services—who are a part of the aforementioned lawsuit with HIAS. Nonprofits serve as the liaison between both federal and local governments and the refugees themselves, ensuring that the services offered by the city governments make it to the refugees. This can include coordinating housing arrangements, picking up families and individuals from military bases, and assistance with benefit applications for social security and Medicaid. Both Catholic Charities Refugee Services and Lutheran Immigrant and Refugee Services in the District of Columbia provide these services to the refugee community. Their role is important to ensure direct connections are made with the refugees who arrive from Afghanistan.

The Community’s Role

Local governments and nonprofits play a critical role in refugee resettlement, but so do members of the community. In the District of Columbia, local businesses and charities are accepting donations. Items that are in demand include household items, utensils and cookware, furniture, clothes, food, and toiletries. Along with accepting donations, the same organizations are putting out Amazon wish lists for those resettling in America from Afghanistan. Organizations are also coordinating volunteers to help set up refugees with apartments, and rides from the airport. Support for Afghan refugees starts from the top and trickles down to individual volunteers and donors. HIAS has set up resources and instructions to contact federal representatives to advocate for greater support for refugees. 

The increase in refugees coming to America is sudden, but urgent. Those coming from Afghanistan are vulnerable to the Taliban and are relying on American organizations to provide safety and stability. Local governments are not often thought of in this process, but they are immensely important to it. However, years of depleting resources from refugee resettlement at the federal level has trickled down to hit local governments, as they carry the bulk of resettlement responsibilities for vulnerable populations with the least number of resources.

Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité...et “Un Passe Sanitaire?” How COVID-19 Vaccine Requirements Forced France to Reconcile its Values

The ongoing nature of the COVID-19 pandemic has forced nations across the world to examine their societal failings, as governments worldwide struggle to balance the need to protect their citizens with the need for personal freedom and a strong economy. While the United States experienced the ravages of the pandemic and the anger of its citizens early on, many European countries succeeded in holding the pandemic, and their citizens' tempers, at bay. France proves to be the perfect example of this phenomenon; the implementation of a strict lockdown policy, the “confinement” which closed businesses and schools, but also limited the periods in which individuals could be outside of their homes throughout the day, all succeeded in lessening the death toll compared with the United States and United Kingdom. 

However, the French government’s recent decision to implement vaccine requirements and vaccination proof has brought about tension and protest towards the government, previously unseen throughout the pandemic. For the first time, the French must question if their beloved national values align with the government’s actions. 

The “passe sanitaire” or French health pass is a compulsory health statement that proves the vaccinated status of an individual, or a negative COVID-19 test, within the past seventy two hours. The passe sanitaire also resembles similar “vaccine passports” seen across the world as both local and national governments attempt to achieve higher vaccination rates and protect their citizens. The passe sanitaire works in conjunction with France’s reopening plan for its economy and as part of the greater European Union’s border health control, a collaborative effort between EU member states to ensure that citizens are not bringing COVID-19 with them to various countries .  

Implemented for several reasons, the passe sanitaire has worked to increase the vaccination rates in France, through the establishment of the passe sanitaire as a ticket into everyday French life. A passe sanitaire is required for entry into restaurants, movie theaters, train and airplane travel, and the majority of public indoor spaces. French president, Emmanuel Macron, promised French citizens that vaccines would never become obligatory, with the exception of individuals in certain industries, however the pass sanitaire can feel obligatory since it serves as an entryway into French society. 

The French government’s decision to implement the pass sanitaire resembles other government’s decisions to create legislation that does not necessarily require vaccination, but “nudges” the population to receive the vaccine. Known as the Nudge Theory, this term describes how a population can be swayed to make decisions that are in their best interest through minor government reforms and policies that encourage citizens to make the choice that is in their best interest. By requiring a passe sanitaire to freely go about the activities of everyday life, the French government is nudging their population towards vaccination. 

The passe sanitaire can easily be described as a success. Since its implementation on July 12th 2021, vaccinations have increased dramatically, with over one million French citizens registering for vaccine appointments the day the passe sanitaire was announced. Vaccination rates rose dramatically in groups that were previously less likely to be vaccinated, such as adolescents and young adults. However despite the passe sanitaire’s success at achieving higher vaccination rates and imposing COVID-19 safety restrictions, the outlash and anger towards the government reveals that a deeper issue is lurking within French society. 

France’s famous revolutionary motto: Liberté, Égalité, et Fraternité (liberty, equality, and brotherhood) is a well known staple of French culture, so much so that evoking the phrase can appear cliché. However, the French mindset surrounding these three key pillars of society has shaped French values. Therefore, the implementation of the pass sanitaire can be viewed as a direct affront to this motto and the purpose it serves. 

Created in 1793 during the first French Revolution, the motto signified the end of the monarchy, the creation of French unity, and the establishment of democracy. The establishment of ‘Liberté’ drew from older notions of liberties, or the exemptions from rules or regulations certain groups within society could experience. Therefore liberty did not just signify freedom, but freedom from the choice to engage or not. Liberty did not just mean personal freedom, but also the right to exist in one's own space, away from the world at large, the acknowledgement of a separation between the individual and society. Maintaining this concept of liberty has been crucial to the French identity. Liberty is a dearly prized concept in French society, but according to a significant portion of the population the passe sanitaire is threatening to destroy French liberty and personal choice. Although the passe sanitaire does not make COVID-19 vaccinations a requirement, it does limit the participation of the unvaccinated in everyday life. Despite the obvious health benefits of the vaccine, at both an individual and national level, critics of the passe sanitaire believe that it threatens individual liberty and suggests the signs of a tyrannical government at work, which leaves the French with one obvious option: protest. 

Following the requirement of the passe sanitaire, hundreds of protests have sprung up around France, in all regions of the country as citizens gather in the streets from all sides of the political spectrum. The protests have remained largely peaceful, however they have revealed specific issues within French society and feelings toward President Macron that suggest a likely change in national interest towards the government.Widespread protests are not a new concept in France, and have played a role in the national identity since the original French Revolution, when the Bastille Prison was liberated by French citizens in 1789. The legacy of the event shaped French society for centuries to come, with monumental shifts in society and culture often happening as a direct result of protests. The protests and uprisings of 1968 turned into a cultural battle between Charles De Gaulle’s traditional French government and the anger of university students in Paris; these protests then transformed into national rallies, and the events of that year would witness a dramatic change in all levels of life, with government reforms, societal norms, and workers rights all undergoing massive development. The 1990’s saw successful results at the hands of French protesters when then prime minister, Alain Juppé, attempted to reform the French social security system, only to quickly back down after three weeks of protests.  More recently, the Yellow Vest movement in France has sparked strikes and protests against Macron’s pension reform and tax breaks for the wealthy, as rural pockets of France and poorer regions express outrage over what they believe are unfair benefits to urban elites. 

Unlike many other western countries, the French frequently achieve tremendous success when protesting, at both a cultural and legislative level. The French government has routinely been brought to its knees by the outrage of the French citizens, which has allowed protesting to become a key part of national identity. Taking to the streets is a way to ensure societal change and to prevent the government from becoming an authoritative, tyrannical regime; protesting is not solely a way to demonstrate outrage, as is frequently the case in allied countries like the United States and United Kingdom, but to shape policy and norms. However, the statistics of the protests would suggest that the majority of French citizens either tolerate or support the implementation of the passe sanitaire. In a country that is known for protesting, the large crowds do not suggest the same national anger as would be the case in other countries. Instead, it appears that there is a growing understanding of the importance of the passe sanitaire as a necessity for daily life and to protect others from COVID-19.

Each protestor has their own reasons for protesting, however there are common shared sentiments. The overlying feeling of the protesters is worry and fear that the passe sanitaire will take away from the personal liberty awarded to each French citizen by ultimately forcing them to get vaccinated. The concept of forced vaccination goes against both the nature of an individual’s right to choose and the right to privacy when it comes to the government’s knowledge of their citizens' health. France is a notoriously private country, and this national value is witnessed in everyday aspects of French culture and law. The simple tradition of closing one's shutters or the government’s refusal to collect data on the racial breakdown of their citizens both reflect an immense desire for privacy. However, issues over personal liberty and privacy are not the only reason driving the French to protest.

The political anger expressed at the Yellow Vest protests towards President Macron and the French government has only grown, and now anger at the implementation of the passe sanitaire is directly targeted towards the government. There is a great distrust and suspicion over the government’s decision to implement the passe sanitaire, with protestors feeling as though the French government is using the passe sanitaire as a means of control, as democracy threatens to be replaced by tyranny. Frustration over the passe sanitaire has manifested itself into different formats, as witnessed in the many protests. The use of symbols from history as a tactic to shock and inspire onlookers is not new, but recent instances reveal that protesters in France are frequently linking the implementation of the passe sanitaire and Macron with Hitler. Images of President Macron’s face embossed with a Hitler-esque moustache or the pinning of a yellow star onto one's shirt suggest a deliberate attempt to connect modern events with historical ones. Despite the blatant offensiveness of these actions, as well as the lack of similarity between the COVID-19 pandemic and the Nazi Regime, the overall effect is haunting and upsetting, suggesting a deep anger towards the French political establishment. 

A quick analysis of the multitude of opinions held reveals the true complexity of feelings surrounding the passe sanitaire. The protestors at these events come from all sides of the political spectrum, from the far left to the far right, a sharp contrast from protests in the United States which are often strictly bipartisan. Interviews with protestors from all sides reveal one shared fear: the threat of authoritarian government policy and the loss of ‘liberté’. One protester, who defines herself as a libertarian and anti-fascist activist, expressed outrage over seeing fellow passe sanitaire protesters associate the vaccination requirements with anti-semitic symbols and carrying the flags of the far-right in support. However despite the shared anger over the health pass and the decision to take to the streets together, there is little unity between the two groups. A far left protester described the separation of the two groups, saying: “We already knew it, but it confirms that my enemy's enemy is not necessarily my friend…” The primary motivations of the far-left protesters appear to be fear over the threat of a tyrannical government, and fear that the far-right will dominate this movement and turn issues of vaccination into a political issue that will serve to benefit them in the upcoming presidential election. The motivations of the far-right also reveal issues with the threat of a tyrannical government, but these protesters are also critiquing the French government’s response to COVID-19 in general, and their frustration at Macron’s Centrist policies. Emmanuel Hirsch, a medical ethics professor lamented over the government’s issue with implementing the passe santiare in an interview with Le Monde. Hirsch claims that Macron did not properly reflect upon the implementation of the passe sanitaire, claiming that this initiative could have been used to create a larger conversation about rebuilding trust in the government and in science. Instead, the passe sanitaire has only served to deepen the tensions between powerful institutions and French citizens. 

The lack of unity at these protests reveal that the French protestors have yet to establish a clear position on the passe sanitaire, simply using it as a symbol to fight against their own personal complaints against the government. The passe sanitaire may indeed be limiting France’s concept of liberté, but the greater issue is one of distrust and fear towards the government, something a vaccine cannot fix. 

Violence Against Yazidi Women

Since 2014, the Yazidi people have made international headlines and attracted the attention of local activists and heads of state alike as the targets of an ethnic cleansing campaign led by the terrorist organization known as Da’esh, ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), or ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant), which will be referred to here as the Islamic State. While horrific violence has been inflicted upon Yazidis as a whole, women, as all too often happens during wartime, have borne the brunt. Victims of sexual violence range from eight-year-old girls to married, pregnant women - those women who are considered too old are killed and buried in mass graves. The UN Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry for Syria found that the Islamic State showed “intent to destroy the Yazidislack, in whole or in part,”, and accordingly characterized the Islamic State’s crimes as acts of genocide. 

But who are the Yazidi people? Little is widely known about them besides their current state of suffering. As much as the Yazidi genocide deserves attention - and indeed, for its magnitude, is not covered nearly enough in the media - failing to recognize, address, discuss, or celebrate Yazidi culture contributes to cultural genocide and the further erasure of the Yazidi people. Instrumental in any genocide or concentrated violence towards one ethnic or religious group is the erasure of their identity; in addition to telling the story of the Yazidi’s suffering, we must tell their whole story. 

The Yazidi people are a religious minority of the Kurdish people, concentrated in Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, and the Caucasus mountains. Depending on the region where the population is located, Yazidi is alternately spelled Azidi, Zedi, Yezidi, Izadi, Ezidi, or Yazdani. Yazidism is more of a religious than an 

ethnic minority - the term “Yazdanism”, under which Yazidism falls, was coined by Dr. Merhad Izady as a blanket term for the pre-Abhrahamic religions of Kurdistan. The Yazidi people originated in northern Iraq, stemming from the last remnants of the Umayyad dynasty. There are records of a Yazidi community in what is now Mosul dating back to the twelfth century. Today, Yazidis number between 200,000 and 1,000,000. These staggeringly low numbers of these ancient people are not the result of the genocide carried out by the Islamic State: Yazidis have a long, bloody history characterized by hatred, persecution, and ethnic cleansing. First viewed as rivals for political power by other Muslims in the fifteenth century, then suffering severe casualties through massacres and conversions alike, many Yazidi people fled to Germany in the late twentieth century to escape the bloodbath that had become the Yazidi experience in their ancestral homeland. In more recent history, Saddam Hussein’s regime carried out a mass displacement of Yazidis around the turn of the century: carrying us to the genocide of today. 

A central tactic that the Islamic State has utilized against the Yazidi people is dehumanization. Victims have reported being sold into sexual slavery, describing being bought and sold the same way people would buy or sell cars. The Islamic state has granted its members permission to “buy, sell, or give as a gift female captives and slaves, for they are merely property, which can be disposed of.” Their treatment of their captives reinforces their position of power over them, often transferring them more than ten times in under sixth months, and heightening their victims’ sense of fear and disorientation. Beyond pure sexual violence, this is particularly classified as genocide as they are stripped of their Yazidi identity - Islamic

State fighters marry them in order to “purify” them. These women are almost always forcefully converted to Islam, and Islamic State leaders “elevate and celebrate each sexual assault as spiritually beneficial, even virtuous”. The Islamic State puts out many of its communications through a publication called Dabiq, and victims have reported that it has been stated in here that if a captured woman is raped by ten different members of the Islamic State, she will become Muslim. As far as lineage goes, it is culturally held by the Islamic State that lineage is passed down through the father which is reiterated in Dabiq, which claims that that “the child of the master [man] has the status of the master”, meaning that if a child is born to a member of the Islamic State and a Yazidi woman, the child will not inherit the Yazidi identity - in this way, a new generation of Yazidis is being prevented from being born. 

The magnitude of atrocities committed against Yazidis by the Islamic State is clear. But under what conditions can they be classified as genocide? The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court established in 1998 four core international crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of agression. As per the ICC, “"genocide" means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: 

1. Killing members of the group; 

2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; 

3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 

4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; 

5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. 

Clearly, each of these acts have been committed against the Yazidi people, specifically, women and girls. In a March 2015 report, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights stated that the perscution of the Yazidi people by the Islamic State qualified as genocide, and almost exactly one year later, the United States House of Representatives voted unanimously that violent actions performed by ISIL against groups such as Yazidis, Christians, and Shia were acts of genocide. Additionally, former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry stated shortly after the House of Representatives vote that the violence initiated by ISIL amounted to genocide. The violence has also been strongly condemned by Islamic scholars and Muslim organizations alike. 

Since the term “genocide” was first coined in 1944 by Polish-Jewish lawyer, it has been regarded as one of, if not the most atrocious crime possible. What, then, has the international response to the Yazidi genocide been? Iraq, where the majority of atrocities have occurred, has proposed a legislative solution. This draft law called for crimes committed against Yazidis, women in particular, to be classified as genocide, establishes a national day of remembrances, and demarcates processes for reparations. This law, however, has stalled several times in negotiations, with questions of who should be included being hotly debated. It has since been amended to include other minority groups suffering persecution by ISIL as well as children born of rape. In accordance with the bill, the Iraqi Ministry of Migration and Displacement has created a relief program for Yazidi female survivors, with a grant allocating roughly 2 million Iraqi dinars (which translates to about $1700 U.S. dollars) to each victim.

The difficulties faced by survivors expands beyond financial and humanitarian. For survivors, a powerful stigma remains. They are often unable to access trauma care, mental health support, or access to justice, either due to stigma or proximity. Nearly all survivors were converted to Islam, raped, or both - making it difficult for them to integrate back into the Yazidi community, regardless of location, as they are now seen as impure. The stigma surrounding survivors escalated until it was necessary for the Head of the Yazidi Supreme Spiritual Council to issue an edict, both welcoming Yazidi women back into their community and acknowledging their suffering at the hands of the Islamic State. However, no such welcome has yet been made for the children conceived out of rape. 

Despite these recognitions and reparations, the international community is certainly not doing as much as it could for the Yazidi people. This opinion is shared by Nadia Murad, a Yazidi peacebuilder, activist, and UN Goodwill Ambassador. Murad launched the Murad Code in partnership with the United Kingdom, which is a protocol for collecting information from survivors on conflict-related sexual violence. Though this was undoubtedly a triumph, Murad has insisted that, considering that thousands of Yazidi women and girls still face sexual violence daily, a larger effort is necessay. Specifically, she has “called for a collaborative grass roots approach with international organizations, the United Nations, and governments working closely with local non-governmental groups to develop contextually specific approaches”, as well as the rebuilding of the Yazidi homeland, Mount Sinjar. 

