Katoikos Globalisation on human terms 2024-03-15T13:13:22Z https://katoikos.world/feed/atom WordPress Aisling O'Donnell <![CDATA[Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Serbs – together against the war]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20215 2024-03-15T13:13:22Z 2024-03-15T12:51:22Z On the second anniversary of the war on Ukraine, young Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Serbians gathered in the central Republic Square in Belgrade and having lit candles for all the victims of the war on Ukraine, engaged in a protest march to the confluence of the Sava river into the Danube at the plateau under...

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On the second anniversary of the war on Ukraine, young Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Serbians gathered in the central Republic Square in Belgrade and having lit candles for all the victims of the war on Ukraine, engaged in a protest march to the confluence of the Sava river into the Danube at the plateau under the “Victor” monument, and to jointly demand victory for peace.

Many of them organised quickly two years ago in Belgrade to form an association under an eponymous name – Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Serbs (RUBS) – Together Against the War, in order to gather aid for Ukraine and also to support those fleeing from the conflict. They act like one, shuffling the different Slav languages among them without any communication problems, like in the song they played at the protest “Нам не нужна война!” (We don’t need war), which says at some point “Мы с Украиной не враги, а братья.” [We are brothers, not enemies with Ukraine.]. This perhaps unique group of people, in terms of their unity and resoluteness, with the support of another local organisation the Russian Democratic Society, gave a spectacular, infinitely sad and infinitely hopeful protest performance in Belgrade, demanding that the second anniversary of the war on Ukraine be the last one, demanding peace for Ukraine and freedom for Russia, while thanking Serbia for providing them all with refuge.

The spectacular scene at the Victor monument saw these young people waving the flags of Ukraine and flags of the “new Russia” that they hope to make from whose flag the red colour [of blood] has disappeared, leaving a white-blue-white flag, all together, coupled with a flag of the EU, and of the UN – the organisations they want to join and/or whose values they wish to uphold. The banners they held up included the slogans “Putin Is Not Russia”, “The Good Always Prevails and So Will Ukraine”, “Russia Will Be Free”, and “Freedom to Political Prisoners” [in Russia and Belarus]. There were smiles, there were tears.

The good thing is that Serbia never stopped the air traffic with Russia which allowed the persons fleeing Russia to get out and could have possibly been used to repatriate Ukrainian unaccompanied children from Russia should there have been a political agreement and more diplomatic skills on behalf of the Serbian government perhaps. The bad thing is that, as of some months ago, the Serbian State Security Agency (BIA), still led from the shadows, according to his own allegations, by Aleksandar Vulin, twice decorated by the current Kremlin regime for “good cooperation”, has begun disallowing re-entry and/or handing out expulsion orders to the Russians in Serbia who openly disagree with the Kremlin’s undemocratic practices, and never banned the branch of “Another Ukraine” organisation in Serbia (a state within a state?). The Russian Democratic Society (RDS), the independent media and the citizens of Serbia jointly prevented the expulsion of a Russian translator Elena Koposova, who has been living in Serbia since 2019 with two young children and a husband, and who has been found by BIA to be a “security threat for Serbian state” just for having signed an online petition against the aggression on Ukraine two years ago. Late last week, Elena Koposova and her family received assurances of the Ministry of Interior of Serbia that they would be given a permanent residence.

According to Peter Nikitin of the RDS, only 1% or less of the 150,000 Russians who have fled Russia to Serbia support or have ever supported Putin. Hundreds of thousands of refugees from Ukraine have transited Serbia, and some 4,000 remained in the country.

And as Shelley once exclaimed “can spring be far behind”, which was once of the slogans from 96’-97’ student protests against Milosevic in Serbia, these youngsters demand their spring, their better world, which they are currently trying to make in and from their microcosm in Belgrade and other towns in Serbia. This may be THE spring since, according to the Ambassador of Ukraine to Serbia Volodymyr Tolkach, a surprisingly large number of people joined in the march of solidarity for Ukraine in Belgrade this 24 February. If it were up to these young people, the war would be over yesterday.

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Peter Ford <![CDATA[What role for the UN in post-conflict Gaza?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20205 2024-02-17T15:26:06Z 2024-02-17T15:20:08Z With the Israel-Hamas conflict still possibly having months to run and with even the outlines of an end state still far from clear, trying to chart a course for the UN at this juncture is challenging. It is nevertheless possible to identify certain lines of action and rule out others. No role for peacekeepers Let’s...

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With the Israel-Hamas conflict still possibly having months to run and with even the outlines of an end state still far from clear, trying to chart a course for the UN at this juncture is challenging. It is nevertheless possible to identify certain lines of action and rule out others.

No role for peacekeepers

Let’s start with the easy bits first and eliminate unrealistic prospects. To begin with, there will be no role for UN peace-keeping forces. While UN peacekeepers and observers have operated and still operate in Sinai, between Israel and Egypt, on the Golan, between Israel and Syria, and along the Israel/Lebanon border, this is by way of buffer forces to reduce chances of friction between sovereign adversaries through close proximity. Geography and politics do not lend themselves to this approach in tiny and besieged Gaza. Israel has publicly toyed with the idea of creating a buffer zone, presumably in northern Gaza. It is unlikely, though, that the same Israel, which makes a fetish of mistrusting the UN, would agree to UN peacekeeping forces being given a role within territory that it believes it rightly controls, and it is hard to see what incentive the Palestinian side would have to agree to such UN deployment.

Who will rule Gaza?

Here we bump up immediately against the problem of identifying what the ‘Palestinian side’ would look like. The challenge for the UN will look greatly different whether the Western powers get their way and some sort of ‘reformed’ Palestinian Authority (PA) is installed (‘reformed’ here presumably meaning better at repressing resistance forces) or the Palestinian resistance emerges more or less intact and in control/legitimised, even if with a new cadre of leaders, fewer fighters and fewer tunnels and rockets.

The first scenario is less likely, since even if Hamas and the other armed resistance forces ger decimated they will still probably have sufficient muscle to resist any other Palestinian force, unless the Israelis literally take into Gaza many thousands of PA forces in tanks, an unlikely prospect. The idea the Israelis have also publicly mooted of clan leaders policing Gaza is another non-starter: clan leaders would be assassinated if they tried to go against Hamas or Jihad.

In all probability, therefore, post-conflict Gaza in political terms will look much like pre-conflict Gaza, with Hamas ruling in coalition with other armed resistance forces and with humanitarian agencies effectively co-managing with the Hamas administration essential services.

UNRWA’s crucial role

What can and must be ruled out at this point is the idea of any other UN body taking over the central role which UNRWA has played in Gaza since 1948. Much as Israel might like it, UNRWA is too important to be shoved aside. Its expertise, its large locally-recruited and local-society-connected work force and its infrastructure (what’s left of it after Israel’s rampage) are irreplaceable. Some Western countries might but Arab countries will not acquiesce in UNRWA being destroyed on an Israeli whim.

On previous occasions, when the US had again put UNRWA on a punitive starvation diet, Gulf countries stepped up to the plate. They can do so again, although the mere prospect of them doing so would probably be enough to spook the US into realising that the power its money gives it to decide what goes down in UNRWA is not lightly to be tossed aside. A large UN agency with the financial independence to be able to face down US-Israeli pressures is not a prospect the US could envisage with equanimity, and not a precedent it would wish to see set with other UN agencies in mind and an emerging new world order beginning to manifest itself.

Key role for Arab donors

Arab donors will also be key in rebuilding Gaza. While the level of destruction this time has been an order of magnitude greater than in previous Israeli incursions, Arab donors, both bilaterally and through UNRWA and UNDP, have already in recent years helped to rebuild entire neighbourhoods in Gaza as well as many schools, hospitals and clinics, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.

Can Hamas be a partner in rebuilding Gaza?

Of course it can, and will. As before, entry of construction materials into Gaza will be a major challenge, especially if Hamas remain in charge, with Israel able to control all access, even through Egypt. If the Egyptian/Israeli peace accords survive an Israeli onslaught on Rafah, this will be a problem, probably insuperable as long as Netanyahu is in power. Most observers believe, however, that Netanyahu will not survive long politically after the end of the current fighting.

Even while Netanyahu does survive to persecute Gaza beyond an IDF withdrawal, much can still be done. In the first instance, the overwhelming priority for months is bound to be emergency humanitarian assistance in the new tent cities. With no hostage situation remaining to justify continuing siege by Israel, such assistance is not likely to be blocked.

Not all reconstruction need be kept on hold in the early months. Experience after earlier Israeli bombing sprees in Gaza has shown that self-help can achieve surprising results. Just give a Gaza head of household $20,000 and they can restore a badly damaged dwelling. Large scale self-help programmes can provide employment for many thousands, refloat small businesses, recycle materials and generally contribute to economic revival. Such help also bypasses the need to deal with local authorities. Donors generally prefer large scale projects with high visibility for their generosity. If they wish to see Gaza recover, however, they will, like the Gazans, have to adapt. Western donors with so much to atone for will surely not withhold such assistance.

In some ways the situation will be like 1948, with huge displaced populations needing survival assistance. Unlike in 1948, however, the skeleton of an infrastructure will still be in place, the UN machinery will be in place, and funding should be available. To the chagrin of Israel and at least part of the West, a local administration is also likely to be in place to formulate its own plans for recovery and play an essential role in coordination. Donors have been practising work arounds for decades now to handle the issue of Hamas administration, and the UN has been central to that effort. It will be again.

Back to the future

The role of the UN in the post-conflict era will therefore look very much like its role after previous Israeli attacks, only on a much bigger scale and with a much greater and longer lasting humanitarian component compared to a developmental component. The security and political aspects will probably remain tenuous – among the Palestinians, with Israel, and vis-à-vis the broader set of actors and the UN – for a while longer.

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Ingeborg Breines <![CDATA[The Culture of Peace – Utopia or Alternative Security Policy? A Book (self-)Review]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20194 2024-02-08T00:00:43Z 2024-02-07T23:44:59Z Is it possible to see the UNESCO/UN culture of peace program as a blueprint for a feminist, non-violent security policy? Are there alternatives to war and militarisation, or is the culture of peace just utopia? Can a more pacifist view help us out of the increasing horrors of war? These are questions that I, Ingeborg...

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Is it possible to see the UNESCO/UN culture of peace program as a blueprint for a feminist, non-violent security policy? Are there alternatives to war and militarisation, or is the culture of peace just utopia? Can a more pacifist view help us out of the increasing horrors of war?

These are questions that I, Ingeborg Breines, a former UNESCO director and president of the International Peace Bureau, raise in my new book The Culture of Peace – Utopia or Alternative Security Policy? published May 2023, by the Orkana Publishing House, Stamsund/Oslo. The publication, which is written in Norwegian, has gotten good reviews. It consists of 416 pages in hard cover and includes rich reference material and some illustrations.

The publication has three parts. The introduction describes my intentions writing the book and the challenges facing the culture of peace vision. (See attached table of contents.) I argue both for peace on earth and peace with the earth. Drawing on my background, I challenge the old thinking that “Si vis pacem, para bellum/If you want peace, prepare for war”. For the survival of humanity I consider it urgent to develop a new paradigm and new structures and practices underlining that “If you want peace, prepare for peace”!

Part I describes the culture of peace program of UNESCO/UN – the origin, the process, the vision, the goals, the partners, the hopes, the enthusiasm, the achievements. I try to bring to the forefront a series of guiding documents, inspiring projects and publications such as the International Year for a Culture of Peace, the International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-violence for the Children of the World, the Manifesto 2000 on a Culture of Peace, the Seville Declaration on Violence, the Statement on Women’s Contribution to a Culture of peace, the Declaration on the Right to Peace and not least the Constitution of UNESCO with its emphasis on international intellectual and ethical cooperation and its credo: “Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that defences for peace must be constructed” .

Part II highlights factors that hinder the culture of peace to take roots, notably the broad and growing militarization, not only of society but also of the human mind. I argue that humanity is facing three alarming existential crises: (i) the climate and environmental catastrophe, (ii) the growing gap between the “haves” and the “have-nots”, and (iii) the nuclear arms threat. I consider that the military-industrial complex seriously – economically, ecologically and ethically – stand in the way of finding innovative and sustainable solutions to the challenges facing humanity.

Part III presents an holistic approach to peace-building based on the eight pillars of the UNESCO/UN culture of peace program: (i) Learn to live together, (ii) Promote sustainable social and economic development, (iii) Promote respect for human rights, (iv) Secure equality between women and men, (v) Foster democratic participation, (vi) Foster understanding, tolerance and solidarity, (vii) Promote free flow of information and knowledge, (viii) Foster international peace and security, with special emphasis on pillar one on education and pillar eight on peace-building. Part III contains descriptions of relevant international structures and institutions, both within the UN system and regional and sub-regional ones, as well as peace building projects and ideas, including from the international peace movement and visionary individuals. Seen together, the publication provides both important knowledge and suggestions for a hoped for and effective transition from a culture of war and violence towards cultures of peace and non-violence.

Blurb

Military expenditure was reduced in the period between the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the attack on the Twin Towers in New York in 2001 and many people started to hope that finally the world’s military and political resources would be used for welfare instead of warfare. UNESCO developed a global program for a culture of peace that got broad and enthusiastic support. Individuals, organisations, institutions and countries contributed to the development of the vision of a culture of peace and got inspiration, energy and sense of community and meaning. ? The UN, both in a visionary and hopeful way, put the culture of peace as the headline for the new millennium.

But the war against terror changed everything. Also Norway participated in wars in countries where we had no controversies. Fear, enemy images and suspicion were created – again. The climate- and environmental crisis is threatening both humanity and the planet. A worldwide pandemic has further aggravated poverty, violence against women and social unrest.

The war in Ukraine has brought the horrors of war closer to us. Could it lead to disgust for all war, for war as an option? Could the vision and experience of a culture of peace help us stand against a dominating and desperate belief that weapons, ever more numerous, ever more lethal and potentially capable of full extinction of humanity, and that it is necessary in order to build peace and justice? Is the time ripe for acknowledging that it is only through disarmament and détente that we can manage to meet the ecological and social challenges facing us?

This book is a contribution to the strengthening of the world’s fragile peace architecture and gives suggestions as to how a culture of peace may be build through education, diplomacy, dialogue, democracy, justice, gender equality, art, culture and sound common sense.

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Manan Shah <![CDATA[India celebrates its 75th Republic Day]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20186 2024-01-25T21:47:48Z 2024-01-25T21:25:04Z India, a democracy of 1.4 billion people, celebrates its Republic Day, one of three major national days, on 26 January every year. While Indians celebrate Independence Day as the day of gaining freedom from British Colonialism, Republic Day marks the adoption of the Indian Constitution as a free nation. This year is the 75th anniversary...

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India, a democracy of 1.4 billion people, celebrates its Republic Day, one of three major national days, on 26 January every year. While Indians celebrate Independence Day as the day of gaining freedom from British Colonialism, Republic Day marks the adoption of the Indian Constitution as a free nation. This year is the 75th anniversary of India’s Constitution coming into effect.

The Indian Constitution is the longest written national constitution in the world, reflecting the diversity in this vast democracy. The Constitution is the supreme law of this land, which even the parliament is not allowed to overrule, barring limited exceptions. Heavily inspired by constitutions of other countries around the world, including those of the United States, France, Ireland, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, the Indian Constitution declares India a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic, federal parliamentary republic. It assures its citizens of justice, equality, and liberty? and endeavors to promote fraternity among its diverse communities and citizens.

As reality stands today, 75 years later, most of these values remain on paper and are absent from the everyday life of the common man and woman. To demonstrate this, we will look at three specific recent events – suspensions of Members of Parliament (18 December 2023), ongoing conflict in the North Eastern state of Manipur (3 May 2023 – ongoing), and the opening of a new temple in the city of Ayodhya (22 January 2024). We will examine how the values set out by the Constituent Assembly are kept in practice or not.

  • The suspension of 141 Members of Parliament on 18 December 2023

In response to a security breach in India’s parliament on December 13, 2023, where intruders set off colored gas, shouted slogans and disrupted proceedings, tensions escalated as opposition MPs demanded accountability. The breach occurred on the 22nd anniversary of a previous militant attack on the parliament. The government suspended a total of 141 lawmakers, 18% of the total number of MPs, accusing them of disrupting parliamentary proceedings. The opposition, mainly part of the INDIA alliance, criticized Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government for attacking democracy. The breach suspects were charged under anti-terror laws, with reports suggesting their frustration with government policies. The opposition, suspended for the rest of the winter session, alleged a deliberate attempt to stifle questions and pass bills without debate.

The suspended lawmakers sought a debate on the security lapse and a statement from Home Minister Amit Shah. However, the Modi government rebuked the opposition, promising an investigation while refusing a parliamentary debate. Critics, including opposition MPs, labeled the mass suspensions as a mockery of democracy and part of Modi’s authoritarian style. The opposition claimed a purge to pass bills without meaningful debate and shield the ruling BJP MP linked to the security breach. The government countered, accusing the opposition of disrupting parliamentary functioning, disrespecting authorities, and employing a pre-planned strategy. Analysts questioned the move’s political motivation, emphasizing the potential misuse of institutions against opposition leaders.

The MPs who were suspended did violate the rule cited, but it is a common happening in the Indian parliament, and never before have so many members been suspended in a single day or even a single session. Leaving aside the merits in this act on either side, let’s look at what followed the suspension: The Home Minister, who refused to address the MPs when they were demanding so, was going to “friendly” media channels and other public events, addressing the security issue; he only avoided taking responsibility inside the parliament. Further, the Home Minister did not enter the House when demanded to do so but was present immediately on the next day of suspension coming into force. The government, using these suspensions of 141 MPs, passed several very important bills without any discussion, including three bills that seek to replace the entire criminal code of this nation. These three bills were described by sections of society as making India a “police state,” as some laws are worse than the original code written by the British colonizers.

The parliament has already been treated like a rubber stamp for many years, but this particular session crossed all limits. The three bills that revamped the entire criminal code saw little to no relevant discussion, with most MPs of the ruling party saying nothing of importance, or even relevance. The worst example of this was when a MP from Uttarakhand, Dr. Kalpana Saini, read out a poem singing laurels of the Prime Minister, the Home Minister, and the Finance Minister.

  • The conflict in the Indian state of Manipur, ongoing since May 2023

Ethnic violence has erupted in Manipur, India, between the Meitei majority and Kuki minority, escalating into what some describe as a civil war. The conflict has resulted in at least 180 deaths, 400 injuries, and over 60,000 displaced people. This is heavily undercounted data figures, as the state government has frequently cut off all communication channels, media, and the internet for long periods to avoid any larger backlash and publicity of the issue nationwide. The Meitei and Kuki clash stems from disputes over tribal status, land and influence.

One incident that showcases the severity of the situation was when a video emerged in July 2023 of two Kuki women who were gang-raped and paraded naked in front of huge mobs. Even though a complaint had been filed on the very same day of the incident, 4 May, the state police (under Meitei leadership) took no action until 21 July, when the video got viral and severe criticism poured in from everywhere. It took more than 2 months for the police to act on such a heinous crime against humanity. The Kukis have accused the state Chief Minister (head of state government, member of Modi’s BJP), who is a Meitei himself, of siding with the Meiteis in the conflict, rather than staying neutral and helping resolve the conflict.

The conflict has severely impacted businesses and entrepreneurs, causing extensive economic losses. With so many deaths, homes and places of worship destroyed, and thousands displaced, the state faces a dire situation. Retail inflation is high, and an internet shutdown compounds economic challenges. The violence has paralyzed the economy, with businesses experiencing over 70% losses. Entrepreneurs have been forced to lay off employees, and the violence has disrupted traditional business activities. The tourism sector, once thriving, has collapsed, leading to predictions of economic stagnation. Economic recovery will require comprehensive government intervention.

The Prime Minister, who has generally tweeted and shared his opinion on all major happenings in the nation and worldwide, has refused to utter a single word on Manipur since when the violence broke out. He only addressed this once in parliament, when the opposition forced him to do so, by bringing in a No-Confidence Motion, in a completely inadequate manner, and tried to deflect the whole attention from this massive crisis comparing it with much smaller incidents in opposition-ruled states.

  • A Hindu Temple opening in the city of Ayodhya on 22 January 2024

On 22 January 2024, the Prime Minister of secular India presided over the opening ceremony of a new Hindu temple in the city of Ayodhya. This marked the end of a contentious journey that began with the demolition on 6 December 1992 of the 16th-century Babri Mosque that stood on the same ground as the new temple, and the court case between the Hindu and Muslim communities dating at least 140 years before that. The first judge in the Ayodhya dispute was a British-appointed judge in the then British colony of India.

Tensions arose from the belief among many Hindus that the mosque had been built on the birthplace of Lord Ram. The demolition of Babri Mosque and the communal violence that ensued leading to the death of thousands, has been a defining moment in India’s history. After years of legal battles, the Supreme Court in 2019 awarded the disputed land to Hindus, allowing the construction of the Ram Temple. The concept of a mosque being “not integral to Islam” was remarked by the Supreme Court in 1994, reinforcing the Hindu claim. The decision also mentioned that the mosque’s demolition was against the rule of law.

The new temple’s grandeur is part of a multi-billion-dollar makeover of Ayodhya, transforming it into a “Hindu Vatican.” The timing of the temple’s opening, months before general elections, is seen by critics as a strategic move by the Prime Minister to rally Hindu nationalist support. The city’s transformation includes expanded infrastructure, a new airport, railway station, and the demolition of homes and structures to widen pilgrim corridors. Critics accuse the government and the ruling BJP of violating the secular nature of India’s Constitution by supporting a religious event. The Muslim community expresses concern over the government’s lack of outreach and assurances regarding potential tensions. For Muslims, especially in Ayodhya, the new temple’s opening ceremony evokes fear and painful memories, anticipating tensions as Hindu devotees from across India flood the city.

While many express joy at the construction of the temple, locals also voice concerns about the impact of the city’s transformation. Residents displaced by demolitions claim inadequate compensation and lament the toll on their homes. The makeover has sparked a mix of emotions, with some appreciating the economic boost and others feeling their lives have been disrupted. Despite the events being a source of pain, some locals believe in the historical interdependence between Hindus and Muslims in Ayodhya.

Hinduism is the majority religion in India, a supermajority, actually, as Hindus comprise over 80% of the population, but the Constitution was drafted with the principle of separation of government and religion front and center. This principle has been violated by many leaders in India, by almost every government since Independence in one way or the other. However, Ayodhya is an extreme case.

Further after opening the temple, the Prime Minister gave a long speech, full of rhetoric and talking about the virtues of Lord Ram, the deity of the temple, all of which were violated in building the same temple. Out of everything he said, one sentence deserves to be more heavily criticized: “Ram is the aadhar of India.” Loosely translated, it would mean Ram is the basis of India. This is completely untrue; the Indian constitution specifies India to be a secular state, in its very first page, the Preamble.

India has seen a violation of the Constitution and its values by most governments since Independence; I have only counted the latest ones, which also happen to be some of the worst violations. For a majority of Indians, everyday life has hardly changed post-Independence, with the only exception being that the ruling elite in this land are no more foreign Britishers (as British people are referred to in India), but Indians who are still using power and privilege to get their way, very similar to how Britishers controlled India for their gains.

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_India
The Constitution of India – https://legislative.gov.in/constitution-of-india/
https://www.drishtiias.com/daily-updates/daily-news-analysis/rules-regarding-suspension-of-mps

https://newsonair.gov.in/Main-News-Details.aspx?id=473274

https://www.livemint.com/news/india/parliament-mp-suspension-amit-shah-three-bills-to-replace-criminal-laws-nct-delhi-taxes-bill-lok-sabha-rajya-sabha-11702991086971.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/1/17/will-new-criminal-bills-turn-india-into-a-police-state-ahead-of-2024-vote

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR13ZC82AWs&ab_channel=meghnerd
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023%E2%80%932024_Manipur_violence

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/India-s-Manipur-holds-mass-burial-amid-unyielding-violence
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/manipur-women-old-video-paraded-naked-controversy-biren-singh-bjp-opposition-reacts-2408988-2023-07-19

https://thewire.in/politics/narendra-modi-parliament-speech-manipur
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Supreme_Court_verdict_on_Ayodhya_dispute
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-68003095
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Bombay_bombings

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[Stand your ground…]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20180 2024-01-23T23:44:54Z 2024-01-23T23:41:26Z La entrada Stand your ground… aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[A Global Perspective on Responsible Democratic Citizenship]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20178 2024-01-23T23:35:37Z 2024-01-23T23:35:37Z The modern notion of “citizenship” is connected to the nation state and has emerged to a large extent from the struggle for civic rights in Western societies. In recent years the term “citizenship” or “citizen” is occasionally used in a broader sense, informally as in “citizen of the world”, or even formally, as in “citizen...

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The modern notion of “citizenship” is connected to the nation state and has emerged to a large extent from the struggle for civic rights in Western societies. In recent years the term “citizenship” or “citizen” is occasionally used in a broader sense, informally as in “citizen of the world”, or even formally, as in “citizen of the European Union”. Can there be, however, citizenship concepts, attitudes and arrangements vis-à-vis quasi-sovereign or supranational institutions, at the regional (e.g. EU) or global (e.g. the UN) level, or is the term citizen/citizenship used metaphorically in such cases?

Let us zoom in to some key aspects of citizenship to explore whether they also apply to institutions outside the nation state. The main reference document, on which often the oath of citizenship and/or of public service is taken is a state’s constitution. Is there such a thing in the UN / global context and in the regional / EU context? Actually, the founding document of the UN is the UN Charter, which has a Gospel-like aura, even if it is often respected in the breach. Together with the Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights completes the core constitutional duo of the post-World War II global governance system. The EU may have no concise constitution as such (attempts to get one have failed, as of now), but its “founding agreements”, including the Rome, Maastricht and Lisbon Treaties, play this role and are a clear reference for its citizens.

A creation story or “founding myth” is also part of the shared heritage that determines citizenship at the nation state level. It can be the liberation struggle against a colonial power, or the fight for the rights of the people against a monarchy or an oligarchy. The epic of World War II plays that role for both the UN and the EU, as their creation was part of the effort to avoid any repetition of such carnage and destruction, in the world as a whole and on the European continent, respectively.

sense of identity and solidarity is another key aspect of citizenship at the state level. But is it also evident at regional and global level? The answer is positive, if one considers the “EU Citizenship package” that includes various legal texts and administrative provisions in support of the rights of people having the citizenship of any and all EU countries, along with a set of funding programmes that distribute money to farmers, artists, researchers and numerous other groups across the EU. The various international human rights instruments, the work of institutions like the Human Rights Council and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, as well as multilateral funding mechanisms of the broader UN system, like UNDP, UNICEF, the World Bank, IFAD, the Green Climate Fund, etc. also play the same role at the global level, even if within much narrower financial margins.

Another level of governance, which has recently emerged but cannot be ignored, is that of cyberspace. Large numbers of people, young people in particular, spend large parts of their time / of their lives online. The term “cyber citizen” or “digital citizen”§ has acquired de facto meaning and should be taken into account too when talking about citizenship beyond the nation state.  What is the source of legitimacy and “sovereignty” in cyberspace? No founding document as such, no unifying founding myth either. One has to go to individual “cyber kingdoms” to get the founding documents and narratives of digital superpowers such as Google, Microsoft, Facebook/Meta or X (formerly known as Twitter), with many more smaller “princedoms” and communities of all sorts offering a sense of identity and solidarity to like-minded groups of people.

In conclusion, human beings today have to grapple with many overlapping identities and citizenships, which can be seen as complementary, unless something goes wrong in the relations among the various levels of governance each one of them is based. While state-level citizenship remains the most defining for an individual, not least because of nationality documents and enforcement arrangements maintained at that level, other citizenships or “meta-citizenships” increasingly become the “locus” of loyalty and engagement. No Education for Democracy (EfD) curriculum, even if controlled by state authorities as part of national education systems, can ignore the emerging broader notions and practices of citizenship at regional, global and digital level. They have to be taken into account and harmonized to achieve the purported shared goal of individual and societal well-being, human security and resilience across all levels and borders.

_________________

* First published on the Agora platform of the DEMOCRAT Project; original can be found here:https://blogs.democrat-horizon.eu/2024/01/14/a-global-perspective-on-responsible-democratic-citizenship/ Based on a presentation made by Dr. Georgios Kostakos at the ECPR General Conference 2023, Charles University, Prague, 7 September 2023.

§ See previous blog post on the DEMOCRAT project website entitled “Embracing the Digital in Democratic Citizenship Education”, by Janette Hughes, Jennifer A. Robb & Molly Gadanidis. Interesting that the apparently very relevant web site https://www.cybercitizenship.org/ does not seem to have any human names associated with it…

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Peacemaking Reflection Group https://www.foggs.org/prg <![CDATA[WORLD LEADERS: AVERT MAJOR CATASTROPHE IN GAZA]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20173 2023-12-28T16:36:57Z 2023-12-28T16:01:19Z Call for UNSC resolution 2720 Immediate Follow-Up To world leaders and heads of international organizations: We are in shock and outrage at the dire crisis in Gaza. We implore you to take immediate, decisive action. This is a crucial moment to avert a greater catastrophe and uphold human dignity and peace. The world at large...

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Call for UNSC resolution 2720 Immediate Follow-Up

To world leaders and heads of international organizations: We are in shock and outrage at the dire crisis in Gaza. We implore you to take immediate, decisive action. This is a crucial moment to avert a greater catastrophe and uphold human dignity and peace.

The world at large stood still in disbelief and condemnation of the massacre by Hamas on 7 October 2023, including the horrendous murders, rapes, and hostage-taking of Israeli and other nationality civilians. Evocations of centuries of vulnerability, not just the genocide of the Shoah/Holocaust which killed half the world’s Jewish population, remind us of our collective responsibility to prevent such massacres and any genocide anywhere, as well as any additional inflaming of already persistent antisemitism.