Ultimately, it is up to both Iraq and the international community to provide better recognition, reparations, and support for the Yazidi community, particularly Yazidi women and girls. One can only hope that apart from simply attempting to repair the horiffic damage done to the Yazidi community, it will be addressed at the root and the Yazidi genocide will be stopped before its final goal is reached.

An Alliance of Asterisks? The Significance of the U.S.-India Relationship

When Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi travelled to Texas in September 2019, he was greeted by over 50,000 people — and introduced by none other than then-American President Donald Trump. The Texan-style cries of “Howdy, Modi!” lifted through the air at one of the largest mass rallies for a foreign leader in United States history. “I’m so thrilled to be here in Texas with one of America’s greatest, most devoted, and most loyal friends,” exclaimed Trump, part of a series of affectionate remarks between the two leaders. In turn, Modi introduced his “family,” a jubilant nod to the many Indian-Americans in the crowd, to Trump. The years-long, sometimes-called “bromance” between Modi and Trump was on full display.

Despite grandiose moments like this, U.S. ties with India remain far less discussed than those with competitors like Russia or China, or allies like Japan or Germany. Though these relationships are not uniform and simple, they are far easier to classify as cool or warm. In contrast, New Delhi’s posture toward Washington and vice versa is more complicated, with areas of agreement and others of divergence. However, the U.S.-India alliance will likely grow with time. Undoubtedly the rapid growth of India’s population and economy plays a role. It is also worth noting a growing community of Indian-Americans and Kamala Harris’s recent election as America’s first Vice President of Indian ancestry, in addition to being the first woman and person of color to hold the post. Her triumph was celebrated by some in India and highlighted by Modi when congratulating her and President Joe Biden on their victory.

Though Modi will find a very different counterpart in Biden, and may adopt a different strategy toward the relationship as a result, the U.S.-India alliance will nevertheless continue to grow in importance. While the latter half of the 20th century saw some estrangement between the two countries, U.S. administrations since President Bill Clinton’s have developed an ever closer rapport with their Indian counterparts. However, as currents bolster this partnership, several issues will soon become key, some of which will draw the two countries closer, like wariness of China. Others, like the global retreat of democracy and human rights, may make this still-burgeoning relationship more awkward. Furthermore, these themes raise and reflect key debates in contemporary U.S. foreign policy. This juncture thus affords an opportunity to investigate these deepening bilateral ties’ implications moving forward.

America and India: An Evolving Relationship

India’s first post-independence prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru famously trumpeted his country’s stance of nonalignment in the Cold War, signaling that New Delhi would adopt a track of neutrality in global geopolitical disputes. This irked Washington, especially as this opened the door to some Indian ties with the Soviet Union. In much of the 20th century’s latter half, India had its fair share of conflicts with Pakistan and China, many of them over border disputes, leading New Delhi to race toward nuclear proliferation. To make matters worse, clashes between India and Pakistan sometimes brought the U.S. to support the latter, such as in 1971. While communication between India and the U.S. continued, the relationship was not close. As C. Raja Mohan writes for Foreign Policy, India in this time “became a champion” for the global south, took a sharp leftward turn economically, and even voted more frequently against the U.S. than the Soviets at the United Nations.

This trajectory began to reverse with Clinton’s 2000 visit to India. During his successor President George W. Bush’s administration, relations continued to strengthen. In a rejection of India’s previous skepticism of military cooperation with America, closer defense ties were reached, and agreements over nuclear proliferation and trade resulted. In the War on Terror era, India’s own concerns with terrorism also rendered the U.S. a logical ally. President Barack Obama’s administration increasingly — and rightly — recognized India’s growing power. While Modi’s election in 2014 presented reasons for strain, not least because of Modi’s nationalist outlook, the Obama administration chose instead to welcome him for a visit to the U.S.

The Trump years were truly strange for many American alliances. India, however, seemed impervious to many of these tensions. Modi was quite capable in appealing to Trump’s fondness for close personal bonds with foreign leaders, especially when greeting the American president with a bear hug at one of their first meetings. As Institute of South Asian Studies researcher Amitendu Palit tells the Financial Times, “India was one of the few countries that got used to working with Trump.” This could have to do with similarities between the two leaders. Scholars Duncan McDonnell and Luis Cabrera argue that Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) shares several similarities with the European right-wing populist party grouping to which Trump’s politics have often been compared. While there is a tendency to refer to comparable leaders as simply permutations of Trump in foreign countries, this urge often obscures concrete differences and dynamics. However, Modi’s BJP has been characterized as Hindu nationalist, protectionist, and anti-elitist, trafficking in discourse not altogether different from that of Trump’s, albeit adapted to a different societal context.

This is not to say there have not been areas of discord between the two leaders. Trade is one. Trump went as far as to end India’s special trade status with the U.S., citing India’s market as unfair for American companies, prompting Modi to unleash tariffs on some American goods. Even through spats like this, however, the two remained cordial. Despite rough patches, Modi avoided the mercurial jabs Trump launched at other world leaders who once fêted him, like French President Emmanuel Macron. 

Today, Modi realizes well that Biden is quite different from Trump. But this does not mean the two leaders’ contrasts will necessarily derail warming ties. After the events of January 6, 2021 in the U.S. Capitol, Modi joined a chorus of foreign leaders condemning efforts to delay the transfer of power between administrations. Since his victory, Biden has been embraced by Modi, particularly during recent talks on China. Biden will likely continue this convergence, as areas for partnership with New Delhi abound. 

The Indo-Pacific and Beyond: Areas of Agreement

This March, Biden was joined by his Indian, Japanese, and Australian counterparts for a meeting of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, nicknamed the Quad, an informal strategic grouping revived during the Trump administration focusing on Indo-Pacific affairs. Central to its current agenda is the distribution of vaccines in the region and combating further responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. But the Quad certainly has additional motives in a region fraught with danger. Through this venue, the U.S. and India may find themselves working together more frequently.

The largest task of the Quad moving forward was not lost on observers: an increasingly strong and assertive China. Tensions between Washington and Beijing have been building for years over a vast array of issues, but the recent U.S.-China summit in Alaska was perhaps the most blatant show of discontent yet between the two sides. Dignitaries swapped their usual pleasantries for harsh critiques, with Chinese officials condemning American police brutality and American officials condemning China’s crackdown in Hong Kong, among other complaints. The areas of competition between China and the U.S. continue to grow over technology, trade relations, stewardship of the international order, the internment of Uighurs, and military relations in East Asia, to name a few.

India and China have long been adversaries, but enmity between them has also been on display in recent years. Their infamous border disputes have flared up again multiple times, sometimes leading to casualties, usually patrolling soldiers. But the tension has even deeper roots. As Vijay Gokhale argues for Carnegie India, a general divergence between the two countries’ geopolitical goals — and their perceptions of one another — have fueled distaste between them, including the feeling in New Delhi that Beijing sees it necessary to box out India to lock in control of the Indo-Pacific. China’s Belt and Road Initiative, bringing it closer to nations like Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and especially Pakistan, has certainly not helped to turn down the temperature. This tension was reflected in a recent poll: a staggering 83% of Indians view China as a security threat, yet 63% still hope for better relations.  However, the same poll found that a larger 75% of Indians want relations with the U.S. to strengthen. Washington’s growing coziness with New Delhi is without doubt partially about combating Beijing, especially as India has increased its naval presence in the Indian Ocean.

Other matters of global significance are also factors. For one, India is a significant partner on climate change, as underscored by a trip from U.S. climate envoy John Kerry. With its large border with Myanmar and rapport with its armed forces, India could use some leverage to help improve a rapidly deteriorating situation following recent violence and coups. India’s growing economy and population also make it a logical ally for the U.S. Yet even as many issues offer opportunity for agreement, room for separation still exists.

Of Media and Missiles: Areas of Divergence

Biden, against the backdrop of eroding norms at home, has made democracy a pillar of his foreign policy. Especially after the events of January 6, a desire to restore confidence in democracy at home and abroad is welcome. Though little has manifested yet, his administration floated a Democracy Summit of sorts, aiming to bring fellow democracies to the table in the face of autocratic trajectories abroad. India would ordinarily be guaranteed an invite. However, Modi’s governance has alarmed observers concerned about a retreat of democratic norms. Freedom House has downgraded India from “free” to “partly free,” and Varieties of Democracy, an index tracking the integrity of democracy worldwide, recently made the momentous decision to classify India as an “electoral autocracy.” These rankings were promptly lambasted by Modi’s government. 

Worrying developments include immigration policy. Critics point to BJP-crafted laws and rules changes, like that in Assam, which discriminate against Muslims and erode India’s religious tolerance tradition, including by offering a path to citizenship for migrants of many faiths except Islam. Indeed, mobs and violence have threatened Indian Muslims before. When demonstrations arise in response to these changes and others, Modi has relied on a favorite tool to quell unrest: restricting Internet access and the press. He blacked out phone and Internet services recently after massive farmer protests formed to protest his economic policies. These same tactics were deployed in Jammu and Kashmir after he repealed the disputed state’s special status in Indian law. Most recently, India’s government has threatened to arrest Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter employees if the sites do not agree to regulate content related to the farmers. The world has watched uneasily as the leader of the most populous democracy has leaned on increasingly authoritarian tactics. Even if this summit idea ultimately does not materialize, a U.S.-stressing democracy abroad might find cozier ties with India awkward. As Tanvi Madan assesses for Brookings, the Biden administration will still see in India a strategic partner, but the relationship will not deepen as fast or as much as it otherwise could due to these concerns. 

Geopolitical thorns exist as well. Though Modi may feel comfortable aligning India closer to the U.S., he does not see India working solely with America. Just as New Delhi’s nonalignment and subsequent relations with Moscow bothered Washington in the Cold War, Modi’s relations with Russia today leave the U.S. unsettled. Though Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin have not been particularly close, except for an invitation to host Putin after COVID-19 subsides, India’s purchase of the S-400 Russian missile system ruffles American feathers. (Turkey’s purchase of the same system has similarly sparked controversy on Capitol Hill.) Indian officials defend buying the system as necessary for defense against neighbors like China and Pakistan. But as the U.S. State Department warns, India could be subject to U.S. sanctions as a result. Though these measures against India may still be unlikely, the transaction remains a sticking point between the countries. The U.S. may still struggle to trust an ally which hopes to retain a more nonaligned stance between Moscow and Washington.

Conclusion: An Alliance of Asterisks

Evidently, the U.S.-India partnership will elevate in importance as years pass. However, existing concerns lead the two countries to remain more estranged than they otherwise might be. Though these bilateral ties are unique, the dynamics at play reflect larger pressing questions in U.S. foreign policy. The U.S. today finds itself in odd positions with many of its allies. Some, like the Philippines and Brazil, have far-right leaders whose disregard for the rule of law and liberal international order complicate ties with America. Turkey, despite its NATO membership, worries the U.S. due to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s closer relations with Putin, authoritarian populist worldview, and general revanchism. Other high profile examples include Saudi Arabia, whose Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has attracted notoriety over the bloody war in Yemen and the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Biden has had to — and will continue to — balance a foreign policy advocating simultaneously for specific values and also American alliances with some partners who violate these standards, while also withdrawing support from such transgressions.
In the case of India, the U.S. should not reject an expanding alliance. It should realize India’s foreign policy goals and aspirations are not as dichotomous as America’s and will not always align, yet a mutually beneficial partnership can flourish in some areas. Geopolitical disagreements like the S-400 missile purchase alone should not fragment U.S.-India ties. Where possible, the two countries should cooperate. Biden’s ability to aid India in its current battle against the raging coronavirus is one such area. Even so, the U.S. should not stay silent with India on troubling topics, particularly human rights. Badly-needed moves to strengthen America’s own democracy and immigration system would also be a boon to Biden’s foreign policy, to make it one of mutual appreciation for reinforcing democratic norms in the face of malaise. If done right, both countries could enjoy a mutually beneficial partnership, even if the days of “bromance” have passed.

Narcoculture as a Crisis of Dignity: A Somatic Solution and the Limitations of 'Practical Philosophy'

Conclusions of Three Indicators: Fitting Narcoculture in Somatic Dignity Model

To recap the analysis of this case study, by abstracting from these illustrative qualities of Narcoculture, we generalize the source of this movement of conflict in two ways. The first is from a traditional environmental or circumstantial analysis, which could certainly be applied to discourses of psychology and sociology, but is much more grounded in the particulars than a philosophical narrative. The second, through this conceptual ‘practical philosophy,’ as demonstrated by this series of articles’ application of a Somatic Dignity framework, is through the lens of broader questions about the tendencies of human nature and its interaction with institutional forces. Alberto-Sánchez, a philosopher himself, supports a sort of synthesis of the two, demonstrating how policy analysis and historical inquiry can collaborate with philosophy for a directly applicable use of its narratives to generate meaningful change. He notes that “the history of narcoculture is wrapped up with the history of America’s War on Drugs…the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914, which regulated the sale and distribution of opiates and coca products and continues to do so to this day…[and] American (or US) intervention in the dismantling of the Colombian drug-trafficking infrastructure- namely, with the fall of Pablo Escobar in 1993. More impactful to its continual survival and evolution is its reactionary relationship with US antidrug (and border) policy, a relationship that forces narco-culture to continuously change, morph, and evolve with every new regulation US lawmakers invent to curb or combat the sale, consumption, and trafficking of illegal or illicit drugs. As drug use and sales are further criminalized in the US, thereby pushing consumers and producers alike further an further past the periphery of legality, Mexico narco-culture flourishes and becomes mainstream, turning ‘Mexico at the dawn of the twenty-first century into a bloodbath that has shocked the world.’” (Alberto- Sánchez, 2020, 2-3).

And yet, Alberto-Sánchez simultaneously describes how “As a historical event and social fact, narco-culture and the violence that frames it reveal a human crisis.” Seeing his utilitarianly motivated responsibility to employ philosophy, he notes that this is a question about violence and death, and thus, best understood through the methodology of phenomenology and existentialism, connecting the “violent terrorism,” of narco-culture with the same phenomena we have seen in Naziism and fascism, which as we know, parallel just as simply Enlightenment vs. Religious violence as Hegel observed in the French Revolution. For Alberto-Sánchez, and certainly historicist philosophers comprising the foundation of my Somatic Dignity theory, these iterative, violent identity-based conflicts cannot be understood from the perspective of the individual. Rather, “Within the violent terrorism of narco-culture, moreover, the ‘individual’s impotence’ is, in fact, absolute; individuals are swallowed up by the culture of violence itself, defined in their identity by a cultural ethos, by an ideology that is greater than themselves- so much so that they can no longer think beyond the immediacy of their station and believe themselves impotently tied to their circumstances,” (Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 4). He agrees, then, that it is philosophy which is uniquely equipped to breakthrough these particulars of the situational crisis and place them within larger frameworks to understand the propaganda and violence, or the true sources of the seeming absurdity of the terror (Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 4-5). This is what we see demonstrated through not only his own work, but the application of Somatic Dignity here.

Somatic Practices as Alternative to Mastery: Case Study of Marisela Escobedo’s movement against Narcoculture’s Femicide

Seeing that narco-culture phenomenologically overlaps strongly with Hegel’s framework of cultural mastery, and therefore, the character of a historical crisis over a deprivation of the recognition of dignity, it follows that there might be promise in the Somatic Dignity framework of providing a solution to this and related conflicts. Returning to the original proposal of Somatic Dignity, we must then consider if mastery is the harmful psychological response, how can we scale the transcendentally powerful habits of the slavish consciousness, who performs embodied work, and thus, learns to transform his own character alongside that of the world around him? By searching for parallels between the Somatic Dignity proposals and the movement of Escobedo in the documentary as well as Alberto-Sanchez’s practical philosophical solution, this series of articles will both provide an extended defense of the previous proposal, and demonstrate how it can and has been successfully applied to an acute case example. As such, it will provide a foundation for the original argument that we have an ethical responsibility toward practical philosophy particularly with regard for these historical iterative identity-based conflicts, due to its unique capacity for human-nature/institutional analysis, not simply because of the destructive degree of conflicts.

By responding to the death of her daughter by engaging in the imagination and construction of a social movement to raise consciousness around femicide and make a call for justice, Marisela Escobedo embodies something akin to this Hegelian slavish consciousness. We can call the death of Escobedo’s daughter the initial existential crisis, or instilling of existential fear that melts away the slave’s stability of identity or perception of the world. This existential crisis or fear is renewed with each threat posed to Escobedo or her family in her efforts, which were frequent and serious. Following the moment of threat, Escobedo dropped her usual activities within her family, or her former “social role” within the Family as a mere being for herself, and entered a more dynamic shared role of Family/Citizen in her public engagement so as to achieve justice for her daughter. This hybrid social role, or challenging of the usual Hegelian borders of ethical institutions suggests the creation of an already more fluid space as a result of the adoption of this transcendentally powered consciousness.

Now having all of the norms of her previous life shattered through the existential crisis, Marisela Escobeda began to engage in a process of imagination, trying to analyze the roots of injustice so as to imagine a better future and chart a path of tangible, working steps to actualize that vision. This ability to imagine and create a new future is a clear example of transcendental consciousness. At first, Escobedo tried standard institutions; searching for her daughter’s remains and the answer to what happened to her by hand, and then pursuing the legal/court system, and appealing to the government. She went to the streets and asked other people for answers, put clues together, and dug through landfills examining bones. She learned the law around the case, gathered and presented evidence, and experienced the emotional toil of expressing all of this at the mercy of a higher authority obsessed only with maintaining their mastery, which involves the cartels and normalization of femicide. She is, in other words, performing embodied, physical work at the will of the consuming, cultural mastery.

 In doing so, that melting down process of all norms and stability of her identity recurs as each institution fails to grant Escobedo justice. This fluidity is what allows her to see the world through new eyes, and set different priorities as to what must be done about it, as seen in her switching ethical roles in the Hegelian system, dropping previous activities, and launching a broader movement. Laws no longer mean anything to her, nor respect for or trust in political authority, so she is forced to come to a new understanding of this subversive, systemic mastery and what power really is. She does not, however, want to be like the Masters, as looking upon narco-culture from the slavish perspective, she can see it is not fulfilling. She can see the perpetrator constantly on the run, and now stuck in that violent life- alive, with power, but not really living for himself. She chooses, thusly, to not share the desire for Mastery, but rather, to transform the world for a higher purpose.

When constructing the movement to raise consciousness around femicide, Escobedo included several key aspects that align with the Somatic Dignity model. First, she channeled person-based narratives through mass media, such that she was not spreading an abstract ideology, but an embodied story that connects with a broader problem, that hinges on an empathetic resonance to have power. Second, she undid the dignity deprivation that occurred for victims of femicide by seeking honor for her daughter and, with others who had lost particular individuals, performed rituals of honor such as holding vigils, leaving flowers and holding faces up so as to give these women a being-for-themselves again within their families, but also meaning within a collective somatic consciousness that is rooted in an emotional, dynamic recognition of the dignity of persons, rather than an abstract notion. She observed that this dignity was intrinsic, but also failing to be recognized by institutions, and through the process of consciousness raising, worked to help individuals and small groups engaging generate empathy and pressure institutional change/ shatter faith and expose corruption of institutions such that there was hope for shifting the historical needle of recognition for women in a positive direction, rather than focusing on her own particular actions.

This follows the Critical Theorist tradition of generating movements, as seen in Martin Luther King Jr.’s influence on the Civil Rights Movement, where it is clear a particular embodied, engaged consciousness has to develop within individuals to allow for imagination, innovative collective action and institutional reform that is responsible rather than a complete overhaul taken by violent force. This is different than an antagonistic use of nonviolence, which aims still to make an impact through some show of force that puts pressure on existing institutions, as Judith Butler points out can be a typical social foundation of movements of non-violence, as in the case of Ghandi (Butler, 2020). It puts a heavier emphasis on cultivating an embodied, transcendental recognition of an individual’s own dignity within themselves which they will then scale in an ethical responsibility to preserve the now perceptible dignity of others. This does not pit two opposing forces, but simply breaks down prior norms and opens someone’s capacity for empathy on a revolutionary scale which will be reflected in accordingly shifted institutions as a result of such a movement. This organically scales because it is dignity deprivation which is the mistaken root of binary, polarized social tensions in these moments of conflict, or to put more simply, that leads to two abstract forces, old institutions and new, fighting by force in the mastery dialectic. As such, fulfilling recognition of dignity will be something, when presented with, many will be thirsty for and receptive of.

In fact, it is Butler’s central claim that to pursue nonviolence “plainly” to solve these problems, or in other words, to understand “non-violence” as a “dialectical opposite to ‘violence,’” as they are often mistaken by our institutions, is often more detrimental. As put by Saswat Samay Das and Dhriti Shankar, two reviewers of Butler’s latest book, when the institution sets up a rigid non-negotiable categorical divide between what it calls violence and nonviolence rather than treating them as divergent yet overlapping processes arising out of expressing and affecting each other, it lays the scope for their partisan manipulation and exploitation for “the purposes of concealing and extending violent aims and practices” (Samay Das, Sawat, Shankar, Dhriti, 2021, 102; Butler, 2020, 5). To instead pursue this transcendental formulation of embodied consciousness of dignity is to move out of the binary polarized space into a dynamic engagement with others to carefully imagine gradual institutional reform according to a particular issue, not the force of an ideological “side” claiming to deem a person holistically good or evil through their loyalty to it.

For Butler, nonviolence with integrity is founded on a radical acknowledgement of the social relatedness of the subject. She views the supreme act of nonviolence as the act of registering the “grievability” of certain lives. Unlike the Masters of Narcoculture or the Reign of Terror, who inflict unimaginable brutality so as to dehumanize, nonviolence is Escobedo, again, giving those who lost their lives to femicide dignity, or value for their lives within themselves, through the practice of grieving together. It is this grieving together that builds an engaged movement to reconstruct their world as one of greater justice and recognition of dignity that can translate into institutional shifts without force in the way of abstract revolution (Samay Das, Sawat, Shankar, Dhriti, 2021, 103; Butler, 2020, Chapter 1).

Limitations in Impacting Institutional Shifts: The Individual vs. Historical Narrative, and a Return to the Ethical Responsibility towards ‘Practical Philosophy’

The biggest limitation of the Somatic Dignity approach which should be noted is rooted in the inherent dynamic of individuals versus institutions in cultivating a shift of the historical needle. Embedded in the larger movement of German Idealism, Hegel grapples with this question head on. However, we can also see it illustrated in Marisela Escobedo’s efforts to counter the historical movement of narcoculture, and related feminist or social justice movements. Through a brief synthesis of these two frameworks in the spirit of the Somatic Dignity proposal, we will examine how important those limitations are in discouraging the push for institutional spreading of Somatic Dignity, and in some ways, other efforts of ‘Practical Philosophy.’

Beginning with Hegel’s interaction with German Idealism, the large movement of German Idealism ventured to fill a logical gap Kant’s framework of transcendental philosophy, such that Kant’s project would not only provide an explanation for how it is we can have knowledge of how we can have knowledge, but be self-explanatory, and explicate how it is we can have knowledge of how it is we can have knowledge. In doing so, they have to understand how it is the self can both be a universal, self-determining thing which possesses freedom, and therefore dignity, but that same self can also posit itself as a finite being which is therefore limited, rather than fully free, by other beings via moral law. In this way, the construction or conception of the self and dignity is directly related to the source and content of ethical obligations.

The first major thinker to take up this project following Kant was Fichte, who asserted that we ought to understand the self as a paradox between this universal, Absolute self, which could fully determine itself, and the finite self posited by the absolute self, this being the tangible, particular being in the world (Fichte, 1994). He understands freedom to be the mechanism by which individual selves are able to fulfill their moral obligations. However, he also argues that freedom is something which we can never fully attain or understand, but only move towards asymptotically across the course of history, thus creating a massive limitation for individual selves in generating historical change or ever fully recognizing dignity.

Schelling, the next major contributor to the Idealist project, critiques Fichte for practicing a “one-sided Idealism,” and argues that the self cannot be understood without its relationship to the objective, or independent unconscious world- Nature (Schelling 1800). Schelling instead understands Nature and the Self to be united under an shared telos or end purpose- this being the fulfillment of moral duty. Nature, he argues, is self-determining insofar as it determines itself so as to allow for conscious selves to have and be able to exercise freedom, and freedom, or the self-determination of the conscious subject is the mechanism by which to fulfill moral duty. In this way, they are individually self-determining but unified concepts that limit each other due to their subordination to an ultimate cause. Because the exercising of freedom can only happen when the self-determining subject is manifested as a tangible, finite being on Earth, Nature self-determines the self as a finite being, answering Fichte’s question without the contradiction. 

Schelling believes, however, that this conception of the self and freedom, and therefore dignity, can only be uncovered through the philosophy of art, rather than formal discursive logic, or precise formulation (Schelling, 1800). Art, he believes, epitomizes the relationship between the conscious self-determining self, and the unconscious self-determination of Nature unified in one task. The artist, in creating a piece, exercises conscious intent in the subject matter and its representation, thereby contributing meaning. The natural materials they work with, however, such as the paint, canvas and so forth, also contribute unconsciously to the meaning of the final product. As such, philosophizing about their unification, he believes, is one way of understanding the relationship between the self and Nature so as to learn about the historical process of fulfilling moral vocation. This is, again, exceptionally limiting for individuals trying to understand freedom so as to exercise their moral duty, as it is ultimately imperfect.

Hegel, then, agrees with Schelling’s latest contribution that such a project cannot fall into a one-sided idealism as Fichte proposed, as this does not consider Nature, or an objective sphere that exists independently and determines itself separately from Subjectivity, nor the proper relationship between Subjectivity and Objectivity (Hegel, 2010). He also maintains Schelling’s argument that in order to evade this trap, transcendental philosophy must focus on the Absolute, or what exists prior to the subject vs. object distinction, and thus acts as a source for each. Hegel provides a critique, however, of Schelling’s assertion that the Absolute cannot be understood through consciousness or discursive thought, (this being understanding the Absolute through logic or language), and instead can only be grasped through art, and the philosophy of art. This happens particularly through a critique of Schelling’s claim that the Absolute is the ‘absolute indifference point’ in the System of Transcendental Idealism.’

According to Hegel, the Absolute cannot be something which exists prior to any difference, the most fundamental being Subjectivity and Objectivity, because to think any concept of the Absolute, including a particular unity between these through the teleological orientation of both towards moral vocation, involves generating a negation between the two things so as to make them cognizable, (this thing is what it is because it is not this other thing) and therefore, includes difference. Instead, the Absolute, Hegel believes, must be an identity of identity and difference themselves, because this is the most abstract indeterminate point, and it is indeterminacy which allows us to affirm concepts without negation. Hegel proves this indeterminacy point as a resolution to the contradiction still present in Schelling’s account through the framework of the Dasein, or the finite, conscious, determinate being, which is able to offer a determinate negation of Being that allows Being and Nothing, which Hegel argues are the most indeterminate and therefore legitimate starting point of the task of understanding the Absolute, to be understood as distinct things, and therefore not be contradictory to one another but provide a solid starting concept with no internal difference.

In other words, for Hegel, there is a pathway by which we can formally understand the nature of our freedom or dignity. However, it is not through discrete, or brute facts about dignity. Rather, it is through the logical movement of resolving contradictions between finite beings and their absolute, eternal character (complete freedom or dignity). Fichte and Schelling both try to resolve contradictions in the self through discrete logic. Hegel says that instead, logic has infinite movement through a finite pattern, and that pattern of movement, a dialectical pattern, is what reveals the character of dignity. Individuals, then, may make certain resolutions of contradictions of their own historical circumstances, which move institutional change in favor of wider recognition forward, but ultimately this is a broader historical task, as outlined in the intro to Somatic Dignity.

In this way, the individual is a necessary mechanism for historical change in favor of fulfilling our moral duty, and widening dignity recognition. However, particular individuals will never fulfill that full vocation on their own. In this way, historically scaled change, or institutional impact that shapes the habits and prejudices of all individuals is the most important form of moral engagement, and it starts with the movement of the individual’s psychology out of the tendency for mastery and into the dynamic, transcendentally powered slavish consciousness. Movements which help to cultivate those psychological shifts and use them to civically engage in movements that spread these habits are the most equipped for fulfilling ethical obligations.

Because philosophy, as demonstrated through the case study of Somatic Dignity theory as applied to narcoculture, is the most equipped, and uniquely so, to understand this relationship of the individual to history, and this moral vocation is the broad telos of the human species, it is not a mere discrete utilitarian ethical obligation to participate in practical philosophy, or applying these patterns to the contradictions and conflicts of our time, but a deeper responsibility. Without it, we have no framework by which to determine what movements for historical change are constructed with a positive benefit, and which will land us in another contradiction and spiral of immeasurably brutal violence. We need philosophy to see the transcendental power and importance of movements like Escobedo’s and the broader way in which those habits apply to other global conflicts, if we are to move the needle in our own time, and not go back into the same easy misunderstandings of our past. As Butler points out, it is easy to label a cause with something everyone can agree is good, as well as with a moral quality like “non-violence,” and in fact foster more aggression and dehumanization. Philosophy offers a sophisticated historical analysis of psychology that allows us to move into a truly impactful shift of our own habits, and ultimately, our historical condition of recognition such that we can live truly more fulfilled lives, rather than delusions of mastery.

Economic Democracy: Prospects for the Future

In spite of consistent economic growth and reduction of poverty in the world as a whole, the world continues to be increasingly unequal, with an accompanying increasing gap between those belonging to the more clearly defined socioeconomic groups and a devastating strain on natural resources, again most negatively reflecting upon those on the lower end of the inequality spectrum. The reality and interests of the majority of workers and the world’s poorer classes thus is increasingly less clear to the elites, or those usually in positions of power and greater control over the political and economic life globally. This can only reinforce the vicious cycle and perpetuate, not only economic, but also ultimately democratic exclusion of those unable to participate in the highly market-driven society as people are systematically stripped away of opportunities, including the ability to be heard. 

Economic democracy recognizes the need for inclusion of the people in the economic processes and decision-making as much as in political processes, thus allowing for a framework that supports development and sustainability of a true democracy as well as, consequently, a constant commitment to strengthening of the communities, support of human dignity, as well as ecological regeneration and advancements. While political economies have been widely praised and noted for expanding overall economic growth and, importantly, investment in human capital, social programs, and political stability, the benefits of such contributions of political democracy have also been attributed as largely accruing amongst the upper and middle class citizens. Ultimately, one unable to participate in the economic life of one’s community and country cannot be expected to exert much influence on the sociopolitical level, which is why sociopolitical inclusion cannot truly happen without economic inclusion and economic democratization, revealing urgent need for economic democracy as a means of truly democratizing the world and enabling a more holistic approach to development. This article will examine what is meant by the movement for economic democracy as well as what some prospects are for the flourishing of this approach as a means to improving the health of the world’s democracies from here on. Case studies explored in the article will showcase potential to work towards economic democracy as seen in the past and present, as well as some aspects of political democracies, such as referendums, voting habits, and approaches to constitution-making, including the constitutional text itself, that can serve as examples of work towards the principles of holistic inclusion consistent with the economic democracy approach. 

 On Economic Democracy

The idea of economic democracy comes from an understanding that purchasing and ownership power over resources is intricately tied to the self-governing process proposed by the ideals of democracy, and thus this socioeconomic philosophy is advocating a push towards a world in which a large group of stakeholders instead of, for example, corporate shareholders, would hold ownership rights over the resources in a given community and play a role in decision-making and shaping of the community’s socioeconomic future with respect to individual economic rights. Economic democracy can further be defined as “a system of checks and balances on economic power and support for the right of citizens to actively participate in the economy regardless of social status, race, gender, etc.” and this will be the definition assumed by this paper, with the economic power understood as ability to participate in resource manipulation and decision-making processes in production and resource allocation. The way in which it is practically implemented has evolved from thinking simply in terms of labor unions and collective bargaining to also include community cooperatives and more nuanced and complex ways in which a sense of ownership and economic decision-making power is allocated in a given industrial/productive context. In the context of today’s political polarization, the political and economic issues are too often being seen as separate in spite of the fact that the two are intrinsically linked and it is ultimately impossible to understand one without the other. This creates a paradox because the sociopolitical is seen to impact the economic life more than the socioeconomic, and this is a paradox that economic democracy works to address. 

Economic democracy also recognizes the role and agency of the poor in the stride for reversing the effects of climate change, acknowledging that not only the rich should be privileged to care about their environment and instead enabling the movement for ecological health to be voiced and practiced widely. In the unequal and exclusionary world we live in, the poor are forced to watch the degradation of their environment without agency to promote and motivate change, but the principles of economic inclusion and empowerment, the people en masse would be allowed to voice concern for their communities and immediate environment throughout their not only civil and political but also economic and work life, allowing for a more holistic approach to development and ability to most appropriately allocate resources in accordance with the wishes and desires of the local community which is naturally best able to recognize and most equipped to care of the potential negative consequences and sustainability measures in place.

Historical instances of economic democracy

Modern stride towards implementation of practices of economic democracy can look to the past for inspiration. Of course, given the nature of economic democracy, it will ultimately look different in every locality as the communities themselves will be given agency. When it comes to historical attempts at implementation of the practices of economic democracy, Yugoslavia is where an example can be found. Unlike the USSR at the time, Yugoslavia looked to decentralize its management as a way to promote the workers’ participation in the economy and established the practice of a worker self-management system in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The goal was to create an alternative to the Soviet state-led socialist program that would democratize economic processes and allow for decisions to be made in the root of production of the country. The idea was practically implemented with mixed results - it created a space for workers to advocate for their rights and become more legally protected and also managed to increase their output, but the extent to which workers ultimately gathered significant power remains up to debate as the state continued to hold onto political power and continued significant involvement in terms of economic planning, which resulted ultimately in overspending and a simultaneous failure of both the political and economic systems of Yugoslavia and the violent break-up of the country. 