Sympathy and support for Israel’s right to self-defence have been willfully mis-interpreted, though, by the current Israeli government’s need for security and its waging of a massive campaign of collective punishment by destruction, devastation and displacement of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip. This is unacceptable and must stop immediately. Against the lessons of their own tragic history, the Israelis have allowed themselves to become the instrument of prolonged repression of the civil and individual rights of generations of Palestinians living under the yoke of occupation since 1967.

Against this background, the UN Security Council adopted resolution 2720 on Friday, 22 December 2023, demanding rapid, safe, and unhindered humanitarian access, along with the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. The calls in the resolution have gone unheeded by both warring parties. Israel continues to bombard non-combatant civilian infrastructure, eliminate entire families and inflict massive suffering in its campaign of retribution against Hamas that affects all Palestinians in Gaza, and indeed in the West Bank. Hamas, on its part, continues to retaliate with attacks on Israel and refuses to hand over the remaining hostages.

It is imperative that the United Nations and its agencies and partners be fully enabled to implement their part of UNSC res. 2720 and provide urgently-needed humanitarian assistance to the population of Gaza. Moreover, the dire situation and the imminent danger of Palestinian civilian starvation and disease call for the utilization of assets like helicopters to circumvent the destruction of roads and other infrastructure. We believe this approach would be a pragmatic and effective method to expedite the delivery of much- and vitally-needed aid throughout the Gaza Strip.

None of this can happen realistically without a total and immediate ceasefire followed by a colossal humanitarian mobilization.

The primary onus of responsibility for achieving a ceasefire lies with the warring parties, namely the Israeli government and the Hamas leadership. Special responsibility is also borne by the United States and Iran, the respective main backers of the belligerents. They must use all political, military and economic leverage they possess to bring home to the parties the imperative of a robust and complete ceasefire immediately, on absolute humanitarian grounds.

An immediate ceasefire followed by a massive humanitarian mobilization are necessary to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians, who have reached the limits of their endurance and are under imminent threat of psychological collapse, starvation, thirst and disease. Nobody with any remaining conscience and humanity should allow this to happen, and the governments and leaders addressed via this call have the primary responsibility to act swiftly.

Once the humanitarian situation has stabilized and the ceasefire holds, all parties must return to the broader negotiating table and progress rapidly towards the full implementation of the two-state solution, as demanded in UN Security Council resolution 2720 and numerous other Security Council and General Assembly resolutions.

 

NOTE: This urgent call was initiated by the Peacemaking Reflection Group of former UN system staff (PRG) but is open for signing by other individuals and institutions too. To add your or your institution’s signature, please use this electronic signature form. Irrespective of whether you sign the form or not, if you agree with its message please circulate it as widely as possible, acknowledging its source. Feel free to draw on the call to produce your own statement or article adapted to your own language or tradition. Acknowledgement / crediting of the source, as indicated above, would again be appreciated. The pdf version of the Call can be accessed here.

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Patrice-Ariel Français <![CDATA[Gaza: It’s time to redesign the future!]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20167 2023-12-19T22:59:05Z 2023-12-19T22:59:05Z Many would advise me not to venture into such a minefield as Gaza, literally and figuratively. However, I cannot remain silent in the face of the outpouring of hatred, invective, disinformation and bad faith that distorts and obscures the debate on this issue, which is tragic. I will not engage here in a historical analysis...

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Many would advise me not to venture into such a minefield as Gaza, literally and figuratively. However, I cannot remain silent in the face of the outpouring of hatred, invective, disinformation and bad faith that distorts and obscures the debate on this issue, which is tragic. I will not engage here in a historical analysis of the problem – apart from a few points of reference – nor will I look for the miracle solution to this crisis, which no State or protagonist will be able to do at this time.  I will only try to put things in their proper place and identify ways to redesign the future.

One atrocity does not justify another

But first of all, I want to emphasize my position on the human dimensions of this crisis: one atrocity does not justify another. In other words: Hamas’ atrocities against Jews around the wall encircling Gaza – whether they live on kibbutzim or attend a rave party – are inexcusable. Just as the atrocities committed by the State of Israel and its army — Tsahal — against the civilian populations of the Gaza Strip — whether children, women, the elderly and even the youth, in terms of destruction, death, mutilation and other abuses — are equally inexcusable. There is no justification for these atrocities, which are equally reprehensible on both sides.

However, behind these atrocities lie calculations that can in no way justify them. On the side of Hamas, considered in the Western world as a terrorist movement or, on the contrary, in the Arab-Muslim world, as a movement of resistance, even liberation, the attack of October 7 was clearly intended to strike the minds and relaunch the struggle against those it considers to be occupiers and plunderers:  the Jews of the State of Israel. On the side of the Israeli government – now led by the most extremist fringes of the political spectrum – the counter-offensive, officially directed against Hamas but also in fact against the civilian population of Gaza, would have the implicit and unavowed aim of simply erasing the Gaza enclave from Israel’s map and expelling the Palestinians who occupy it. In this sense, the elimination of the Gaza enclave would be the counterpart of the Israeli government’s strategy towards the West Bank, which consists of getting rid of the Palestinian population through the colonization of that space, reducing the latter to confetti on the map of this region, doomed to disappear.

A masked project of ethnic cleansing

Many observers have compared the attack of 7 October 2023 in Israel to that of 11 September 2001 in the United States, because of the element of surprise and horror they both caused. To me, they are more challenging the way in which these events have been politically seized upon to justify reprisals and, beyond that, military interventions.  September 11 fell like “blessed bread” for the neoconservatives in the United States, with the aim of justifying and triggering in its wake the military expedition to Afghanistan (2001), followed by the American armed intervention in Iraq (2003). The same was true in my view of the most reactionary, Zionist-oriented government Israel has known since its inception, which no doubt saw the events of October 7 as the perfect opportunity to advance its masked project of ethnic cleansing of Israel. Some even speculate that the Israeli government was aware of Hamas’ plans and “let it happen” to begin its military intervention, as would have done  the United States at the highest levels of the executive branch in 2001 in response to reports that a terrorist attack was being prepared. This is implied by the leaks that the Israeli government was warned of the imminence and nature of the “Al-Aqsa Flood”.

What will happen in Gaza in the coming weeks and months? No one knows yet. For the time being, it seems that the goal of the government led by Benjamin Netanyahu, which comes from the Likud but is also populated by extremists of all stripes from the far-right parties and the ultra-Orthodox, wants only one thing: to get rid of Hamas, of course, but also to get rid of the Palestinians in Gaza. The expulsion of the civilian population from Gaza to the south under a deluge of bombs, as well as the implicit eviction of the same population to other areas or countries in the region, are steps in this direction, although the Rafah gate remains locked for the time being for fear of Egypt having to deal with an uncontrollable flood of refugees. In the longer term, the ideas circulating about the future of Gaza would consist of placing this territory under Israeli administration, or even under the administration of the Palestinian Authority or – an insane idea from my point of view – under the tutelage of a third state or a coalition of states, not to mention of course a UN variant, which is not popular at the moment. The fate of the Palestinians in Gaza, as well as the future administration of the territory, remain up in the air for the time being.

Navigating in the fog

The international community is currently navigating in a thick fog, having reacted differently to the events in Gaza. Overall, the so-called Western countries, led by the United States and the European Union, immediately lined up behind Israel, unconditionally condemning Hamas’ bloody attack but turning a blind eye to Israel’s inhumane and disproportionate response. Arab and Muslim countries have also mobilized to condemn the deluge of fire unleashed by Israel on the population of Gaza and to blame once again the policy of double standards practiced by the West. Not surprisingly, the U.S. rushed to send a second aircraft carrier and naval air forces to the area. Unexpectedly, but shockingly, President Macron rushed to Prime Minister Netanyahu to assure him of unwavering support and propose the establishment of an international coalition against Hamas, seriously discrediting the credit that France could still have in the Arab-Muslim world and decades of diplomatic efforts to strengthen its ties with that part of the world. Both President Biden and President Macron then sought to make up for it and save their image by calling on Israel to kill fewer civilians, as if killing civilians at all could simply become normal.

It didn’t take long for the conflict to spill over into the Western and Arab-Muslim worlds. Anxious to prevent political clashes, Western governments have sought to prevent protests and internal reactions, with some, such as France, even going so far as to ban demonstrations in support of Palestine while promoting a broad campaign against anti-Semitism. In the Arab-Muslim world, declarations and demonstrations in support of Gaza and Palestine have multiplied, as was to be expected. Not surprisingly, too, anti-Semitism has entered the debate, driven by Jewish pressure groups and lobbies and with the complicity of governments close to Israel. The waving of the Holocaust ghost and the denunciation of anti-Semitism — the supreme accusation to silence and nip in the bud any criticism of Israel — has resurfaced aggressively.

A new threat for the Middle East

At the international level, the conflict resulting from this new crisis threatens to engulf the Middle East and even beyond. The protagonists likely to intervene against Israel if the crisis worsens are known: Hezbollah in Lebanon, Shiite militias in Syria and Iraq, and even the Houthis in Yemen, for the moment in a limited way and as a proxy on behalf of Iran. The so far anecdotal seizure of Israeli-owned cargo ships in the Red Sea, as well as the launch of missiles towads Israel by the Houthis, suggest the possible extension of the conflict. States such as the United States and France immediately understood this by sending naval air forces to the region. Attempts at mediation have also multiplied in an anarchic manner on the margins of the United Nations, without success apart from the release of a handful of hostages and a few days of truce in the Gaza Strip, a worrying sign of a retreat in multilateral diplomacy.

Finally, with regard to the United Nations, there has been a worrying decline in its role in peacekeeping, as a result of the paralysis of its Security Council and the attacks on the Organization. This has manifested itself recently with the war in Ukraine, which pits the permanent members of the Security Council against each other, in addition to the misuse by some of them of their “right of veto”. This decline has been accentuated recently with the trend towards the multiplication of separate meetings of groups of states (i.e. the G7, the G20, the BRICS, etc.)  and international forums held on the margins of the Organization, as well as attempts at mediation between States conducted outside the Organization. Added to this are the malicious or rather ill-intentioned criticisms of the United Nations, including the systematic denigration of the United Nations by one of its members, the State of Israel, which not only systematically violates its resolutions, but does so with the blessing and veto of the United States. Added to this is the insolence of Israeli leaders when they declare, among other things, “lecturing” the UN (sic) through their permanent representative to the Organization or when, without fear of ridicule, they accuse UNIFEM (UN Women) of complicity with Hamas for its alleged silence in the face of sexual violence committed against women during the October 7 attack. Fortunately, the role of the United Nations is far from limited to peacekeeping at a time of climate change and the multiple dangers that threaten the planet, ranging from human misery to pandemics, not to mention the countless tensions and imbalances that threaten our world.

Getting out of the Gaza crisis

How can we get out of the Gaza crisis and, beyond that, this never-ending confrontation between two peoples, the Jewish people and the Palestinian people? Few analysts are currently venturing down this particularly thorny but oh-so-necessary track! In the very short term, it is obvious, there should be a ceasefire. Let’s call it “humanitarian” if you like, or whatever. Only strong pressure on Israel, from its supporters, led by the United States, is likely to achieve this result, at the cost otherwise  of a humanitarian disaster and a new “Nakba” with dramatic consequences (the “catastrophe” of 1948 in the Palestinian historical narrative).

Secondly, a formula of administration should be quickly put in place in this battered territory for the survival of its population and for its eventual recovery. Let us reject from the outset the outright annexation of this territory by Israel, accompanied by the expulsion of the Gazan population, which is politically and morally unacceptable. Direct administration of this territory by Israel would theoretically be conceivable, but at the cost of a ferocious repression of the people of Gaza that will never forgive the horrors committed by the occupier.  Hamas’ continued administration of Gaza would also be theoretically conceivable, but intolerable in the eyes of Israel, which has vowed its destruction. An administration of the Gaza Strip by the Palestinian Authority is also on people’s minds, but it would suffer from all the ills that affect this Authority, on a larger scale in the space where it is confined: political, economic and security submission to the State of Israel, which in fact occupies and administers this fiction of a Palestinian State. As for the mandate that could be assigned to another State or a group of States, it would lead to an unstainable mode of management or co-management in view of the complexity of the case. The only viable solution remains: to hand over the provisional administration of Gaza to the United Nations, which knows the territory well, has worked on it through UNRWA for 74 years and enjoys the confidence of its people. The establishment of such an administration would not be new to the Organization, which had successfully implemented it in the past, including in East Timor, during its reconstruction.

Thirdly, in the longer term, there would remain the question of peaceful coexistence between the Jewish and Palestinian peoples, who have been at odds since 1948. The Middle Eastern model of communal coexistence between populations of different faiths (Lebanon and Syria in particular) has often been mentioned, but its practical functioning in the region leaves much to be desired in view of the successive crises experienced by the States concerned. The solution of a multi-confessional and multi-ethnic state seems attractive and has long been on people’s minds, but it turns out to be utopian in the real world given the outpouring of hatred and resentment that has accumulated on both sides since the birth of the State of Israel. Palestinians of Israeli nationality live and work in Israel, but their status as citizens seems increasingly precarious in the context of the violence and resentment that is developing in the country. Progressive Jews and local NGOs are campaigning for a rapprochement between the communities, but their struggle seems doomed to failure in the climate of animosity and horror that prevails today and is unlikely to be resolved overnight. This leaves the two-state solution, the only viable long-term solution for peaceful and – why not? Let’s dream it – friendly  coexistence between the two peoples.

Revisiting the two-state solution

The two-state solution has been tried and failed, many observers and protagonists will say. But it failed because it was built on shaky foundations and systematically undermined by its opponents. Brought to the baptismal font in Oslo (Oslo Accords, 1993-1995), it provided for the gradual establishment of a sovereign Palestinian entity but subsequently only resulted in an ersatz state, subject to the goodwill of Israel. It will take too long to list here the shortcomings and even violations of the Oslo Accords, ranging from the military occupation of the West Bank, the colonisation of its land by Jewish settlers, the expropriation of the Palestinians of East Jerusalem to the trusteeship of the Palestinian Authority in the context of economic, financial and commercial agreements that restrict it.  Not to mention the security and military control of the entire Palestinian population. Some have compared today’s Palestine to a Bantustan, others speak of apartheid to characterize the system in place or a ghetto to depict the situation in Gaza.  The proto-state called the “Palestinian Authority” is not sustainable, let’s put it bluntly. Only a contiguous Palestinian state, stretching from the West Bank to the sea and fully sovereign, would have a chance of being viable and thus contributing to the lasting healing of relations between the Jewish and Palestinian communities.

Building a contiguous and fully sovereign Palestinian State requires mutual concessions that go far beyond the Oslo Accords.  This would require mutual land cessions and agreements on the status and compensation of populations affected by transfers of sovereignty. This could take the form, among other things, of a cession to the future Palestinian state of the north-west of supposedly Israeli territory, in exchange for the cession to Israel of the Gaza Strip and part of the West Bank. The “Northern District” of Israel, attributed mainly to the Arabs in the partition plan for Palestine (approved by the UN in 1947) would thus be retroceded to the new Palestinian state, giving it continuity, depth and access to the sea, while the Golan Heights, annexed by Israel, would be retroceded to Syria. Israel would gain compensation from the Gaza Strip and part of the southern and even western West Bank. Israel would thus gain continuity, depth and security, no longer having borders with Syria and Lebanon. Jerusalem, ideally, should regain its international status, subject to co-management of the city by Israelis and Palestinians.

A new generation of leaders

 Negotiating such an agreement would first require a new generation of leaders to come to the negotiating table and overcome the hatreds and resentments of the past. Obviously, time and patience, as well as calming measures, would be needed to move gradually towards such a goal. This would necessarily imply a political transition between generations that could pave the way for such changes. On the Palestinian side, Fatah and Hamas would agree on a new political platform for the future of Palestine. The release of currently imprisoned Palestinian leaders could also, according to many observers, be a game-changer, if Israel’s leaders have the intelligence to do so. A similar process would also be desirable on the Israeli side. Once the trauma of the October 7 attacks has passed, a new generation of leaders should take the lead in courageously addressing the root causes of the conflict and finding a modus vivendi between the two peoples. The United Nations, for its part, could support this process, with a low profile, by quietly but effectively promoting dialogue between the parties in the form of discussion forums and informal meetings between actors on both sides, in the hope that solutions for the future will emerge. It certainly wouldn’t be for tomorrow. But this would be the only politically conceivable way to overcome a confrontation between two peoples that has lasted far too long, generating blood and despair from one generation to the next.

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[The good that may yet be]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20158 2023-12-19T14:27:55Z 2023-12-19T14:27:55Z La entrada The good that may yet be aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Cilene Victor <![CDATA[Overcoming media opacity regarding UN reform efforts]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20151 2023-12-12T06:03:16Z 2023-12-12T05:59:02Z In this article, we analyze whether the media has been facilitating or hindering public engagement with global governance reform efforts. By scrutinizing media roles, we aim to understand their contributions to the discourse on UN reform, considering their reach, influence, and implications in shaping public opinion. The media section of the September 2023 report of...

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In this article, we analyze whether the media has been facilitating or hindering public engagement with global governance reform efforts. By scrutinizing media roles, we aim to understand their contributions to the discourse on UN reform, considering their reach, influence, and implications in shaping public opinion. The media section of the September 2023 report of the Global South Perspectives Network consisted of two methodological approaches: a survey and a focus group with media professionals. This article presents the analysis of responses from 512 survey participants from 48 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, and the Middle East and North Africa.

The survey’s focus encompassed newspapers, television, radio, and platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. It delved into how these media, including those of the UN system and other multilateral organizations, have disseminated information, influenced discussions and enhanced social engagement with global governance reform initiatives.

Effectiveness of media and the coverage of UN reform

Survey findings in Latin America (LATAM) revealed that 65.3% of the 202 respondents found mainstream media ineffective in covering UN reform. While 26.2% considered it somewhat effective, only 5.9% perceived it as highly effective. This widespread skepticism indicates a need for a reevaluation of mainstream media strategies in LATAM to better inform the public about UN reform, possibly influenced by factors such as prioritizing local issues and lacking knowledge and resources to cover the UN and its activities.

In Africa, 42.5% of 200 participants viewed mainstream media as ineffective in covering UN reform, with 36% considering it somewhat effective and 15.5% highly effective. Similar to LATAM, African respondents tended to perceive mainstream media as ineffective or only somewhat effective, possibly due to limited resources for international news coverage and a preference for local news.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region exhibited comparable pessimism, with 47.3% of 110 participants believing mainstream media was ineffective in covering UN reform. However, 29.1% perceived it as highly effective, and 10.9% found it somewhat effective. Doubts about effectiveness may arise from political influences, regional conflicts, or limited resources for comprehensive international reporting.

The prevalent perception of ineffectiveness in these regions underscores a crucial need for strategic reassessment in media approaches to foster better public understanding of UN reform initiatives. Factors such as prioritization of local issues and growing distrust in mainstream media appear to inform this doubt. Despite variations in the degree of skepticism among regions, the overarching theme suggests a call for nuanced communication strategies that not only address concerns but also leverage positive views. Understanding the complex interplay of factors influencing media effectiveness is essential for tailoring approaches that resonate with diverse regional contexts and ultimately contribute to more informed public discourse on UN reform. 

The role of UN system media in raising awareness  

 Part of the survey focused on respondents’ perceptions of the effectiveness of the UN system media in raising awareness and promoting understanding of UN reform and multilateralism. The participants from LATAM largely expressed unbelief, with 41.6% considering the UN system media as ineffective, and 36.1% expressing uncertainty or having no opinion. Only a small percentage (5.9%) believed the UN system media was highly effective.

In Africa, a comparable pattern emerged, as 43% of respondents found the UN system media ineffective, and 25.5% expressed uncertainty. Trust in the effectiveness of UN system media was relatively low at 9%. Moving to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, a more divided perception surfaced, with 55.5% considering the UN system media ineffective and 20.9% finding it highly effective. A smaller percentage had no opinion (18.2%), and a minority considered it somewhat effective (5.5%).

Collectively, these responses highlight a prevailing disbelief across regions regarding the effectiveness of UN system media. The substantial number of respondents expressing uncertainty or lacking a clear opinion underscores an opportunity for more effective communication efforts to bridge the awareness gap. The consensus in each region suggests that the UN system media is generally perceived as ineffective, calling for strategic enhancements in its communication strategies to engage a wider and more informed audience effectively. The analysis indicates a need for improvements or increased visibility in the role of UN system media to foster a deeper understanding of UN reform and multilateralism.

The media of the institutions interested in UN reform issues

In the final question of the media section of the survey, respondents’ views on the effectiveness of social media platforms of the major institutions interested in UN reform, such as NGOs, universities, research groups and think tanks. In LATAM, 13.4% considered these platforms highly effective, while a larger percentage (46%) found them somewhat effective. However, 18.3% perceived them as ineffective, indicating reservations, and 22% expressed uncertainty. This mixed perception suggests a need for a nuanced communication approach to address both positive views and concerns about the effectiveness of social media platforms in promoting UN reform initiatives in this region.

Moving to Africa, a similar pattern emerged, with 21% perceiving these platforms as highly effective and 36.5% finding them somewhat effective. However, 25.5% considered them ineffective, suggesting skepticism, and 17% did not express a clear opinion. While there is a significant impact, the unbelief and uncertainty indicate the necessity for more engagement and awareness-building efforts to address varying perceptions in the African region.

In MENA, a majority (41.8%) viewed these social media platforms as highly effective, and 29.1% found them somewhat effective. A minority (15.5%) considered them ineffective, and 13.6% did not express a clear opinion. This relatively positive perspective suggests a significant impact on public engagement, yet there is room for improvement or addressing concerns within a subset of respondents. The segment that did not express a clear opinion indicates potential for enhancing awareness and understanding of UN reform efforts through these platforms in the MENA region.

These insights collectively underscore varying regional perceptions regarding the effectiveness of social media platforms in popularizing and raising awareness about UN reform. The results emphasize the need for tailored communication strategies to address specific regional considerations and enhance public engagement in UN reform initiatives, taking into account both positive views and reservations expressed by survey respondents.

In this context, FOGGS, through Katoikos.world, has launched this series of articles on the results of the research conducted by the Global South Perspectives Network. aiming to contribute to increasing awareness of issues related to global governance reform. In this way, it seeks to facilitate access to information and ideas, promoting the engagement of various strategic social actors, such as journalists, academics, students, government representatives, and NGOs.

For 2024, FOGGS has planned a series of communication and dissemination actions, always committed to prioritizing and amplifying the voices of the Global South for a pluralistic, participatory, and effective UN reform.

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Francis M. O'Donnell <![CDATA[A world in disarray – we can do better than this]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20144 2023-12-10T12:47:15Z 2023-12-10T10:35:33Z America’s last chance to lead Yesterday, 9 December, was the International Day of Commemoration & Dignity of Victims of the Crime of Genocide & Prevention of this Crime. Yet, the international community continues to fail abysmally to prevent it, and to intercept, arrest and hold accountable those directly responsible; nor to adequately uphold Human Rights,...

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America’s last chance to lead

Yesterday, 9 December, was the International Day of Commemoration & Dignity of Victims of the Crime of Genocide & Prevention of this Crime. Yet, the international community continues to fail abysmally to prevent it, and to intercept, arrest and hold accountable those directly responsible; nor to adequately uphold Human Rights, whose day we mark today, on 10 December.

Hamas’ refusal to release all hostages, and continuing missile assaults on Israeli population centres, massively squander thousands of innocent Palestinian lives used as human shields. Whilst recognising Israel’s right to self-defence, the Netanyahu régime has massively squandered global sympathy for the victims of the atrocious assault and murders by Hamas on 7 October. And this is not to ignore the egregious Russian invasion of Ukraine, nor wars elsewhere, especially in Africa, nor looming Venezuelan aggression against Guyana.

My former United Nations colleagues in our “Peacemaking Reflection Group”[1] and I are disgusted. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ position now seems untenable, as he invoked Article 99 of the UN Charter for the first time in over 30 years, calling for a ceasefire to prevent further catastrophe and save innocent Palestinians, especially thousands of women and children, from a fate worse than their tragic Nakba, and to prevent further Hamas attacks on Israeli cities, towns and kibbutzim[2]. Guterres’ possible resignation, or even a statement to the effect that he is “reconsidering his position as SG”, might serve to send a politico-diplomatic shockwave around the world. But would it be enough anymore for a breakthrough consensus among the P5, the permanent veto-wielding UNSC members to whom the primary responsibility for global peace and governance is anachronistically entrusted? Let us see first how the vastly more-democratic UN General Assembly now considers that veto, within ten days of its casting, as it must in accordance with its own resolution (document A/77/L.52)[3].

America’s veto on the latest draft UN Security Council resolution[4], after Guterres invoked Art. 99, nonetheless undermines the UN & its secretary-general and prolongs Hamas’ dwindling capacity to wage its ruthless terror campaign. It also empowers Netanyahu’s régime to push Palestinians to south-west Gaza, the only area Israel dubiously says will be “safe”, i.e. “to the sea”. Ironically this reverses David Ben Gurion’s paranoid canard in his speech of 27 October 1961 to the Knesset[5], his suggestions of resettlement of Palestinian refugees notwithstanding. It is echoed today by the current Israeli government’s mooted plans for resettling Palestinian IDPs from Gaza, as reflected in recent exposures of the policy documents[6] and statements by its Minister of Intelligence, Gila Gamliel[7].

In retrospect, UNRWA’s remit is considered by some to have only prolonged and not resolved the displacement fate of millions of Palestinians, now into their 4th or 5th generation. It may have been better to have folded it into UNHCR which was created a year later in December 1950.

As for USA, if some lose faith in President Biden’s leadership even after the UN Secretary General, The Elders led by former Irish President Mary Robinson, and prevailing world opinion all urged him otherwise, some may abandon hope. On the other hand, US naval deployment in the eastern Mediterranean, two carrier strike groups[8], whilst ostensibly preventing any military adventurism by Israel’s neighbours or Iran, may also serve as a springboard for an eventual multinational force, preferably UN if not NATO, to impose a security cordon around Gaza, and enable reconstruction with international aid and the establishment of a civilian administration initially with UN support as done in Kosovo with NATO involvement, or in East Timor after Australian military deployment over two decades ago.

In these times of desperation at failures of global governance and multilateralism, and erosion of global norms, the rule of law, and human rights, it is from ancient Egypt that we have humanity’s first book. Ptah-Hotep’s brief wisdom literature can inspire us forward, written 4,500 years ago and long before the Torah, Bible, or Qu’ran, and their “modern” extremist religious fanatics, or corrupt ideological demagogues and their tyrants. Too few follow his 5th aphorism: “if you are a leader, who controls the affairs of many, then seek the most perfect way of performing your responsibility so that your conduct will be blameless[9].

So why can we not do better than current geopolitical disarray? Perhaps we CAN….

America’s primary role in the founding of the UN, vigorously and in a matter of months, pulling out all the diplomatic stops to do so, in what Stephen C. Schlesinger has rightly called an “Act of Creation”, places a very special responsibility on it to rediscover its creative influence at a time of rising global geopolitical competition[10].  There is less than a year to go now, for the UN Summit of the Future to re-engineer multilateralism and its primary global architecture. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict represents an almost unique opportunity for the P5 to forge a consensus that at least begins to resolve the world’s most intractable and dangerous conflict. More than anyone else, the ball is decidedly in Biden’s court, including to save American democracy, Israel’s, and multilateralism’s ailing life support.

[1] Peacemaking Reflection Group: https://www.foggs.org/prg/

[2] UN Secretary-General’s letter of 6 December 2023 to the President of the UN Security Council: https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/387/09/PDF/N2338709.pdf?OpenElement

[3] UN General Assembly resolution: https://press.un.org/en/2022/ga12417.doc.htm (initiated by Liechtenstein; adopted by consensus on 26 April 2022); see also: https://reliefweb.int/report/world/general-assembly-adopts-landmark-resolution-aimed-holding-five-permanent-security

[4] American veto: https://press.un.org/en/2023/sc15519.doc.htm

[5] Speech of Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion to the parliament, the Knesset: https://www.gov.il/en/Departments/General/13-statement-to-the-knesset-by-pm-ben-gurion-27-october-1961

[6] https://www.972mag.com/intelligence-ministry-gaza-population-transfer/

[7] https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/likud-minister-suggests-world-should-promote-voluntary-resettlement-of-gazans/

[8] https://cepa.org/article/huge-us-naval-force-off-israel-comes-with-costs/

[9] The Teachings of Ptah-Hotep (on less than 20 modern pages in translation by Battiscombe G. Gunn, 1912): https://archive.org/details/instructionptah00amengoog/page/n6/mode/2up?view=theater

[10] Schlesinger, Stephen C. The Art of Creation – The Founding of the United Nations – A Story of Superpowers, Secret Agents, Wartime Allies and Enemies, and Their Quest for a Peaceful World, Westview Press, 2003.

 

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Paola Bettelli <![CDATA[Inclusive Global Governance for a Peaceful and Resilient World: A Thought Note*]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20140 2023-12-07T11:31:49Z 2023-12-06T16:24:30Z It is broadly accepted that business as usual is not enough to effectively address the urgent global crises confronting humanity today, which range from wars of the traditional, geopolitical kind in Ukraine, Gaza, Yemen, Sudan and many other places to non-military threats like climate change, pandemics, food insecurity, inequalities and a self-serving global financial system....

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It is broadly accepted that business as usual is not enough to effectively address the urgent global crises confronting humanity today, which range from wars of the traditional, geopolitical kind in Ukraine, Gaza, Yemen, Sudan and many other places to non-military threats like climate change, pandemics, food insecurity, inequalities and a self-serving global financial system. Change is required to (re)build trust in and among governments and international organizations in terms of increased transparency, accountability and inclusiveness in decision-making, as well as effectiveness in bringing about results for the benefit of all, “not leaving anyone behind”.