Chile saw development of production committees in Allende’s era that saw practices of worker management through their labor unions eventually expand to 500 factories. This process, however, came to an abrupt end with the military coup in 1973, which again makes the theories behind these processes and their probable impact more difficult to determine. However, they were a clear characteristic of this historical period and found practical implementation in this context. More recently, following the economic crisis of 2001, Argentina saw the movement of empresas recuperadas flourish as a way of workers to hold onto their labor rights and even recuperate factories that were going out of business under market pressures, with the state allowing worker cooperatives to apply to temporarily use the firms and retain their positions - these cooperatives were treated different depending on the country’s changing political climate, but recent departure from strict neoliberal policies and unprecedented agreement for debt restructuring offer an exciting opportunity for the future of the empresa recuperada movement that gained international support to flourish and adapt to current challenges. 

A particularly recent example is Greece that saw a rise in worker collectives and cooperatives that attempted to restructure the way their businesses worked. In the case of Greece, this happened following the economic crisis of 2008-09 that particularly negatively affected Greece forcing it into bankruptcy. Research conducted amongst three small businesses focused around journalism and political and social advocacy work, found that workers were able to successfully challenge the hierarchical structures and promote broader participation on behalf of all of its workers. The challenge here was that in this case there was virtually no attention to this principle coming from the state which resulted in major limitations to broadening the scope of the firms’ decision to institute the practices of economic democracy and worker participation. 

What is revealed through these historical examples of instances of economic democracy is that there were divergent contexts and models for implementation of the practices of economic democracy, with the principles of economic democracy finding application within both socialist and capitalist contexts, and that ultimately there was usually inadequate extent of state support for the programs, with such initiatives either being ignored or overly dependent on the state structure. What is needed is a way to implement such principles ensuring simultaneously their independence from the regime in power and resiliency in spite of economic challenges. These historical strides to achieve this and the fact that such sentiments and efforts remain in spite of corporate neoliberal influences in essentially all of the countries mentioned, including their successors, shows that there is the interest and need to continue finding the most appropriate application for a form of economic democracy practice. 

Modern instances of economic democracy 

On top of aforementioned historical efforts at establishment of economic democracy practice, effects of which still linger on today, there are also active cases of forms of economic democracy that can inspire further progress in this field and that show practicality in the context of today’s day and age. 

When it comes to Costa Rica, Coopenae is a cooperative lending institution that now is one of top revenue generating banks in the country. It is known for its successful inclusion of hundreds of people and it incorporates decision-making power amongst all the shareholders. While one may not necessarily think of banks as a “fertile ground” for cooperatives and economic democracy, banks, as the people are quite literal shareholders in the bank, might actually be an easier way to approach it than, for example, the traditionally relied upon agriculture. Costa Rica’s history with cooperatives also can be traced to its agricultural and artisanal past dating to the early 19th century when merchants and farmers began organizing to combat changing climatic and market conditions among other factors and divide the risks, once again showing that there are various historical origins that might influence a group’s thinking about engagement in self-management/cooperative or other means of achieving economic democracy. Also, while Costa Rica has had great success comparatively working within the constraints of neoliberalism and remaining a close ally to the US, it still maintains the virtue of cooperatives, and these are included as a fundamental worker right and even a necessity for worker benefits and sustainable development within the Constitution of Costa Rica. This answers the question of how compatible with free trade these cooperatives can be as it shows the system would work within different macro-level/worldwide frameworks. It is also important to note that fishing, agricultural, and artisanal communities in Costa Rica remain resilient through cooperatives and have successfully been adapting themselves to this day. Environmental benefits and sustainable practices are again linked to cooperatives, though there is debate on how inherent this is to the system given that it is up to the communities to decide trajectories of local changes and progress. 

Nigeria has a number of interesting cooperatives whose goals are to be people-centered and provide workers with appropriate living conditions and benefits for their work. It seems that there is an understanding that they can in the long run lead to greater economic democracy as well, but at this stage they are more of a stepping stone to it functioning as a skill and practice builder on the way to achieve economic democracy. It seems that Nigeria Police Cooperative is the largest cooperative in Nigeria and all of Africa, and it was formed precisely with the goals of enabling greater worker rights and protections. It is unclear to what extent there was intentional aim toward worker participation as well, but the process seems to naturally head in that direction as workers gain greater empowerment. Cowries Multipurpose Cooperative is another example of a successful cooperative in Nigeria and also another example of a funding/lending-based cooperative institution to show success in member inclusion probably due to the fact that shareholding comes more naturally in bank/stocks settings. Their aim is to keep improving, incorporating more innovative technologies, training for its personnel, and better planning strategies in order to remain on the track of development and the mission to achieve successful collaborative effort at development and, importantly for economic democracy, “mentally empower [their] members, expound their economic means and influence their financial choices in the fight against poverty and mediocrity for the continuous improvement of individuals and ultimate transformation the society as a whole.” It seems that funding issues and lack of trained personnel and practitioners poses a great challenge to sustaining cooperative efforts in the African context, but this certainly shows awareness of the issue and Nigeria’s readiness to address these issues and use this as a potential framework for future development can function in part also as a corrective measure to the uneven development through the traditional neoliberal corporate framework. 

Another approach to collective organizing that can support broader economic democracy initiatives is found in Nordic housing policies. In this case, cooperative associations own the housing units and rent or sell them to their members at a more affordable price. The system of cooperative housing was developed in the early 1930s and survived the shift towards market liberalization successfully adapting itself to the laissez-faire scenario. One example is Búseti in the greater Reykjavik area that serves about 1,200 dwellings. Such housing initiatives also benefit greatly the elderly and those in need of additional accommodation and services thus resulting in greater inclusivity and promoting greater social cohesion. Such initiatives are increasingly promoted around the world, including in the US, though Nordic countries provide a particularly coherent and widely spread and implemented framework.

Germany is particularly notable for ensuring board-level representation of its workers. Between 30 and 50 percent of board members are labor representatives, with firms over 2,000 employees and heavy industries such as steel and iron production featuring a mandatory even spread of worker and shareholder representation on the board. Workers on the board are protected from discrimination, reimbursed for training, and entitled to compensation for their membership and equal participatory rights to any other board member. The system is implemented and works relatively well in practice in over 600 large companies. 

Yemen remains entrenched in a complex, multi-sided war that triggered one of the biggest humanitarian crises in the world, with currently an estimated 24 million in need of assistance. In spite of devastating consequences of the war, communities on the ground remain resilient and proactive. This led, among other things, to initiatives such as Sabcomeed’s trading initiatives to support coffee farmers nationwide. Companies such as Sabcomeed support local farmers’ coffee growing initiatives and have facilitated the process of building roads and exporting while Qima Coffee productions facilitated the production of coffee and sponsors schools in the area, allowing coffee cultivators of Al-Ruwad cooperative to sell their product and earn two or three times more than an average coffee exporter and ensure the benefits of this business reach all aspects of the community. The business would generate income that contributes to all stakeholders and the companies involved in the building of community infrastructure and generating this trade would describe themselves as part business, but also part humanitarian organization and an NGO. Initiatives such as these show the capability for community organization and planting of the seeds for economic democracy even in the moments of great crisis. The experience of Yemeni coffee growers also shows the ability of the private sector to invest in communities and work towards mutual development, though the ways in which such initiatives will further be developed were the government to invest in them more, either through supportive policies or direct investments, remains to be seen and has been noted as something communities and supporting companies would benefit from and currently desire. 

Principles of economic democracy observed in the current democratic practice

The practice of political democracy also reveals principles that can be either directly tied or translated to function within the economic democracy field. While political democracy in itself may not necessarily be sufficient to reduce inequality and promote equal access to economic and resource agency, some of its methods, including referendum, voting and constitutional practices, are instrumental for economic democracies and show opportunity for political and economic democratic initiatives to exist and develop together. 

Switzerland has a very particular referendum system that the country considers a way to maintain checks and balances on the government through essentially direct civilian participation in democracy. A popular vote must be held on any amendment to the Constitution, so this referendum would be mandatory, while any citizen eligible to vote also has the right to request a referendum. A group of at least seven citizens can assemble and form a Popular Initiative group that can then launch a request for amendment to the Constitutions, though not to a law. There is a need for popular majority and double majority across cantons for the change to become constitutionally accepted. This is ultimately the way to consistently keep people connected to the democratic process and promote democracy, transparency, and decision-making power and accountability amongst the citizenry. While voter turnout is low in Switzerland for federal elections, with around 50% of eligible voters actually voting similarly to the US, Swiss voters have plenty of opportunities to vote on various issues and on various elections throughout the 4-year period so 90% report to voting at least once during this period. Selectivity in voting probably comes from the abundance of ways one can participate. The ease at which one can access information on voting roles and referendums is impressive, and this fits the idea of inclusion, common participation, and democratic transparency. There are referendums about business tax laws, public information, naturalization process, biometric passports, pension, migrant workers, animal protection etc. so citizens remain consulted across various topics in the society. Depending on the need, there are repeated referendums on a specific issue within a span of a year or even months. There are even more regular ballot box votes on local and cantonal issues, and there are still town-hall meetings and open-air assemblies across Switzerland (now with adjustments for the pandemic measures). The newest in line is the planned Swiss referendum on COVID-19 lockdown measure as citizens decided to challenge the government’s ability to impose lockdown and other restrictions amidst the pandemic, which will be the newest display and test of Swiss direct democracy. Switzerland’s referendum culture, including high voter turnout, voter education, frequent and accessible town-hall meetings, and opportunity for organization at the local, regional, and national levels are all promising components of economic democracy as well. 

Italy showcases a strong referendum culture as well, with the 1946 referendum single handedly and effectively abolishing monarchy, and the 1974 referendum protecting divorcing rights, but more recent referendums reveal the flaw of high quotas that result in virtually every popular referendum between 1996 and 2016 having been deemed invalid due to the failure to meet the quorum of 50% turnout or having low turnout. Due to parliamentary instabilities reflected in frequent changes to parliament members and the executive branch’s tendency to prolong parliamentary referendum-related decisions, 90% of laws proposed from citizens’ legislative initiative from 1996-2001 are still awaiting consideration as a consequence. Lessons learned here are that referendums being held are not necessarily sufficient, with the need to also provide mechanisms for referendums to have actual effect as well as to promote greater citizen participation and greater direct citizen involvement through, for example, showing stronger support for laws and initiatives proposed by the citizens. Greece represents another cautionary tale as another mechanism Greece relied on to resolve the 2008 financial crisis was intended to be a referendum. In 2010, the need for austerity measures after increasingly grim news about the national budget resulted in then Prime Minister Papandreou calling for a national referendum in 2011 in order to get public opinion on whether or not to accept the bailout measures, but then called it off after he got center right opposition to agree. There was a lot of political pressure to call it off given that Article 44 of Greek Constitution allows for referendums on critical social matters but not on economic issues. He ultimately had to step down from his position and protests continued throughout 2012 as a backlash against the bailout. Then Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras called for a referendum in 2015 to discuss continued austerity and privatization measures. At first, he said “no” to the measures and called the public to agree but then just a week after the referendum resulted in a “no”, the Greek government, spearheaded by Tsipras himself, agreed to accept more austerity measures, privatizations, and tax increases citing them as necessary to keep people alive and insisted on keeping the country in the EU and eurozone. Greece thus has a very unfortunate relationship with referendums as they appear to be easily manipulated by prime ministers/political elite. 

Referendums are ultimately criticized to be expensive and logistically difficult to frequently execute. This is where modern practices can be combined with the traditional democratic principles to launch more elaborate e-democracy initiatives where citizens would be encouraged and supported in electronic voting. This is one way in which direct democratic participation, both politically and economically, can be achieved as members of collectives, be they countries or firms, will be more easily reached and coordinated using modern technologies.  

Finally, constitutions themselves are framing documents basing the orientation of the country, not only politically but in every other sense, including economically. In the case of Greece, we have already seen the way that economic democratic participation can be marginalized through constitutional wording. However, constitutional practices and framings can also serve to promote economic democracy. In the very practice of writing the constitution, countries can in fact show exceptional strides towards greater and more holistic democratization. 

A very particular development was the 2008 crisis that saw Iceland going bankrupt and people going to the largest protest in the countries’ history since 1949. Citizens emphasized that they do not feel like their vote at elections matters, and it was largely the inability to have a real say in the economic life in the country that was the source of dissatisfaction and that was starting to stand out as opposed to the ideals of democracy. As a result, almost a thousand people drawn at random, though controlling for age, geographical location, gender etc., were combined in the National Forum and asked to give input in redrafting of the constitution, and people felt empowered as this was the first time such a thing was done. Public officials were to be bound to respond in accordance to agreed upon fundamental Icelandic values of honesty and integrity. Now, while the main principles of the country’s future trajectory were established, such as the wish for transparency, animal rights protection etc., critics describe this episode as shallow and without tangible plans. Of course, drawing so many participants together without previous experience in politics nor management was never expected to have specific, profound results, but rather to begin the discussion and remind the public and the government of the shared values, identity, and goals so that the country overcomes the crisis, in which it can be said that this initiative succeeded. 

The realization process of the National Forum included the 950 participants organized into groups of 8 and seated for roundtable discussions facilitated by specially trained personally that did not contribute views, but simply guided the discussion and ensured participation - the discussions were centered around the core themes needed for the constitutional drafting assembly, such as values, principles etc. and a sentence was drafted to reflect the input from each roundtable discussion; these were then grouped together and summarized, and personal recommendations to the Constitutional Assembly were also written, including by the facilitators. The ultimate text of the Constitution is said to in some parts reflect the core values identified in the National Forum, including ideals “such as the public ownership of Iceland’s natural resources, an article on information rights, and an attempt to enshrine the Parliament’s role in the supervision of financial management.” Out of the 950 participants, 75% said the forum was organized exemplary and 95% considered it a success. Iceland’s very low Gini coefficient of 0.24 after government taxes and transfers means that Iceland is actually the lowest amongst the OECD countries, and 4 out of 5 people, according to this OECD study, use the internet to interact with the authorities, so relative equality, as well as access to and a culture of interacting with authorities do exist, potentially representing contributing factors to the success of the National Forum. Iceland’s population of a little over 356,000 people and general identification with the middle class of the majority of Icelanders may result in an easier facilitation of such attempts at more direct forms of democracy, but it is important to note that class awareness differs from class reality, so identification with middle class can often come from a relative point of reference, and a full 10% of Icelanders remained in poverty at the time of the National Forum in 2010, with that number more recently becoming 8%, showing that prospects for success are more complex than mere population size and baseline statistics, but also involve complex social processes and understandings.

The constitutional texts themselves ultimately are fundamental to orienting the goals of the country, and pursuit of economic democracy can become one of those goals. Bolivia has seen its fair share of constitutions, precisely 17 since its founding in 1825. What is significant about the latest constitution is that it for the first time acknowledged to such an extent the position of indigenous people of the land, dedicating an entire chapter to the country’s ethnicity and declaring Bolivia to be a plurinational state; some of the country’s economic sectors such as the gas industry were nationalized and the country’s political system was decentralized to include departmental, municipal, regional, and indigenous authorities. What is very interesting about the 2009 Constitution is that it actually took 3 years to be approved with the process starting with creation of the constitutional assembly in 2006 as promised in Morales’s campaign and then this body spent two years collecting data and creating a draft later approved by the National Congress, though the National Electoral Court and the opposition debated the process, and then was finally approved with a historic referendum with 90.24% voter turnout and 64.43% agreeing to the new constitutional framework. While all political parties and ethnic groups were called to participate, and the nation’s people were able to vote for members of the constitutional assembly, the assembly itself got mixed reviews, the process was deemed transparent, respected the separation of powers as neither branch was to be involved in the drafting and influence the assembly, and the process empowered the people as the constitution had to be approved by at least 51% of Bolivian voters and it guaranteed that departmental heads would also be subject to the will of the people, thus promoting and cementing democratic and participatory values of the country and beginning a process of decentralization, but this time in a democratic, transparent, and accountable fashion. The 2020 peaceful elections after turbulent 2019 political crisis that saw Evo Morales resigning due to pressure from the military and still debated accusations of manipulated election results were also praised by international observers - the success is attributed to diversification of the electoral tribunal, successful campaigns to educate voters, agreement that the losing party will yield to the winners, and the public’s genuine exhaustion with political unrest and desire to establish normalcy and peace in the country’s political life. In any case, this crisis put the constitutional groundings to the test and showed that this constitutional experiment demonstrates resilience and stability on top of promoting plurinationalism, inclusivity, and some principles of economic democracy such as decentralization of economic decision-making as well as an emphasis on the people’s self-determination when it comes to community resources. 

Ecuador’s constitution is the first in the world to acknowledge the right of nature “to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles” through a chapter titled the Rights of Nature, which moves past seeing nature as a commodity or property. Citizens are also encouraged to actively participate in the country’s democracy and guaranteed the right to inclusion in all aspects of social interaction - these ideals are reinforced through the Law of Citizen Participation (2010) that puts additional emphasis on inclusion and the country’s orientation towards participatory democracy, and one way in which this is manifested in practice is the push towards the Participatory Budgeting framework in which citizens are asked to play a role in decision-making in terms of the national and local budgeting. Research surrounding the Municipal Autonomous Decentralized Government of Gualaquiza canton that has 10 districts and around a dozen millions of dollars in its budget showed that political participation was promoted through the participatory budgeting initiative, but that only 2% of the budget was allocated to this initiative and that the outcome was ultimately highly dependent on the will of local authorities, with limited outreach to rural communities. The reasons for limited outreach of the participatory budgeting initiative included lower educational levels, as well as the type of work rural communities do as work in the field positions them farther from decision-makers physically and creates additional logistical problems in realization of contact with the communities, showing the shortcomings in political democratic process as a consequence of socioeconomic positioning of a population. While the scope of this initiative remains limited, it still shows that legal basis for economic democracy can help launch and better augment strides towards economic empowerment and democracy.

Conclusion 

Economic democracy is asking us to think outside of the current divide between political and economic liberation, ensuring inclusivity, and showcasing clear compatibility with human rights and even rights of nature and ability to advocate for environmental regeneration. It is also not an unachievable ideal as there are not only historical initiatives, but also present-day frameworks, including through current political systems, that support ideals of broader economic participation and agency. In a world that so deeply values democracy and freedom, it is only natural to also pursue the goals of economic democracy and make this ideal at least more visible and more widely studied and applied in the future. 

*This article was developed in collaboration with the International Center for Globalization and Development (CIGLOB) 

What Foucault Can Teach Us About COVID-19: Understanding the Effects of the Pandemic Through Philosophy

The COVID-19 pandemic has upended daily life for the majority of people around the world and brought about dramatic changes in our living habits and the ways we can conduct ourselves in our day to day lives. Despite the prolonged and devastating nature of this pandemic, the rise in vaccinations and increase in effective treatments for the disease have finally allowed us to look to the future with some optimism. However, as we start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, it is important to now understand the different ways in which the pandemic can be explained and analyzed through a more theoretical and scholarly lens. Much has been written about the pandemic, but the majority of COVID-19 written material has consisted mostly of news sources simply offering information about cases, new breakthroughs in research, and official government updates. 

Michel Foucault

Analyzing the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic through a philosophical lens can provide insight and discovery into the new ways of looking at this momentous year. In particular, the work of famous French philosopher, Michel Foucault, can provide theories and explanations towards understanding the effect of things such as mass vaccination and government intervention within a population. Foucault (1926-1984) dedicated his life to understanding the ways in which humanities struggle with power, control, and knowledge. More specifically, Foucault focused on the role that societal institutions played in influencing and controlling society. His study of historical events and ancient institutions revealed new ways of understanding power and force. 

Biopolitics

Taking a Foucauldian lens to the COVID-19 pandemic requires using Foucault’s theories and concepts to apply them to our modern era. Foucault’s famous concept of ‘biopolitics’ from his book, The History of Sexuality, is the first concept that can be applied to this pandemic. Foucault defined biopolitics in his book as a way "to ensure, sustain, and multiply life, to put this life in order." However, more simply put, biopolitics is a way of understanding how society exerts control and dominance over the creation and maintenance of human life. Foucault explained that this was a new type of power, created in the nineteenth century by the rise in modern medicine and technology, which allowed governments and societal institutions to view society as one grand body, and allowed it to enforce regulations and mandates for the whole of the state body or population. There are many examples of biopolitics in society, but common examples include ways of regulating human life and the importance of sustaining it. Anti-abortion laws, health mandates, eugenics, and scientific racism are all examples of this concept, as they explain how society had progressed enough to control the reproduction of a population. However, with that ability to control reproduction came a need and requirement: society had to ensure that the population stayed healthy and continued to grow, and to do this, they provided institutions with the power to do so.

Biopolitics within the coronavirus pandemic appear in a variety of ways. Mask mandates and distancing regulations at a minimum of six feet apart are just two examples of Foucault’s theories at work. Both of these requirements have been enforced by the government as a way to prolong human life and ensure the safety of the population by preventing the state body from becoming ill and dying in huge numbers. Vaccination represents a specific form of biopolitics, in which a government can actively gain control over their population through guaranteeing the ability of their population to survive. Vaccines represent an intense form of institutional power, as the government gains power to decide who lives or dies, as they make choices about groups within society that must be vaccinated first. Within the United States we have witnessed vaccinations to the weakest members of society, the elderly and those with chronic health conditions, as these individuals are at the greatest risk of dying. Essential workers were also prioritized within the vaccine rollout, due to their need to care of others and their proximity to the disease. 

However, vaccine rollout has also been harshly criticized for not being equitable enough. The COVID-19 vaccine offers the promise of safety and the ability to remain alive, but other factors such as racism and poverty play a role in who can access the vaccine. Individuals who lack technological resources find it harder to make vaccination appointments, and similarly, communities of color within the United States are reported to have received less vaccinations than communities with primarily white people, a sign of systemic racism within the medical field. Foucault’s concept of biopolitics allows us to understand that unfair, racist distributions of the vaccine rollout are quite literally leading to the deaths of people of color at the hands of the government. Public health experts have declared that vaccine disparity results from struggles to make appointments and lack of resources and education provided. Here, we witness biopolitics in its worst form, in which a state has the power to provide for its united body, but fails due to internal and systemic issues. 

Governmentality 

The work of COVID-19 contact tracers and public health officials to track the origins of outbreaks can also be better understood through Foucault’s theory of ‘Governmentality.’ Foucault’s theory of governmentality can be defined as the unity of two forces: government and rationality. Foucault wrote that this combination of the two terms is what allows governments to guide and shape the behaviour of their citizens; through utilizing his concept of governmentality, Foucault hoped to gain insight into the ways in which governing occurs and how it is understood in society. Foucault viewed his concept of governmentality and government in a broad sense, analyzing smaller subsections of society as a government as well. 

Thanks to Foucault’s broad definition of this concept, we can understand governmentality as a term that applies to other organizations and systems of power within society. The scientific and medical community, such as the CDC or WHO can be defined as actors that greatly influence human conduct and behaviour since the start of the pandemic. Individuals learned from the CDC about the benefits of mask wearing and the importance of being aware of one's overall health and possible symptoms for signs of infection. The culture of awareness and protection promoted by these actors thus influenced a change in human behavior, as we as a society were forced to become more aware of the overall wellbeing of our bodies. 

Analyzing the nation’s mindset early on in the pandemic versus now allows us to understand the process of governmentality and how it slowly takes hold. The rise of mask mandates proved difficult for people to understand at first, and many protested against these new measures, unwilling to sacrifice their “personal freedoms” and unwilling to believe in the scientific benefits of wearing masks. Yet now, thirteen months into the pandemic, the majority of Americans have accepted mask mandates, and while they may not personally enjoy nor support them, people understand that the mandates are now a part of daily life. Tracking the rise of the mask mandate and individuals' views on them over time allows us to understand governmentality as a whole, and how organizations in power can change societies’ conduct.   

Disciplinary Power

The pandemic has forced us to restructure the everyday fabric of our lives. We have become accustomed to the routine of online school, of restaurant capacity, of hand sanitizer stations, and being unable to visit our loved ones in the hospital. Humanities' sudden change in behavior can be seen in the most minute details, but also in larger societal issues that regulate the actions and thoughts of groups of individuals. Foucault’s creation of the concept of ‘disciplinary power’ is another aspect of his philosophy that can explain phenomena resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In his works, Foucault explains that disciplinary power is a newer form of power in recent history that resulted in a change from the sovereign power demonstrated by monarchies to the rise of the surveillance and a government’s ability to watch and track its people, which required technologies and human effort not available until the 18th and 19th centuries. Foucault’s primary intention with this new concept of disciplinary power was to demonstrate how discipline and control are a form of power. Foucault believed that discipline regulates the thoughts and actions of actors, therefore a government that could control its citizen’s behaviors through the ever present nature of discipline had achieved a new level of power. 

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, we have witnessed governments use the concept of disciplinary power to alter their citizens’ behavior and help stop the spread of the pandemic. The normalization of masks and standing six feet apart from everyone at all times are examples of this power at work. Foucault believed that disciplinary power was a subtle force, not easily recognizable. Instead, disciplinary power permeates a society through its institutions and the power that specific institutions, such as prisons, schools, and hospitals might hold. Throughout the pandemic, we have also witnessed the power institutions hold in determining the outcome of our lives and our manner of behavior. School districts have individually decided to shut down or restart at certain points, dramatically changing children’s educational experiences. Above all, Foucault believed that this form of disciplinary power seeks to “increase the utility of the body.” Institutions have established norms and conditions that keep us safe and in turn protect the national body as a whole, allowing us to continue maintaining our population and our society. The success of disciplinary power throughout the COVID-19 pandemic is seen in our smooth adjustment to these new ways of life. When individuals no longer protest mask mandates or engage in expected social distancing practices without thought or question, we can then acknowledge the success of disciplinary power, as citizens will have become disciplined and adhere to the expected behavior promoted by institutions. 

Using Foucault’s theories and philosophies alongside events and changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic is not to critique our new behavior or government actions, nor is it to pass judgement on Foucault’s own theories and his views on government and society; it is merely to provide greater insight to how and why society has changed in the way that it has, and to show the role that power and knowledge have played throughout this pandemic. Despite the success of America’s vaccine rollout and the promise of a “normal” summer, we should not forget the lessons and observations that Foucault’s teachings reveal to us, particularly in our understandings of human behavior and institutional action during a time of crisis and illness. 

China’s COVID Vaccine Diplomacy

Ever since January 2020 when the first cases of COVID were discovered in Hubei Province, China has had a significant role to play in the development and distribution of COVID vaccine doses. The public-private partnerships which joined the resources of the Chinese government with the manufacturing capabilities of the country’s pharmaceutical companies have allowed them to make speedy progress, and that has opened opportunities for providing global assistance during the pandemic. Indeed, China has made offers to a number of countries in a move that could be seen as a public service, a strategic play, or a combination of the two. The Chinese government has pushed one narrative, of course, but there is no denying that China has extensive room for growth in terms of soft power. China’s capabilities have increased its competitiveness with the West and opened doors to its expansion on the national market. Though, much of China’s COVID vaccine operations remain ambiguous. Firstly, there is uncertainty about the safety and efficacy of the country’s three vaccines. There is also confusion and a lack of transparency surrounding the vaccine research. There is skepticism about China’s follow through and what they may ask for in return. There are also the Chinese people who need to be cared for. China is acting on the center stage during this COVID pandemic, and there is no unified expectation from its spectators.

Global Assistance from China

Last May, Chinese President Xi Jinping allocated large sums of money to about 17 vaccine projects and gathered 22 firms and research institutes to get to work. With this devotion to overcoming the pandemic that killed so many and initially tarnished China’s reputation, China has committed to delivering about half a billion doses of vaccine to over 45 countries. These countries are low and middle income, and they are struggling to meet their demand due to the costs and requirements of Pfizer, Moderna, and the like. One difference between these Western vaccines and China’s, for example, is that the latter do not require ultracold storage; standard refrigerators are sufficient. This alleviates the problem of transporting mass amounts of vaccines to areas without substantive infrastructure. Many low and middle income countries see China’s offer as more cost-effective and distributable than the other vaccines. 

Although the Chinese government rejects the phrase due to its negative connotations, this global assistance has been called “vaccine diplomacy.” Many suspect that China’s actions are less of a public service than they are a political move, and the Associated Press relayed “concerns about what China might want in return for deliveries.” It is not yet clear what China expects from the countries they have pledged to help, but no matter the intention, China has a lot to gain from this circumstance. 

China’s Competition with the West

China’s primary gains from assisting low and middle income countries are in regard to competing with the West. Assisting Serbia and Hungary, for example, is a “geopolitical victory in Central Europe and the Balkans.” This will give China greater economic influence in the region. This diplomacy is also about showing China’s advancements and proving that they can keep up with the United States. Foreign Affairs quoted a Chinese virologist who said that China is “not lagging behind the United States as far as the technology is concerned,” and the research is being conducted in public-private partnerships. President Emmanuel Macron of France said that China’s vaccine diplomacy was “a little bit humiliating” for the West, and to top it all off, the Chinese government is pushing rhetoric and theories about how COVID did not originate in the country and American vaccines are unsafe. China is attempting to establish itself as the world leader in COVID response.

Additionally, China’s involvement in COVAX (COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access) compels the World Health Organization (WHO)to approve vaccines that were developed in China. This is because China has committed to buying a certain amount of vaccines, and they have the option to choose Chinese brands. If the WHO permits the use of China’s COVID vaccines, COVAX may order these vaccines for developing countries, therefore expanding China’s market share. Some estimates predict that COVID vaccines may bring more than 10 billion dollars in sales. COVID vaccine diplomacy is a way for China’s pharmaceutical companies to broaden their scope. 

Joining COVAX is also a way that China is leading in comparison to the United States because former President Donald Trump chose to give up the opportunity for soft power that China has been pursuing. He refused to join COVAX, and he refused to offer vaccine aid to any country — including allies of the U.S. Foreign Affairs viewed the United States’s action — or inaction — as a nationalist path, yet they also pointed out that this play only bolstered China’s benefits from vaccine diplomacy. While the Biden administration has since joined COVAX, China has already been able to make major strides in distribution pledges and gain influence. If former President Trump had just joined COVAX from the beginning, it is possible that the low and middle income countries that China has been collaborating with would have had a more difficult decision. Instead, the concerns about the safety and efficacy of China’s COVID vaccines have been overlooked by these countries due to their major lack of options.

The Safety and Efficacy of China’s COVID Vaccines

China has developed several vaccines, but there are concerns about how safe and effective they are. One of the vaccines, Sinopharm, is reportedly 79 percent effective. CanSino is reportedly 65 percent effective. There is a significant amount of variation in research about the Sinovac vaccine, and it could be anywhere from 50 percent to 91 percent effective. Although the Sinopharm, CanSino, and Sinovac vaccines seem to have their benefits, this should be put in perspective. Although the three vaccines developed by the Chinese seem to have their benefits, these efficacy rates are significantly lower than the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that are 95 percent and 94.1 percent effective, respectively. To be fair, while Dr. Anthony Fauci said that he would like a vaccine to be at minimum 75 percent effective, the minimum requirement for a vaccine to be approved by the Federal Drug Administration is only 50 percent. The main issue here is about whether or not these percentages are even on the nose. 

This issue has arisen because information about the Chinese vaccine studies is difficult to come by. None of the three Chinese companies have released their late-stage clinical trial data to the public, and multiple requests to interview have been declined by the vaccine companies. If China cannot deliver, Beijing will not gain much from the pledges it has made. As stated by the Associated Press: “China’s vaccine diplomacy will be only as good as the vaccines it is offering, and it still faces hurdles.” 

Honoring Promises and China’s Own Population

Western vaccine makers are not alone in their struggle to meet production goals; there is widespread concern that China may not be able to follow through with the commitments they have made in a timely manner. As aforementioned, Chinese vaccine makers have not been the most transparent, and the public only knows a bit about how production levels are thus far — but what is known does not paint a good outlook. For example, Sinovac production levels reached only half of its intended manufacturing capacity in January.

It is unclear if China will be able to deliver on its promises, and shipments have already been delayed and fallen short repeatedly. In Southeast Asia, the region which has been promised the most vaccine doses, it is predicted that mass immunization will take until at least 2024. Revealingly, China has promised many countries in Southeast Asia priority access to the Chinese vaccines. Moreover, there is uncertainty about how the Chinese government will proceed with juggling their vaccine diplomacy on top of taking care of their own people. There are 1.4 billion people in China, and its COVID vaccine makers have been consistently coming up short. China has a goal to vaccinate only 40 percent of its population by the end of July, and at the beginning of March, “China had committed more than ten times as many doses overseas as it had administered in China,” according to Foreign Affairs. 

China has been a prevalent actor in the development and distribution of COVID vaccine doses. Although the Chinese government has denied that they are participating in “vaccine diplomacy,” they have made moves to help them restore their reputation, pull ahead of Western competition, and expand China’s share in the international vaccine market. However, while the public-private partnerships in the creation and manufacturing of Chinese vaccines jump-started the country’s scientific and diplomatic successes, their gains have been threatened by their shortfalls on pledges made to low and middle income countries in need of vaccine doses, and there remains uncertainty about the safety and efficacy of each Chinese vaccine. On top of that, China has not yet delivered much for its own citizens. There is significant uncertainty surrounding China’s vaccine diplomacy that will unfold in the coming months.

Narcoculture as a Crisis of Dignity: Reframing Our Responsibility towards the Emerging Field of ‘Practical Philosophy’

Reframing Our Responsibility towards the Emerging Field of ‘Practical Philosophy’: A Defense of the need for Somatic Dignity and Related Synthesis of Abstract Theory with Contemporary Crises           

‘Practical philosophy,’ or the application of philosophical theory and pedagogical techniques to everyday problems, has been identified as school of thought since the Ancient era. Aristotle explicitly identifies this branch of philosophy in the first book of the Metaphysics, but it is certainly also captured in the spirit of the Platonic dialogues and Thucydides’ reflections on political psychology, as well as Eastern conceptions of moral duty towards one’s community. In recent years, however, particularly with the decline of employment prospects within the academy, ‘practical philosophy’ has been transformed from a thing of theoretical speculations to a serious, emerging field of its own. Political philosophers, such as Daniel Allen and Yuval Levin, have used philosophical frameworks to support specific policy initiatives in civics education and electoral institutions through initiatives like the Our Common Purpose Report. Political philosophy, while containing an inherent bridge with the interests of public service, has colloquially often been regarded as too abstract for the fast-paced, white-paper world of policy. Allen has remarked the difficulty that one faces on an individual level trying to persuade leaders in both politics and the academy that such a collaboration is a worthwhile venture. However, efforts have clearly expanded in the last couple of decades particularly with high level officials taking seriously these studies produced by philosophical minds as deeper, wiser, characterizations of and solutions to contemporary political crises.