Creating a safer, more resilient and sustainable world cannot be relegated from one UNFCCC COP to the next, nor from one UN Summit to another. Only by acting with urgency to confront the various crises at hand, on the basis of the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and existing institutional and operational tools improved as necessary, can we truly chart a path towards an effective multilateral system that works for all. It is a question of everybody doing their part for the desirable effect to be reached, from politicians and civil servants at all levels of government to religious, cultural and business leaders, civil society activists and the broader public. A special burden falls on national and international media, which should realize their responsibility not to present one-sided views of a given situation but respect in practice the principles of objectivity and inclusiveness in their reporting, aware of their mood-setting and educational role.

To reflect contemporary realities, peace and security need to be reframed through the lens of human security. No doubt, traditional wars are here to stay, as we were reminded in recent months, and have to be dealt with through well-tested peacemaking and peacebuilding tools, as foreseen in Chapters VI and VII of the UN Charter. Human survival, though, also requires  focusing on adequate preparedness and solidarity vis-à-vis different types of menaces that affect human resilience and wellbeing, such as climate change and pandemics. Mounting inequalities, government corruption and lack of transparency and accountability have also been identified as risk factors of this latter kind.

More emphasis needs to be placed on multilateral mechanisms to build trust and cooperation and thus resolve violent conflicts through peaceful means. The role of the UN as “violence interruptor” needs to be further developed and made central. For non-military threats, the creation of a Global Resilience Council, with an intergovernmental core and a constellation of non-state actor constituencies organically tied to it, would offer a human security counterpart to the Security Council’s traditional security threat considerations. The two together, with the Security Council duly reformed to regain its legitimacy and effectiveness, would cover the continuum of threats to peace and human security and would revitalize confidence in and the effectiveness of global governance arrangements through the UN.

Regarding current conflicts, including the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Hamas war, preventive action by the UN Secretary-General (Article 99 of the UN Charter) and negotiated outcomes by way of conciliation, arbitration and mediation (Article 33 of the Charter) are tools that exist for decades but have been underutilized. What is urgently needed, though, is practical steps such as convening an emergency summit, appointing a high-level envoy, and exploring avenues for good faith negotiations. Taking adequate consideration of historical grievances, root causes and using violence interruption methodologies can prepare the ground for negotiations towards a ceasefire, ending the loss of life and infrastructure destruction, while buying time for a negotiated settlement.

There is need for more candour and moral compass to overcome biases, structural and systemic inequalities and disparities. Acknowledging and understanding different epistemological and cognitive paradigms, such as those of indigenous populations, are necessary not only for paying due respect but also for bringing the experience and wisdom of those cultures to use for the common good. For example, learning by doing and speaking from the heart are some of the means through which indigenous peoples learn about the world, resolve conflicts amongst themselves and remain resilient while facing numerous adversities. The view points and voices of underprivileged countries and peoples, as well as of women and youth, are valuable for resolving longstanding issues entrenched in outdated mindsets.

Creating a culture of peace and resilience requires entertaining diverging opinions and enabling the conditions for civil debate – hence the importance of freedom of speech and objective media. The ability to freely associate oneself with a political view point, conviction, ethical consideration or religion is also paramount to the creation of a culture of solidarity and mutual respect. Strengthening institutions and the rule of law to protect these rights and freedoms is indispensable. There is a need for a more balanced approach where the Global South reclaims increased agency in global governance, thereby countering the claim by the West or the North to being the sole voices of the international community.

In sum, increased empathy, solidarity, transparency and accountability, grounded in ethics, truthfulness, equity, inclusivity and fairness are the necessary foundations for building a more peaceful and resilient world. Alternative perspectives from the Global South and underprivileged or marginalized groups can help build bridges and find innovative solutions in an increasingly polarized and fragmented international community. If the United Nations still has a useful role to play, and wants to play it, it should take initiatives and provide the fertile ground for all this to flourish. This takes moral strength and dedication to humanity, which is sought beyond words, in concrete actions.

 

* FOGGS and partners convened a whole-day event under the same title on 15 September 2023 in New York, on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly’s high-level segment. In the course of the event, two reports were launched, the first one prepared through the Global South Perspectives Network and entitled Global South Perspectives on Global Governance Reform (linked here), and the second prepared through the Peacemaking Reflection Group of former UN system staff (PRG) and entitled An Enhanced Role for the UN in Peace & Human Security (linked here). The agenda and the video recording of the event can be found at: https://www.foggs.org/foggs-partners-event-in-nyc-15-september-2023/ This Thought Note is partly based on what was discussed at the 15 September 2023, without purporting to be a summary of the discussions held there. The Note is also informed by subsequent discussions and events like the Israel-Hamas war that started on 7 October 2023.

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[Good soldier (Commentary on ongoing wars)]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20135 2023-12-01T08:28:21Z 2023-12-01T08:23:16Z La entrada Good soldier (Commentary on ongoing wars) aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[If only… (Commentary on COP28)]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20131 2023-12-01T08:31:00Z 2023-12-01T08:09:16Z La entrada If only… (Commentary on COP28) aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Mohammad Taher Gholi Tabar <![CDATA[Voices from the Middle East: Evaluating the UN’s Role in Peace and Security]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20125 2023-11-27T23:10:55Z 2023-11-27T22:42:14Z Introduction As the Middle East grapples with a myriad of intricate geopolitical challenges, the role played by the United Nations (UN) in ensuring peace and security becomes increasingly pivotal. This article aims to delve into the perspectives of Middle Eastern citizens regarding the capabilities and effectiveness of the UN in addressing the security threats prevalent...

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Introduction

As the Middle East grapples with a myriad of intricate geopolitical challenges, the role played by the United Nations (UN) in ensuring peace and security becomes increasingly pivotal. This article aims to delve into the perspectives of Middle Eastern citizens regarding the capabilities and effectiveness of the UN in addressing the security threats prevalent in the region. Additionally, it seeks to elucidate the expectations that Middle Eastern citizens have concerning the UN’s role. While drawing insights from the report titled Global South Perspectives on Global Governance Reform published by the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS) for contextual background, our primary focus is on distilling the sentiments of individuals residing in the Middle East, representing the broader spectrum of ordinary citizens, towards the UN’s initiatives in the realm of peace and security.

Furthermore, this paper aims to scrutinize whether the UN has been able to meet the needs and expectations of the Middle East, particularly in light of the recent conflict in Gaza. The examination of the UN’s response during this critical period serves as a lens through which we assess its effectiveness and relevance to the specific concerns and challenges faced by the Middle East. By addressing these dimensions, we aspire to contribute to a nuanced understanding of the dynamics between the Middle East and the UN in the realm of peace and security.

Perceived Threats and UN Effectiveness

The Middle East region faces a multitude of challenges, including wars, religious conflicts, terrorism, and organized crime, which significantly impact peace and security. When examining the sentiments of the region’s inhabitants regarding these issues, certain concerns consistently stand out. Religious conflicts, terrorism, and organized crime are seen as paramount threats to peace and security in the region.

It is important to note that while Middle Eastern residents recognize the need to address these challenges by their own means, they also acknowledge the role of international organizations in promoting global security and peace. However, there is a prevailing sentiment that their voices struggle to reach the United Nations  or encounter delays in being heard.

This perception of the UN’s (un)responsiveness and (in)effectiveness in upholding peace in the Middle East is influenced by several factors:

  1. Limited Representation: Middle Eastern populations often feel that their perspectives and concerns are inadequately represented within the UN system. This perception contributes to a sense of exclusion and a belief that their voices are not given sufficient weight in global decision-making processes.
  2. Political Interests and Power Dynamics: The Middle East is a region characterized by complex political dynamics and power struggles. Some residents believe that the UN’s actions and decisions are influenced by geopolitical considerations and the wishes of big powers, like the US and Russia, leading to a perceived lack of impartiality and fairness in addressing the region’s peace and security challenges.
  3. Slow Response and Incomplete Implementation of Resolutions: There is a perception that the UN’s response to peace and security issues in the Middle East is often slow and lacks effective implementation. Delays in taking action or the inability to enforce numerous resolutions, notably in the case of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, contribute to skepticism about and erode confidence in the UN’s ability to effectively address the region’s challenges.

While Middle Eastern residents may express concerns about the UN’s effectiveness, it is important to note that this does not necessarily amount to an outright dismissal of the organization or other international bodies. Instead, it reflects a belief that improvements are needed to ensure that their voices are more effectively heard and that the UN can act promptly and decisively in addressing the pressing peace and security challenges faced by the region.

Addressing these concerns requires fostering greater inclusivity, ensuring broader representation of Middle Eastern perspectives within the UN, and enhancing the organization’s responsiveness to the specific needs and priorities of the region. By actively engaging with the Middle East and addressing these challenges, the UN can work towards building trust and demonstrating its commitment to upholding peace and security in the region.

The Gaza Dilemma: A Test of UN Effectiveness

An undeniable testament to the challenges faced by the UN in the Middle East is the ongoing Gaza war. The inability to effectively enforce a permanent ceasefire and protect civilians highlights a broader issue: the UN’s limited capacity to act decisively in urgent and critical situations. This conflict sheds light on the unfolding humanitarian crisis and raises fundamental questions about the UN’s role as a neutral and effective force in the region.

Since the beginning of the conflict between Palestine and Israel, the UN Secretary-General has consistently called for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. However, these calls have yet to yield concrete results. In fact, Secretary-General Guterres was called upon to resign by the Israeli Ambassador to the UN when he tried to put this latest war in the context of the broader Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a statement to the UN Security Council.

Currently, Palestinian and Israeli authorities have agreed to a 4-day ceasefire, which also allows the UN to bring humanitarian supplies to Gaza, but it is widely acknowledged that this is not a lasting solution. The people of the Middle East expect the UN to serve as both their voice and arbiter in such conflicts, ensuring the protection of civilians and facilitating meaningful negotiations towards a sustainable peace.

The Gaza dilemma underscores the urgency of enhancing the UN’s effectiveness in crisis situations. It highlights the need for the organization to strengthen its mechanisms for conflict resolution, peacekeeping, and humanitarian assistance. Addressing the root causes of the hostilities, such as the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict, requires sustained and unbiased efforts from the international community, with the UN playing a central role.

Conclusion

The Middle East’s perspective on the UN’s role in peace and security reflects a complex interplay of expectations, frustrations, and aspirations. While many individuals recognize the importance of international organizations in addressing global challenges, there is a prevailing sentiment that the UN’s effectiveness in the region can be further enhanced.

To bridge this gap, the UN should prioritize inclusivity, ensuring that Middle Eastern voices are adequately represented in decision-making processes. It must strive for impartiality and demonstrate its commitment to upholding peace and security, even in complex and protracted conflicts. The Gaza war serves as a poignant reminder of the challenges faced by the UN in the Middle East, highlighting the need for greater capacity to act decisively in urgent situations.

Ultimately, the UN’s success in addressing peace and security challenges in the Middle East hinges on its ability to adapt, engage, and respond to the evolving needs and expectations of the region. By actively listening to the concerns of Middle Eastern citizens and working towards meaningful solutions, the UN can foster greater trust and demonstrate its relevance as a key actor in promoting peace and security in this critical region.

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[Bitter Truths]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20116 2023-11-17T22:37:26Z 2023-11-17T22:37:26Z La entrada Bitter Truths aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[The truth is in the middle…]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20105 2023-11-10T00:57:50Z 2023-11-10T00:52:49Z La entrada The truth is in the middle… aparece primero en Katoikos.

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[Call it whatever you want – just stop the killing]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20101 2023-11-10T10:27:31Z 2023-11-10T00:49:48Z Armistice Day is approaching, 11 November, the day that guns fell silent marking the end of the First World War in 1918. As we know, that was not the end of all wars, as much as the millions who suffered from it might have hoped. Wars did not even end after World War II and...

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Armistice Day is approaching, 11 November, the day that guns fell silent marking the end of the First World War in 1918. As we know, that was not the end of all wars, as much as the millions who suffered from it might have hoped. Wars did not even end after World War II and the bigger carnage and destruction that brought about, including letting the nuclear genie out of the bottle. So Armistice Day and its message are always en vogue, because of one or the other war unfolding somewhere in the world.

Fast forward to our days and hope keeps stumbling on dead bodies and destroyed lives, cities and livelihoods, but manages to live on. It is a desperate hope, that the carnage of warfare may end and people may live in peace with each other, resolving their disputes through negotiations, court cases, or other peaceful means. This was and remains the ultimate objective of the United Nations, “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our life-time has brought untold sorrow to mankind” (Preamble to the UN Charter – “twice” refers to the two World Wars). Speaking of the huge gap between lofty pronouncements and actual deeds…

The failures of humanity and its leaders are once again laid bare for everybody to see: Last year, in November 2022, the FOGGS family to which Katoikos.world belongs and the Peacemaking Reflection Group of former UN system staff (PRG) that FOGGS supports were focusing the Armistice Call they issued on the Russia-Ukraine war. This year, in November 2023, the war in Ukraine continues, along with many other wars around the world, but the main focus of attention is the new war that is raging in the Middle East.

This latest episode of the Israeli-Palestinian saga that is lasting for decades (or is it millennia?) started with a horrendous attack on Israel by Hamas militants, who unleashed a barrage of missiles and fighters on the ground, killing hundreds of civilians indiscriminately and taking a large number of hostages on 7 October 2023. The subsequent stage that we are now witnessing is a biblical act of vengeance and collective punishment that is costing the lives of thousands of Palestinians and is pushing the entire Gaza population into internal displacement, dispossession and hunger.

While all this is happening, the world’s major powers, including the US and the Europeans that generally support Israel, are apparently caught up in endless Orwellian discussions on whether Israel should be asked to abide by a humanitarian “pause”, or a series of “pauses” of a few hours each for humanitarian purposes, staying away from even mentioning a ceasefire that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu does not want to hear about. At the same time, civilians are asked at very short notice to leave areas targeted by Israel as presumed Hamas strongholds, the death toll is rising in Gaza (and the West Bank), and humanitarian provisions are only allowed in grossly inadequate quantities for addressing the mounting needs of the Gaza population. Not to mention the broader Middle East region that is close to boiling point.

A lasting “humanitarian truce” has, however, already been requested by a large majority of countries through their 27 October 2023 vote for a resolution to that effect in the UN General Assembly (the veto-plagued Security Council could not agree on a resolution, of course). As another monument to double standards, might is right, and “the international community is me” attitudes, the resolution is ignored by Israel and its Western allies, like Russia ignored the General Assembly resolutions passed against its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In both cases there is a long history of conflict that could keep the respective war going on for ever, but who would gain out of it, except for the arms industries and some shortsighted, extreme and megalomaniac leaders? Certainly not the people on either side of each conflict.

Human lives, though, do matter and that should be recognized in word and deed. A ceasefire, in both the Russia-Ukraine and the Israel-Palestine cases should not be considered as lack of courage or disrespect for one’s own dead people and unfulfilled national aspirations. Combined with temporary international administration of disputed territories, International Criminal Court (ICC) proceedings for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity by actors on all sides, and a respected negotiation process, it should become the standard way disputes are treated. This way precious lives would be spared, infrastructure preserved, and the big picture / context within which the root causes of the dispute may lie could also be discussed, in addition to the specific incident(s) that re-ignited the dispute.

Let us use the power of conviction and the reason of true leaders, of state and non-state actors and of individuals, each one of us, to push for the above standard to be broadly adopted and upheld in practice by all belligerents and their respective supporters. On this Armistice Day 2023 let us demand a permanent cessation of hostilities on all fronts, coupled with systematic and quick steps towards disarmament, globally. To be credible and have a chance to succeed in the quest for lasting peace, humanity and its leaders should finally commit to respecting the value of human life and dignity irrespective of skin colour, ethnicity, religion, gender, age or other diversifying characteristics, and should act accordingly in all circumstances, containing outbreaks of violence that otherwise will continue to pile more and more suffering all around.

Happy Armistice Day 2023!

[Text revised as of 10 November 2023, noon CET]

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Cilene Victor <![CDATA[Peace and security threats through the lens of the Global South]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20087 2023-11-04T00:01:50Z 2023-11-03T20:47:16Z A recent comprehensive survey conducted by the Global South Perspectives Network, an initiative of the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS) and the research group Humanitarian Journalism and Media Interventions (HumanizaCom) of the Methodist University of São Paulo, has offered a unique vantage point on the multifaceted landscape of peace and security threats across...

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A recent comprehensive survey conducted by the Global South Perspectives Network, an initiative of the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS) and the research group Humanitarian Journalism and Media Interventions (HumanizaCom) of the Methodist University of São Paulo, has offered a unique vantage point on the multifaceted landscape of peace and security threats across three significant regions: Latin America and the Caribbean (LATAM), Africa, and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). With a dataset comprising responses from 531 participants, 512 of them from the target regions (see survey ID map), this survey has provided valuable insights into the nuanced perceptions and challenges related to peace and security in these regions.

First and foremost, it is essential to underline the demographic commonalities that span across these regions. A majority of respondents, regardless of their regional origin, identified as male. The age distribution was notably diverse, with a prevalence of educators, students, and individuals with higher education qualifications.

Turning our attention to the core findings, participants were requested to rate the significance of various peace and security threats on a scale ranging from 1 to 5, with 1 signifying “not significant” and 5 denoting “extremely significant.” The findings underscore the complex and interconnected nature of peace and security challenges in the Global South. Organized crime, including drug trafficking, emerged as a persistent and alarming concern shared across all three regions. This underscores the enduring menace that transnational criminal networks pose to peace and security in the Global South.

In both Africa and MENA, religious conflicts garnered noteworthy attention, indicating a heightened sensitivity to the interplay of faith and security in these regions. In LATAM, religious conflicts were generally considered less significant, unlike ethnic conflicts, which were perceived as significant, rooted in historical exploitation and marginalization of Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities. This calls for a deeper examination of the historical and sociopolitical dynamics at play.

While conflicts with neighbouring or distant countries were not regarded as substantial threats to peace and security, internal conflicts and civil wars retained a salient presence in all three regions. These findings signal a relative stability in inter-state relations across these regions, with diverse experiences and attitudes towards internal conflict.

Profound skepticism was evident in the way respondents evaluated the effectiveness of the United Nations in addressing the peace and security threats. Whether in LATAM, Africa, or MENA, the overall sentiment towards the UN’s actions leaned predominantly towards them being considered moderately effective or, more starkly, ineffective.

This pervasive skepticism does more than just raise questions; it triggers a fundamental reassessment of the mechanisms and approaches employed by international organizations, specifically the United Nations, their relevance and adequacy for the diverse contexts and concerns that permeate the Global South. This skepticism is a call for more tailored and region-specific approaches that not only address the immediate issues but also account for the historical, cultural, and sociopolitical nuances that shape the peace and security landscape in each region. In essence, it signifies a moment of reckoning for international organizations, urging them to align their efforts more closely with the actual needs and aspirations of the communities they purport to serve.

The core findings of the survey, particularly the persistent threat of organized crime, religious conflicts in Africa and MENA, and ethnic conflicts in LATAM, point to the complex and interconnected peace, security and socio-economic challenges that require coordinated international efforts to be adequately addressed.

The recognition that current UN mechanisms and approaches may not be adequately adapted to the diverse contexts and concerns of the Global South necessitates a reassessment of how the UN addresses these multifaceted challenges and serves as a wake-up call for the world body. At the same time, these results underscore the pivotal role of multilateralism. The challenges highlighted in the survey are not limited to a single nation but transcend borders. As such, effective solutions must involve collaboration and coordination on a global scale through a reinvigorated commitment to multilateralism.

 

* With contributions from Andrea Waichman and Olivia Simão (LATAM) and Mahdy Yusofi (MENA), members of the Global South Perspectives Network that is convened by Cilene Victor (HumanizaCom) and Georgios Kostakos (FOGGS). This is the first in a series of articles based in whole or in part on the analysis of the Global South Perspectives Network survey results, which have been previously presented in the report entitled “Global South Perspectives on Global Governance Reform” of September 2023. FOGGS wishes to acknowledge the kind support of the Global Challenges Foundation that made the survey and the report possible.

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Peacemaking Reflection Group https://www.foggs.org/prg <![CDATA[Statement on the Situation in Israel-Palestine]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20079 2023-10-24T21:07:24Z 2023-10-24T20:32:25Z As Members of the Peacemaking Reflection Group (PRG), composed of former UN civil servants,  we are alarmed by the crisis situation in Israel and Gaza. We unequivocally reject and condemn the heinous attacks launched by Hamas on 7 October 2023 and the taking of civilian hostages. We welcome and support the approach the UN Secretary-General...

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As Members of the Peacemaking Reflection Group (PRG), composed of former UN civil servants,  we are alarmed by the crisis situation in Israel and Gaza. We unequivocally reject and condemn the heinous attacks launched by Hamas on 7 October 2023 and the taking of civilian hostages. We welcome and support the approach the UN Secretary-General has chosen in his OpEd article in the New York Times on 13 October. He rightfully chose to look at the situation from the perspective of both the Israeli and the Palestinian people.

We urge the members of the Security Council to follow the Secretary-General’s approach and agree on measures to defuse the current crisis guiding the parties towards implementation of the two-state solution and peaceful coexistence. As a first step, we call for the immediate and unconditional release of all civilian hostages, demanding their safety, well-being, and dignified treatment in compliance with international humanitarian law and urge the Israeli authorities to reciprocate by releasing Palestinians currently in administrative detention. We are heartened by the recent release of some hostages.

All available measures should be taken to protect the civilian population on both sides from harm, especially the most vulnerable including children, the elderly, people with disabilities and women. In this regard, we echo the UN Secretary-General’s call for an immediate ceasefire to allow full, rapid, safe and unhindered humanitarian access and cross-border delivery by UN agencies and their implementing partners, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and other impartial humanitarian organizations, to the whole of Gaza and affected areas of Israel. We value interventions by world leaders that have opened the door for an initial convoy of humanitarian deliveries and expect their continuation and increase, in proportion to the rapidly mounting needs.

We stand in full solidarity with our UN colleagues working courageously to provide critical, lifesaving assistance and protection to civilians amidst live fire. Their safety, neutrality and operational capacity must be preserved. We urge the international community to increase funding and support for urgently needed relief efforts, including those undertaken by UNRWA, WHO, WFP and ICRC. Their impartial work is vital and must continue without interference.

We recognize the need to understand the complex circumstances driving this conflict. Both Israelis and Palestinians have legitimate grievances stemming from generations of displacement, oppression, marginalization and violence they have suffered. These painful histories do not justify atrocities, but they must be considered in order to facilitate dialogue and reconciliation. Lasting peace cannot be achieved through military force.

Violence causes more violence. As we have observed too many times – and again in this conflict, retaliation predictably  leads to further violence and further loss of life. We urge the UN Secretary-General and other well-placed mediators to work with the authorities in Israel and Palestine to rapidly establish methods of violence interruption. As first steps, expressions of hate and all threats of annihilation of one by the other should be condemned and removed from all political discourse. All attacks on civilians should cease from both sides, as should all Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank and East Jerusalem and the arbitrary arrest of Palestinians. These measures can prevent further atrocities and should become an integral part of any international or regional peace process. We welcome the Cairo Peace Summit of 21 October as a first step in that direction. Promoting a culture of peace through robust public education and mass media initiatives to denormalize violence, while pro-actively seeking long-term and mutually acceptable political solutions, is urgently needed to end the Israel-Palestine  conflict.

The Peacemaking Reflection Group recognizes that introducing and then pursuing such a balanced approach centred around the well-being and security of all civilians demands a lot of ‘staying power’ by all, in particular the UN Security Council and the UN Secretary-General, along with the leadership of the parties and others involved. It appears to us that the Security Council could still find ways to agree on a combined resolution from among the drafts recently put before it. We strongly encourage efforts by the Secretary-General and his staff to assist the parties to find ways of stopping the current violence and moving towards lasting peaceful coexistence.

21 October 2023

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Manuela Tortora <![CDATA[The Role of International Geneva in the UN 2.0]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20071 2023-10-19T08:57:04Z 2023-10-19T08:24:14Z Those who believe in the need for a stronger and more efficient UN are increasingly concerned about its future. The whole humanity should be concerned. The horizon shows growing selfish nationalisms and arms race, no appetite for more multilateral cooperation, and in particular a paralysed Security Council. While in the UN in New York pessimism...

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Those who believe in the need for a stronger and more efficient UN are increasingly concerned about its future. The whole humanity should be concerned. The horizon shows growing selfish nationalisms and arms race, no appetite for more multilateral cooperation, and in particular a paralysed Security Council. While in the UN in New York pessimism seems to dominate all minds, in Geneva, delegates, secretariats, NGOs continue working. The agenda of International Geneva is essential for any « UN 2.0 » that humankind can envisage if it wants to survive. It is not a « collateral » to the political agenda.

 What is “International Geneva”

This ecosystem encompasses 40 international organisations ( five UN specialised agencies and several UN entities), 180 Permanent Missions, 400 NGOs.[1] It is an amazing concentration of experts, delegates, negotiators interacting daily, producing data, analyses, ideas.

What makes Geneva unique among other UN headquarters is the scope and relevance of its agenda.  From humanitarian aid, refugees and migration to internet governance, from international trade to global health, from intellectual property to economic development, from human rights to biodiversity, from employment and social protection policies to climate change, almost all the “non-military threats” and the “roots of current multifaceted crises”[2] are addressed in Geneva.

Considering the danger of a nuclear conflict, can we take the risk of a multilateral system driven by short-sighted political goals? Rather the other way around: economic, social, environmental and human rights goals should be the driving force leading political decisions.

Why International Geneva matters in any debate on a “UN 2.0”

Three key features make the Geneva ecosystem highly relevant today and for the future.

First, the analytical, negotiating and consensus-building work is mainly normative and regulatory. It aims at establishing rules and mechanisms to manage the globalisation processes. The UN Charter values and the SDGs move from theory to reality each time a multilateral instrument is used in Geneva: a WHO regulation on global health, a Human Rights Council resolution, a WTO agreement on international trade, an ILO convention on rights and obligations for workers and employers, an ITU debate on the “terra incognita” of AI. There are many nuances and shortcomings in this normative landscape, from legally binding provisions to «best endeavour» recommendations or symbolic declarations. But they represent decades of multilateralism – a political treasure still to be fully assessed and understood.

Secondly, Geneva reaches the “country level” with the information, research, rules and standards it produces, but also with its role in transforming that work into concrete world-wide technical assistance through countless trainings, capacity building programmes, policy advice and advocacy. The humanitarian assistance is the most visible in the headlines, but whenever a policymaker says to a UN expert: « I changed my mind following your training », the reward is more significant than a headline.

Finally, Geneva is a puzzle: it is the main multilateral crossroads of intersectoral issues characterising increasingly complex crises. The list of linkages among multilateral topics is long: trade, food security and health; migration, refugees and climate change; human rights, health, employment and social security policies; gender, electronic commerce and economic development; intellectual property, access to vaccines and technology; labour markets and artificial intelligence; internet governance and digital economy; blue and green economies, supply chains and investments…

How to strengthen the bridges between UN Geneva and UN New York

What lessons can be drawn from the Geneva experience? Can the trust being built on these «technical» topics be capitalised and transferred from Geneva to New York? How can the exchanges between experts and decision-makers lead to knowledge-based policies following the Geneva approach? How can all the global public goods – peace in the first place – be managed in a constructive way for the sake of common interests?

As in New York, there is frustration in Geneva because geopolitics contaminates many negotiations. But the ambiance is still more positive, starting with Swiss public opinion and politicians that do not practice the sport of criticising the UN for the fun of it.

Some actions could stimulate a positive contagion of New York by the Geneva atmosphere and «technical » work:

First, the proposal to establish a Global Resilience Council[3] as a subsidiary body of the General Assembly (or of ECOSOC) to address the « non-military threats » deserves attention – particularly for the Geneva agenda, grounded on these threats. The proposal for this Council, beyond political support, requires a solid and transparent articulation with the Geneva ecosystem, above the traditional interagency silos. It could be a catalyst to ensure, more than coordination, coherence of values and ideas within the UN system.

Secondly, civil society has to be mobilised. Where are the Greta Thunbergs willing to take to the streets to defend the UN values, clamouring for a « UN 2.0 » for future generations? Debates among academics and diplomats on the niceties of the Charter are necessary, but weak and ineffective if they do not involve citizens. This includes the private sector: Geneva is well equipped to develop more dialogues and cooperation between diplomats, researchers and businessmen.[4]

Finally, all players in New York and Geneva should intensify their contacts before the Summit of the Future.[5] They should take stock together of the SDGs. They should act together to raise awareness on multilateralism. They should identify how the work done in Geneva could bring oxygen, substance and steam to the New York process.

[1] https://www.geneve-int.ch/genevainternational

[2] Terms used by Georgios Kostakos in https://www.foggs.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/PRG-Booklet-on-An-Enhanced-Role-for-the-UN-in-Peace-and-Human-Security-Final10Sept2023_FOGGS-Papers-2023.pdf , see in particular p.42.

[3] Proposal made by FOGGS: https://www.foggs.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/PRG-Booklet-on-An-Enhanced-Role-for-the-UN-in-Peace-and-Human-Security-Final10Sept2023_FOGGS-Papers-2023.pdf   p.40.

[4] GESDA, the Geneva Science and Diplomacy Anticipator is a good example. https://gesda.global/

[5] Scheduled to take place in September 2024.

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[Israel-Palestine: A monumental failure of leadership and humanity]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20062 2023-10-11T15:37:28Z 2023-10-11T08:30:13Z The carnage in Israel and the Gaza Strip seems to have no end, with hundreds if not thousands of fatalities on both sides and a region ready to explode. Who is to blame and how can this end? Peace or justice first, under whose interpretation and on what terms? For people like me who have...

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The carnage in Israel and the Gaza Strip seems to have no end, with hundreds if not thousands of fatalities on both sides and a region ready to explode. Who is to blame and how can this end? Peace or justice first, under whose interpretation and on what terms?