Outside the classically relevant political philosophy, there has been a simultaneous surge of new applications for practical philosophy. Philosophers are being increasingly employed as consultants on bioethics within medical environments, business ethics (as we see in a growing number of ethics certificates for corporate leadership learning programs within universities), and legal consulting. Within education grows a new pedagogical tradition of Philosophy for Children, now being taken up by large organizations such as the National High School Ethics Bowl as a way to cultivate sustainable, healthier modes of civic dialogue. Gone are the days where philosophy acts as a mere abstract inspiration or rationale for psychotherapy- today, we see clinical studies developed around embodied behavioral techniques to support psychological integration that were formerly disregarded as only spiritual or religious practices.

While all of these examples illustrate pragmatic applications of philosophy to earthly problems, some philosophers have now ventured toward a more radical argument, not of ‘Practical Philosophy’ as something to be explored only for the sake of comparative causal efficacy with other problem-solving disciplines, but out of a moral obligation on the part of the philosopher. In his recent book, A Sense of Brutality: Philosophy After Narco-Culture, Carlos Alberto Sánchez takes practical philosophy, and rather than merely bestowing a sort of promise or persuasion of its benefit, asserts the responsibility philosophers have to employ their reflections on human nature to understanding and solving violent or otherwise destructive conflicts (Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 2). He argues that this responsibility has been demonstratively felt by philosophers during events such as 9/11, where literature exploded in an effort to unpack the causes of terrorism and prevent hate attacks in the future. He then identifies narcoculture, or the culture of violence associated with the surge of drug trafficking throughout the Americas, as another crisis which philosophers hold a duty to help solve. He substantiates this not only with the precedent of 9/11, but the marked more than a quarter of a million lives that have been loss since 2006 at the hands of narcoculture.

Having substantiated his argument for the responsibility philosophers hold to participate in ‘practical philosophy’ through a quantification of the devastation posed by these particular violent conflicts, Alberto-Sánchez seems to see the origin of this duty from a sort of utilitarian ethical lens. To spend such time both noting statistics of lives lost or severity of brutality as a reason for feeling a moral imperative, and particularly do so through a comparative discussion of two conflicts implies that these examples are being chosen “as opposed to” others, relative to the degree of the danger or destruction they pose. I would argue that while the scale of a conflict and the consequences it leaves in its path are relevant to the decision of philosophers to get involved, there is a deeper, stronger root of our obligation. This source can be best generalized as philosophy’s unique capacity to unpack broad historical patterns of conflict, and particularly identity-based, cultural or ideological conflict, as in both of the examples offered by Alberto-Sánchez.

Where other social science methodologies are confined to the consideration of just a few causal variables per theory, philosophy is naturally oriented towards generating more complex, authentic narratives that consider relationships between institutions and psychology over historical fluctuations, rather than discrete moments in time. While philosophy too can ask particular questions about individuals and their circumstances, its central focus has often been a more general conception of human nature and the consequences that follow from those passions or tendencies. In the case of many similarly natured divisions arising in communication around the globe, but each within different particular circumstances, philosophizing thus seems a uniquely appropriate tool.

In this series of articles, I will make a case for the responsibility to engage in ‘practical philosophy’ as a particular result of this unique capacity philosophy holds for generating meaningful frameworks that unpack broader historical causes of our most existentially debilitating or destructive. I will do this by applying the framework of Somatic Dignity to Alberto-Sánchez’s selected case study of Narcoculture, as I argue this framework’s historical character will clearly illuminate the deeper source of our moral responsibility to engage in ‘practical philosophy’ as a result of its unique power to overcome systemic conflicts. If the framework can place Narcoculture in conversation with other conflicts that, while embedded in different environments, might all relate to the same natural human and institutional tendencies, it may also be able to find that they respond to similar solutions. This could scale the positive impact of a philosophical solution to movement of the historical needle, demonstrating a power unseen by most particular social studies.

Crisis as Clarity: Iterative Historical Brutal Conflicts as Indicators of the Deprivation of Somatic Dignity

As introduced a previous article, Somatic Dignity: The Bridge Beyond the Global Communication Crisis, philosophical literature around radical questions of the construction of human identity has unfolded alongside the evolution of communications technology, such that each time institutional shifts lead to an alteration of social dynamics, and particularly, more abstract communication behaviors, we have encountered an existential crisis, and subsequent return to the question of what is human dignity? In political or institutional assertions of dignity, however, Kant has typically been the source of its ontology as he discusses it most explicitly through his conception of moral law, which aligns very well with the idea of drafting “rules” within human rights law. I argue, however, that the Hegelian notion of dignity is more useful for understanding dignity in a way that relates to contemporary conflicts, such as narco-culture, as he articulates the consciousness of dignity as something that we don’t have full access to, but which unfolds across history alongside the reform of institutions. When our consciousness of our dignity no longer matches that recognized by institutions, we go through an existential crisis from the contradiction, reform institutions, and move forward. This is done, as will be detailed later, through an embodied consciousness, such as that supported by Eastern philosophical practices of mindfulness and integration, and used by critical theorists to raise consciousness for social justice and generate institutional change. I label this conception of dignity uncovered through somatic practices “Somatic Dignity,” and declare it is the deprivation of this, and instead assertion of shallow notions of dignity from abstract authorities that leads to violence, as it usually happens through a process of othering or dehumanization, as we again will come to later.

This series of articles will use the Hegelian understanding of moments of contradiction in institutional recognition and individual consciousness of dignity, or conflict, as a model by which to understand narcoculture as a crisis resultant from a deprivation of dignity- and thus, one of a larger historical process, not a mere discrete conflict to understand through simple social science methodologies. Similarly, having shown an alignment of the Hegelian crisis model and narcoculture, it will offer solutions that fit that conflict by alleviating the deprivation causing the conflict. Finally, it will explore the limitations inherent to such methods, and assert why practical philosophy is the uniquely suited, and therefore ethically obligatory pathway by which we should work to generate solutions to these existential crises.

Narcoculture as a Crisis of Dignity: The Nature of Brutality

Indicator 2 of Dignity Deprivation: Incomprehensible Brutality

The second defining characteristic of narcoculture, already alluded to through the sublime authority and its necessary reign through terror discussed in the previous section, is its quality of brutality, which is not mere violence, but a particularly grotesque, sensational kind of violence. As interviewees in the documentary discussed, victims of cartel crimes are murdered in exorbitant numbers, but also often in performative fashions, particularly if that victim was a notable threat to the cartel’s authority. For example, Escobedo, by launching a movement against femicide that informed the masses of the cartel’s link to government corruption was a threat in its exposure of the authority which was meant to be this sublime subversive sort of control. As such, she was shot in clear view of the government, where it was known no justice would be served for the crime in the symbolic, hoped ultimate ironic failure of her protest. Others who posed a threat often had their eyes dug out, bodies dismembered, heads shoved on stakes, burning to the flesh, graffiti on bodies, acid damage, were tossed in landfills, or other stark kinds of brutality that led to the perception of a “bloodbath” rather than mere out of control violence.

Alberto-Sánchez calls the phenomenon a “spectacle of death,” and describes how images of this sensational violence have been normalized to mainstream culture by broadcasting through television and the internet scenes of “dead bodies strewn across dirt roads, riddled with bullets to the head, chest, stomach, face; headless corpses left inside abandoned cars, heads atop the car’s roof, in the trunk, or missing from the picture altogether; the noticeable profile of human bodies wrapped with black trash bags or blankets leaning lazily against walls or fences. In many cases, written confessions accompany these crimes, detailing the reasons for the executions, decapitations, or dismemberments and the person or groups responsible,” (Alberto- Sánchez, 2020, 5). These confessions are a custom of narco-culture, and meant again, to establish a formal show of power from this sovereign entity, such that their power appears calculated and insurmountable. Sometimes, in the case of Escobedo’s daughter, perpetrators would simply admit to random people on the street what they had done, and still get off in court, having to face no consequences under the protection of the corrupt, truly sovereign power. Alberto-Sánchez argues that what is notable about this excessive level of brutality is its ability to dehumanize its victims.

He says when we read headlines like “5 Decapitated, Hearts Left in the Mouths of Severed Heads,” we cannot comprehend the violence, and in this inability to comprehend, we are unable, also, to imagine these victims as people. Often, bodies are dismembered to the point where they cannot be identified at all, but are simply piled in mass graves. Similarly, unable to identify an origin for or explanation for such violence, and not wanting to accept the fear we should feel for such a reality, as Susan Brison points out of the difficulty of understanding trauma, and Hannah Arendt, among others, observes, the brutality simply is absorbed as a cultural norm, such that it cannot disrupt our stability (Alberto- Sánchez, 2020, 17; Brison, 2014). The brutality is absorbed so easily because Narco-culture is a rational extension of the excess and disregard for dignity that comes with the mores of hyper-capitalist economic social consciousness (Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 17). This capitalist ethical and political culture of individualism fosters a psychology of mastery, as we will come to later, that harbors an aggressive neurotic obsession with domination that dissolve the self as one among a dynamic social body, and posit it as a violent force that stands against “others.” (Butler, 2020) In other words, the narco-culture treatment of the dead in this unintelligibly violent way such that they become just drops in the bucket of so many dead at the hands of this phenomenon is no accident, but again, a necessary piece of the mastery framework, and indicator of a shortage of dignity recognition. It is an inevitable consequence of the historical crisis resultant from human nature interacting with institutions of the particular moment in a contradiction of the consciousness of dignity, not specific to the particular demographic or sociological topology of Mexico. To abide by such a misconception would only aggravate the need for recognition more, leading to building prejudice rather than solutions.

Hegel concurs with this argument through the illustration the analogous brutality of the Reign of Terror of his time which he analyzes through the mastery framework. Here again, there was an unimaginable level of brutality in the killing of religious leaders, or those who pose the greatest threat to the new authority of the Enlightenment regime. They were often drowned in groups through a twisted appropriation of “Baptism” as murder. Heads were again, shoved on pikes, and mass graves dug. Formal orders of crimes, the charges of course, being their religion, were issued by the sovereign authority, just as in the case of the narco-banners, or confessions. For all those who were simply “suspected” of not being on board with the new regime, numbers which were inflated in a culture of accusation with no real justice so as to demonstrate the weight of the power and terror of the administration, they were killed in the most efficient way possible with the introduction of the publicly shown Guillotine. “Being suspected, therefore, takes the place,” he says, “or has the significance and effect, of being guilty; and the external reaction against this reality that lies in the simple inwardness of intention, consists in the cold, matter-of-fact annihilation of this existent self, from which nothing else can be taken away but its mere being.” (Hegel, 1977, §591).

Hegel describes how the Guillotine was a physical manifestation of the rule of “Reason” created through the Enlightenment-based French Revolution that shows how contorted, shallow, and brutal these fervent pushes for abstract ideologies that replace overnight all old institutions can be. What was defended as a “more humane, efficient” and therefore “rational” instrument of death of the regime was in fact killing more people as a public demonstration of power than one could possibly wrap their head around. Just as in the case of the cartel killings, Hegel describes the dehumanization of the victims that resulted from this practice using the metaphor of a “head of cabbage” that would roll from its blade to express how devoid of all dignity was this practice of death. “The sole work and deed of universal freedom is therefore death, a death too which has no inner significance or filling, for what is negated is the empty point of the absolutely free self. It is thus the coldest and meanest of deaths, with no more significance than cutting off a head of cabbage or swallowing a mouthful of water [in the case of mass drownings.]” (Hegel, 1977, §590). “…All social groups or classes are abolished…the individual consciousness that belonged to any such sphere, and willed and fulfilled in itself, has put aside its limitation; its purpose is the general purpose, its language universal law, its work the universal work.” (Hegel, 1977, §585). “In this flat, common place monosyllable is contained in the wisdom of the government, the abstract of the universal will…” (Hegel, 1977, §591). None of these victims were identifiable individuals, but instead, were indistinguishable parts of the collective.

The result of submitting these individuals to the domination by this collective power, however, does not, as pointed out in the previous contradiction in the psychology of mastery, lead to the recognition of dignity of the master. Rather, this abstract dynamic of control between powers only works to deny the dignity of those it kills. “All these determinations [honour, wealth, language, etc.] have vanished in the loss suffered by the self in absolute freedom; its negation is the death that is without meaning, the sheer terror of the negative that contains nothing positive, nothing that fills it with a content. At the same time, however, this negation in its real existence is not something alien… on the contrary, it is the universal will which is in this its ultimate abstraction nothing positive and therefore can give nothing in return,” this being the fulfillment of recognition (Hegel, 1977, §594).

Alberto-Sanchez explicitly agrees with this situation of the framework. He argues that “Narco-culture, in its material structure- one constituted by a politics and economics of competition and excess- is thus that form of life where the other can be reduced to an object, where killing him is legitimated under its own rules. Allowing the other [the victim] to be more than a “sensible datum’ would imply a recognition and acceptance of one’s own moral obligations to that other, a recognition that has no place in a culture of violence where the goal is the conspicuous consumption of resources, be they money or people,” (Alberto Sanchez, 2020, 84). He supports this with feminist philosopher Judith Butler’s analysis that “Violence…becomes necessary for an Ego that in the vulnerability of its being exposed seeks to guard itself from murder [threats to power.]…To the extent that we commit violence, we are acting on another, putting the other at risk…threatening to expunge the other,” (Alberto Sanchez, 2020, 83). What Hegel’s analysis is particularly helpful in contributing is the historical setting which has created a lack of dignity through contradiction of its institutions and consciousness of dignity, then, is what creates this thirsty cry for recognition that creates a defining, existential crisis and mores that tend toward violence and brutality or dehumanization rather than a soothing of that problem. It is not, as Alberto-Sanchez fears the misconception of, anything particular to this conflict.

To pursue, again, the question of dignity that will solve the need is an arduous task that leaves people vulnerable in their desperation to the easy answers provided by abstract authorities in a way that defines a historical moment, through what Hegel calls Spirit. “Just as the realm of the real world passes over into the realm of faith and insight, so does absolute freedom leave its self-destroying reality and pass over into another land of self-conscious Spirit where, in this unreal world, freedom has the value of truth,” (Hegel, 1977, §594). “This is just the skepticism [disillusionment with current institutions in historical moments of dignity-based contradictions] which only ever sees pure nothingness in its result and abstracts from the fact that this nothingness is specifically the nothingness of that from which it results. For it is only when it is taken as the result of that from which it emerges, that it is, in fact, the true result; in that case it is itself a determinate nothingness, one which has a content. The skepticism that ends up with the bare abstraction of nothingness or emptiness cannot get any further from there, but must wait to see whether something new comes along and what it is, in order to throw it too into the same empty abyss,” (Hegel, 1977, §79).

Indicator 3 of Dignity Deprivation: Contrasting Care for Dead Leadership

This works in complete contrast to the final characteristic; the treatment of dead cartel leaders. This treatment in some ways falls under the culture of excess previously discussed, I narrow in on it not only because of the defining quality it has for the movement, but for the place of importance it holds in the Hegelian phenomenological model of dignity. Within cartels, it was noted by the documentary that dead leaders are honored with sophisticated rituals and placed in temples that emulate the glory of Egyptian pharaohs. They are buried with their immeasurable wealth, guarded after death. As described by Alberto Sanchez, they die like a king (Alberto Sanchez, 2020, 152). Where the treatment of victims serves to dehumanize them in response to their threats to the collective power, the treatment of cult leaders does the opposite, and instead, works to recognize them as powerful, “dignified” masters, or individuals with value in their own right. In order to fully understand the significance this has in serving as an indicator of dignity deprivation being the underlying cause of this historical conflict and its character, we must first understand Hegel’s argument around the phenomenological character of death rituals.

Hegel’s historical view argues that social relations occur on two levels; one relating to the construction of particular, temporally contingent individuals which exist in their peculiar circumstances for themselves, and one where individuals exist only as part of a larger whole or universal. Institutionally, Hegel attributes the construction of an individual which exists as a particular being for itself to the Family, and the individual which exists only as part of a larger universal to the Citizen, or the person which is defined by their subservience to the larger Nation. Each of these institutional beings, Citizen and member of the Family, are defined through their activities in ethical life. For Hegel, Ethical life can be understood as the set of social norms or habits which one realizes and carries out because of their role in a particular structure, this being an institution such as the Family or the Nation. As such, the Family and Nation both have ethical norms unique to themselves which define their character as an institution. In a family, or blood relation, this is a set of habits which add onto the natural relationship that exists due to biological connection, but feel as natural as that biological connection. They are not intentional in the same way as chosen love, as we find in romantic, emotional love. Rather, they are obligations set forth from birth, or the origin of a blood connection. A key defining example of such obligations are the care a Family will exhibit for their dead. We do not choose out of a particular love for our blood relations that we should honor their death and perform rituals or care around it. It feels like a naturally bestowed duty upon us, even though it is really a socialized custom of the institution of the Family. This is the work of the True Spirit, or Ethical Order for Hegel. Relative to Narcoculture, we can think of the Family as being the inner circle of the elite leadership of cartels, where citizens are the masses subject to being victims. Their “biological bond” is simulated by membership, and the hierarchical order of intelligence.