For people like me who have been following the Palestinian-Israeli saga over many years what is happening now is nothing new, but it is of a different complexity and scale. The “shock and awe”, multi-front and multi-means attack on Israel by Hamas is unprecedented and has apparently taken by surprise the Israeli and other renowned intelligence services. Similarly, the severity of Israel’s response seems well placed to break past records too, with the fate of more than two million Palestinian residents of Gaza hanging in the balance.

As is often the case, especially when guerilla groups are involved, it is civilians on both sides that bear the brunt of this conflict, suffering physical and emotional wounds that will be very difficult to heal. And yet, for those who attempt an attack from one or the other side it is or it should be known that the conflict will not be solved, the decisive blow will not be delivered to the opponent, shared peace and prosperity will become an even more distant dream shared by fewer and fewer people… Perhaps this is what they are seeking, extremists on all sides (to include interested regional and global actors)?

Absolute beliefs, involving absolute “truths” and claiming a direct line to God, lead to a shut-down of inhibitions and absolute crimes “with the blessing of God”. It is difficult to reason with people who hold such beliefs, unfortunately too many of them on both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most political and religious leaders encourage this, either because they actually share the absolute beliefs or because they see this as the way to gain and hold on to power. One would hope that there would be enough sane voices to moderate if not pacify the extreme feelings but no, national unity is achieved at the most nationalistic level, in a survival mode, against the other side that is portrayed as (in)human vermin and should be eliminated.

If there are not, as is apparent, enough safety valves within the two communities in conflict, what about external actors that may be able to defuse the situation? Unfortunately, one cannot find many honest brokers in this conflict, and that shows from statements made by leaders around the world on the occasion of the latest conflagration too. Long past are the days when Clinton was bringing together Arafat and Barak at Camp David to talk peace.

The two-state solution – Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace, with the respective parts of Jerusalem as their capitals – has repeatedly been recognized as the only way forward. The two-state solution cannot happen, though, with Israeli settlements expanding in the West Bank, East Jerusalem encroached upon, Gaza an open-air prison and every movement of people and goods controlled by Israel, with periodic strikes to remind who is in control. There is no respect, no human dignity, no fairness of any kind in this. The two-state solution cannot happen either if the right of Israel to exist is not accepted by the Palestinian population and the Muslim world more broadly, not only on grounds of economic or diplomatic expediency but in a deeper sense of mutual recognition and respect.

One cannot but feel deeply sorry for all the lives that are being lost on both sides of this latest confrontation in the Middle East. Every effort needs to be made by the UN, the EU, states of the region and beyond to bring an end to the killing and destruction. Anybody with clout and reasonable policies that recognize the interests and frustrations of both sides should intervene as soon as possible. This is for the sake of the people directly affected by this war but also for the rest of the region and the world.

Nobody should want to see more people shot or bombed, abducted or mistreated, nobody should have to deal with a population of millions strangled through starvation and severance of basic utilities, nobody should want to see another front with global repercussions festering for months and years and becoming part of a global confrontation. For those believing that they are safely afar let them selfishly think of potential refugee flows, spreading terrorist acts, skyrocketing energy prices and more that could affect them, even across the oceans. For all those trying to play God, let them remember of hubris and its destructive impact first and foremost on those who display it and those around them. For the rest of us, we should not allow anybody claiming to be bringing their heaven on earth to make it hell for all of us.

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Jeffrey Gorham <![CDATA[A Race to the Bottom? Mining the Seabed for Critical Minerals]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20056 2023-09-13T12:34:53Z 2023-09-13T12:34:53Z State of play The monumental task of the clean energy transition has touched every corner of the globe, and soon may go even deeper than ever before: the bottom of the ocean. In the race to secure critical minerals needed for a variety of technologies, notably electric vehicle (EV) batteries, some companies have launched exploration...

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State of play

The monumental task of the clean energy transition has touched every corner of the globe, and soon may go even deeper than ever before: the bottom of the ocean. In the race to secure critical minerals needed for a variety of technologies, notably electric vehicle (EV) batteries, some companies have launched exploration missions onto the ocean seabed. Thousands of feet below the surface, a trove of minerals lies untouched, and many want to keep it that way. The battle over the ocean floor came to a head in July of this year, as the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the international organization in charge of deep-sea mining, met to establish a series of rules for mining operations.

The targeted area for mining operations is the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ), a 6 million square kilometer area in the Pacific, located between Hawaii and Mexico. On the CCZ ocean floor rests mineral-rich nodules containing nickel, copper, cobalt, iron, manganese, and rare earth elements, which are critical inputs into technologies that can reduce greenhouse gas emissions. On one side, opponents of deep-sea mining raise environmental concerns, including the potential to harm biodiversity on the ocean floor. As scientists study this region, more species are being discovered, and many are calling for a moratorium on any mining until the full impact of operations can be better assessed. Proponents, including The Metals Company, a Canadian-based mining company, emphasize the speed required for electrification to stave off the worst effects of the climate crisis, as net-zero pathways require a huge increase in mineral use. In the Sustainable Development Scenario of the International Energy Agency (IEA), nickel demand is set to skyrocket by 2040 for a plethora of clean energy technology, including a 40-fold increase in nickel demand for EVs alone.

This past month, opponents to deep-sea mining won a victory, as the ISA postponed a decision on mining regulations under pressure from activists and sovereign governments, notably Chile, Costa Rica, and France. Although a blow to the mining sector, this battle is far from over. The Metals Company still intends to submit an application to begin mining the seabed, in partnership with Nauru, at the next ISA meeting in July 2024.

 

Difficult Tradeoffs

The fight over the ocean floor poses larger questions about how to tackle the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. How can we balance biodiversity loss and localized environmental damage with the race to cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and the broader consequences rampant climate change is having? The climate crisis poses an existential threat to humanity, as more frequent and intense extreme weather events are already disrupting lives and livelihoods around the world, while higher sea levels and extreme heat will make wide swathes of currently inhabited land unlivable. The race to curb the climate crisis has already fallen behind, with the World Meteorological Organization predicting a 66% chance that we will cross the 1.5°C threshold by 2027.

Biodiversity loss and climate change are inextricably linked and feed into each other in a vicious cycle. Diverse ecosystems, like wetlands, forests, and mangroves, act as carbon sinks, serving as guardrails to reduce the quantity of GHGs that get trapped in the atmosphere. The destruction of these ecosystems makes each ton of CO2 emissions that much more perilous to the survival of humanity. Conversely, a warming climate already threatens biodiversity, even beyond the direct human activity that harms it. The UN estimates that if warming increases to an average of 2°C over pre-industrial levels, global coral reefs will diminish by 99%. Both climate change and biodiversity must be central pillars of global action, but time is running out.

Deep-sea mining will damage biodiversity on the seabed, although the exact degree is a matter of debate. However, existing onshore mining practices are already having harsh local environmental impacts, and this should be considered in the debate about deep-sea mining. Indonesia is the world’s largest producer of nickel, but its practices have led to water pollution, rainforest loss, and harm to local indigenous communities, in addition to GHG emissions from the coal required to mine and process nickel. With these impacts and the projected surge in nickel demand, other sources must be developed. Perhaps the biodiversity impacts of deep-sea mining are too great to ignore, and caution is warranted, but the quantity of minerals required will only continue to grow and options are limited. As with most minerals, nickel is geographically concentrated, with over 50% of all reserves found in Indonesia, Australia, Russia, South Africa, and Canada. Estimates place the quantity of deep-sea nickel reserves at 300 million tons, which would almost double the known global reserves. In the face of limitations for sustainable growth for onshore nickel production, the deep sea could offer a path forward.

 

The Big Picture

Examples abound across the energy transition of tradeoffs, where climate goals must be weighed against biodiversity loss, impacts on indigenous communities, and localized pollution. Whether it is transmission lines that would connect renewable energy projects to population centers or offshore wind projects that coastal communities oppose, energy transition-related projects will continue to face criticism and backlash, much of it valid. Two things are for certain: We need massive changes to the way we get our energy, and that will have negative local impacts. Projects should be carried out thoughtfully, with measures taken to minimize the environmental and social costs of projects. Furthermore, clean technology alone will not solve the climate crisis, and societies must also find ways to live more sustainably and use less energy. However, if every climate-focused project turns into a battle, the delays will prevent us from tackling the greatest problem of our era.

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Alejandro Zurita <![CDATA[Nuclear Facilities as Military Targets – The Zaporizhzhia Case*]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20047 2023-08-17T18:01:01Z 2023-08-15T20:55:58Z For the first time in history, a nuclear power plant has become a military objective during a war. While previous military operations at the Iraqi Osirak reactor (1981), the Iranian Bushehr plant (1987) and the Slovenian Krško plant (1991) were somewhat ad hoc, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant continues to be contested between the parties...

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For the first time in history, a nuclear power plant has become a military objective during a war. While previous military operations at the Iraqi Osirak reactor (1981), the Iranian Bushehr plant (1987) and the Slovenian Krško plant (1991) were somewhat ad hoc, the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant continues to be contested between the parties as a target in the war in Ukraine, a new and unprecedented situation for which the international community is unprepared. The nuclear research centres KINR in Kyiv and NSC-KIPT in Kharkiv have also been affected.

This highlights the lack of a ratified global agreement or treaty on non-aggression against nuclear facilities. The 1977 Additional Protocol I of the 1949 Geneva Conventions refers to international armed conflicts and in its Article 56 to certain restrictions on the protection of facilities with potential impact on population. The Russian Federation withdrew in 2019 its previous ratification of the Protocol. Among other countries, the USA never ratified the Protocol and explicitly rejects Article 56 in its Law of War Manual of the US Department of Defence. The 1979 Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and Nuclear Facilities of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) does not cover military attacks on nuclear facilities either. Recent attempts to correct this situation at the 2022 Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and at the 2022 IAEA General Conference failed. A reactivation of the Nuclear Security Summit, which has been inactive since 2016, could also be an influential forum to seek consensus and begin to reverse the current situation.

The above points to a certain legal vacuum, which may formally mean that attacking a nuclear facility may not be illegal. There is, therefore, an urgent need for a global convention or treaty on non-aggression against nuclear facilities to prevent such facilities from being used as military targets. The very existence of international rules should prevent the normalisation of potential future attacks during armed conflicts, should delegitimise any warlike action on nuclear facilities and should deny the possibility of justifying such action.

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant was taken over militarily in March 2022 by Russia and continues to be mainly operated by Ukrainian staff. After the outbreak of the war, the IAEA established seven pillars of nuclear safety and security to assess risks in wartime contexts. The IAEA inspectors sent by the UN Security Council to Zaporizhzhia in September 2022 concluded that all these pillars were compromised and recommended specific actions, plus the establishment of a safety protection zone without military equipment around the plant. Furthermore, the UN Security Council endorsed in May 2023 five concrete principles established by the IAEA essential for averting a catastrophic incident at the Zaporizhzhia plant.

The gradual loss of safety levels and margins in Zaporizhzhia is brewing a potential slow-motion disaster to the frustration of the international community. Certainly, the insecure electricity supply necessary to maintain its safety systems, the difficulties in maintaining its coolant inventory as a result of the recent destruction of the Kakhovka dam, the dispute over the plant with detonations on the war front and with mines placed between the site’s internal and external perimeter barriers, as well as the current insufficiency of staff to ensure adequate maintenance of all the equipment, are all elements that make the situation of the Zaporizhzhia plant unsustainable in the medium term. Indeed, in the event of a total external power outage, the plant must be operated with emergency diesel generators as a last resort, which occurred in October 2022 for the first time in the plant’s 37-year history, and which has already occurred seven times since.

Zaporizhzhia needs to be protected. A complete and definitive lack of coolant would cause a fuel meltdown accident with the release of radioactive products, which could have a transboundary and indiscriminate impact affecting various countries. Such a scenario would alter the course of the conflict, leading to possible external humanitarian interventions and escalating the confrontation.

The war in Ukraine also represents a major challenge for global nuclear safety and security since the standards and guides for nuclear safety and protection of the IAEA cannot be currently applied to nuclear facilities in armed conflicts. This war should legitimize the IAEA to monitor and support nuclear facilities in war contexts, with the UN mandate be rethought and adapted so that the IAEA Commission and Safety Standards Committees could fully develop the safety standards and guidelines for wartime environments.

In theory, nobody wants a nuclear accident, but for the first time, a nuclear power plant is being disputed as a military target on a war front, with both contenders accusing each other of misinformation and of preparing sabotage or terrorist actions at the power plant. With various safety margins decreasing, Zaporizhzhia is in a kind of grace period that is not infinite. A possible slow-motion disaster has been brewing for a long time and the world must be able to act now before it happens.

*This is a summary of an extensive paper on the subject written by Dr. Zurita and published by FOGGS – for the full paper see here.

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Louis Edoa <![CDATA[Targets designed in the 17 Sustainable Development Goals will not be achieved in communities such as Pós-Balsa in Brazil]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20023 2023-08-01T13:25:43Z 2023-08-01T13:01:54Z Quality of life, access to clean water, basic sanitation, decent living conditions, and good education remain far from the reality of the population. In October 2016, with the sanction, by the President of the Republic, of Decree No. 8.892 of October 27, 2016, Brazil officially adopted the 2030 Agenda together with other UN member states,...

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Quality of life, access to clean water, basic sanitation, decent living conditions, and good education remain far from the reality of the population.

In October 2016, with the sanction, by the President of the Republic, of Decree No. 8.892 of October 27, 2016, Brazil officially adopted the 2030 Agenda together with other UN member states, with the aim of achieving the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which cover social, economic, and environmental objectives for a better life for all. SDG fulfillment depends on actions by governments at all levels, civil society, the private sector, and all citizens. However, while it is clear that some communities and locations in the world will reach most if not all, of the SDGs by 2030, others will continue to live in precarious situations. This is the case of the Pós-Balsa community in the municipality of São Bernardo do Campo, located in the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo.

With a population of approximately 20,000 inhabitants, representing around 2.5% of the municipality’s population, the Pós-Balsa community is socially excluded and relegated to social invisibility. Residents have no access to the basic social rights described and defended by the SDGs, and also present in the Brazilian Federal Constitution, which guarantees decent living conditions such as basic sanitation, access to health, quality education, drinking water, and quality food. Every day, it’s necessary to face precarious public transport, irregular housing, poor quality of the health system, and a disastrous educational system. Even though most of the region has only access to the ferry, which often suffers from technical problems, forcing residents to wait in line for up to 3 hours to get to other regions of the city to work, study, go to the doctor, the bank, or the supermarket.

The Ferry is the only access the population has to reach the rest of the city.  Photo: Louis Edoa

The community is located in the Billings Dam basin, which makes the region an area of ​​preservation and protection of water sources, requiring special care and attention from authorities at different levels (municipal, state, and federal). However, because it is located in this area, the community is abandoned, and the population is made invisible.

This situation experienced by the community goes against the commitment assumed to promote the 17 SDGs. For, from the eradication of poverty, which is the most painful point in the life of the community’s population, to Goal 17, partnerships in favor of the goals, none of them is presently implemented in the region. No health service brings well-being to the population, education is of poor quality, lack of basic sanitation, and clean water, a factor that directly interferes with the environment, as sewage is disposed of in the open.

Another finding is that the majority of the population is composed of black people (black and brown), indigenous people, women (often single mothers), poor people, or descendants, a sample of Brazilian minorities, excluded, marginalized, and constantly under-represented in the corridors of power. Also, due to a lack of education, we have a population of workers who end up gathering around jobs such as house or street cleaners, doormen, salespeople, store attendants, waiters, etc.

 

Community mobilization

Despite all the difficulties they face, residents of the community are looking for ways to improve their conditions and preserve the environment they regard as their home. This led them to join forces and create the Post-Balsa Solidarity Committee, which seeks to bring together in communion and solidarity the various entities and citizens of the region. Its purpose is to fight for the recognition and representation of the community, promoting actions of dialogue and solidarity, human well-being, and environmental protection in a network, in addition to democratically seeking improvements for the community and engaging in dialogue with the government to that end.

Based on the conviction that responsible social coexistence is possible, the guarantee of people’s basic rights and environmental protection and preservation throughout the Pós-Balsa region, the Committee accepts divergent points of view but seeks to converge towards consensus through reasoning and enlightened dialogue. It is also open to partnerships with the public authorities and the private sector, but it is by nature a civil society movement. One of its struggles is non-discrimination, whether due to skin color, religion, sexual orientation, gender, origin, being physically or mentally disabled, ideological convictions, or any other reason.

 

Challenges of achieving the SDGs in Brazil

Despite presenting some important advances in the implementation of the SDGs, Brazil’s actions are insufficient to achieve the goals within the stipulated timeframe. The strategy adopted by the country has many restrictions, such as failures in the coordination of institutions and deficiency in inclusion and transparency. Furthermore, Brazil entered the stage of implementation of the goals at a time marked by economic recession and political instability. However, the country is considered a reference in good practices related to the consolidation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which preceded the SDGs. However, as the challenges in the public sector persist, this creates doubts about the expected achievement of the SDGs by 2030.

In the Pós-Balsa community, the biggest challenges to fulfilling the SGDs are the increase in poverty, and lack of government investment in areas such as health and education. As it is a Watershed Protection area, insufficient investments in the environmental area, as well as the decrease in inspection, had negative consequences and compromised the entire SDG 9. Another challenge is inequalities, the drop in public investments in all social areas: health, education, social assistance, culture, science, and technology point to an increase in social inequalities.

Faced with so many challenges, it is not possible to expect only government measures. It is important that everyone contributes to lower rates, improve the environment, and adopt measures that help achieve global goals. The Pós-Balsa community so well that it barely understood that it could help in actions such as preserving the environment, and promoting voluntary actions that collaborate with vulnerable people, because everyone can be part of this movement.

Photo: Louis Edoa

 

 

 

 

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[Global Resilience (Council) – If not now, when?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20018 2023-07-24T07:12:24Z 2023-07-24T07:08:29Z It has been a hot, unbearable summer in the Northern Hemisphere. Wherever the temperatures are not breaking new records and the forest fires are not filling the air with suffocating smoke and other pollutants it is the floods that are hitting the high mark, including in places where water is becoming worryingly scarce over time....

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It has been a hot, unbearable summer in the Northern Hemisphere. Wherever the temperatures are not breaking new records and the forest fires are not filling the air with suffocating smoke and other pollutants it is the floods that are hitting the high mark, including in places where water is becoming worryingly scarce over time. We are not talking only about developing countries, where you would expect disasters to happen more frequently because of lacking infrastructure, imperfect planning and underfunded response mechanisms. It is the very core of the developed world in North America and Europe, as well as in East Asia, that is suffering too. In a perfect storm that has been gathering for years, human-made climate change and natural phenomena, notably El Niño, are coming together to challenge human hubris of planetary dominance, as expressed most recently in the official pronouncement of the start of “the Anthropocene” (“Anthropo-ending period” would be more accurate, under the circumstances).

What are the most powerful societies of the most powerful being on the planet doing in response? Not much, really, other than drinking more water while they can still find to survive the successive heat waves it and mobilizing military forces to fight forest fires and floods (which is much better than killing other people, one might point out). Otherwise, politics and business continue as usual, playing their big games that traditionally ignore the small people and the planet with its other species. It is a historic(al) irony and certainly a cause for at least a grin by the proverbial or actual Mother Earth that decisions keep being made to divert even more resources to armaments and continue pointless homicidal wars when the very survival of the human species is at stake. Moral compass? Broken – permanently showing South. The common enemy is “ad portas”, or has rather entered the human fort, but the human neighbourhoods keep throwing their projectiles and their garbage at each other, faithful to a game that they have been playing for ages. Will they ever learn?

The rhetoric continues about the need for urgent climate action, together with other wise advice to the powerful, notably the need to reform the global financial system and lighten the debt burden of developing countries. No action, though, to speak of. Maybe we are waiting for UNFCCC COP28 in Dubai to deal with all this, which it won’t because it has no operational role of any kind and this is much bigger than anything a gathering of climate negotiators can deal with. Or the UN Secretary-General’s Climate Ambition Summit in September will really unite world leaders in action; although most probably it will result in another ambitiously worded declaration with no impact on the real world. Or perhaps we are waiting for the Summit of the Future in September 2024 to give the Secretary-General the permission he thinks he needs to convene an Emergency Platform, as per his March 2023 policy brief on the subject. It feels like the orchestra is playing its usual tune while the Titanic is sinking…

The unhappy ending is not inevitable, though, or so one wants to believe. Human ingenuity and all that can still be summoned and a good fight at least put up, before it is really too late. What is needed? Let’s start from basics: “…the least diversion for armaments of the world’s human and economic resources” (quoting Article 26 of the UN Charter). Let’s use the world’s human and economic resources to adapt to extreme weather events, the rich countries by paying for it themselves and the developing with own resources but also that 100 billion annual package lost in the mail, plus Loss and Damage funds, plus… We can also be creative with funding mechanisms like the much talked-about issuance of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) for developing country use (see, for example, the relevant recommendations in the report of the High-level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism). At a more technical level, we have to rethink buildings and urban settlements for natural cooling; build flood overflow systems, not only for flood avoidance but also for water storage for the periods of drought that follow even in the most flood-affected of regions; rethink trade in things such as food stuffs that can be produced locally or more closely; and so on and so forth.

There is no forum to discuss all this, though, not in an operational way towards decision-making. It is certainly not the increasingly dysfunctional and non-competent in such matters UN Security Council. We at FOGGS have long been advocating the establishment of a Global Resilience Council (GRC) to deal with exactly such things. It can easily be created in days, as a subsidiary body of the UN General Assembly, an executive council for the world community of states facing a myriad of interconnected threats to human security. It can be a representative body of 25 to 30 member states and/or regional organizations of states, closely interacting with the whole UN system of funds, programmes and specialized agencies, other intergovernmental organizations and arrangements, as well as associations of scientists, local authorities, civil society, businesses and other non-state constituencies. Its remit to transparently and accountably examine and agree on practical ways forward on climate action, food shortages, pandemics, and whatever else may threaten human survival. Global civil society, at least in its C4UN (Coalition for the UN We Need) incarnation, has endorsed the GRC proposal (see Interim People’s Pact for the Future issued in April 2023).

When are the world leaders going to roll up their sleeves and start dealing with the real issues, instead of big words about the common good and nasty deeds, by commission or omission, to humanity and the planet?

 

*Georgios Kostakos is Executive Director of FOGGS (Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability), a former (and for-life) international civil servant, and a scholar of global governance.   

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Renata Juliotti <![CDATA[Disability matters for Climate Justice]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20013 2023-07-06T23:19:14Z 2023-07-06T23:19:14Z The effects of climate change usually fall heavily on marginalized populations, including millions of persons with disabilities (PWDs) worldwide, especially those living in rural areas and poor communities. Almost 13 years ago, at COP16 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the 2010 Cancun Agreements identified PWDs as disproportionally affected by the climate...

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The effects of climate change usually fall heavily on marginalized populations, including millions of persons with disabilities (PWDs) worldwide, especially those living in rural areas and poor communities. Almost 13 years ago, at COP16 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the 2010 Cancun Agreements identified PWDs as disproportionally affected by the climate crisis and emphasized inclusion as an essential element of climate justice. Sadly, climate change professionals and policymakers tend to overlook these individuals more than any other demographic group.

Some of the challenges faced by persons with disabilities include a lack of targeted data and research on development and climate policies, social and political discrimination, and a lack of informative materials and strategic plans that can be accessed in formats such as braille and similar disability-friendly technologies used worldwide. Inaccessible websites and the unavailability of sign language interpreters are also common issues. This increases the already high vulnerability of PWDs, vis-à-vis the onset of climate change impacts that lead to increased food and water insecurity, reduced access to healthcare services and livelihoods, and decreased accessible infrastructure.

Moreover, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), the main document to support disability inclusion and policies, emphasizes that individuals with disabilities are an “integral part of relevant strategies of sustainable development.”. Article 11 reinforces this statement in the context of climate change by requiring states to take “all necessary measures to ensure the protection and safety of persons with disabilities in situations of risk,” including “humanitarian emergencies and the occurrence of natural disasters.”.

The CRPD means to ensure the participation of persons with disabilities in the creation of climate adaptation and mitigation measures. Individuals with disabilities and Disabled People’s Organizations (DPOs) should be included as relevant stakeholders in the design, development, and implementation of these plans and policies.

 

Reliable data and research efforts

Data collection is a continuous challenge for disability justice and inclusion, especially when it comes to the intersectional matter of disability and climate change. The collection and promotion of reliable data on disability is essential to enabling national and international policymakers to address the issues that concern this part of the population in a more effective way.

Future research on environmental sociology is needed to further explore the relationship between disability justice and climate justice. On one hand, researchers should investigate the relationship between the perception of existing policy and its efficiency and perceptions of risk among disabled people; on the other. Besides the efforts of disability associations and think tanks, it is necessary to engage governments, civil society, and the private sector in promoting climate justice and inclusion for this vulnerable group through accurate research toward the implementation of new strategies and risk management projects.

 

Social and political discrimination

The name given to discrimination against persons with disabilities is Ableism, and it is considered a structural discrimination in most societies globally. Such discrimination prevents PWDs from enjoying the fulfillment of their human rights and citizenship.

Under a disability human rights approach, persons with disabilities are viewed as disproportionately experiencing environmental threats and natural disasters due to their exclusion from state laws, policies, and services available to their non-disabled peers. To ensure their rights and to overcome barriers, meaningful participation is required in policy development, priority setting, decision-making, and implementation activities. Representation matters!

The disability must be seen as a transversal matter in society. Understanding and connecting disability, vulnerability and environment, adaptative capacity and resilience, risk perception and management, information accessibility, policy, and action – can enable policymakers at various levels to better understand these unique climate-related challenges facing PWDs and other vulnerable communities.

In this light, it cannot but be expected that at the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28), a seat at the table will be reserved for disability climate inclusion and justice. This would be fulfilled by ensuring the participation of PWD / DPO representatives in the negotiations, motivating dialogue, to share their insights, articulating their needs, and securing climate justice solutions for themselves. Persons with disabilities need equitable access to information platforms and decision-making processes to enhance their knowledge and participation in climate mainstreaming conversations at every level.

 

 

 

 

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Johnatan Santos <![CDATA[Wagner Group’s attempted coup shakes Putin’s regime and sparks global concern]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20008 2023-06-29T15:01:01Z 2023-06-29T15:01:01Z Unprecedented challenge reveals a weakness in Russia’s centralized power structure The recent coup attempt in Russia, led by the Wagner Group, has shaken the country’s political landscape and led analysts to question the stability of President Vladimir Putin’s regime. The armed rebels’ incursion into Russian territory and their march on Moscow directly challenged Putin’s authority...

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Unprecedented challenge reveals a weakness in Russia’s centralized power structure

The recent coup attempt in Russia, led by the Wagner Group, has shaken the country’s political landscape and led analysts to question the stability of President Vladimir Putin’s regime. The armed rebels’ incursion into Russian territory and their march on Moscow directly challenged Putin’s authority and constitute one of the biggest challenges he has faced since taking office in 1999.

The Wagner Group, led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a longtime Putin acquaintance and a controversial figure known for his involvement in the Kremlin’s catering services, became a decisive force in Russia’s war in Ukraine. Tensions escalated, however, when Prigozhin accused the Russian Defense Ministry of attacking his forces in Ukraine, whereupon he decided to march on Moscow.

The rapid uprising of the Wagner Group succeeded in capturing several Russian cities and destroying military installations. Prigozhin claimed that his troops had entered Russia from Ukraine and faced little resistance at checkpoints manned by young conscripts. The Kremlin’s response reflected the seriousness of the threat, as security was increased in Moscow and Rostov-on-Don, the southern region’s military headquarters that oversees fighting in Ukraine.

The coup attempt raises serious concerns about the stability of the Putin regime and the ongoing war in Ukraine. Although Prigozhin’s actions could be seen as a strategic maneuver to put pressure on official Defense Ministry forces, the use of mercenaries in conflicts without proper oversight poses significant risks. The lack of transparency, accountability, and adherence to international norms threatens the existing international order and global security.

The repercussions of the Wagner Group coup attempt reach beyond Russia’s borders, highlighting the dangers of using mercenaries in conflicts and underscoring the need for comprehensive international mechanisms to address this challenge. The international community must work together to find solutions to prevent the proliferation of mercenaries, which could lead to an increasingly insecure global environment.[1] Notably, the United Nations[2] has already undertaken pertinent initiatives, such as the development of an International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing, and Training of Mercenaries. [3]

Despite Putin’s lack of popularity, this failed coup can be seen as positive for him, as international powers prefer to negotiate with him rather than with unpredictable figures like Prigozhin, whose assumption of power would pose a threat to the world. This preference may be due to Russia’s status as a nuclear-armed state with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. While maintaining the status quo offers some predictability, the coup attempt underscores the fragility of Putin’s position and highlights the urgency of foresight and risk-reduction strategies.

As the situation continues to evolve, the full implications of the confrontation between the Wagner Group and the Russian military remain uncertain. According to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, recent events demonstrate the strategic mistake Putin made in invading Ukraine last year.[4] The current developments in Russia have far-reaching consequences, both regionally and globally, and underscore the need for a comprehensive approach to addressing the challenges posed by mercenary groups and conflicts with state actors.

In summary, the Wagner Group coup attempt has placed President Putin in an unfavorable position that could lead to a decline in his popularity within Russia. Moreover, Mr. Putin’s decision not to hold the Wagner Group accountable for its actions in the coup attempt has created uncertainty not only in military circles but also among influential elites who supported his aggressive stance in Ukraine. This situation highlights the fragility of Russia’s power dynamics and the need for Putin to navigate carefully to ensure his hold on power. National and international reactions to these events will determine the future course of Putin’s regime and his standing in the global community, with the repercussion that may have on peace and stability in Europe and the world.