Care for the dead is particularly relevant to defining the institution of the Family as that which exists for the individual to uncover a being for itself, rather than being for a universal whole. This is because Death, for Hegel, as something Natural of which we have no choice whether or when to experience, is the ultimate thing which subordinates our lives to the power of Nature. It condemns us to a realm of the ultimate universal where we are one in an infinite collective of the dead, and the experience of our lives becomes an indistinguishable droplet in that sea, rather than meaningful within itself. Yet, we are able to transcend that identity as nothing but indifferent powerless pieces of that collective through the Family, which remembers us as the particular beings we were, and retains that memory through the care for the dead. We remain beings for ourselves through the power of Spirit expressed in these customs. The Family can only do this, however, by actually recognizing or performing the death, this being “taking the act of destruction [death]” onto itself, such that it transforms that event into the meaningful part of the particular individual’s life and part of the broader work of Spirit, rather than only the immediate consequence of Nature’s irrational course. While the customs feel obligatory, they are still conscious actions which give Substance to that consciousness of the meaning of an individual’s life. In this way, it interrupts the natural process and adds to it this conscious meaning.

In other words, where the narcoculture brutality of throwing others in acid and mass graves, totally making them unidentifiable, and analogous Guillotine of the French Revolution are ways of rewriting death as for the collective or as a dehumanization of an individual outside the family ethical life institution, the inner Cartels building temples for their dead leaders is a way of, through the institution of their inner circle, or “Family,” maintaining dignity and personal value of that particular individual. In this way, they transcend death as being something which takes away their dignity, and pose a stark inequality to the lower masses. This, again, falls directly into the psychology of mastery. As such, it fits the model as an indicator of a crisis of dignity.

Grieving the Victims of US Sanctions

Sanctions are defined as the “withdrawal of customary trade and financial relations for foreign- and security-policy purposes.” The use of sanctions against countries perceived to be a threat to American interests began soaring in popularity in the 1990s, which was known as the “sanctions decade.” Since 9/11,  sanctions have become more precise in their targeting of individuals and entities, as a way to supposedly minimize the impact on civilians. They are utilized by both major political parties in the US and are painted as a more peaceful alternative to war; physical violence is not inflicted upon these target countries and American citizens can’t even feel their reverberations. The US currently has country-wide sanctions against Iran, North Korea, Syria, Sudan, Cuba, and Venezuela; more narrowly framed sanctions against individuals and entities have also been implemented, affecting an additional 27 countries. They are seen as the ultimate tool for enacting American interest and putting pressure on regimes the US would like to see ousted, while still being able to claim that the US cares about “peace” and foreign civilians- it’s a win-win for politicians and their polling numbers. 

However, while sanctions are painted as an ideal alternative to war, as it does not produce immediate physical violence, the damage that they create cannot be understated. Former UN Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali has described economic sanctions as a “blunt instrument” that very much harms civilians and causes long-term damage to a country’s ability to function. This article’s intention is to elaborate upon this claim and analyze sanctions and their effects on various countries through the lens of Judith Butler’s grievability. This ethical position argues that every life should be worthy of grief and that this recognition serves to create a more equal society. As Butler says in The Force of Nonviolence: “To be grievable is to be interpellated in such a way that you know your life matters; that the loss of your life would matter; that your body is treated as one that should be able to live and thrive, whose precarity should be minimized, for which provisions for flourishing should be available.” Sanctions are in direct violation of this principle; their implementation suggests that the lives of certain people, i.e. foreign civilians, especially those of target countries, are not of a particular value, and therefore not worthy of grief. Additionally, sanctions maintain a certain power dynamic that produces and exacerbates the precarity of the target country’s situation. As I will attempt to demonstrate, the impact of sanctions is extremely damaging which suggests that violence does not just manifest in physical acts of war, but also in the economic, political, and social institutions of a country. 

Iraq in the 1990s

In the 1990s, the United States imposed a number of country-wide sanctions in order to pressure certain regimes- this included Iraq. The United States used the UN Security Council to implement multilateral sanctions on Ba’athist Iraq, led by Saddam Hussein. These sanctions, coupled with unilateral sanctions from the US, created the most “comprehenseive embargo of a country since at least World War II.” Though the reported intent of these sanctions was to pressure Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait and to disclose the presence of any weapons of mass destruction, the results were disproportionately felt by civilians. Instead of ahcieving the desired results, these robust sanctions decimated Iraqi society and infrastructure. Prior to the sanctions, Iraq had one of the highest standards of living in the Middle East and boasted modern infrastructure. Contrary to what one may believe about 20th-century Iraq, it had an extensive healthcare system, water treatment facilities, and a school and university system. Additionally, Iraq had a significant reliance on imported food and technology. This meant that the all-encompassing trade sanctions decimated both the Iraqi economy and basic access to necessary goods. 

The sanctions made Iraqi civilians susceptible to food and water shortages, which were accompanied by the total collapse of the healthcare system. These food shortages were a direct result of UN sanctions, as Iraq heavily relied on imports of food which were subsequently cut off by the international community. Approximately 70 percent of calories in Iraq were imported thus meaning that the sanctions severely impacted the nutrition of Iraqis. While reports of malnourishment, especially among children, conflict with one another, it can be agreed that the sanctions had a very real impact on food access which subsequently led to health problems. Water has also been in short supply; the Gulf War damaged the general infrastructure of Iraq, including water pumping and treatement facilities. The country was unable to access the technology and engineering resources needed to fix these facilities as they no longer had access to the imported technology. This made water access extremely unreliable as well as unsafe due to the fact that water could no longer be properly treated. 

Furthermore, the decline in both quality and quantity of water sources reportedly led to the spread of infectious diseases such as cholera. However, the health problems that were produced by the food and water shortages could not be treated as the health-care system collapsed during this period. Firstly, the physical hospitals and medical centers can no longer be attended to as the financial resources to fix them are simply not there; access to the technology that could have once fixed medical infrastructure was no longer present. Secondly, the sanctions completely stopped the import of medical equipment and materials which resulted in a shortage- things such as stethoscopes were in extremely limited supply. Perhaps most damning is the fact that Iraqi doctors were also operating on outdated knowledge; within the ten years of sanctions, no new medical literature entered the country as it was specifically prohibited by the sanctions. 

While the Iraqi sanctions were eventually lifted in 2003, the damage was done. Iraq’s infrastructure and economy were in ruins. Furthermore, it is up for debate as to whether the sanctions even achieved their goal. However, that point is arguably irrelevant- what matters is the very real toll these sanctions took on Iraqi civilians. The impact of these sanctions on Iraqi society demonstrates the ways in which violence can manifest. While the US and the UN didn’t drop bombs on Iraq, at least not until the invasion of Iraq in 2003, they were still inflicting great violence- the tools for doing so just simply took on another shape. How is it not violent to cut off a country’s food supply? Or their access to clean water? Or medical supplies? Oftentimes, violence is only viewed through a lens of war, when in reality it has implications that transcend this purely physical understanding. Ignoring these implications is deliberate as it allows the US, as well as the UN, to continue pursuing foreign policy interests, which are quite frankly imperialist in nature, without facing legitimate consequences. The actions of the US and the UN prove that they assigned a lesser value to the lives of Iraqis. Taking Judith Butler’s grievability into account, it is important to understand that Iraq’s civilians are worthy of grief; to acknowledge their grievability is to acknowledge their value as humans. 

Venezuela

The US has a total embargo on Venezuela, which is coupled with sanctions from the EU. The goal of these sanctions is to oust President Nicolas Maduro, which has been a bipartisan effort in the US. The sanctions were announced in 2015 by President Barack Obama; as a result, foreign companies stopped doing business and Venezuela’s foreign accounts were closed. In 2017, President Trump then imposed an oil embargo that prevented the purchase of petroleum from the state oil company, PDVSA; this came alongside the confiscation of the US subsidiary CITGO. This has had a huge impact on Venezuela’s economy and the government’s capacity to function as it gets the majority of its revenue from oil.

Once again, the very real, and violent, impact of sanctions has been felt across Venezuelan society. One report estimates that 40,000 people may have died as a result of sanctions limiting access to food and medicine. In a similar vein as Iraq in the 1990s, the sanctions on Venezuela has destabilized the country’s economy and prevented access to basic necessities. It should be noted that US sanctions don’t explicitly prevent the import of food or medicine. However, Venezuela is very much dependent on oil revenue as a source of hard currency that private and public businesses can use to import goods. Once again, the specific undermining of Venezuela’s oil industry has led to a sharp decrease in imports; the average monthly public import dropped to $500 million in 2019 and subsequently dropped to $250 million in 2020. There are approximately 300,000 people who are at risk as there is a lack of access to medicines or treatment as a result of sanctions. The health-care sector has taken a major blow mainly due to the fact that the government has reduced its expenditure for the public health-care system; this is arguably a result of the fact that the government can no longer raise the necessary revenue due to the US’s oil embargo.

The Grievability of Those Impacted

“Peace” advocate Gene Sharp defines nonviolent action as “a sanction and a technique of struggle involving the use of social, economic, and political power, and the matching forces in conflict.” However, as previously demonstrated, there is a significant issue with this definition of nonviolent action and the way the concept of sanctions is perceived. The idea that sanctions can be qualified as “nonviolent” ignores the very real history of their use. While Iraq and Venezuela are only two examples of the impact of sanctions, the fact that both countries have experienced extreme shortages in basic necessities, thus causing thousands of deaths, is not “nonviolent action.” It is very real and very violent. Violence is not just acts of warfare, but it also manifests in the way economic, social, and political power is wielded. The fact that sanctions are perceived as nonviolent allows the US to engage in imperialism without facing legitimate criticism or consequences. And it should be noted that sanctions are an example of modern-day imperialism- the US has made it clear on many occasions that they utilize sanctions in an effort to oust regimes that they deem a threat to US interests. While these regimes are certainly flawed, the idea that the US has the right to dictate the internal affairs of a country, and use the deaths of civilians to do so, is imperialism. 

Furthermore, the use of sanctions allows the US to deny their responsibility for the deaths of thousands. These deaths go ungrieved in the international community which is precisely the point. As Judith Butler says: “After all, if a life, from the start, is regarded as grievable, then every precaution will be taken to preserve and to safeguard that life against harm and destruction.” Grievability essentially assigns worth to lives that have been historically marginalized, both in domestic and international terms. The fact that lives in the Global South, especially in countries deemed enemies of the US, are not seen as worthy of grief allows the US to impose these sanctions without care for their impact. If the US did start to care about these lives and respect their inherent value, they would have to stop their use of sanctions and seek out solutions that would actively protect their lives against “harm and destruction.” That would mean that US foreign policy would have to be completely reformed. Grievability is not in the interest of the US; to embrace such an ethical position would be anithetical to the US’s commitment to safeguarding American interests, which are often rooted in imperialism. However, this makes grievability of the utmost urgency. To embrace this position would be an embrace of an entirely different world, where those in the Global South are deemed valuable and therefore worthy of protection. This would challenge pre-existing power dynamics and create the incentive for solutions that prioritize legitimate self-determination and basic human rights.

Narcoculture as a Crisis of Dignity: Examining Abstract Leadership

Understanding the Narcoculture as a Case Study of the Deprivation of Somatic Dignity

To situate Narcoculture in this historical framework, I will examine the characteristics which Alberto-Sánchez and those who have been directly affected by Narcoculture argue define the cultural phenomenon and demonstrate how these characteristics correlate to the indicators of somatic dignity deprivation. Because the existential crisis of Hegel’s time was largely sparked over the rise of the Enlightenment Movement that politically took the form of numerous violent revolutions, including, notably, the Reign of Terror of the French Revolution, his analysis of the character of dignity crises is largely colored by examples from that historical moment. As such, this discussion will seemingly unfold as a comparative analysis of the nature of the French Revolution and Narcoculture, but the principles of comparison apply to all similarly sourced conflicts. In other words, as per the discussion of the historical trend of conflict from the previous section, these are not to be taken as coincidentally similar examples, but part of a larger analytical framework that speaks to how and why a mindset of mastery manifests out of the systemic deprivation of recognition for human dignity.

While Alberto-Sánchez offers a description of narcoculture in conversation with its philosophical relevance that will be used as well to understand its character, it will be put in conversation with The Three Deaths of Marisela Escobedo. This documentary, examining a mother’s launch of a consciousness-raising movement against femicide, or intentional violence against women on the basis of their sex, in order to attain justice for her daughter not offered by the corrupt Mexican legal system, discusses Narcoculture as a source of this violence against women, as well as the political failures to address it. In doing so, it illustrates through first-hand experiences the culture of and sheer power held by the authoritative regime of Narcoculture, these being drug Cartels and their hierarchical leadership. The defining characteristics of Narcoculture which are agreed upon between the documentary and Alberto- Sánchez’s book are the nature of the power of the Cartels, including their hierarchical order, subversive control over other institutions, and “economy of excess,” the sensationalism of the brutality Cartels inflict on their victims, and juxtaposed to that, their treatment of their dead leaders (The Three Deaths of Marisela Escobedo; Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 5).

Indicator 1 of Dignity Deprivation: The Culture of Abstract Power

To examine the first characteristic, this being the culture of abstract power in a moment of historical contradiction, the drug cartels which hold the power in narco-culture are generally extremely hierarchical, but in no arbitrary sense. Rather, their leaders are regarded by members as almost mystical, religiously divine figures. They are never seen, nor use their real names. They are sublime forces of terror, causing “men [to] simply vanish and…never [be] heard of again,” (Alberto-Sánchez, 2020, 4). Most exclusive members will never know who they are, according to the speakers of the documentary. There is an elitist culture in their peripheral circle, such that to be a member of a cartel is to put you at some level of “intelligence clearance,” taking on the character of a national security protocol, or to generalize, a sovereign state of its own. Given that, as Escobedo’s story reveals, these cartels have bought out high level government officials and cemented this control with terrorizing threats, capable of killing anyone in their way in the most brutal way imaginable, they have in many ways become the sovereign power of Mexico and nearby territories. Existing in opposition to the previously dominate political regime or mainstream culture, as we will come to in a moment, in itself is not accidental, but an expression of resentment for those institutions rooted in their perceived failure to recognize the leaders of the Cartel, such that they have now gone after this recognition through force, or mastery.

Further, the leaders live in an extraordinary, immeasurable and frankly inhuman excess of wealth, as a result of their complete domination, but also focus a majority of their resources towards maintaining that control through all of their “slaves,” or lower members. Usually, leaders live in enormous mansions, with all of the finest consumption goods they can dream of. They spend their lives consuming that which is brought to them through the sales of lower members. These lower members are blindly consumed instead by their overwhelming desire to be recognized as the same level of power as their leaders, and hope to climb the ladder, but also seek fulfillment through this joining of the collective, which promises meaning, though it often never gives it. Instead, most members will inevitably die young as a result of the intensity of the violence, having spent most of their time on the run living secret lives, rather than for themselves and the sake of meaningful relationships with those they care about, or some positive purpose in the world.

Hegel notes in the introduction to The Phenomenology of Spirit that this kind of sublime, systemically controlling power is that which comes from a cultural mindset of mastery paired with societal yearning for stability during a moment of existential crisis on a historical scale, often as a result of a contradiction between consciousness that humans at that historical point have uncovered of their dignity, and the dignity which is bestowed upon them or recognized by the social norms and institutions of their day. When their consciousness of their own dignity is different than the institutional recognition, they feel that deprivation in a deep anguish that creates a revolutionary nature for change. They desire, above all else, the recognition they are now aware they deserve.

The master believes that it is only by risking their own life that they can receive recognition for their status as a human being from another conscious being. If the animal’s existence, including all of their thoughts and behaviors, are teleologically oriented to the highest goal of survival, then demonstrating one’s humanity can only be possible by subordinating that goal of survival to a higher, meaningful purpose- this being the desire for recognition. However, if one risked their life merely through killing another person, that person would no longer be alive, and therefore have consciousness with which to recognize the humanity of the other who desires it, defeating the goal. If one died in risking their life, they would also not be alive to receive recognition. Further, both parties have to have a Desire for recognition so as to understand what is at stake and have a capacity to therefore be conscious of what is gained or lost through this risk in a mutual recognition of the outcome. As such, the dynamic which comes out of the pursuit for recognition is a power differential, where one person “risks their life” but remains alive and free as another person chooses to preserve themselves by giving up their agency in exchange for safety from that figure which doesn’t back down from the risk of their life, thus deeming them the “slave” to the “master.”