 

[1] https://g1.globo.com/jornal-nacional/noticia/2023/06/24/situacao-de-putin-ainda-e-delicada-mesmo-apos-recuo-de-mercenarios-dizem-analistas.ghtml

[2] See, for example, a report to the UN General Assembly by the Working Group on the use of mercenaries: https://www.ohchr.org/en/calls-for-input/report-evolving-forms-trends-and-manifestations-mercenaries-and-mercenary-related

[3] https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/international-convention-against-recruitment-use-financing-and

[4] https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/opinions_212998.htm

 

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Jeffrey Gorham <![CDATA[Lithium Fever: Can Electrification be Sustainable?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=20004 2023-06-23T14:33:21Z 2023-06-23T14:33:21Z Lithium is flowing from the Global South to the Global North, powering a massive electrification effort in high-income countries, particularly due to its criticality in electric vehicle (EV) batteries. However, this silvery metal is not a silver bullet. Lithium mining comes with high environmental and social costs to the land and local population, disproportionately harms...

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Lithium is flowing from the Global South to the Global North, powering a massive electrification effort in high-income countries, particularly due to its criticality in electric vehicle (EV) batteries. However, this silvery metal is not a silver bullet. Lithium mining comes with high environmental and social costs to the land and local population, disproportionately harms indigenous communities, and contributes to biodiversity loss. Underpinning the present framing of the climate crisis is an internal tension: lithium is necessary to drive the energy transition, but it is actively contributing to localized destruction.

Many high-income countries view EVs and broader electrification not only as a way to meet their climate goals but also as a key step to securing energy independence, more critical than ever as the War in Ukraine has upended the natural gas market. Many of these same countries lack domestic lithium production, and governments and companies are scrambling to secure lithium supply chains now, as the International Energy Agency projects an increase in global lithium demand of 42 times by 2040. Amidst this modern-day gold rush, two critical questions must be examined about the sustainability of lithium mining and the EV business.

 

Will there be enough lithium to meet demand?

 The short answer is no, at least under the current approach in EV planning. Policies like the Inflation Reduction Act, and President Joe Biden’s landmark climate bill, provide incentives for EVs, spearheading a push to replace traditional gasoline-based cars. A one-for-one replacement of internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles with EVs will require far too much lithium, and even scaling up the industry will not prevent bottlenecks in supply. Boston Consulting Group (BCG) projects a supply gap of 1.1 million metric tons by 2030, 24% less than demand. Many pledges for EV growth ignore this reality. Our car-centric societies are not sustainable, even as they get increasingly electrified. Greater benefits can be achieved by investing in public transportation and increasing the ability to survive without a car.

To preserve a livable planet, society must be transformed at many levels. The International Energy Agency estimated that global EV annual sales must reach 47 million by 2030 to align with its sustainable development scenario. However, even reaching 28 million sales annually by 2030 would require a sixfold increase in lithium production. For humanity to avert the worst effects of the climate crisis, it either needs an outlandish increase in the production of a scarce resource, or it needs to change how it organizes its communities fundamentally. Basic concepts like the 15-minute city, more reliable public transport, and more interconnected rail systems have the power to reduce automobile demand radically. For example, Paris has successfully cut car use by 45% by reducing areas designed for cars and reclaiming them as public spaces. By looking under the hood of the vehicle electrification movement, it’s clear that only a multifaceted approach can prevent a lithium shortage from stalling all progress toward key climate goals.

 

Can lithium be mined sustainably?

Gabriel Boric, the Chilean President, says yes. In April 2023, Boric announced plans to nationalize the lithium industry. Part of Boric’s plan attempts to address the sustainability of the lithium industry, by advancing direct lithium extraction (DLE) to a commercial scale. Evaporation is the primary process employed in Chile, the second-largest producer of lithium in the world. To do this, brine, a saltwater mixture containing lithium, is pumped into massive, shallow pools, where evaporation slowly leaves behind lithium. This uses huge amounts of water in the Atacama Desert, which can hardly afford any wasted water. The indigenous Colla community’s ancestral lands have been eroded and dried up due to lithium mining, and members fear that those still living in the mountains will be forced to move to the urban center of Copiapó. The loss of the Laguna de Santa Rosa, a nearby wetland, threatens the 17 endangered species that live there, as well as the migratory birds that stop by.

Boric’s plan to nationalize the lithium industry provides the opportunity to mitigate the externalities of the mining practice. DLE extracts lithium directly from the brine, using less water and land than evaporative pools, while recovering a greater percentage of lithium in less time. Naturally, there is a catch. DLE has never been implemented at a large scale before, and the data is less clear on costs than the proven method of evaporative pools.

Boric is staking his country’s lithium future on untested technology. Nevertheless, this switch, if it proves effective in practice, could protect indigenous communities and biodiversity. His is also a measured nationalization, with an emphasis on public-private partnerships and respect for existing contracts. With lithium fever and few options, companies, and investors are unlikely to flee the country; they may not find more favorable opportunities elsewhere. This resource power gives Boric the latitude to shift lithium production in a sustainable direction, and, if successful, this can provide a roadmap for other countries to develop their lithium industry, particularly Bolivia, which sits on the world’s largest lithium reserves.

 

Path forward

 Electrification is a critical step towards a carbon-free economy, making lithium immensely important for the clean energy transition. Done carelessly, the mad rush for lithium will cause severe environmental and social impact, while still failing to keep up with accelerating demand. Only a multi-sectoral response focused on curbing lithium demand through a commitment to public transport and achieving buy-in from local communities by reducing the impact of lithium extraction will allow the economy to adapt sustainably.

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Nádia Moragas <![CDATA[Extreme weather events and forced displacement: why do they need to be covered more often by journalism?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19999 2023-06-20T18:27:55Z 2023-06-20T18:27:55Z The transversality of the issue of climate change, its causes, and consequences, would allow this subject to be presented in various editorials of the daily media. However, when it comes to news coverage, the newsworthiness criteria that permeate the entire production process of journalism require a set of characteristics for the facts to be considered...

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The transversality of the issue of climate change, its causes, and consequences, would allow this subject to be presented in various editorials of the daily media. However, when it comes to news coverage, the newsworthiness criteria that permeate the entire production process of journalism require a set of characteristics for the facts to be considered newsworthy. In the case of climate change, this coverage occurs especially when new reports are released, such as those of the Intragovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), or intense negotiations take place in the context of the UNFCCC Conferences of the Parties (COPs), or when the climate change-related weather extremes manifest themselves as disasters with human losses.

The slow-onset and multifaceted nature of climate change makes it difficult to include it in the media cycle with the proper degree of frequency and depth. However, by establishing connections between what happens at the local level and global events, journalists are able to communicate more widely and in a contextualized way this phenomenon.  As part of that, climate-induced human displacement is already considered a humanitarian crisis of the 21st century.

The Groundswell report update, released in 2021 by the World Bank, emphasizes climate change as a super-potent driver of human displacement. It is estimated that 216 million people could thus be forced to relocate within their countries. “By 2050, Sub-Saharan Africa could see as many as 86 million internal climate migrants; East Asia and the Pacific, 49 million; South Asia, 40 million; North Africa, 19 million; Latin America, 17 million; and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, 5 million”.

In February of this year, the intensity of rain on the north coast of Sao Paulo, Brazil, made around 2,000 people homeless and resulted in more than 60 deaths. In just 24 hours of torrential rain in the cities of São Sebastião and Bertioga, the most affected, the rainfall exceeded the expected two-month total, according to the National Center for Monitoring and Alerts of Natural Disasters (Cemadem). Connecting this extreme event to a global phenomenon helps the public understand that the impacts of climate change are already occurring, but not homogeneously across the globe.

The latest report by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center (IDMC, 2023) informs that, by the end of 2022, 71.1 million people were in a situation of internal displacement, because of conflicts and disasters. The data reveals an increase of 20% in relation to the survey of the previous year. The number of forced internal displacements due to disasters was 8.7 million. As stated in the report: “The La Niña weather phenomenon persisted for a third consecutive year, leading to record levels of flood displacement in countries including Pakistan, Nigeria, and Brazil. It also fueled the worst drought on record in Somalia, Ethiopia, and Kenya, triggering 2.1 million movements”.

The increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events are due to the anthropogenic origin of global warming; therefore, it is no longer possible to consider such disasters as natural. Communication that emphasizes this fact contributes to the advancement of public policies for disaster risk reduction and raises awareness that the private sector and organized civil society also need to contribute in some way to coping with extreme events. This is the most important document in this regard at the international level and offers guidelines for coping, managing, and governing disaster risk.

Journalism is legitimated in democratic countries due to a social and historical process. Also, it’s an important part of the macro field that is Disaster Risk Communication, so if the journalistic practice does not naturalize disasters in its coverage, it contributes to the understanding of the “social inequity” of the risks and the “reflexivity” capacity of each society. Those concepts brought by Antony Giddens can help the understanding of this problem by showing that despite the fact that the impacts of climate changes expose all of us, some regions of the planet are more susceptible to suffering from extreme weather events. The same can be said about the capacity of each community to respond to such events.

The global effects of climate extremes are diverse: they increase internal and international conflicts over natural resources, inflame political tensions, drive the displacement of individuals and communities from their places of origin, and impact the field of collective health, among others. The multiplicity of facets of this issue is evident, as its potential for inclusion in the media agenda more recurrently. If it happens, this can contribute to shaping a better-informed public that is aware of its role in collectively demanding, monitoring, and participating in governance actions. It can also highlight the role of the individual as an active agent of the necessary transformation for adaptation and resilience in the face of the challenges posed by climate change.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 14 – The age of democratic decline | Stefanos Loukopoulos]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19994 2023-06-15T16:14:01Z 2023-06-15T16:14:01Z The end of the second world war ushered in a new era of change for humanity. Having tested out all of their new, shiny weapons on each other, the nation-states of Europe decided to tone things down for a while and to focus on rebuilding their war-ravaged continent. A key factor for the success of...

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The end of the second world war ushered in a new era of change for humanity. Having tested out all of their new, shiny weapons on each other, the nation-states of Europe decided to tone things down for a while and to focus on rebuilding their war-ravaged continent. A key factor for the success of this was, of course, the US. American financial aid was a major helping hand for Europe, especially in the years right after the end of the hostilities of WW2. Along with the US’ money, however, came also their influence. Holding the United States’ hand, Europe entered a period of liberalism, urbanization, opening up of markets, systemic integration (🇪🇺), and increased laissez-faire in its economies and industries – a period often called by 20th-century historians “the Golden Age.”
🏙 This changed Europe’s demographic, sociopolitical, and cultural characteristics to an incredible degree, and with great speed. A mostly agrarian and industrial collage of societies, Europe was being transformed – to its core – into a land of opportunity, bustling market economies, and capitalist models of economic planning. Today, the situation remains the same, but even more intensified. This is the case not only in Europe anymore, but, especially after the fall of the Soviet Union, in the majority of the world’s economies. Fukuyama said this was the end of history – however, the corrosive elements of our system are starting to bear its teeth. Scholars believe that late capitalism does not actually require democracy to function. Systems with healthy democratic elements hinder private enterprises’ ability to make more profit by keeping them on an “institutional leash,” regulating their activities in the name of public interest. Therefore, one could say that giving people the power to decide for themselves isn’t the greatest business decision. And this has started to become obvious.
🗣 Today, I was joined by Stefanos Loukopoulos, co-founder and director of Vouliwatch, a parliamentary watchdog NGO based in Athens. Greece is a prime example of the process I explained above, and Stefanos was kind enough to come on the show to help explain the situation better. We discussed a lot about Greece, the decline of its democratic institutions, and the disillusionment and apathy of people toward their political system. We also talked about his organization, Vouliwatch, and what kind of action it takes to tackle this phenomenon. Finally, we tied the local to the global aspect, touching on the phenomenon of democratic decline on a worldwide scale. I am so grateful to Stefanos for sharing his amazing insights on these topics, and I’m happy we got to dive deeper into the goings-on of my home country, Greece. I’m excited to share this episode so that all of you can also get a bit of a clearer picture of what’s going on in my little sun-washed corner of the globe 🙂
Thanks for tuning in!
Supported and published by: 📰 katoikos.world 📰 🏛 FOGGS 🏛

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 13 – Is climate change really a crisis of values? | Finnur Ricart]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19989 2023-05-31T14:58:48Z 2023-05-31T14:58:48Z The planet is on fire metaphorically (and unfortunately, quite often literally). As a young human in their mid-20s, I’ve slowly and painfully learned, as I’m transitioning into adulthood, that the world I’m living in, and one day maybe my children, is on a downhill spiral of environmental degradation and that increasingly tougher times are ahead. ...

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The planet is on fire metaphorically (and unfortunately, quite often literally). As a young human in their mid-20s, I’ve slowly and painfully learned, as I’m transitioning into adulthood, that the world I’m living in, and one day maybe my children, is on a downhill spiral of environmental degradation and that increasingly tougher times are ahead.  The causes of this might be simple to point our fingers at – namely, destruction of the environment, exploitation of natural resources past their breaking point, and radical disruption of very fragile planetary and biological systems. However, if we want to get out of this mess and stay out of it, it is important that we understand exactly why we have brought ourselves to this point of environmental breakdown in the first place.

My guest, Finnur, thinks – and in my opinion, very rightly so – that the core of the climate crisis is related to our values as a society. It might be the case that the pillars upon which we base our human existence on this planet at this point in time, which are predominantly values like growth, expansion, individualism, and consumption, are fundamentally incompatible with a planet with finite resources and extremely delicate ecosystems. Maybe the solution for climate change doesn’t only lie in our technological capacities but might also require that we rethink our relationship with life and nature in general.

Finnur Ricart is Chairperson of the Icelandic Young Environmentalist Association and Icelandic UN Youth Delegate on Climate Change. He’s in his early twenties, but he’s already achieved so much, and from what I can tell, he’s just getting started. Our conversation covered a range of topics, like the Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC, which he attended as a youth delegate for Iceland, as well as in the role of representative of his organization, the Icelandic Young Environmentalist Association. Finnur gave me a comprehensive, first-hand account of what it’s really like to attend the conference of the parties, that absolutely massive political forum, and especially what it’s like to be there as a youth delegate, so we talked a lot about what kind of impact the youth has on the diplomatic procedures of the conference.

Of course, as I mentioned above, we also talked a lot about climate change being, at its core, a crisis of values. I’m very grateful that I got to hear his perspective on all of these things and even more grateful that I get to share them on the podcast.

 

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[The Unbearable Lightness of Being UN Secretary-General*]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19983 2023-05-19T14:23:34Z 2023-05-19T14:23:34Z The news about the United States spying on United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and his deputy, Amina Mohammed, revealed dissatisfaction in leaked US intelligence documents over Guterres’s perceived lack of toughness regarding the Russians and their invasion of Ukraine in 2022. One would expect the Russians, undoubtedly also spying on Guterres, to have different views, annoyed by...

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The news about the United States spying on United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres and his deputy, Amina Mohammed, revealed dissatisfaction in leaked US intelligence documents over Guterres’s perceived lack of toughness regarding the Russians and their invasion of Ukraine in 2022. One would expect the Russians, undoubtedly also spying on Guterres, to have different views, annoyed by his apparent siding with the West, as they have indicated in their own way. Multiply the spying on and opinions about Guterres’s conduct of his job, it can be easily said that it is an impossible job indeed.

If it is accepted that the goal of a secretary-general is to please everybody, starting from the most powerful countries down the pecking order, it is surely an unfeasible position. But should there be another goal? What about serving the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the basic principles of moral behavior that are common across humanity’s many political systems, cultures and religions? Abiding by all of the above would make the UN leader’s job easy.

Or perhaps doing so would make the UN chief’s role unrealistically lightweight and irrelevant by his using idealistic language and wishful thinking to address real-world geopolitical and economic interests? With the illusion of post-Cold War peace and prosperity for everyone gone down the drain for good, the ugly face of politics as ancient, blood- and profit-thirsty as ever is staring at us once again. This is not happening only in one country or region, but quite a few Medusa-like faces exist all around.

Despite these vicissitudes and without oversimplifying it, the job can be straightforward if the 38th-floor occupant strives to pursue it that way. Here are a few rules for that to happen, if it does not come naturally to the incumbent:

Love thy UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and universal ethics rules

These make up your compass, legitimacy and light to guide you in your pronouncements and actions. Do not be led astray by strong voices, threats and enticements — look straight into the source of your light and move in that direction. If being straightforward does not come easily, for politicians in particular, try to unlearn your previous roles and learn the new one properly, if you want to leave a good legacy.

Love thy member states

All of them, big and small, veto-yielding and veto-less, developed and developing. They are supposed to be your masters, but you are their steward, so it’s important to rise to the task. Get their advice and advise them, remind them of the principles that the UN embodies and guide them back to a positive path of action.

Love thy organization and thy staff, know them well and engage them appropriately

The UN does not start or end on the 38th floor of the Secretariat building. Get to know all the resources at your disposal and deploy them wisely. There is an entire universe that has been put together around your position, not always rationally or efficiently, but it has many bright lights for you to deploy to good end. This is true in terms of UN departments and UN system organizations, as well as terms of the staff that move them. Get used to the variety of backgrounds, languages and ways of thinking that make the UN so special, a miniature of the actual world. Not all apples are good in your garden, but neither are they all rotten. Approach them, inspire them and ask for their services and their advice, not only those who say they agree with you.

Love civil society the world over and other nonstate actors

You should listen to the world’s public opinion, the general and the specialized one, common citizens and scientists, the poor and the rich. That does not mean that you have to side with one or the other, or pay lip service to all while working with a few of them. Watch the proxies of geopolitico-economic interests lest you be misled by them, and remember that you are not an academic expert or an activist, nor is the UN a think tank or a nongovernmental organization.

Love action, not just words

There are things that you can say and things that you can do; choose wisely the course of action in each case, but do not fudge issues or wait things out because of risk-averseness. No pain, no gain is one way to remind yourself when you are making decisions; it is about gains for the world and the common good, not political survival. Remember that action is not just feeding the hungry and helping the destitute survive. The UN can set the agenda and lead the action, not just sweep away the mess that the big players make with their fights.

Love thy office, thy role and play it well

You have been given the most difficult but also the easiest, most rewarding job in the world. Your mandate is to speak for humanity and for our planet, for the incredible diversity of beings and ways of living, for a paradise that remains to be built, while doubling as hell in the meantime. The responsibility is huge and simultaneously light and clear: lasting peace, sustainable prosperity, respect for every human person — human resilience and well-being, that is. All for one and one for all, and you stand in the middle of it, reflecting the light of the Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and human ethics. Or you can stand in the black hole, watching the mess and destruction unfold.

If you abide by the above rules, you do not care who is spying on you and to what end, who is calling to threaten or to entice you, who is happy or less happy with your pronouncements and deeds, because you are doing the right thing.

 

*This article has been previously published by PassBlue. See the original version HERE

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 12 – The problems and challenges of climate diplomacy | Richard Kinley]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19977 2023-05-04T17:20:30Z 2023-05-04T17:09:49Z Since the beginning of our species, the one key factor that has allowed us to survive and thrive is the ability to communicate. With advanced communication comes advanced cooperation – enabling us to achieve feats much greater than any human can pull off alone. This critical skill has helped us with everything from surviving in...

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Since the beginning of our species, the one key factor that has allowed us to survive and thrive is the ability to communicate. With advanced communication comes advanced cooperation – enabling us to achieve feats much greater than any human can pull off alone. This critical skill has helped us with everything from surviving in prehistoric jungles to repairing the ozone layer – and it is now more important than ever.

Today, our ability to communicate and cooperate is being tested, as we’re facing arguably the biggest challenge we’ve had to deal with so far: catastrophic climate change. Surviving this cataclysmic event requires effective teamwork. To figure out a collective solution, the international community has created the UNFCCC – the flagship UN agency for dealing with climate change. In the Conference of the Parties (COP) of the UNFCCC, the nations of the world confer with each other and make cooperative pledges to reduce emissions and transition to a sustainable future. But is that enough?

My guest for today is Richard Kinley, a retired senior official of the UNFCCC with more than 25 years of experience. He kindly joined me on the show to give me an insider view of this quintessential global forum. We talked about his experience in the UNFCCC and the COPs, the biggest challenges he and his colleagues faced during their active years, and how multilateralism itself has evolved since the beginning of the COPs in the mid-90s.

We also discussed whether the international community is doing enough to address climate change, the unfortunate lack of political will in national politics, and outlooks for the future of climate diplomacy.

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Joao Victor Cruz <![CDATA[Heliopolis: A Story of Struggle and Hope]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19970 2023-04-20T15:11:16Z 2023-04-19T21:29:38Z To introduce myself and express who I am worldwide is complicated because the world has many realities. To present mine, I have to tell a story that came before me that I inherited from my parents and my teachers. I come from one of the biggest favelas in Brazil, and you may have seen this...

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To introduce myself and express who I am worldwide is complicated because the world has many realities. To present mine, I have to tell a story that came before me that I inherited from my parents and my teachers.

I come from one of the biggest favelas in Brazil, and you may have seen this term before. Still, beyond everything you can find on the internet about favelas, these are places of struggle and empowerment, a great school of what civil organization is, and a place of much resistance from people who, most of the time, are just exercising their right to have a place to call home. It is no different in my Quebrada (as the favela’s residents call it).

The favela of Heliópolis, in the city of Sao Paulo, has one million square meters, with about two hundred thousand people living here today, and more than 50 years of history of struggles, similar to other favelas throughout Brazil. It started as temporary housing for 120 families that were involuntarily relocated by the government, from another favela, with the promise of a decent home after five years. However, 20 years have passed since then.

These families have never received the right to this housing in another area. As it is a human instinct, during this time, people started to communicate and organize themselves as a community, with assemblies and the creation of several organizations. However, as these years passed, the government wanted to sell part of that area to build a shopping mall. This action made the population there organize itself even more, and all these associations, organizations, and leaders got together to stop this eviction. There was the beginning of what we call a civil society organization, but I like to call it UNAS.

UNAS (União de Núcleos, Associações dos Moradores de Heliópolis e Região) is the organization that arose from the union and communication between the diverse collectives organized in the territory, not only to defend the right to live in Heliópolis but also to transform it into a place where the rights of all were exercised and guaranteed. Over time the fight for housing became a fight for life, not only in the sense of being alive but also in the sense of being able to live with dignity, understanding that it is the government’s duty and the right of people, especially the poorest, to have a guaranteed quality of life, with health, education, culture, and leisure. A struggle that has lasted for more than 50 years.

Despite all this history of 50 years, which I have summarized here, I still continue the struggle for my parents, now in a different context and time. For almost ten years, I have participated effectively in social projects and in the battle to guarantee rights for my neighborhood and other places that identify with the reality of the slum, understanding that to do politics is much more than speaking on behalf of a political party, that to do politics and articulate public policies that serve society it is necessary to be in contact with the people that are in the place, understand them from the potentials of the people, and understand that they are the ones who are in charge of the politics.

To understand their potential and their challenges in an effective way, this should be the role of the government. It is necessary to open spaces and encourage young people, essentially those who are more vulnerable and in conflict with the state in some way, whether because of their color, race, or social reality. This is the fight I inherited from my parents, not only to transform the territory but to transform people. Following the line of thought of a great Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, I don’t believe I will change the world, but I will encourage and educate someone who will. Today I work as coordinator of a public policies observatory; this is my mission; working with other young people, I multiply the will and teachings passed to me by the history of my place, forming new citizens who will fight for their rights.

Giving space to these voices is essential for minority agendas to be discussed in depth, from poverty to issues such as the extermination of nations and cultures and climate change. When I say give space, I mean that it is necessary to fund these voices because we often depend on governments and their willingness to listen to us or not; I believe that in Brazil, we have a little more space this year. Still, to expand these voices, it is necessary to invest and demand the participation of civil society in these discussions.

This article is based on one of the stories told during the Development track in the Talanoa Dialogues session, Global Futures Forum, which took place on March 20-21, 2023, in New York City, organized by the Coalition for the UN We Need (C4UN).

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[PRAYING FOR THE END OF HISTORY…]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19965 2023-04-08T15:11:11Z 2023-04-08T15:11:11Z When in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Francis Fukuyama evangelized “the end of history,” he did it in the context of a widely held belief that the collapse of Communism and the victory of Liberal Democracy was a major milestone in human evolution. Beyond the end of the Cold War, this was supposed to...

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When in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Francis Fukuyama evangelized “the end of history,” he did it in the context of a widely held belief that the collapse of Communism and the victory of Liberal Democracy was a major milestone in human evolution. Beyond the end of the Cold War, this was supposed to mark a new era built on the solid foundation of Western liberalism, with a shared ideology, system of government and frame of reference worldwide. As one of the two key poles that made history’s current flow had ceased to exist, the world was expected to enter a relatively uneventful era, guaranteed by an unchallenged benign superpower, the USA.

Some thirty years later, and not for the first time, history is showing its ugly face again, stating its claim on fame. If the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent war that continues unabated is not history, then what is it?  The same goes for the heightened tensions in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, increasing inequalities between and within states, intensifying climate impacts, a global financial system that is doing well for itself rather than serving the well-being and resilience of real people and communities, etc.

Instead of “the end of history,” we seem to be witnessing “the revenge of history,” aggressively (re)claiming its own and going forever more. This makes one wonder what the drivers of current history are and what more can be expected if what we already have is not enough?…

Current history, or the current of history, if we return to our battery/pole analogy, seems to be stirred up by a new dualism that in the West at least is expressed as “Democracy versus Autocracy”. In this light, the new existential divide is between countries that respect human rights and democratic rules, with periodic free and fair elections, and countries run like overt or covert dictatorships, disrespecting individual rights, especially civic rights, and having the same party and/or person in power forever. This divide is used to explain and justify action in connection to the Russia-Ukraine war, as well as in the case of China and Taiwan, increasingly also in terms of trade, alliances, and broader international relations.

For some, this recharging of history may be a good thing. Even if enlightened, one ideology and one-hegemon rule make people, societies, and economies sluggish. See how beneficial the Cold War was in encouraging the flourishing of democracy and social economy in the West, especially Western Europe, the technological advances, literature, and all that were inspired by it or developed literally in spite of it. Why not reintroduce another such divide to get juices running on both sides and finally have some historical developments to talk about?

Well, this author is certainly no cheerleader of the above approach. Here are some reasons why:

  • The way this is going with the West’s confrontation with Russia and eventually China, we may well get not another Cold War but World War III, with possible nuclear weapons use and all that it may signify.
  • There is quite a bit of blame to go around to all major powers of East and West, who often talk about international law, what is wrong and what is right, but when it comes to their own interests, they do not respect the UN Charter, no treaties (that they may not have ratified in the first place) or anything. Do we really want to be stuck in a close embrace with one or the other of them?
  • When we have so many serious global threats to tackle – threats to human security worldwide like climate change, pandemics, poverty, and the whole array of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – directing resources to the arms industry and trying to divide the world along ideological lines once again is unconscionable, to say the least.
  • In the process, the painstakingly built multilateral system of global governance is being dismantled brick-by-brick under the pressure of competing mega-interests and the inability to articulate an alternative narrative of cooperation and shared well-being. Who is going to speak about the weak and powerless, but also the mid-sized, and about humanity as a whole, when that loses any remaining credibility?
  • The dictum that enemies end up resembling each other is proving true in this emerging confrontation, too, with many of the best elements of Western democracy undermined by the overall logic of beating the enemy. At the same time, all sides’ vilification of the enemy in the conflict reaches heights of dehumanization that do not allow any way out except for total defeat of the other, which is a zero-sum if not a lose-lose proposition.

This spring, we have again the convergence of the holiest of days of three important world religions, those known as “Abrahamic religions,” that is, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. Instead of joint celebrations and sharing the rich traditions of the three religions – largely constructed one against the other, one must admit, but that was the past – we have increasing sources of tension because of religious fervor, fighting over the same religious sites, and more. What if we stop to ponder how we could really fulfill the ultimate goal of all religions, which is ethical living in mutually supportive and, thus, resilient societies? Ending history, pulling the battery out, stopping the current, and embarking on joint problem-solving in a cooperative, inclusive, and ethical way may sound boring, but it may be the only alternative to the bulldozer of history.

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Renata Juliotti <![CDATA[Gender inclusion in the Global South]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19956 2023-03-08T18:37:17Z 2023-03-08T18:37:17Z As we observe International Women’s Day, 8 March 2023, and CSW67 (Commission on the Status of Women, Session 67) is taking place, with UN Women continuing to run local programs worldwide, one crucial question remains: What women? To whom is the UN talking? The UN’s theme for 2023 is “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender...

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As we observe International Women’s Day, 8 March 2023, and CSW67 (Commission on the Status of Women, Session 67) is taking place, with UN Women continuing to run local programs worldwide, one crucial question remains: What women? To whom is the UN talking?

The UN’s theme for 2023 is “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality,” which aims to recognize and celebrate the contribution women and girls make to technology and online education. The CSW67, taking place in New York on March 6-17, will also explore the impact of the digital gender gap on inequality for women and girls, as the UN estimates that women’s lack of access to the online world will cause a $1.5 trillion loss to the gross domestic product of low and middle-income countries by 2025 if action is not taken. Representatives of Member States, UN entities, and ECOSOC-accredited non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from all regions of the world are invited to contribute to the session.

 

However, where do we stand?

Writing these critical lines, I find it necessary to address my background as a Global South woman who only got to know the United Nations later in my adult life. At least in Brazil (where I am based), the UN activities are not promoted among civil society actors; instead, the women heading those activities are in a different socioeconomic position than most of us. What does this particular information say about the Organization’s influence in my home country? Lack of participation. Unfortunately, this scenario is not a Brazilian exclusivity.

In the Global South, where women face socioeconomic challenges, bias, violence, and inequality, civil society participation, needs to be about finding solutions and opening up opportunities. In other words, through active participation, we create space for listening and belonging, increasing opportunities for representation and promotion of gender equity.

In the past year, women in many countries, such as Afghanistan, Iran, and Ukraine, have been fighting for their rights amid war, violence, and political upheaval in their respective countries. In Afghanistan, the resurgence of the Taliban has hindered advancements in human rights, with women and girls now banned from higher education, from most jobs that would involve working outside of their homes, from traveling long distances without a male chaperone, and they are instructed to cover their faces in public.