On a cultural scale, the desire for dignity recognition, or psychology of mastery, requires the submission of all former authorities or institutions under the control of a new dominating movement of authority. In the case of the rise of the Enlightenment, this meant overhauling the previous religious authority, and replacing it. As Hegel put it, “If superstition and prejudice [religious authorities] have been banished [as a result of their denying recognition], the next question arises, what next? What is the truth Enlightenment has propagated in their stead?” (Hegel, 1977, §557). Being so driven by the fervent desire for a fast solution and more immediate acquisition of recognition, or a mindset of mastery, rather than committing to an institutional shift that could engage in the arduous, historical level of shifting institutions to a higher consciousness of dignity, the Enlightenment chose to define itself through the lens of its resentment; the opposite of religion. Where religion subordinated nature and human outcomes to a divine authority, or God, Enlightenment promised the power to have a domination of nature in a controllable God-like fashion.

That domination of nature, or focus on materialism and being for Earthly selves, culminated in the notion of “Utility,” or working for the consumption of human beings under their control. “Just as everything is useful to man, so man is useful too, and his vocation is to make himself a member of the group [or: “herd”], of use for the common good and serviceable to all. The extent to which he looks after his own interests must also be matched by the extent to which he serves others, and insofar as he serves others, he is taking care of himself: one hand washes the other.... he makes use of others and is himself made use of,” (Hegel, 1977, §560). “The Useful is the object insofar as self-consciousness penetrates it and has in it the certainty of its individual self, its enjoyment .... The two worlds are reconciled and heaven is transplanted to earth below....” (Hegel, 1977, §581). As we will come to in a moment, this is the epitome of the psychology of mastery, thus, again, confirming the desire for recognition present in the historical crisis.

­In order to actualize this Notion of utility in the form of institutions, the Revolution worked to redo all social norms and existing institutions under the “most Rational form.” Democratic constitutions were adopted, and then thrown out and rewritten over an over in a deliberative form (which illuminates the contradiction of mastery we will come to in that Reason clearly could not be trusted in an instantaneous moment of deliberation, so how could these institutions be so certain as to reconcile killing anyone who disagrees?). They replaced religious iconography with divine illustrations of principles of reason and equality. The Guillotine replaced former methods of state killings in an “efficient design,” and was used as a public display of the deaths of numerous religious leaders and followers, or even suspected ones. The calendar and clock were both reworked to remove any religious history and operate under the most “Rationale system,” which for the Reign of Terror meant ten hour clocks that complied with the metric system. Currencies were adjusted, units of measurement changed, and names of cities, streets and other important monuments changed to secular versions. By violently taking on systemic control of all institutions, Hegel says, Enlightenment, “ascend[ed] the throne of the world without any power being able to resist.” (Hegel, 1977, §585). It cannot receive recognition in any way but forcing the submission of former institutions through force and a complete replacement of their overhaul. Subtler but everyday shifts such as the calendar, as well as the culture of suspecting all opponents and murdering them mirror the subversive monopoly of sovereignty of cartel leaders.

We can tell this is a shallow, abstract power grab tactic, or the result of the mentality of mastery, through the contradiction, however, that arises in the foundational claim of this new regime as superior to the last. According to Hegel, while Enlightenment principles identify themselves as being the opposite of and a necessary alternative to faith, this judgement is ‘not very enlightened,” and fails to recognize that Enlightenment “principles are implicit in faith itself” (Hegel, 1977, §564). In other words, Enlightenment’s self-identification as superior to faith does not overcome, but is subject to the same epistemological fragility as religious faith. The Enlightenment movement, according to Hegel, substantiates its supremacy of insight over faith through a sort of causal efficacy. In specific moments, at which technology works or experiment results match up with those predicted by models or theories, followers of Enlightenment principles believe that they have seen the whole causal innerworkings of a system in order to produce a particular effect, and therefore, gain mastery over or transform the natural world (Hegel, 1977, §564). This causal knowledge requires them to differentiate between a desired outcome, or whole, and posit it as opposite to a different outcome which would have occurred without this particular set up or environmental interaction of components. It brings these ideas together of cause and failed cause, positive and negative, into one Notion (Hegel, 1977, §564).

Religious faith, on the other hand, believes that it will not look to falsify theories or search for the negative of a particular outcome so as to understand that something works because another causal path does not (Hegel, 1977, §564). To form such connections faith believes would pervert or make up falsehoods, according to Hegel, about each concept as it exists independently. However, even in faith, Hegel argues that such distinctions are made in order for a ‘believing consciousness,’ or one’s active belief in any explanation, theory, or narrative, including religious ones, to be true (Hegel, 1977, §564). It is simply that religious faith inclines followers to supress the consciousness of this behavior. Just as religious faith, however, fails to recognize its participation in a search for causal explanations, so does Enlightenment fail to see that they are not in fact opposite movements, but instead, share a common activity that cannot substantiate, therefore, Enlightenment’s supremacy over faith (Hegel, 1977, §564).

By also failing to see that both movements participate in the same activity of reasoning, and still positing itself as the opposite of faith, Enlightenment, according to Hegel, mistakes its own character in the same way religious faith does (Hegel, 1977, §565). Enlightenment instead takes for granted that religious faith is its opposite because the Enlightenment movement defined itself as a critique of religious faith out of pragmatic concerns of authoritative power and a fervent desire for mastery over nature rather than true epistemological sturdiness (Hegel, 1977, §565). As Hegel puts it in the Introduction to the Phenomenology, the movement itself falls into the trap of becoming drunk on the illusion of stable answers through its method which it assumes to be correct, rather than engaging in the arduous, long term task of real truth or epistemological knowledge of the whole, which is not so clear cut or accessible. As such, the Enlightenment does not see its own character in the religious faith’s shared search for negation, and thus does not create a unified Notion of the two movements (Hegel, 1977, §565). Yet, to search for unity between a phenomenon and its negation is in fact the asserted “method” of Enlightenment principles. As such, Enlightenment does not follow its own method, which is the same cause for which they attribute religious faith being less “pure.” Instead, by taking for granted its character as the negation of faith, missing Enlightenment and faith’s unified search for causal explanations, and thus sharing in one Notion, the Enlightenment movement positions itself as existing on a basis of faith, or unquestioned assumptions, as well (Hegel, 1977, §565).

This reality of the Enlightenment movement as truly defined from a pragmatic concern for mastery explains the need for leadership to both be hierarchical and pursue continued terror and violence, but also ultimately why it will fail to attain what it truly desires- dignity- due to a core contradiction of the “master/slave” dialectic. While “mastery” is first desired and pursued out of its believed capacity to assert one’s human dignity, the achievement of mastery doesn’t lead to this fulfilment. Instead, it is the Slavish consciousness which results in one’s ability to transcend an animalistic existence. In achieving mastery, one doesn’t truly achieve freedom, Hegel says, but becomes dependent on the slave for their status as a master, and therefore must maintain that risk of life for recognition in a precarious balance of powers rather than calmly exercising their autonomy to become who they should want. We see this in the constant funneling of cartel resources into acts of terror to maintain its reign, and subjection of its members’ entire lives to ones of violence rather than true living for themselves.

By instead doing physical embodied work to produce for the master’s consumption, the slave, or person who does not take on the master’s mentality but lives in fear of them, reflects on how to transform Nature by his own hand, discovering transcendent power where he can rid a natural existence of its character, including his own. The Slave has also, in the becoming a slave, seen the prospect of death (or experienced existential dread) and chosen to evade it, melting away any sense of stability and existing for their own self for protection, thus teaching that their position is not stable either, but can be transformed to a higher being for themselves. Through work, this ability to transform nature and oneself becomes a permanent habit, or longer sustainable autonomy (freedom) over some things while not the universal powers of death. The master, however, only feels freedom as a shallow fleeting sentiment, and can only continue to consume through the slave’s work, which is a more bound to Nature experience than the control a slave has over nature through production. We again, see this in the cartel leaders living for grandiose consumption through wealth obtained by the selling of drugs by their lower members, or slaves.

Scaling this to a cultural level of mastery, the “Absolute Monarchy,” or this assertion of a monopolizing sovereign power that has completely wiped out all previous authorities, amounts to an empty name in the long term, according to Hegel, because the position does not become acquired by the particular self who holds it. Rather, the title expresses a universal notion of a hold on power, which is alienated from that particular self. As such, it belongs to the universal I, or realm of the absolute. By holding the position of absolute power, the particular I does not achieve full mastery of all those below it, as they feel they will through wealth and power which allow them the illusion of controlling nature and other people in the grand dialectic. Rather, the particular “I” becomes subordinated or consumed by the position, such that their name has no meaning except that of contingency. They mean nothing outside the meaning of that position as an absolute universal construct. Their being-for-self was meant to be maximized by having this extreme power and control, but instead, disappears entirely as to be fully defined by the absolute is to no longer exist as a being-for-self at all.

To explain further the notion of absolute monarchy being one of a universal, the idea of control power, and specifically of the state, is to have everyone under that power relinquish their being-for-self to the notion of the state and identity of the state. Thus, to rule over those people is not to do so as a particular individual whose being for self is maximized, but to hold the position of a universal notion that binds all other contingent beings and absorbs them into an abstract universal. As such, by holding the position of absolute power, one holds all the power “of the state,” not for oneself, so the nationalistic or political identity, or that which defines the region of power, is now the identifying being, not the particular being, who is a mere contingency. Despite not having any real payoff, or being shallow, destabilized by this complete upheaval sparked by the new authority and the previous want for a clear path to dignity due to the initiating contradictory historical crisis, the masses seek stability in the new, seemingly stronger answers promised by the new regime. They become drunk on its lies, unable to see the truth, and held into that belief through the master’s terror that cements the gaslighting.

Judith Butler, in her recent book, The Force of Nonviolence, offers a related discourse to this Hegelian framework, arguing that governments and ideological bodies often artificially manufacture divides or conflicts to identify all those who might oppose it or threaten it through protests against its power moves, be they policy changes or cartel killings (Butler, 2020; Samay Das, Saswat, Shankar, Dhriti, 2021, 102). In doing so, it reveals the fragility of its mastery, or shallowness of its sovereignty. It is this positioning of it as a victim that needs to protect itself against threats, or more simply, rhetoric of self-defense, that is used as a moral justification for its dehumanization of others (those that demonstrate its weakness). In reality, Butler argues that the failure to see the mythical reality of these sovereign, abstract powers and truth of the self being just one of a dynamic body of interconnected selves is what leads to these large, forceful movements only doing damage to themselves by searching for and exercising justifications for violence against others.

Better the Neville You Know: Understanding the Strategy of Appeasement And the Lesson of Munich

Among the most denigrated policies in international relations, few can deny the infamy of appeasement: a strategy entailing the reduction of tension between states through conceding points of contention at the root of the conflict. This reputation among scholars is largely attributed to the 1938 Munich Conference, during which British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain negotiated territorial concessions in Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany in exchange for peace, which failed to prevent the Third Reich from ceasing their expansion. Indeed, the powerful imagery of Chamberlain proclaiming “peace in our time” in 1938 contrasting to the violent outbreak of the Second World War with an emboldened Germany merely a year later has served to invoke aversion around the strategy. So significant was this particular failure that appeasement as a strategy has continued to be dismissed as a tool of the meek even in the United States’ contemporary foreign policy. Explaining in 2001 that the US has “learned from Munich that there is no isolation from evil. . . . the wicked must be opposed early…before they threaten us all”, George W. Bush was able to use the perceived meekness of Chamberlain’s policy as a justification for the War on Terror. With the refusal of any negotiations in favor of perpetuating one of the United States’ most costly conflicts having been legitimized by the assumption that appeasement is meritless, it is apparent that that further examination is warranted toward the strategy and its context in Munich, 1938.

Historical Background

Before one may develop an understanding of the motivations behind the Munich Conference and its subsequent condemnation, an overview of the events surrounding it is necessary. The Munich Conference and Chamberlain’s permittance of German expansionism was not an isolated incident and was one of numerous instances in which he had publicly expressed ambivalence towards the growing power of the Third Reich. During the Anschluss, an event preceding Munich by a matter of months in which Germany coerced the Austrian government into annexation, Chamberlain had expressed a refusal to intervene due to his doubt in the United Kingdom’s capacity to wage war, noting “that nothing could have arrested what has actually happened [in Austria] unless [the U.K.] ...had been prepared to use force”. Likewise, Germany’s coerced annexation of Lithuania's lucrative Memel territory was also met with a similar doubt, with Chamberlain having been willing “to give Hitler political and economic hegemony over [Memel] so long as it was accomplished peacefully”. With these sequential concessions having been repeatedly met with further German demands, there soon began to form a stigma surrounding appeasers as being “cunning but ignorant [in contrast to] the ‘anti-appeasers’, men of… principle and historical precedent”, a conflict that would only further divide British politics upon the outbreak of war. Winston Churchill, having been an outspoken opponent to appeasement during Chamberlain’s tenure, was also known to have openly condemned the cession of Austria, Memel, and the Sudetenland as “[giving] away the keys to Europe” to Germany. This denouncement of appeasement would entrench itself during the future PM’s meteoric rise to fame, following his succession of Chamberlain during WWII.

Chamberlain’s Motives and the True Purpose of Appeasement

Although this understanding of the Munich Conference might further heighten one’s sentiment that Chamberlain’s use of appeasement was cowardly, contemporary discourse has started to use this devotion of Chamberlain towards appeasement to reassess his true motives. Noting that Britain’s ability to wage a war of intervention against Germany was lacking in the years leading up to the Second World War, neoclassical realist academics Norrin M. Ripsman and Jack S. Levy argue in their seminal work Wishful Thinking or Buying Time? that Chamberlain’s appeasement intended not to prevent conflict but rather hinder German expansion and allow the UK time to mobilize. Indeed, Chamberlain’s own words prior to the Munich Conference substantiate this, having stated that appeasement would not just be pursued to “remove the causes which are delaying the return of confidence in Europe” as per our current notions of appeasement, but also to "continue [the U.K.’s] program of the reestablishment of [their] defence forces”. In light of the “air-raid phobia” phenomena exhibited by the British people during the early 1930s, referring to the common “[perception] that the German Air Force clearly overwhelmed the British Air Force in the number and quality of its machines” and fear of German land invasion, it is unsurprising that Chamberlain would have chosen to repeatedly make concessions in exchange for the opportunity to restore faith in Britain’s military capabilities. While there have been critics  who have argued that “[appeasement] also gave Germany just as much time to arm”, it was this restoration not just in Britain’s military capabilities, but also their own confidence in their ability to fight another war, that gave the nation the relative advantage it needed.

In addition to its facilitation of Britain’s spiritual and logistical rearmament, Chamberlain’s use of appeasement was also effective in that it appeared to ultimately hamper Germany’s ability to expand in a timely manner before the eventual outbreak of war. Through taking the initiative to establish treaties such as the Munich Agreement, the United Kingdom had effectively taken control of the rate in which German expansion would take place. This was due to the fact that, if Germany “misbehaved and abrogated [such pacts] the world would witness [its] duplicity”, effectively forcing them to accept the stipulations of such a deal to maintain some semblance of legitimacy before choosing to expand once more. The irony of Munich being the most infamous instance of appeasement is that it was, in reality, the most effective of Chamberlain’s appeasement to these ends. The leader of Germany at the time, Adolf Hitler himself, is known to have confessed to Nazi Party minister Martin Bormann in 1945 that they “ought to have attacked [Czechoslovakia] in 1938” due to it offering Germany “the last chance [it] had of localizing the war”, believing that the prolongation of his territorial ambitions through lengthy negotiations and justifications had cheated him out of “a short war”.

Lessons In Modern Appeasement

With ample evidence to argue that the most infamous instance of appeasement— Chamberlain’s concessions at Munich—was in fact justified, it is apparent that there are instances where appeasement is far from a fruitless strategy for the meek. That being said, it is apparent that appeasement has its time and place, as Chamberlain’s strategy of appeasement hinged both on the assumption that conflict was an eventuality and that the United Kingdom possessed a latent military superiority that could be fulfilled in a timely manner. The United States, however, would have most definitely stood to gain from contemplating appeasement as a valid strategy following the 9/11 attacks as opposed to Bush’s denigration of the strategy in favor of launching the War on Terror immediately. It was apparent that the Afghan War was doomed to fail due to a lack of foresight, with Deputy National Security Advisor Doug Lute having infamously admitted in the leaked Afghanistan Papers that the U.S. was “devoid of a fundamental understanding of Afghanistan [and] didn’t know what [they] were doing”. In this regard, it is apparent that the United States would have greatly benefited from appeasing Al-Qaeda through their lack of retaliation until the U.S. reached a point in which it possessed a thorough understanding of its goals in Afghanistan in a manner that could best utilize its military capabilities with minimal losses. There is little doubt that the US did not have the necessary expertise to develop such a doctrine in a timely manner, with the publication of a dedicated counterinsurgency field manual, FM 3-24, having overtaken the conflict-focused “shock and awe” doctrine only 5 years following the initial outbreak of the War on Terror. Though the prospect of appeasing insurgents might initially seem counterintuitive due to the framing of global insurgency and terrorism as an existential threat to the free world, if there exists any lesson to be taught from Munich it is that one needs to know when to forgo smaller victories when better terms exist on the horizon, even when faced with one of the greatest threats to democracy the world has ever known.