In Iran, protests were sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman arrested by morality police in Tehran on 13 September 2022 for allegedly violating Iran’s strict rules requiring women to cover their hair with a scarf. Since then, demonstrations have continued across the country, with many female and male Iranians calling for better rights for women and a change in the current political leadership.

Following the invasion of Ukraine by Russian forces on 24 February 2022, the UN reported that gender gaps in food insecurity, malnutrition, poverty, and increased gender-based violence have worsened inside and around the world due to war-induced price hikes and shortages.

According to a survey called “The victimization of women in Brazil,” 1 in 4 Brazilian women over 16 (24.4%), or about 17 million women, said they had suffered violence during the Covid-19 pandemic, specifically in the past 12 months. Also, 5 out of 10 Brazilians (51.1%) pointed to having witnessed some form of violence against women in their neighborhood or community during the past year.

A key point is whether these women, victims of the patriarchal society, are being included or are they represented by women whose voices are also relevant but not part of the same background. What would social representation, in fact, mean in this context?

 

From the bottom to the top

Note that the diversity in Latin America and the Caribbean, for example, means a diversity of cultural and political perspectives and scenarios as well. Therefore, when we talk about the women of the Global South, we are referring to a variety of voices to be amplified in this geographical constellation. As inclusion means a long-term process, it is necessary to contemplate a strategy prioritizing a movement from the bottom to the top, which means including the perspectives of the women amongst the various vulnerable groups such as poor black women, disabled, indigenous, and others – to the one’s privileged in better socioeconomic aspects.

How we communicate to and with these women and their representation is the key to promoting gender equality programs. Through an inclusive and humanitarian communication strategy, we have a powerful tool to oversee participation in the most remote places. Therefore, creating space for education and qualification for the women we want to involve in decision-making is essential by teaching English as a standard language, the premises of feminism and social activism, gender rights and equality, and good governance. These are just some examples of an educational movement toward promoting inclusion.

Nevertheless, it is necessary and essential to connect voice, listening, and belonging (Marjoribanks, 2018). This process starts with the amplification of these individuals’ voices. Meanwhile, listening depends on integrating a large group of institutions, civil society movements, and social, economic, political, and cultural realities. The process of belonging begins when the voice and the listening aspects are ensured. It is from the sense of belonging of these women who have had their voices amplified and heard in a society that has been sensitized to this listening that the construction of a politics of belonging begins.

A cross-cultural and transnational analysis should contribute to integrating individuals, ideas, projects, institutions, and stakeholders from the public and private sectors and reducing systematic bias and discursive privileges emerging from places with more significant resources.

We – women from the Global South – are the everyday women, the daily struggling ones, the voices echoing, the calls for help, and the ones willing to act for the UN we need and the spaces we rightfully own.

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 11 – Dissecting the Alt-Right Movement | Part 2]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19945 2023-02-17T20:14:36Z 2023-02-17T20:14:01Z Part 2 of our talk with Ipsita Chatterjee, a human geographer interested in the economic, cultural, and geopolitical impacts of globalization. Ipsita is also a prolific author, and her latest book “The Alt-Right Movement: Dissecting Racism, Patriarchy, and Anti-immigrant Xenophobia” served as the basis of our discussion. To help me better understand this phenomenon, she took...

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Part 2 of our talk with Ipsita Chatterjee, a human geographer interested in the economic, cultural, and geopolitical impacts of globalization. Ipsita is also a prolific author, and her latest book “The Alt-Right Movement: Dissecting Racism, Patriarchy, and Anti-immigrant Xenophobia” served as the basis of our discussion. To help me better understand this phenomenon, she took me through how the alt-right came to be, its rise, and its ideological basis. We also talked about the role of the internet as a driver of alt-right ideology, but also as a potential remedy against it. Overall a super interesting discussion that I really feel gave me a much better understanding of the subject, as well as new perspectives on it. Tune in!

 

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 10 – The challenging present and future of global politics | Kerstin Leitner]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19940 2023-02-17T20:09:29Z 2023-02-17T20:08:34Z To help me cope with my existential dread (and also provide incredible value to you, our listeners), Kerstin Leitner joined me on the podcast. Kerstin has 30 years of experience as a UN official, and she has lived in numerous places around the world, like Africa, China, and the United States. Today she lives in...

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The world is in one of the most critical periods that it’s ever been in. Tensions are rising, conflicts are higher and deadlier by the year and the pandemic’s scars are visible and painful. The war in Ukraine has dimmed the spirit of international cooperation at a time when it is most needed. Things are looking pretty gloomy – so where do we go from here?

To help me cope with my existential dread (and also provide incredible value to you, our listeners), Kerstin Leitner joined me on the podcast. Kerstin has 30 years of experience as a UN official, and she has lived in numerous places around the world, like Africa, China, and the United States. Today she lives in Berlin and teaches at Potsdam University.

In our talk, we went over a series of topics. We covered major areas of international politics, like the situations of China-Taiwan and Ukraine-Russia, as well as developing countries and their role on the international stage. We also discussed the potential of the UN to be a key actor in the development of global geopolitics in the coming decades, especially given the monumental importance of climate change and the need for serious cooperation in order to tackle it. We also talked about feminist foreign policy as an alternative to the paradigms that currently exist in governance systems worldwide. Thank you for tuning in!

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Andrew Williams <![CDATA[Geopolitics and ‘Rough Wooing’]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19936 2023-02-17T20:16:38Z 2023-02-16T20:22:16Z The attack on Ukraine has had tragic consequences for all Ukrainians and many Russians. The horror of families being killed and divided is a spectacle that nearly all Europeans believed had been banished forever from our Continent. Even most of the attacking troops and the Ukrainian population refused to believe it might happen. But the...

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The attack on Ukraine has had tragic consequences for all Ukrainians and many Russians. The horror of families being killed and divided is a spectacle that nearly all Europeans believed had been banished forever from our Continent. Even most of the attacking troops and the Ukrainian population refused to believe it might happen. But the physical carnage which has been unleashed by what British – American Russia expert Fiona Hill calls ‘the History Man’, Vladimir Putin with his KGB schoolboy reading of Russia’s history, is also an attack on liberal principles much more widely. It seems unexceptional to most people in Britain to claim that Russia has embarked on an almost 19th Century, even old-fashioned, war of territorial conquest. They usually agree that this is a conscious effort to undermine the hitherto widely accepted concept of relations between states since 1945 that Europe has come to respect almost universally, in direct contradiction with its bloody past of invasions and annexations.

In April 2022 the Kremlin loyalist Konstantin Malofeev asked rhetorically what characterises a Western (or indeed any other sort of) liberal. For him, liberalism is a belief system that recognises ‘no borders between countries and no distinction between men and women’. This stance has found favour with many on the conservative right in Europe and the United States, who profess themselves shocked by ‘woke’ attitudes on gender and the alleged cultural decadence of LGBTQ policies that are supposedly undermining the West. Hence it is that the war between Ukraine and Russia is not just being fought on the battlefield, but also online in a new version of influencing ‘hearts and minds’. The Kremlin has been at pains to assert that Russia is not ‘at war’ with Ukraine, but rather trying to protect itself from NATO attacks and to ‘de-Nazify’ its neighbour. If it is at ‘war’, then it is with the USA which has allegedly encouraged Ukrainian nationalist ‘Nazis’. Most of Ukraine therefore really longs to be liberated from US influence and to be ‘re-united’ with its ‘Slav brothers and sisters’. How can we explain these diametrically opposed worldviews?

Analogies always help I find. In Britain, the history of relations between England and Scotland was somewhat similar to that of present-day Russia and Ukraine until the union of the two Crowns in 1603 and the two parliaments in 1705. The interrelationship was close, especially between the elites who often had land and other interests on both sides of the border. The English had a tendency to bully the Scots who retaliated with cross-border incursions that continued after 1705. The Russian state has often bullied, and far worse, the Ukrainian population, as we now know they did in the famine of 1932-33. Bonny Prince Charlie invaded England in 1745 on his way to claim the English throne. Before then the English embarked on regular attempts to influence Scottish politics by force, by which I mean the kind of behaviour we have seen so widely used by Russian (and mercenary) troops in Ukraine; war, plunder, and rapine. This process was dubbed by Sir Walter Scott as ‘rough wooing’, roughly translating as marriage by right of war (Wiki has a good page on the concept). Russia is using similar techniques and justifications.

In point of fact the aim in England’s relations was as geopolitical as Russia’s in Ukraine, to stop the Scots/ Ukrainians from allying with the French/USA against English/ Russian interests. But in a sudden and welcome change of tone, the joining of the two Crowns of England and Scotland in 1603 was by mutual consent and in many ways a ‘reverse takeover’. This was not a pact forced on the weak by the strong, for it was England, the much stronger partner that invited Scotland to send its King James VI of Scotland to become James I of the ‘United Kingdom’. He proceeded to design a new flag, the ‘Union Jack’, and a new prayerbook and Bible, the ‘King James version’, seen today as one of the greatest literary products in the English language.

The setting up of what is now known as the EU (previously known under different initials from 1956 onwards) was a similar attempt to prevent the mutual ‘rough wooing’ of Germans and French over many centuries and replace geopolitical strife with economic and political harmony, freely agreed, in a process that many see as serviceable if rather cumbersome. But importantly it is done in a peaceful manner. Even leaving it is done peacefully. The British people decided to do so in 2016 and the only result has been what might be called ‘leavers’ remorse’ but has in no way disrupted Anglo-European cooperation in many areas, including defense. There was no ‘Maidan’, no Prime Minister had to flee to Brussels and not a single riot took place in Britain, although views on EU membership continue to be very divided. No one was sent to the (non-existent) British Gulag.

In the context of Britain or the EU in 2023, borders can only be changed by common consent, to do so by war is not only illegal but seen as deeply shocking. Russians who believe that a proper Rule of Law should apply so that they can call a war a ‘war’ face imprisonment for ten years or a tragic encounter with a window frame anywhere they try to speak their mind. To challenge Putin’s ‘existential’ belief that Peter the Great had the right idea when he punished anyone who disagreed with him is very dangerous indeed. In most peoples’ view stopping another world war or an invasion to enforce one state’s dominance over the other is indeed an existential threat to peace and prosperity. Many Russians agree but are too scared to say so openly. They cannot challenge the Newspeak, as Orwell put it, or ‘Big Brother’ will find out and silence them. Legality, truth, and basic humanity, these are the liberal norms that Russia has so egregiously breached. It seems obvious to me that anyone who agrees with their actions is by definition agreeing with their motives. This is to support a direct attack on the most important global norm of not using war to further geopolitical ends.

Putin and his colleagues might argue that the US did that in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003, and I would not disagree, though the Ukrainian regime has never persecuted anyone the way that the Taliban and Saddam Hussein did. As for the future in the liberal states that I inhabit, Scotland and England might well become ‘independent’ of each other once more; England, Britain, or Scotland might well ask to rejoin the EU. But they will do so without sending regiments over the border with murderous intent. To do so would be literally criminal. I and many others agree with the liberal dictum ‘I may disagree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it’. By resisting Putin’s armies the Ukrainians are defending the rights of us all.

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Harris Gleckman <![CDATA[Consultations and Summits aplenty – Is any-body bringing all this together?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19932 2023-02-13T14:19:59Z 2023-02-13T14:19:59Z September 2023 is forecast to be heavy in summiteering, as already two summits and a ministerial meeting are scheduled to take place in the space of a few days, around the high-level “UN Week”, namely: an SDG Summit, another Climate Summit, and a Ministerial Meeting in preparation of the September 2024 Summit of the Future....

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September 2023 is forecast to be heavy in summiteering, as already two summits and a ministerial meeting are scheduled to take place in the space of a few days, around the high-level “UN Week”, namely: an SDG Summit, another Climate Summit, and a Ministerial Meeting in preparation of the September 2024 Summit of the Future. In the usual UN fashion, the outcomes of these high-level events need to be prepared in advance through intergovernmental consultations, to ensure there is something ready for leaders to sign when they come together in New York.

Can we expect that something more than nice, diplomatically balanced words will come out of each and all of these events? There are good reasons why they are convened in the first place:

  • With seven years to go till the supposed achievement of the SDGs, a mid-term review through the SDG Summit makes good sense for course correction and recommitment of both political will and resources. Can we expect anything major on the latter, though, with rich country resources being redirected, as they are, from (domestic) COVID response to the war in Ukraine and broader economic and geopolitical competition?
  • Eight years after the adoption of the Paris Agreement, the world will take stock of progress towards its achievement at UNFCCC COP28 in Dubai in November-December 2023. In that light, it makes good sense to use the new Climate Summit a couple of months earlier to renew pressure on countries and their leaders to actually deliver on the Paris Agreement. Will the necessary funding, technology transfer, and capacity building be delivered, though, and who is really verifying the implementation of state and non-state actor commitments and declarations?
  • The Ministerial Meeting for the Summit of the Future is a preparatory step toward the actual Summit scheduled for September 2024. The Meeting’s outcome can set the tone for the Summit itself. With inputs from the UNSG’s High-level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism and non-state actors, in addition to UN member state input, will the level of ambition be set high enough for meaningful renewal of the UN and global governance, or will it be an opportunity lost with unforeseen consequences?

More summit-level events may be planned for the coming busy September at UN Headquarters. It is already clear, though, from the above three major events, that this may turn out to be “Judgement Day”: an opportunity for multilateralism to show that it can deliver substantively for people and the planet, or a proof that the doomsayers are right in claiming that multilateralism is ineffective and becoming obsolete. We certainly hope the former will carry the day, but for that to happen there are certain conditions that have to be met, not least:

  1. An acknowledgment of the interconnections among the three high-level events, a common narrative, and a shared vision for the future that is clear, compelling, and practical.
  2. New mechanisms for sharing funding, technology, and know-how, with adequate monitoring and verification arrangements, to rebuild the trust between the Global South and the Global North, and to get substantive results that improve a lot of the poorer segments of humanity. Relying on ODA that never reaches the modest and insufficient 0.7 target and on charitable donations can no longer be defended. Structural changes are needed in the way the International Financial Institutions and the global financial system work, the targeted issuance of non-restrictive SDRs, as well as multilateral system funding through direct taxation of international transactions and other such arrangements that benefit from a functioning global governance system.
  3. A coordinated mobilization of the whole UN system and other intergovernmental bodies to tackle effectively today’s existential risks for humanity. These risks have drivers and causes that do not fall neatly under any one intergovernmental body. Similarly, their consequences go well beyond the scope of any single body, even if they are assigned to one (e.g. climate change to UNFCCC, pandemics to WHO). Given the multiple dimensions and complex interconnections such risks exhibit, it is time to adopt a systems’ approach and set up a body with authority, analytical capacity, and operational prowess similar to those the UN Security Council has for addressing traditional threats to peace and security; this time for human security threats, without the veto right for anybody, and systematically engaging non-state actor constituencies.

The UN General Assembly consultations for the Ministerial Meeting and the Summit of the Future that is about to begin offering a good platform to start talking about all this in earnest.

 

The authors of this article, former UN staff members Dr. Harris Gleckman and Dr. Georgios Kostakos, proudly acknowledge that they are members of the Executive Board of the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS), which promotes the establishment of a Global Resilience Council (GRC) as a “UN Security Council for non-military threats” and is actively engaged in the Coalition for the UN We Need (C4UN) of civil society organizations and think tanks from around the world.

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 9 – Dissecting the Alt-Right Movement]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19919 2023-01-26T19:33:42Z 2023-01-26T19:33:42Z Today’s guest is Ipsita Chatterjee, a human geographer interested in the economic, cultural, and geopolitical impacts of globalization. Ipsita is also a prolific author, and her latest book “The Alt-Right Movement: Dissecting Racism, Patriarchy and Anti-immigrant Xenophobia” served as the basis of our discussion. To help me better understand this phenomenon, she took me through...

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Hatred, suspicion, and prejudice are easier to spread than love, compassion, and understanding. Fear is a strong driver for human beings and, in times of uncertainty and turmoil (such as our own), it takes hold of us. In the digital age, expressions of hatred and fear can interact with each other, connecting and forming ideological networks based on these root emotions. A prime example of this is the rise of the alt-right (alternative right), an online (initially) far-right, white nationalist movement, originating in the US. 

Today’s guest is Ipsita Chatterjee, a human geographer interested in the economic, cultural, and geopolitical impacts of globalization. Ipsita is also a prolific author, and her latest book “The Alt-Right Movement: Dissecting Racism, Patriarchy and Anti-immigrant Xenophobia” served as the basis of our discussion. To help me better understand this phenomenon, she took me through how the alt-right came to be, its rise, and its ideological basis. We also talked about the role of the internet as a driver of alt-right ideology, but also as a potential remedy against it. Overall a super interesting discussion that I really feel gave me a much better understanding of the subject, as well as new perspectives on it. 🎙Our conversation was actually so interesting that we ended up talking for quite a while, so I split this recording up into 2 episodes. Please enjoy part 1 and stay tuned for part 2!

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Francis M. O'Donnell <![CDATA[Russia is less than its myths and the truth will set its peoples free]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19911 2023-01-31T14:27:40Z 2023-01-26T19:21:47Z Lately, I came across a very interesting article “The Roots of Russia”, written exactly sixty years ago by Dr. Lev Dobriansky (1918-2008), a renowned Professor of Economics at Georgetown University and former US Ambassador to The Bahamas[1]. Dobriansky’s article was re-published in January 1964, in An Cosantóir (The Defender), The Irish Defence Journal, courtesy of...

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Lately, I came across a very interesting article “The Roots of Russia”, written exactly sixty years ago by Dr. Lev Dobriansky (1918-2008), a renowned Professor of Economics at Georgetown University and former US Ambassador to The Bahamas[1]. Dobriansky’s article was re-published in January 1964, in An Cosantóir (The Defender), The Irish Defence Journal, courtesy of (US) Naval Institute Proceedings-April 1963. Now I learn from the former First Lady of Ukraine, Chicago-born Kateryna Yushchenko, that she studied and later served under Dobriansky when she headed the National Captive Nations Committee and the Ukrainian National Information Service in the USA.

Dobriansky was the US-born son of Ukrainian immigrants and a staunch anti-Communist. Amongst the nuggets that his article brings out, over a half-century ago, when Russia already dominated the USSR, which in turn dominated a good part of the world: Russians did not constitute a majority of the USSR, no more than Germans would in today’s EU. Even back in 1897, 60% of the subjects of the Russian Empire were not Russian. Lenin himself said, “Czarist Russia and the Russians constituted 43 percent of the total population, i.e. a minority, while the non-Russian nationalities constituted 57 percent”. Even the Soviet census of 1951 revealed that of 202 million, 54 percent were non-Russian (later denied by Beria).

Dobriansky pointed out specifically the “statistical tricks in padding figures for political purposes as, for example, counting a person as Russian because he knows the Russian language”. This underpins to this day the egregious and false invasion logic that Putin exerts on eastern Ukraine, including Crimea. Dobriansky also pointed out that the most productive lands were in non-Russian homelands, such as Ukraine, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. He adds, back in 1963, that “both Russian institutional totalitarianism and Russian imperialism have been fiercely resisted by the non-Russian nations in the USSR”.

In all of this, Ukraine, by virtue of its size, history, and capacities, is critical for freedom to flourish. It is critical to the fulfillment of the rights of all peoples in the former USSR space. In this regard, Ukraine’s struggle for normalisation as a free and independent European state is analogous to the struggle of the Irish (and Americans, Africans, Asians, etc.) from imperialist colonial rule. Curiously enough, Dobriansky, without using the term, recommended hybrid means using diplomatic, political, psychological, and cultural weapons, in favour of realising “the expansion of freedom in the world”, especially for “(1) real national self-determination and independence for all the non-Russian nations in the Soviet Union, (2) the advancement of decentralist Siberyak tendencies in the Asiatic sphere of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic itself, and (3) the hope of genuine freedom to countless innocent Russians in an attempt to create and broaden any discernible rift between the Moscow government and the underlying Russian masses.”

From Kremlin.ru, 31 January 2023

Since then, much has changed, the USSR dissolved, but Russia again seeks resurgently to dominate its neighborhood and intimidate the world. Putin’s greatest legacy is likely to be his destruction of Russia’s international credibility, and failure to enhance Russia’s standing in the world. Russia, once constructive in multilateralism, now undermines the instruments of international order required for human security in the 21st century. Putin’s behavior today is diametrically opposed to the values he apparently espoused twenty years ago in June 2003 in his address to the visiting InterAction Council of former world leaders[2]. Add to this domestically, his failure to widen the freedoms of Russians in civil society and the media, to decentralise power, liberalise society, advance democracy, transparency and accountability, and to diversify Russia’s economy on a sustainable basis.

Dobriansky also recalled how Krushchev, at the 20th Congress of the CPSU admitted that “Stalin had attempted to kill off 40 million Ukrainians and had failed“. For those who still think that Russia and Ukraine are brotherly nations, perhaps the parable of Cain and Abel tells it best.

Ergo, the future of European coherence largely depends on three critical factors today: (1) Russia’s ability to respect Ukraine’s sovereign choices and to restore itself to international and multilateral collaboration, and (2) the EU’s ability to maintain strategic unity and political heft, and (3)  Germany’s ability to think “outside the box”, and with some modesty realise that in the wider EU, it is a minority nation, for there is no majority one, and it should therefore exert its influence more positively to build consensus around choices for European futures. Germany needs to let those Leopards roll now, as Ukraine is losing ground around Bakhmut, Berestove and Konstyantynivka, according to the Institute for The Study of War.

Even Russia would be a minority country, if and when it joins the EU (fat chance of that). As Romano Prodi said in 2003, the EU’s Europe is “a union of diversity and minorities”. That is our strength and our only future. This neighborhood no longer has any room for bullies.

The future of Russia lies in a transition back to reform and true democracy, but with complete withdrawal from Ukraine, war crimes trials, and reparations. Can Russia survive? – that is the bigger question.  And at this stage of its moral, financial, political, and strategic decay, the question must be: why should it? It is after all a crony empire and should be stripped of veto power in the UN Security Council, and subject to de-colonisation under chapters XI, XII, and XIII of the UN Charter.

Putin’s Russia has continually violated the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Geneva Conventions, and multiple UN General Assembly resolutions passed against its aggression in 2022. It has become a rogue criminal régime.  Most importantly, Russia cannot legitimately veto any UN Security Council (UNSC) resolution on a dispute to which it is party, i.e. it cannot veto UNSC action on its invasion of Ukraine, according to UN Charter Article 27.3. It is time for the world to stop ignoring that prohibition or interpreting it so narrowly as to enable rogue impunity through global inertia.

While it has been argued that the obligation to abstain from exercising the veto under Article 27.3 only relates to Chapter VI and Art. 52. 3 of Chapter VIII, and not to Chapter VII of the UN Charter, it has to be equally argued that Russia did NOT respect Art. 33 of Chapter VI, neither prior to its aggression in 2014 nor since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022; nor did it respect Art.37, i.e. it did not seek peaceful resolution for its alleged “grievances” through recourse to the international instruments established to prevent violent conflict, and indeed the scourge of war. The UN Security Council also failed to refer the dispute to a regional mechanism, such as the OSCE, under Art 5. of Chapter VIII of the UN Charter. By the way, despite the huge increase in member states through decolonization and later dissolution of the USSR, the UN Charter (let alone the Security Council) has not been revised since 1971. Hence, Art. 27.3 should be re-interpreted without holding world peace hostage to a formal UN Charter amendment and comprehensive UN reform.[3] It is not like other UN Charter articles have not been reinterpreted to allow for adjustment to changed circumstances, including Art. 23.1 which still mentions “the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics” as one of five permanent members of the Security Council but Russia occupies the seat with broad consent after the dissolution of the USSR.

The failure to institutionalize and mainstream such civic education values, norms, and curricula, driving their adherents into exile instead, has deprived Russia of the critical mass of civic empowerment that would have rendered its leaders truly democratically and judicially accountable and served as a check on totalitarianism. Contrary to the appeasing arguments advanced by writers such as Geoffrey Roberts in The Irish Times[7], it is such internal failures of governance that have brought the world to the precipitous chasm we face, not Western aid to a free nation, Ukraine, under unjustified aggression by its former imperial overlord.

It is now up to the world to disempower this rogue state and return it to compliance with its international obligations, which are incumbent on us all, without exception.

Ukrainians deserve nothing less – and the same goes for the diverse peoples of Russia, and the rest of the world.

 

[1] O’Donnell, F. M. Dobriansky, the non-Russian centrifuge, and a union of diversity and minorities, Academia, 17 June 2015. https://www.academia.edu/13049866/Dobriansky_the_non_Russian_centrifuge_and_a_union_of_diversity_and_minorities_

[2] Putin, V. V. Address to the InterAction Council, 23 June 2003  http://www.en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/22033

[3] Comprehensive UN reform, including the Charter amendment, is definitely needed, as made evident once again by the inability of the world organization to address effectively the Russian invasion of Ukraine but also global risks of a non-military nature, like the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. The process of reform initiated by Secretary-General António Guterres’ report Our Common Agenda (2021) will culminate through a number of milestones in a Summit of the Future in September 2024. It is an opportunity that should not be missed to keep the United Nations relevant and useful for humanity in the decades to come.

[4] Chyzh, Olga. When will Putin give up Ukraine? Only when his inner circle forces him to stop.  The Guardian, 22 January 2023  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jan/22/vladimir-putin-ukraine-west-russia-president

[5] Snyder, Timothy. Judenplatz 1010 – A Speech to Europe, sponsored by Erste Foundation and the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM), 9 May 2019. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zs41CkIjRw

[6] Applebaum, Anne. The Russian Empire Must Die, The Atlantic, December 2022. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/12/putin-russia-must-lose-ukraine-war-imperial-future/671891/

[7] Roberts, Geoffrey. West risks war with Russia over escalating military aid, Irish Times, 25 January 2023 https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2023/01/25/germans-are-right-to-think-twice-about-sending-leopard-tanks-to-ukraine/

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Bob Haverluck https://litpress.org/Products/4621/When-God-Was-Flesh-and-Wild <![CDATA[Motivations for Ecological Action #18]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19901 2023-01-04T17:56:11Z 2023-01-04T14:23:42Z    

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Harris Gleckman <![CDATA[50 years after Allende at the UN: a corporate triumph named multistakeholderism]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19897 2023-01-02T15:07:19Z 2023-01-02T15:07:19Z *Originally published on December 30, 2022 **Produced by Lynn Fries / GPEnewsdocs TRANSCRIPT LYNN FRIES: Hello and welcome. I’m Lynn Fries producer of Global Political Economy or GPEnewsdocs with guest Harris Gleckman. A recent symposium marking the 50th anniversary of Salvador Allende’s speech at the UNGA in 1972 delved into the topic of “Corporate Power: Then...

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FOGGS Executive Board member, Harris Gleckman has given an interview to GPE Newsdocs.com commenting on Salvador Allende’s speech at the UN in 1972 and the call of world nations for a New International Economic Order, explaining how global corporations were more effective at setting the rules.




*Originally published on December 30, 2022

**Produced by Lynn Fries / GPEnewsdocs

TRANSCRIPT

LYNN FRIES: Hello and welcome. I’m Lynn Fries producer of Global Political Economy or GPEnewsdocs with guest Harris Gleckman.

A recent symposium marking the 50th anniversary of Salvador Allende’s speech at the UNGA in 1972 delved into the topic of “Corporate Power: Then and Now.”

In this segment, I invite our guest to expand on an argument he made at that symposium. Notably, that to build a stronger democratic multilateral system accountable to the public interest and committed to a sustainable planet we not only need to think about the narrative of where we want to go but we have to think about the institutional ways of making that happen.

I should note our guest speaks from first-hand experience of the ways in which corporate power undermined institutions set up in response to Allende’s appeal. And how into the present, corporate power has shaped or as some would say misshaped the international economic order where among other inequalities, transnational corporations but not citizens are protected under hard law at the international level.

Joining us from Massachusetts, Harris Gleckman is Senior Fellow at the Center for Governance and Sustainability, UMass-Boston. He’s the Director of Benchmark Environmental Consulting and Board Member of the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability. And the author of Multistakeholder Governance and Democracy: A Global Challenge.

Among other distinctions and of particular relevance to today’s conversation, from the early ‘80s until it was shut down in 1992, Harris Gleckman was a staff member at the United Nations Centre on Transnational Corporations. He served as chief of the UNCTC environment unit (1988-1992) and in this capacity prepared the benchmark survey and recommendations on sustainable development management for the 1992 Rio Earth Summit.

I am delighted to welcome Harris Gleckman. Over to you. Harris.

HARRIS GLECKMAN: Thank you and thank you very much, Lynn for inviting me to join your series. The panel reflecting on Allende’s crucial role in initiating global conversations about the power of multinationals was a wonderful marker in history.

I want to pick up on your invitation to say what we really would like to see as a narrative for governing the international market and the institutions for doing that. I think that at a minimum, we have a good model in theory which is what happens in the industrialized countries. And there are essentially five parts.

The first part is the state is intended to be the buffer between consumers and the industry; to be a buffer between the workers and the owners of industry. And the state has this intermediary role and an institutional role in balancing those sets of powers.

It sets up an administrative system to review mergers, to review technology issues, to review disclosure. It has an administrative structure.

It also has a series of organizations that explicitly say: here is what a product safety standard should look like. Here is what a medical device for testing efficiency should look like. Here is how workers should be protected in their workplace. It has a separate set of institutions to make all those activities happen.

It has a tax system which says this is the way in which the corporate world, in principle anyway, ought to be providing resources to meet, amongst other things, these needs.

And it has a court system.

When we move into the international space, we need all of those functions. And we need some additional ones because we have jurisdictional and political boundaries between countries. So those boundaries pushed by the corporate sector issue: They’ve demanded free movement of money going into the country, free movement of money going out, profits. They’ve demanded free movement of their technologies going in.

But we do not have free movement of people. And we do not have clarity about how to deal with liability and responsibility and obligations across borders. All of that needs to be part of a package. The best of the national practices and a whole other collection of institutional and conceptual features to regulate a global market.

But that’s not where we are. And there are a lot of reasons why we’re not there. And amongst those that Allende flagged in his keynote address to the UNCTAD Session Three meeting in Santiago that initiated global attention to the need to figure out how to manage the international market.

Let me explain to you why we’re not where we ought to be. Out of Allende’s statement, a message of which he repeated in the General Assembly [the United Nations General Assembly], the Economic and Social Council brought together a group of eminent persons to say: President Allende, are you really right? Is it really necessary to do this?

And those eminent persons – a mixture of academics, labor, people from the corporate world, people from the legal profession – came with a resounding yes; we do need to do this. And they reported that to the Economic and Social Council who created two bodies. One, a standing body of governments to continue b the political aspects of this, the Commission on Transnational Corporations. And a staff called, as you referred to it, the Center on Transnational Corporations (most commonly used initials, UNCTC).

The Commission at its Second Session said to the staff, we’re giving you three major assignments. First is to address the normative legal basis for how to deal with transnationals in the international market. And please help us develop a Code of Conduct [on Transnational Corporations].

Second, they said: part of the reason President Allende’s appeal for assistance occurs in many, many countries of the developing world is because they need technical and legal and financial assistance in negotiating with multinationals and in writing their own laws. So the Center was asked to provide day in and day out technical assistance to developing countries on matters relating to transnational corporations.

And the third thing they asked of us was to do research and build a data base about the nature of transnational corporations. Because while certain elements were well known, many more had to be researched.

What was the response to this from the corporate world?

Part of it was supporting the Center on Transnational Corporations. Part, however, went to the OECD. And the OECD produced a competing set of standards which they called guidelines. So that introduced us to the first major tension about how we did not get to what needed to be an international arrangement for dealing with the international market.

The OECD explicitly said it’s guidelines. It’s voluntary: We will set some benchmarks, but it’s up to each company, each country, it’s going to be voluntary. This was the beginning of undermining an effort to build a constructive global system for managing an international market.

The narrative and the wording in negotiations around the Code of Conduct remained a tension point. Because when there are references to good accounting, to consumer protection, the concern of those in the corporate world was that these ideas might permeate at the national level in developing countries into law. And that, that in their view was a bad idea.

And so every section of the discussion of the Code of Conduct which might have been binding became a battle over the power of the narrative being moved into a legally binding system at least at the national level.

Lynn, you were referring to in terms of developing the criteria for sustainable development as a contribution to the 1992 Rio Conference on Environment and Development. This was an explicit request from the Economic and Social Council. And the Center convened many discussions with many advisors and produced this set of criteria for sustainable development management.

The pressure on that; sorry, I need to back up and say every idea that was in the criteria had a footnote which said some company in the world was actually doing that activity at that level of environmental and sustainable behavior. That wasn’t good enough.

As an example of the kind of pressure, the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris went to the Swedish government who had helped fund the work we were doing on the criteria and accounting standards. And the Chief negotiating delegate for the Swedish government in this process which was a very active country, was   explicitly told, don’t incorporate this into the material.

And even more was told: don’t talk to the Center on Transnational Corporations. I can be honest with you, they basically did that. But as you understand, there was a conversation because I learned of that pressure brought through the International Chamber of Commerce through the Swedish government that constrained its contribution to the 1992 Rio Conference.

In 1992, something else happened. The Center on Transnational Corporations itself was shut down. That’s also a reflection of the political power of just trying to develop some guidance, some assistance to countries; some research was seen as too much of a challenge to parts of the corporate sector.

But that’s only a part of the story. Another part as I was indicating is that the idea of law and regulatory practices normally done at the national level in developed countries was moved into the area of volunteerism. Whatever standards there were, they had to be voluntary.

Another way in which this battle took place was over what for many it would be a mundane issue which is accounting standards. Part of accounting standards, so far as countries are concerned and so far as people are concerned, is the taxes that can be appropriately charged to international business. That turned accounting standards into a political fight.

The Center on Transnationals hosted an international standards of accounting and reporting body to give developing country accounting professionals and leaders a chance to meet and to recommend the standards they wanted. But the predominant role of setting the standards for the accounting profession worldwide is a voluntary set run through corporate organizations.

Let me just indicate how different these standards could be. Our colleague at the Center on Transnationals used to work in Asia for Exxon. And he would be asked by Exxon headquarters, did we make enough? How much did we make this year?

And his answer, which he repeated, says tell me, I have three different accounting standards I can use to answer your question. The US standard, the standard in the country, the internal Exxon standard, and he could have said, a fourth, the ISAR standard [International Standards of Accounting and Report]. Tell me which one you want, and then I can answer you the question, how much profits, which relates to the ability of the countries to do taxing.

Another area which is missing from what is the national practice is to set product safety standards for workers, for consumers. And here the UN was asked to produce a consolidated list of the rules and regulations about risks from chemicals and medical products.

A book early edition looked like this. As you can see, it was a substantial amount of work. This is a compendium of decisions made by independent countries so that it could be shared with other countries, both from a scientific point of view and an administrative point of view.

Well, you won’t be surprised this also got shut down. That means that the process which would be the equivalent at the national level of environmental protection agencies, occupational health and safety agencies that doesn’t have even a starting point in the way in which the corporate sector has   that from happening, constrained the international level.

Another area is in the area of courts. In the developed world, you have a largely independent court system. You have administrative of courts. All designed to have the leverage to arbitrate facts and the power to order the implementation of decisions.

At the international level, there are no real courts of that nature. But what the corporate world has done is come up with a counter proposal, a counter structure, of the investor dispute settlement arbitration hearings [ISDS].

One of the key differences between that in a court is that the investor dispute settlement arena has an unusual criterion. The corporation has a platform to sue governments who enact health and safety environmental zoning rules, which might disrupt the profitability of the enterprise.

Again, the power of the corporate world on the, on the international level has blocked even the analogous institutions that operate regularly in the developed world. Two other areas where that is occurring; one is in governance.

In many developed countries, corporations, citizen groups, worker groups are encouraged to share their perspectives, to lobby the state, to say what the rules should be. At the international level, when Allende spoke and many years of the Center on Transnational’s and the Commission on Transnational’s life, the companies worked with their governments and the governments expressed certain views. Again, playing this moderating role but heavily influenced by corporate lobbying.

Subsequently, that wasn’t seen as adequate enough and corporations wanted to become at the table in setting rules and standards. And one of the ways in which they did this is create another form of institution called a multistakeholder body.

These multistakeholder bodies exist in the area of setting product standards: The Marine Stewardship Council, the Forest Stewardship Council. In effect, these are the analogs to the national bodies. But now the firms involved are on the governance of these bodies.

The firms or their spokesperson organizations wanted to be in the policy debate through multistakeholder forums. And this is now a direction which is, for the last 15 years now, a push from the World Economic Forum.

And unfortunately, to be candid with you, one which the current Secretary General [the United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres] has largely agreed to. And has a partnership agreement with the World Economic Forum to open the door more for these multistakeholder bodies which brings the corporation into the governance process.

The current Secretary General has proposed as part of going forward after the 75 years of the United Nations: Our Common Agenda is his report. That report says that six other multistakeholder bodies should be created to deal with global policy issues. And it’s also telling that the Secretary General made no recommendations for governments to negotiate new international agreements.

So another way in which the pressure from the corporate world has influenced the governance of the market is that the firms now are seeking and have got a seat at the table for a number of the standard setting practices and policy making in global governance.

And I want to share one other which is quite central to this discussion. And it’s quite central to the discussion in the climate discussions and in the sustainability discussions.

The sustainable development goals are negotiated between governments. But those governments who have the capacity and the money for doing it didn’t put up the money, are not putting up the money. Because they’re leaving the door open for corporate philanthropies and individual firms to decide how to fund the future needs.

And so corporate philanthropy power is very serious. We just had a very dramatic example of that political leverage through funding in the institution set up to deal with COVID – to fund the vaccine access for many developing countries – called COVAX.

COVAX did not meet its goals. COVAX was a multistakeholder body. But, two weeks ago, one of the funders of COVAX, it’s called GAVI, the Global Alliance on Vaccine Initiative, said: It’s not working. We’re going to stop funding it.

GAVI is supported largely and centrally by the Gates Foundation. Meanwhile, the World Health Organization is saying very clearly, COVID is still a problem in the developing world and other parts of the world, and we need money. But the corporate funders have said that’s enough.

Unfortunately, also by the current Secretary General’s advice, many countries who might have previously given their donations to the World Health Assembly to do vaccines for COVID, instead, we’re encouraged to give their money to COVAX. And now COVAX is collapsing.

Now I mention [all] that as the six different ways in which what ought to be the system for governing multinationals and transnationals has been undermined in the last 30 years.

So where can we pick up some of Allende’s enthusiasm and the enthusiasm and commitment of many other people around the world going forward? Let me offer five possible routes for maintaining and pushing forth further on this.

First is the need to keep transnationals [transnational corporations] out of the governing process of international affairs. At the level of products, this is actually being done in the case of tobacco and infant formula. Where the treaties explicitly say that firms in that industry cannot be in the room, cannot participate, cannot contribute. Because the space is for governments to figure out how to make decisions.

But that’s not what’s happening in climate. In climate, the corporations were all over the recent Conference of Parties in Egypt (COP 27). They struck an agreement with the Egyptian government, Coca-Cola, to fund part of the cost of the COP. They held sales exhibitions; oil and gas companies could put up tents to show how good they are.

A new wall has to be built to reassert the space for governments to meet without the corporate world interfering in setting what should be the rules for the global market.

A second area is some work under the United Nations Human Rights Council where they’re negotiating a binding treaty dealing with the issue of cross border liabilities. This is one of the areas where on the international market, there’s an enormous hole. And this gap prevents those who may cause problems from having a court room where those who have been harmed can make their case and that settlements can be enforced.

So, there’s an effort for a binding treaty for the Human Rights Council. And that work is an area which would be very helpful for many people to be aware of and to join that activity in Geneva.

A third area is to keep raising the attention the way multistakeholder bodies provide a frame, an institutional space for the corporations to enter public decision making. These are presented as if we now got everybody in the room. But everybody in the room has been ones which the f unders or the powerful actors have selected. And governments are treated as if they are equal to academics or to the corporate world or civil society.

This forum does not have a base in any concept of democracy. And that’s an area, you know, Lynn that I’ve been writing on for a while.

Another direction, a fourth, is to begin envisioning what would the next commission on transnational corporations, the next Center on Transnational Corporations, what would they look like? In terms of the narrative, their assignment, their institutional relations, planning how to build the next foothold. To begin to construct the kind of ways in which we ought to be able to govern the international market.

And my last suggestion is the toughest one, as we need to figure out what is, what we really would like to scale up democracy at a global level. And how does this fit well with regulating dominant forces in the market?

And this is a tough question right now; our basic principle is enshrined in the ‘one country one vote’. It doesn’t take a lot of quick of study to realize that there are a lot of small countries in the world population-wise, and there are a number of very large countries in the world population-wise.

But at most democracies are based on individuals. And we haven’t got that kind of system at the international level. Do we want it? That’s one of the questions about envisioning what one would want out of a whole global governance system.

A key part of that would be how to make sure that the right balance is maintained between the international firms and workers who are employed directly or indirectly by them; between international firms and the products and services that they provide; and between international firms and the natural resources that they are using. Those features of a global oversight of a market are essential. Thank you, Lynn.

FRIES: With those thoughts, we are going to leave it here for now. Thank you, Harris. And from Geneva, Switzerland thank you for joining us in this segment of GPEnewsdocs with Harris Gleckman.

Harris Gleckman is Senior Fellow at the Center for Governance and Sustainability, UMass-Boston and Director of Benchmark Environmental Consulting. He is Board Member of the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability. Gleckman was a staff member of the UN Centre on Transnational Corporations and head of the NY office of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. He is the author of Multistakeholder Governance and Democracy: A Global Challenge.

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 8 – Climate policy and activism in the MENA region – Neeshad Shafi]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19891 2023-01-02T14:49:19Z 2022-12-22T15:07:04Z In this episode, we had the privilege of learning about climate activism specifically in the Middle East and North Africa region by one of the most important players in that space: Neeshad Shafi! 🗣️ Neeshad is an environmentalist, speaker, and social change advocate from Qatar. He has over 5 years of experience in analyzing Global...

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Climate change is a global crisis that knows no borders. As a consequence of that, climate activism is (thankfully) becoming a global storm that transcends borders, in order to collectively imagine and create a livable, sustainable future for our species, no matter which part of the world we’re from. 

In this episode, we had the privilege of learning about climate activism specifically in the Middle East and North Africa region by one of the most important players in that space: Neeshad Shafi!

🗣 Neeshad is an environmentalist, speaker, and social change advocate from Qatar. He has over 5 years of experience in analyzing Global Environmental Politics and Climate Policies with a special focus on the Middle East. He’s an active member of several global environmental youth groups and contributed actively to international summits, notably the Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC, the UN Youth Climate Summit, and more. He is also the co-founder of the Arab Youth Climate Movement Qatar, which is the first, registered, Independent, youth-led, grassroots, non-profit association in the State of Qatar.

🌳 In our conversation today, we went over the youth climate movement in the MENA region, namely how it functions, what its prospects are, and what its future (and the future of global youth climate activism) might look like. Additionally, we explored topics around climate policy in the MENA region in general, touching on various subjects, from oil geopolitics to climate justice. Tune in for more!

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[End-of-Year Thoughts – For a Better 2023]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19887 2022-12-15T15:21:41Z 2022-12-15T15:21:41Z Two weeks from the finish line, 2022 can safely be said to have been a year of conflicts, tensions, and upheavals par excellence. The Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February may still be the darkest highlight of the year, but certainly not the only one. Some hopeful signs with ceasefires that held/are holding in...

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Two weeks from the finish line, 2022 can safely be said to have been a year of conflicts, tensions, and upheavals par excellence. The Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February may still be the darkest highlight of the year, but certainly not the only one. Some hopeful signs with ceasefires that held/are holding in Ethiopia and Yemen, offer limited solace, in view of continuing wars in Mali, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar, and other places. In terms of high-stake geopolitics, tensions between China and the US over Taiwan and the Southern China Sea are also a source of major concern, connected closely as they are to the possibility of direct superpower confrontation and even nuclear war, as is the case between Russia and the West too.

While the COVID-19 pandemic is hopefully subsiding, its impact on the world economy is combining with that of the war in Ukraine and the sanctions against Russia, plus speculation in shares and commodities, to cause destabilizing inflation with exorbitant energy and food prices, another debt crisis in the weaker economies, and widespread insecurity across the world. Economic, social, environmental, and political causes merge to produce explosive domestic unrest in places like China, with the “Zero COVID” policy as the immediate cause, and Iran, where massive protests by women and youth have been sparked by the death of a young woman in the hands of the Morality Police a couple of months ago. Accumulated frustrations among countries and population segments within countries are of course at the root of what is happening in this new season of widespread discontent.

Even in the privileged West, labour action is increasing, in view of rising inflation that further undermines the purchasing power of the large majority of citizens, with inequalities continuing to grow, as they have been doing in recent decades, and the super-rich cutting costs to increase even more their profit. “Culture wars” in increasingly divided societies play out through the rise of xenophobic governments that do not tolerate dissent, while conspiracy theories and misinformation abound in cyberspace. As for climate action, it is caught up between the need for ready and affordable energy and heating almost at any (environmental) cost, and the backtracking on promises for significant funding to developing countries for climate action and reparation for harm done.

We could continue the painting of the bleak picture of our world today, but the real purpose of this editorial is not to mark the end of the calendar year with doom and gloom but to renew hope for the start of the new year. We believe that in the recent negative experiences there exist several lessons that if heeded can help set the workings of societies and the international system on a more solid footing for the medium and long term. What could these lessons be:

  1. 1. Aggression and violence are not the solutions to any kind of grievance – use peaceful means to discuss and redress

The Russian government could have used such means to air apparent grievances about the treatment of the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine, as well as regarding its perception of being encircled by NATO. Resorting to aggression and invading a sovereign country was a major mistake that can lead to no legitimate results and must have economic and legal consequences for the aggressor.

At the same time, from the side of Ukraine and its allies, excluding any possibility of discussion and insisting on a fight to the end, which may prove bitter for the whole European continent and even the world if it goes nuclear, is probably not the most productive way to proceed for the medium-term.

One should not expect the Ukrainians who are defending their country and their lives to immediately agree to talks. Preparing the ground, though, for an eventual cessation of hostilities, troop withdrawal, and talks for a peaceful settlement should be high on the agenda of third actors, notably the UN and its Secretary-General. One way this could be pursued is put forward in the Armistice Call proposed by FOGGS and endorsed by former world leaders.

  1. National institutions must consult with and work for the well-being of their citizens – the “international community” must watch, encourage/discourage but also allow space for domestic processes to sort themselves out

The Iranian authorities could have probably averted or softened the public anger, protests, and deaths if they had investigated the death of the young woman, JIna Mahsa Amini, in police custody on 16 September 2022 and had brought the culprit(s) to justice. The handling by the US authorities of periodic social unrest in their country because of excessive police violence, especially towards minorities, is a good practice one can learn from. It does not solve all problems, as there is a lot that comes in the open through such a trigger – from the rule of law, social and regional cohesion, gender issues, the economic and broader state of young people, and more – but an approach that acknowledges wrongdoing and makes amends can help with de-escalation and opens space for peacefully dealing with the rest.

At the same time, protesters, from the family of the initial victim to other individuals and civil society organizations concerned, could have used all legal avenues at their disposal to pursue the case and ensure a fair investigation and prosecution of the culprit(s). Was this tried, and/or did those connected to the victims realistically have a chance to have their case reviewed objectively by the administrative and legal system of the Islamic Republic?

As for groups and countries outside Iran, it would have been helpful to demand a fair investigation, propose good practices and offer good services, rather than instantly politicizing the situation and threatening sanctions. The recent decision by the UN Human Rights Council to establish a fact-finding mission to Iran moves in this problem-solving spirit. Of course, at this stage, one must take into account many more deaths that have been added to the initial one, because of bad handling of the situation by the Iranian authorities and escalation.

  1. Engage at all levels in goodwill, for the common good, and with a problem-solving attitude

Urgently needed is a sane approach that would focus on the problem at hand each time and not on geopolitical or ideological differences, international or domestic stereotypes, or partial interests. All involved in these situations – and we are literally all involved, in one or the other way – need to keep sight of the end goals that are professed and could unite but are often not adhered to: individual well-being and societal resilience, with rights and responsibilities, for the provision of common goods.

The United Nations, its intergovernmental organs, and its Secretary-General have a central role to play in such problem-solving exercises, from spreading a positive narrative of peaceful coexistence to fact-finding, naming, and saving (better than shaming, if the latter can be avoided), facilitating and enabling.

We very much hope that the new year’s resolutions of leaders, intergovernmental and civil society organizations, companies, and individuals will be along the above lines.

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Tapio Kanninen <![CDATA[The imperative of de-escalation in Ukraine: negotiations and possible solutions]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19880 2022-12-01T14:45:01Z 2022-11-29T14:59:28Z In the West, there are two different competing narratives about the war in Ukraine. The prevailing narrative is that it is a struggle between the “bad guys” and “good guys”. For many, Russia led by dictator Putin represents imperialism and is alone responsible for this unprovoked war, whereas Ukraine represents freedom and democracy as well...

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In the West, there are two different competing narratives about the war in Ukraine. The prevailing narrative is that it is a struggle between the “bad guys” and “good guys”. For many, Russia led by dictator Putin represents imperialism and is alone responsible for this unprovoked war, whereas Ukraine represents freedom and democracy as well as courage and heroism. The forces of evil must be won decisively by military means. The likelihood of a nuclear conflict is played down as it would lessen the resolve to reach a total victory.

If the Ukraine war is seen through moral prescriptions, as a struggle between good and evil, like in ancient Manichean thinking, we approach a very dangerous territory in the world of nuclear weapons. Russians have their own version of demonization, with an opposite view on locating the good and the evil. In this black-and-white, moralistic environment, only a few peace proposals have been presented while actors resort to increasingly harsh military measures, stricter sanctions and further escalation of conflict. Generals have become the oracles of the future and politicians and diplomats their servants. Is this really the future we want?

The minority or at least the less vocal view in the West is that reality is much more complicated than what the majority suggests. The unfortunate and short-sighted Russian invasion violates international law and has caused an enormous amount of suffering and turmoil, for the directly warring sides, for Europe, the US and the world, but this invasion was not unprovoked. While there are different ways of articulating the specifics of the narrative, this storyline involves the idea that also the West and the US in particular bear partial responsibility for the tragic outcome of the long process of mutual alienation and escalation of conflict between Russia and the West.[1]

What is more, the escalation has continued to a point where the world is verging on nuclear war. Nothing can justify a nuclear war and yet humankind is now becoming close to the darkest moment of the Cuban Missile Crisis, through brinkmanship and escalation. Nuclear war will be on the horizon unless a peaceful solution is found. China’s president Xi Jinping’s early November plea to stop making threats and prevent the use of nuclear weapons in Europe and Asia may have eased the rhetoric temporarily but is no substitute for the de-escalation of the conflict itself.

The proponents of the first narrative may respond that it is impossible to negotiate in good faith with the Putin regime. The point of ever more extensive military aid to Ukraine and deeper sanctions against Russia is also to undermine the Putin regime in the hope of the emergence of a more peaceful and democratic government in Russia. However, a coup d’état or a sudden revolution of some sort would likely lead to a destabilization of the Russian state, economy, and society. It is not only that we may be seeing a kind of return to the chaotic 1990s but there is also a possibility of dissolution of central political authority and fragmentation, civil strife, even war.

Many Western politicians and the bulk of media people seem to be thinking that the harder the sanctions the better because that will lead to some kind of a breakdown of the Russian economy leading to a regime change. But apart from the fact that the sanctions do not seem to be working the intended way, they hardly consider the consequences. Assuming a breakdown, even if someone would be able to again stabilize the situation in Russia, it is quite likely that the successor system will be a dictatorship, as the army and police are among the few coherent institutions that can keep the huge country from falling apart. Moreover, any loss of central control of Russia’s nuclear weapons would have nightmarish consequences.

Already during the Cold War, many researchers argued that the main danger lies in a situation, which is preceded by a steady erosion of trust and confidence. In this kind of scenario, a crisis may precipitate the first use of nuclear weapons, particularly if the initiator faces a desperate situation and believes that only nuclear weapons might provide an escape from certain defeat and death.[2]

The uncertainties and risks of the current situation have become increasingly blatant. Thus, while President Biden has criticized the Russian invasion harshly from the start, and including in his address to the UN General Assembly on 21 September 2022, the lessons of the Cuban Missile Crisis of the early 1960s seem to have started to resonate at the White House after mid-September. In his address at a fundraising dinner on September 29th Biden put forward some poking questions: “We’re trying to figure out: What is Putin’s off-ramp?” “Where, where does he get off? Where does he find a way out? Where does he find himself in a position that he does not — not only lose face but lose significant power within Russia?”

According to the New York Times[3], the main message that Mr. Biden seemed to be conveying is that he was heeding one of the central lessons of the Cuban Missile Crisis, which unfolded in October 1962. That lesson is that the United States and its allies need to avoid getting Mr. Putin’s back to the wall, forcing him to strike out. “It’s part of Russian doctrine”, he explained to the well-heeled crowd of potential donors to Democratic senatorial campaigns, that “if the motherland is threatened, they’ll use whatever force they need, including nuclear weapons.” This implies an understanding that if the Russians face continuous battlefield victories by NATO-assisted Ukrainian forces, the war will be in a political and military stalemate, where a nuclear strike becomes more and more likely, especially if the leaders’ political and physical survival is at risk.

The White House’s insistence that if Putin uses tactical nuclear weapons the US will respond “with catastrophic consequences” does not help defuse the approaching Armageddon. We do not know what these consequences mean in practice but General Petraeus, former CIA Director, has suggested striking Russian forces, installations and the Black Sea Fleet, destroying them completely with massive conventional arms. But that would be brinkmanship of the highest order. An attack against Russian forces by NATO countries allows or even might force Russia, according to its stated nuclear policy, to launch intercontinental ballistic missiles in return.

In 1962, after having vetoed various strike options proposed by the military – that we now know would have started a nuclear holocaust – President Kennedy eventually proposed a secret deal that was accepted by Soviet First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev. Kennedy suggested removing US nuclear missiles from Turkey secretly if Soviet missiles were removed from Cuba, publicly under UN monitoring. In addition, the US made a public declaration to not invade Cuba again.

During the Cuban crisis, President Kennedy estimated the probability of a nuclear war to be somewhere between one in three and one in two, while other participants in the crisis thought the probability was somewhat lower. Sixty years later, in 2022, we have already seen estimates that the probability of a nuclear war is approaching the heights of the 1962 crisis. For example, in October 2022, Matthew Bunn, Professor of the Practice of Energy, National Security, and Foreign Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, estimated that the probability of the war in Ukraine turning nuclear is 10-20%.[4] These levels of likelihood are unacceptable.  Former US Senator Sam Nunn “has also been sounding the alarm about the threat of an accidental nuclear exchange as a result of a cyber-attack on nuclear command-and-control systems — including by malign actors not directly involved in the conflict who could be confused for a nuclear adversary”[5].

The Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), a respected international institution established by Senator Nunn and Ted Turner, has for a long time advocated disarmament measures and military confidence-building measures. In face of the increasing escalation potential of the conflict in Ukraine, NTI published on 18 March 2022 a hypothetical scenario of how the world could plunder, unintentionally, into full-scale nuclear war through miscalculation and misinformation under the enormous pressure of the war, including mental and physical stress and sleep deprivation[6]. Numerous war games by the US department of defense and independent research institutions have also simulated the world moving unintentionally to nuclear war in hypothetical scenarios of war-like conditions between the US and Russia. And accidents become more likely when the war is prolonged as it is happening right now.

How to ensure in this dangerous situation that the nuclear war does not start intentionally or accidentally?  The prospects are not promising because of the almost complete loss of trust and communication between Russia and NATO. In December 2020, a high-level group of 166 former generals, politicians, ex-diplomats and academics from the US, Europe and Russia, all concerned about increasing risks of nuclear and other military accidents, signed a report entitled ‘Recommendations of the Expert Dialogue on NATO-Russia Military Risk Reduction in Europe’[7]. The talks continued in a smaller group but unfortunately have essentially been moribund after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In this serious situation of potential nuclear escalation, the UN Secretary-General could resort to a rarely used leadership measure the founders of the UN Charter endowed to him: the use of Article 99 of the Charter[8].  The Article says that the Secretary-General can “to bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security.”  It is in fact difficult to imagine a more urgent and appropriate use of Article 99 than the increased risk of nuclear war in Ukraine.  Secretary-General Antonia Guterres has himself said that nuclear tensions are climbing to dangerous levels in his speech at a UN Alliance of Civilizations meeting in Morocco in November 2022.[9]  Nuclear Threat Initiative could brief the Council, officially or informally, about the increased risks and propose that the seven recommendations by the NATO-Russia Nuclear Risk talks referred to above should be implemented to the maximum degree possible and official disarmament talks should also be urgently resumed.

We also believe in a nearly absolute and unconditional requirement to de-escalate the conflict through negotiations. This is a war between Russia and Ukraine, with intensive NATO involvement and with long-deteriorating US-Russia relations looming in the background. Any peace agreement must be negotiated by the relevant participants and with appropriate third parties.

On 11 November 2022, the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability issued a Call for Armistice in Ukraine.  So far five heads of State of Government have co-signed it.[10] The initiative asks for a transition from a general cease-fire to a final peace settlement between Russia and Ukraine which is to be supervised by the United Nations and possibly other international organizations, such as the OSCE. Demilitarization of the occupied areas and a larger demilitarized zone of disengagement between the armed forces of the belligerents could be a part of a wider agreement. The plan also calls for immediate efforts to be focused on repairing civilian infrastructure, including in the areas to be placed under temporary international administration, and on securing an adequate supply of food, water, health care, and energy for the inhabitants.

This is an example of a constructive proposal that stresses the role of common institutions and goes beyond thinking in terms of simple territorial concessions either way. In particular, the option of using the United Nations’ presence in Ukraine is an already much-tested model for the de-escalation of the war and building the elements for peace. Instead of seeing the conflict as a mythic struggle between good and evil, what is needed is a sense of nuance, context, and reciprocal process. The reliance on common institutions and especially the potential of the UN presence on the ground as a tool for de-escalation would be a step in the right direction – even if only a small step in the long march toward a more sustainable and desirable future.

 

[1] For discussions on this point, see Tuomas Forsberg and Heikki Patomäki, Debating the War in Ukraine. Counterfactual Histories and Future Possibilities, Abingdon and New York: Routledge, forthcoming in Dec 2022.

[2] Rudolf Avenhaus, Steven J. Brams, John Fichtner and D. Marc Kilgour, ‘The Probability of Nuclear War’, Journal of Peace Research, 1989, Vol. 26, No. 1, p. 91.

[3] David E Sanger, “In Dealing with Putin Threat, Biden Turns to Lessons of Cuban Missile Crisis”, New York Times, October 7th, 2022.

[4] View expressed in an NPR interview on 4 October 2022, summary available at https://www.npr.org/2022/10/04/1126680868/putin-raises-the-specter-of-using-nuclear-weapons-in-his-war-with-ukraine.

[5] Bryan Bender, “How the Ukraine War Could Go Nuclear”, Politico, 24 March 2022.

[6] Christopher Coletta, “Blundering into a Nuclear War in Ukraine; a Hypothetical Scenario”, Atomic Pulse, Nuclear Threat Initiative, 18 March 2022. Available at https://www.nti.org/atomic-pulse/blundering-into-a-nuclear-war-in-ukraine-a-hypothetical-scenario/. 

[7] European Leadership Network, “Recommendations from an experts’ dialogue; de-escalating NATO-Russia military risks”, 6 December 2020. Available at https://www.europeanleadershipnetwork.org/group-statement/nato-russia-military-risk-reduction-in-europe/

[8] See Tapio Kanninen and Heikki Talvitie,” How to Move the UN Security Council from Hostility to Cooperation”, PassBlue, 22 November 2022, Available at https://www.passblue.com/2022/11/21/how-to-move-from-hostility-to-cooperation-in-the-un-security-council/

For the history of the use of Article 99 see https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/monthly-forecast/2019-08/in-hindsight-article-99-and-providing-the-security-council-with-early-warning.php 

[9] “UN Chief: Nuclear tensions climbing to dangerous levels”, Global Affairs, SmartBrief, 23 November 2022.

[10] The Call is available at https://www.foggs.org/armistice-call-11-nov-2022/.

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Stella Ladi <![CDATA[Launching an interactive map on Covid-19 vaccination policies]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19872 2022-11-19T15:01:38Z 2022-11-19T15:01:38Z Authors: Dimitra Panagiotatou, Stella Ladi, and Angelos Angelou* Vaccine hesitancy has alarmed governments anxious to return to normality for economic and political reasons. Unlike other vaccination programmes, the Covid-19 one has been subject to extraordinary levels of politicisation. Conspiracy theories disseminated via fake news have transformed the universal fight against a global health threat into a controversial...

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Authors: Dimitra Panagiotatou, Stella Ladi, and Angelos Angelou*

Vaccine hesitancy has alarmed governments anxious to return to normality for economic and political reasons. Unlike other vaccination programmes, the Covid-19 one has been subject to extraordinary levels of politicisation. Conspiracy theories disseminated via fake news have transformed the universal fight against a global health threat into a controversial policy topic resulting in electoral gains for the extreme right and left. Given this, our project aimed to offer policy insights into how to increase vaccine uptake across the globe. It mapped Covid-19 vaccination policies worldwide to identify best practices and, subsequently, improve vaccine uptake.

Our mapping clearly indicates that employing expert advice is an ever-relevant topic when it comes to vaccine rollouts and vaccination policies. Most – if not all – countries across the globe have relied on scientific evidence and recommendations coming from national and/or international expert bodies before making any given vaccine available to their population. However, the extent to which expert input and evidence-informed policies have facilitated the vaccine rollout, has differed considerably from one country to the other. The same is the case for the impact of experts on countering vaccine hesitancy and anti-vaccination movements as well as increasing actual vaccine uptake.

Our project ‘A global mapping of vaccination policies and the role of experts’ (Queen Mary Global Policy Institute/Queen Mary University of London, 2022) has therefore addressed these questions by updating and extending the scope of the Covid-19 interactive map we initially launched in May 2021. The map now includes material on vaccine rollouts in different countries, including:

  • Information on the institutions and bodies that provided expertise on the approval of vaccines and the regulations governing access to vaccines
  • Different types of vaccination policies
  • Communications campaigns designed to encourage vaccine uptake
  • The emergence of anti-vaccination movements and their characteristics.

The map is publicly available and covers 16 countries with different economic capabilities, institutional barriers, and performance with respect to vaccine uptake. Moreover, the selected countries cover the full performance spectrum with respect to experts’ involvement in the vaccination effort. Reviewing the map indicates that a cluster of countries like Australia, South Korea, the US, Portugal, and the UK heavily relied on permanent and ad hoc expert bodies for the regulation of how vaccines should be prioritised and administered as well as for deciding and implementing vaccine mandates for specific population groups.

These countries appeared to base their communication campaigns on experts, presenting their vaccine strategies as informed by the best available research. Another cluster, including Russia and Bulgaria, determined their vaccine rollout strategies based on political considerations rather than scientific input. Consequently, they have been plagued by controversies between different domestic expert bodies and/or between domestic and international ones.

A final cluster – including Brazil, Kenya and Lebanon – appeared to adopt a mixed approach, following expert advice while also taking into consideration the political dynamics in the field. The cluster of countries drawing heavily on expert input, for instance Portugal and South Korea, appear to be top performers in terms of the share of fully vaccinated, thus demonstrating the benefits of bringing experts front and centre not only in the design and implementation of the vaccination programme but also in the relevant communication campaign.

As far as vaccination policies are concerned, the selected countries reveal four key policy types:

  1. Policies employing monetary rewards (Australia, Bulgaria, Russia)
  2. Policies employing non-monetary rewards (Greece, India, US)
  3. Policies offering freedom incentives (Portugal, Zimbabwe, South Korea)
  4. Policies entailing monetary fines (Greece, Lebanon) and other restrictions for the unvaccinated population (South Africa, US, UK).

However, it is worth noting that the type of policy does not seem to have a catalytic effect on actual vaccine uptake, with the most decisive success factors lying, first and foremost, in the populace’s entrenched consenting attitude toward national vaccination programmes: this is evident in the cases of Portugal and Brazil, but also Bulgaria.

The effectiveness of the government’s communication campaign and the effort put into disclosing frequent and credible information and devitalising anti-vaccination and vaccine-hesitant voices also has a significant effect on vaccine uptake.

 

*This article has been previously published at the Global Policy Institute at the Queen Mary University of London. 

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Georgios Kostakos http://www.kostakos.net <![CDATA[ANOTHER KIND OF ASSERTIVENESS FOR EUROPE: Peacebuilding Past, Present and Future]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19868 2022-11-15T19:29:33Z 2022-11-15T19:29:33Z Whom to call when you want to talk to Europe was the famous question attributed to Henry Kissinger that pointed to the lack of a central node of international contact and decision-making in the European integration project. The question remained unanswered for decades, despite earnest efforts to provide a credible answer, notably with the establishment...

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Whom to call when you want to talk to Europe was the famous question attributed to Henry Kissinger that pointed to the lack of a central node of international contact and decision-making in the European integration project. The question remained unanswered for decades, despite earnest efforts to provide a credible answer, notably with the establishment of the post of the EU High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy. In any case, the question has now been authoritatively answered and the number that the US authorities can call to talk to “Europe” is no other than that of the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen’s. This is according to European Commission Vice-President for Promoting our European Way of Life, Margaritis Schinas, speaking at a recent event organized by the Delphi Economic Forum in Brussels.

The Oracle of Delphi has thus pronounced, Dr. Von der Leyen speaks for Europe, a Europe that has successfully transitioned “from innocence to assertiveness”, as Mr. Schinas also stated. Obviously, it is a geopolitical Europe that does not hesitate to play hardball, notably in the case of Ukraine, where the EU is committed to helping the country unconditionally in its resistance against Russia’s aggression. One wonders, though, whether this uncompromising stance originated in Europe or resulted from one of those transatlantic calls greatly facilitated by the now single European number, as it does not exactly respond to the needs and the long-term aspirations of Europe itself.

Through its successive incarnations until today’s EU, European integration has been in essence a large-scale peacebuilding project binding together initially the states of Western Europe that fought most fervently against each other during World War II – and World War I, for that matter. By creating a common market and shared economic interests the hope was that eventually, a common polity would emerge that would make another major war unthinkable. Thankfully, this has been the case for the members of the EU and its institutional predecessors for some 70 years now. It has not been the same, though, for the European continent as a whole – remember the wars in what used to be Yugoslavia and now the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

What would one expect from a peacebuilding project, even in its assertive phase, regarding this new war? No matter what grievances the Russians might have vis-à-vis Ukraine or NATO, they have broken basic international legality rules by invading an independent, sovereign state. There has to be punishment for the crime of aggression and for any and all war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Ukraine in the course of this war, and there has to be payment of reparations for the destruction caused. But for that to happen, or even for any such discussion to get started, the fire has to cease, either because of a total Russian defeat or through a process of de-escalation and peacemaking. Can one reasonably count on bringing about a complete defeat of a major military power with huge nuclear capabilities, without engaging in an all-out war, possibly the West directly against Russia and not via Ukraine? What are the odds for that and can one take the risk? Or can one live with the indefinite continuation of the ongoing war of attrition that increases the suffering of civilians, especially the population of Ukraine, as well as the food and energy insecurity of people around the world?

An assertive but still peace-loving and peace-seeking EU could join forces with the United Nations (UN) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to broker an agreement that would pave the way to a lasting and just peace between the belligerents. An EU striving for a better future for itself and the world could help create a vision of that future for the whole European continent, Ukraine and Russia included and able to co-exist in peace, with mutual security guarantees, verified gradual disarmament and a focus on working together to address shared challenges, such as climate change, pandemics, food and energy insecurity.

Instead, it is heartbreaking and ominous to see the assertive EU, its central institutions and its individual member states, speaking the language of war to the bitter end and embarking on a major build-up of their arsenals. This means the diversion of funds from other budget lines, thus exacerbating the economic woes of EU citizens just recovering from the COVID-19 crisis while increasing instability in the region and the world. It is worth a pause, serious rethinking and a change of course before it is too late. Geopolitical assertiveness does not need to mean a return to old patterns of combative behavior among great powers, the EU now being one of them. It can mean the proud assertion of the European integration cum peacebuilding project and the expansion of its peace dividends, with varied intensity and appropriate institutional arrangements, to the whole of Eurasia.

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Armistice Call]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19858 2022-11-12T11:56:27Z 2022-11-12T11:42:17Z On this commemoration of Armistice Day, 11 November 1918, Marking the silencing of weapons at the end of World War I, We, the undersigned concerned citizens of the world,  Call for a ceasefire in all conflicts currently raging on our planet, between and within countries, on all continents. How many more millions of dead human...

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On this commemoration of Armistice Day, 11 November 1918,

Marking the silencing of weapons at the end of World War I,

We, the undersigned concerned citizens of the world, 

Call for a ceasefire in all conflicts currently raging on our planet, between and within countries, on all continents. How many more millions of dead human beings, destroyed infrastructure, and contaminated natural habitats do we want to see before we learn? Centuries of pain and misery, hatred and mutual destruction should have taught us better, if only we wanted to learn.

On this solemn occasion, reflecting on the carnage that World War I brought to the people of Europe in particular, and the mistakes made already in its origins, conduct, and conclusion, which led to the even more destructive World War II, we call on leaders of all sides directly or indirectly involved in the ongoing war in Ukraine to realize their responsibilities and End the Hostilities Now, allowing for an internationally supervised process that will bring about a just and lasting peace.

In the letter and the spirit of the UN Charter, we stress that:

  • There is no justification for attempting to change internationally recognized borders by force and no such attempt can lead to an acceptable change of existing borders;
  • There is no justification for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, and each and all relevant allegations should be investigated and duly prosecuted before the competent courts;
  • Grievances and disputes have to be resolved “by negotiation, inquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort to regional agencies or arrangements, or other peaceful means” (quoting from Article 33 of the UN Charter);
  • Peace, reconciliation, and mutually beneficial co-existence should be the ultimate goals of any peace process, with full respect for the individual and collective rights of all people involved;
  • The transition from a general ceasefire to a final peace settlement between Russia and Ukraine will have to be supervised by international institutions, notably the United Nations, under conditions of demilitarization of any and all occupied areas and a larger demilitarized zone of disengagement between the armed forces of the belligerents.

We call on the parties directly involved, those supporting them, the leaders of the G20 nations that will soon meet in Bali, Indonesia, and the world at large to unite around an agenda as described above and proceed to its implementation immediately, to avoid further victims in view also of the incoming winter in Europe. All immediate efforts should be focused on repairing civilian infrastructure, including in the areas to be placed under temporary international administration, and on securing the adequate supply of food, water, healthcare, and energy for their inhabitants.

Let us start the process of healing and make this the last major confrontation in our world. Let’s listen to the collective voice of humanity that demands that we join forces to fight against common enemies that are closing in upon us, namely climate change, disease, food and water insecurity, deepening inequalities, and systemic malfunctions.

This Armistice Call is open for signing by former Heads of State and Government, as well as former heads of regional administrations within federal states, and will be updated as signatures are added. The same Call is available for signing by the public as a petition on Change.org . FOGGS is grateful to members of the Peacemaking Reflection Group (PRG) of former UN system staff for contributing to the formulation of the Call and to the Secretariat of the InterAction Council for circulating the Call among its members.

 

On this Armistice Day, 11 November 2022

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Thomas G. Weiss <![CDATA[Russia’s War on Ukrainian Heritage, Yet Another War Crime]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19850 2022-11-10T12:33:45Z 2022-11-07T15:17:27Z The nineteenth-century German poet Heinrich Heine’s words inspired Raphael Lemkin, the drafter of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: “Burning books is not the same as burning bodies…but when one intervenes … against mass destruction of churches and books one arrives just in time to prevent the burning...

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The nineteenth-century German poet Heinrich Heine’s words inspired Raphael Lemkin, the drafter of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: “Burning books is not the same as burning bodies…but when one intervenes … against mass destruction of churches and books one arrives just in time to prevent the burning of bodies.”[1]

Lemkin’s immediate reference was the November 1938 Kristallnacht crimes, the coordinated program and cultural destruction in the Third Reich, but there are far too many other instances across time and space. While Vladimir Putin’s docket in The Hague is already lengthy, the war crime of destroying cultural heritage is yet another reason to say “nyet” to Russian recolonization.

The UN General Assembly’s condemnation and decision to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council reflected the continuing and contemporary relevance of what former UNESCO director-general Irina Bokova labeled “cultural cleansing” with reference to Iraq and Syria. This expression is not a legal term, but UNESCO applies it to connote cultural removal akin to “ethnic cleansing”—a term coined in the early 1990s to describe mass atrocities in the former Yugoslavia, which also has no formal legal definition. Cultural cleansing and ethnic cleansing are evocative; both capture dramatic crimes that shock the human conscience.

Scholars have paid only fleeting attention to this emphasis in Lemkin’s work—the relevance of biological and cultural genocide, [2] but it certainly applies to Ukraine. UNESCO has compiled a growing list that in mid-November counts 210 sites that have been damaged or destroyed since Moscow’s invasion began on 24 February 2022. It includes 91 religious sites, 76 buildings of historical or artistic interest, 18 monuments, 15 museums, and 10 libraries.

Unfortunately, recent history is replete with similar tragic examples. Shortly after ISIS (or Da’esh) took the city of Palmyra in Syria in the summer of 2015, they exploded the 2,000-year-old Temple of Baalshamin. For informed observers, the destruction was linked to the group’s ongoing murder, human trafficking, slavery, and terror in Syria and Iraq. Mass atrocities also accompanied the destruction of cultural heritage when insurgents deliberately shelled the Mostar Bridge in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1993, destroyed the fabled mosques, mausoleums, and libraries of Timbuktu in Mali in 2012, as well as when the Taliban dynamited the sixth-century Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan in 2001.

Social scientists are taught to ask, “so what?” Moreover, we should add, “Can anything be done?” Affirmative responses are suggested by the history of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS). The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) is a remarkable human rights achievement despite its contested application and nonapplication—e.g., in Libya but not in Syria, Myanmar, and Ukraine.

The concepts applied by the commission mirror those of cultural specialists—the essential responsibilities are to prevent, to react, and to rebuild. The heightened attention in academic and public policy discourse to the demands of coming to the rescue of people now also characterizes the challenge of protecting cultural heritage.

In fact, the intimate link between attacking bricks and attacking blood, or murdering history and people, provides means to unite the tasks of protecting heritage and humans because the international political disputes about when and where to intervene in specific crises to protect people do not characterize the protection of cultural heritage. Rogues that destroy heritage—such nonstate thugs as ISIS, such pariah states as Taliban Afghanistan, and such major powers as China in Xinjiang—are immediate targets for external opprobrium. Widespread if not quite universal international condemnation erupts rather than endless debates about whether outside interveners are neo-colonialists or cosmopolitans.

Ironically, many iconoclasts who destroy heritage and murder people can use social media to help recruitment. Ironically, such performative destruction constitutes a “benefit” for them, which is dramatically overshadowed by the costs borne by local residents and the rest of us.

Could reframing intervention to protect heritage make it easier to reach a consensus about robust international action that would also protect the people whose culture is under siege? That question animated a research project and the resulting open-access publication of the J. Paul Getty Trust, Cultural Heritage and Mass Atrocities.

Amidst the political gloom that dominates the present moment, there is a bit of good news. The public’s awareness and shock about the destruction of such renowned sites as the Bamiyan Buddhas, Mostar Bridge, Palmyra, Sana’a, and Timbuktu, also lay behind the nearly universal international revulsion and outrage in January 2020, when Donald Trump mindlessly threatened to target 52 Iranian cultural sites when Tehran menaced retaliation for the assassination of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani.

In short, protecting heritage has become visible on the international public policy agenda. It is no longer a “niche topic,” the exclusive domain of cultural specialists. If any further indications were necessary, the failure to protect adequately Iraqi cultural heritage during the initial US occupation suggested the need to broaden perspectives and participation. The rescue of individuals caught in the crosshairs of violence and menaced by mass atrocities invariably are amidst conscious cultural heritage destruction. Indeed, for those of us who analyze politics and design responses, including military ones, it is important that insiders at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) speak increasingly of the “security-heritage nexus.”

It is essential that we be preoccupied not only with visible World Heritage sites recognized by UNESCO but also less well-known, everyday structures—Uyghur mud-brick temples in China, Christian village cemeteries in Iraq and Syria, local Rohingya mosques in Myanmar, and Russia’s campaign since 2014 to eliminate Tatar traces in the occupied Crimea. While they do not make for media coverage, these more commonplace sites have become a daily bill-of-fare of destruction, another indication of the widespread onslaught against the people whose heritage they represent, as part of efforts to eliminate histories along with human beings.

The core R2P ethical framework is to halt mass murder and mass forced displacement, actual or anticipated. Its emergence reflected an altered political reality. Although specific decisions about exactly when and where to invoke R2P remain controversial, few observers question whether global responses to mass atrocities are justified. Instead, the debate centers on precisely how best to achieve R2P’s lofty aims.

So too is the intersection between violent attacks on humans and heritage. The protection of immovable cultural heritage is not a distraction for proponents of the robust protection of people. There is no need to add another crime to the four mass atrocities agreed by the UN’s 2005 World Summit. Rather, protecting cultural heritage is a fundamental aspect of protecting people from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing.[3] In addition, emphasizing such protection within the R2P framework has the potential to widen support for the evolving norm and its evolution in customary law as well as contribute to ongoing conversations about legitimate sovereignty.

Responsible states view mass atrocities as an international concern and not merely one of domestic jurisdiction. The destruction of cultural heritage should be viewed similarly because of the universal value and the intimate links between attacks on cultural objects, structures, and monuments and attacks on vulnerable populations.

While destroying cultural heritage is not new—examples go back to antiquity—neither is the impulse to protect and preserve it; the contemporary convergence of two factors has altered the politics of protection and the feasibility of international action. First, the destruction of cultural heritage has riveted the attention not only of curators, archaeologists, historians, and activists but also of major media outlets and popular audiences. Second, they find themselves in the company of a cottage industry of social scientists, international lawyers, and military officers exploring R2P’s application to the protection of cultural heritage.

There is no need to split hairs between safeguarding people and the cultural heritage that sustains them. Trying to establish a priority between them constitutes a false choice, reminiscent of juxtaposing development and the environment. The staff from the Middle East Institute, the Asia Society, and the Antiquities Coalition evaluated the widespread devastation in Asia and concluded: “The fight to protect the peoples of the region and their heritage cannot be separated.”

 

[1] Quoted in Robert Bevan, The Destruction of Memory: Architecture at War, 2nd ed. (London: Reaktion Books, 2016), 15.

[2] Raphael Lemkin, “Acts Constituting a General (Transnational) Danger Considered as Offences Against the Law of Nations,” (1933); and Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation, Analysis of Government, and Proposals for Redress (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment, 1944), xiii.

[3] UN, 2005 World Summit Outcome, General Assembly resolution 60/1, 24 October 2005, paragraphs 138–140.

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Francis M. O'Donnell <![CDATA[Nine months is enough]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19844 2022-11-03T17:07:50Z 2022-11-03T15:33:42Z This essay is written to distance proper understanding of the Russian war against Ukraine from any false equivalence that this is a conflict between two belligerents, whose perspectives deserve equal recognition as a prelude to a negotiated outcome. Attempts to explore alternative avenues to peace, and identify differentiated messages and appropriate envoys and institutions should...

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This essay is written to distance proper understanding of the Russian war against Ukraine from any false equivalence that this is a conflict between two belligerents, whose perspectives deserve equal recognition as a prelude to a negotiated outcome. Attempts to explore alternative avenues to peace, and identify differentiated messages and appropriate envoys and institutions should not drift into “servile diplomacy”, but remain principled and grounded in the imperative of upholding existing global norms, laws, and instruments of accountability and redress.

Nine months is enough gestation to bring a human being to birth, but Vladimir Putin cannot in this time realise the abject folly of his war against Ukraine. He and his régime must go, and any talk of negotiating with him or his current government only prolongs his claim to power. This does not mean that a time will not come to talk to a new Russian leadership – it will and it must.

For many decades, indeed for the better part of the past century, the USSR and subsequently the Russian Federation, played a major role in advancing humanity’s progress in science, technology, medicine, culture, and outer space, and indeed in engaging in technical and development cooperation with the newly independent countries that followed the post WW2 era of decolonisation.

It is hard to realize that, today under the régime of Vladimir Putin in sharp contrast to all his predecessors, Russia could not be further away from that legacy than it finds itself now, indeed increasingly a pariah state recognised mainly for its rogue behaviour by the vast majority of UN member states.

From aggression against Georgia in 2008, and continuing destabilisation of Moldova, its arc of hostility has gone global in subversion of domestic politics in western countries, the USA, the UK, EU countries and the Balkans. Since its initial unprovoked aggression against and invasion of Ukraine in 2014, Putin’s régime has embarked on a further diplomatic frenzy that has increasingly alienated Russia’s erstwhile closest friends and foreign partners, even threatening nuclear war and bringing its aggression into outer space, with threats of attacks on foreign commercial satellites.

Russia’s own military recognised the madness of such a war beforehand, when distinguished Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov called for Putin’s resignation, on behalf of the vast majority of members of the All Russia Officers’ Assembly. The statement accused Putin of destroying Russia, without any real threat from NATO, to avoid responsibility for “the main threat” to the Russian Federation: “But this is a threat of an internal nature, emanating from the model of the state, the quality of power and the state of society. And the reasons for its formation are internal: the unviability of the state model, the complete incapacity and lack of professionalism of the system of power and administration, the passivity and disorganization of society. In this state, any country does not live long.”  The isolation, failure, paralysis, and decay of Russia, that we now witness were accurately predicted by Ivashov, who rightly also identified the gross failures of Russian diplomacy[1].

Yet just four years ago, Russia was party to UN Security Council resolution 2417 (2018) “Protection of Civilians in armed conflict” which recognized for the first time the intrinsic link between hunger and conflict and the essential role of international humanitarian law in preventing and addressing hunger in armed conflict, condemning the starving of civilians as a method of warfare — as well as the unlawful denial of humanitarian access to civilian population.  It also supported UNSC resolution no. 2573  “Protection of Objects Indispensable to the Survival of the Civilian Population”.

Now Putin’s regime obliges Russia to behave in stark defiance of these norms. This year alone, on four separate occasions, the UN General Assembly has resoundingly rebuked Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and unwarranted and egregious violations of UN norms, expressed in four strongly condemnatory resolutions[2]. In addition to increasing sanctions against it, Russia has been suspended from membership in the UN Human Rights Council, from the Council of Europe, from which it then withdrew completely, and has lost its seat on the Governing Council of the ICAO. In the meantime, it has obstructed the implementation of UNSC resolution 2254 relating to Syria. It has again obstructed grain exports for Ukraine, even if only momentarily.

In a resolution adopted on 4 March 2022, the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva also agreed to establish a commission to investigate violations committed during Russia’s invasion. Its special session on 12 May (resolution S-34/1) examined the deteriorating human rights situation in Ukraine stemming from the invasion and accumulating evidence of thousands of war crimes, upon which the later report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine submitted findings about events during late February and March 2022 in the four regions of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Sumy, through the Secretary-General (A/77/533 of 18 October 2022). Beyond that early period, evidence has mounted of tens of thousands of war crimes committed by Russian forces acting under command responsibility, as distinct from occasional rogue elements; of official statements, policies, actions, and systemic politically-driven campaigns with clear genocidal intent, including widespread ethnic cleansing, deportations, and direct repeated large-scale missile and artillery targeting of civilian populations, in urban centres, residential zones, health, educational, and commercial facilities, institutions, and vital civilian infrastructure.

For a comparatively minor but illegal territorial gain, the Putin régime ruling the world’s largest country has sacrificed its global name & socio-economic well-being – but worse, the ricochet effects have also surged around the world in food and energy insecurity, escalating inflation, and widespread impoverishment. There would never have been a “good time” for such a wilful misadventure, but coming in the wake of the Covid pandemic, and the onset of climate change, is absolutely the worst time.

The increasing mendacity of the Putin régime is now so severe, that not only can they not be trusted by Ukraine and the international community, already victim and witness of its flagrant violations of international norms, they cannot even trust each other. Some examples: the lies about the Ukrainian “genocide” of Russian-speakers in Donbas, and a western “coup” in Kyiv in 2014, Nazism in Ukraine, followed then and now by false narratives of Ukrainian dirty nuclear bombs and bio-weapons, Putin’s failure to deliver his quick blitzkrieg victory over Ukraine, Lavrov’s repeated lies about “no invasion planned”, and now Kadyrov’s accusations that Ukrainian forces are fighting a war on Russian territory (presumably he means annexed Ukrainian lands), and Prigozhin’s denials that he had anything to do with Wagner mercenaries, and now that he has been criticising the Russian Armed Forces and Putin’s leadership. As Putin loses grip not only of the information space, but of the battlefield, and the Kremlin and its siloviki are increasingly consumed by internecine conflict, Putin will have no choice other than to crack-down on Kadyrov and Prigozhin, or be “retired” himself. Luckily, Russia has now shared with the USA its details on its nuclear drills (while accusing non-nuclear Ukraine!). Russia’s own prospects today are the dimmest they have ever been since World War Two: break-up into chaos, rogue criminality, mass displacement, warlordism, nukes, etc.

Supporting Ukraine, western leaders can allow this to play out, whilst stating publicly that while they have no intention of interfering in the “sovereign” integrity and internal governance of the Russian Federation, nonetheless they demand or expect its full compliance with its international obligations, including the UN Charter, international law, norms and treaties, and stand ready to support the legitimate aspirations of the diverse peoples of the Russian Federation to enjoy their human rights, and civil, economic and social well-being. At this stage, the explicit inclusion of Russian local governments and municipalities in the global effort to tackle climate change and pandemic recovery, through advancing means and methods for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, could be an opener to subsidiarity and the de-concentration or levelling of power. When Trump pulled the USA out of the Paris Accord on Climate Change, several US states and municipalities strengthened their commitment to it.

Nonetheless, we are already witnessing the “early warning signs” of degradation of the now fiscally-unsustainable Russian state, not only viz sanctions impact, military weaknesses/defeats, but fragmentation within the Russian body politic, with two warlords now challenging Putin’s authority.  The Russian élite, beyond this ailing régime, need to take stock of the decline of their Federation, not with a view to yet more adventures in misguided neo-imperialism, but with a view to harnessing the energies of Russian society, reforming its institutions, and removing the cancer at the top and in its heart. The real Russia is deeper and richer that the stolen billions in assets and the forfeited lives in genocidal wars against brotherly nations. The real Russia, including its repressed civil society, and its talented emigrés, can strive to optimise broad-based outcomes that uplift the people of Russia and enhance their lives whilst restoring international partnerships and global respect, only though openness, transparency and accountability of elected leaders at all levels, divorced from the power of money, media, and mania.

Multiple networks of Russians abroad need to coalesce around a reform agenda that removes the Putin régime, and ushers in a new era of benign leadership that puts the well-being of the Russian people before the narrow predatory interests of the kleptocratic megalomaniacs now ruining Russia.

Ironically, during the worst period of the Covid pandemic, various Russian-based networks of civic activists with enlightened ideals and social innovators have gone online with exponentially-expanding audiences around the world. Today they represent a considerable antidote to Kremlin repression, and a well-spring of ideas and practical wisdom to nurture good governance, public service, accountable leadership and participatory democracy in a post-Putin future.  And that is an indispensable condition for a global normalising of international relationships with Russia, beyond its return to full compliance with the UN Charter, Human Rights, and all its other international legal and treaty obligations.

The West and the Rest should therefore focus their attention and resources not only on enabling Ukraine to win the war in its territory and recover all of it, but also encourage and support the need for a process of reconciliation and convergence that unites all the various and often conflicting elements of the Russian opposition both internally and in its diaspora.  In other words, the efforts for “peace negotiations” should perhaps be better expended on bringing coherence to the Russian opposition with a view to régime change.  It was the unifying of the Serbian opposition DOS (Democratic Opposition of Serbia), with the support of OTPOR (influenced by the non-violent methods of Gene Sharp and the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi) that led to the overthrow of Milošević and his régime.

A recognition of the dilemmas and internal stresses that Russia is facing, as distinct from but in addition to the harm caused to Ukraine and the world at large, warrants attention at the G-20 summit. The stifling of civil society and dissent has deprived the people of Russia of their rightful freedom of expression, debate, and coherence. Despite various opinion polls supposedly indicating a majority support Putin’s “special military operation”, this cannot be credibly authenticated. By its behavior and utterances alone, the Kremlin has disqualified itself from international relations, and from the representation and governance of Russia. It is time world leaders acknowledge that a change of tack in Moscow is essential, and indeed, a change in its leadership.

The West and the Rest must act to help empower alternative voices. The global networks, institutions, and methods, that can enable capacity for mediation and negotiation in conflicts around the world, are a vital resource to foster engagement with Russian civil society, which is largely silenced internally but not abroad, or can be approached virtually at the local/municipal levels. Getting Russian civil society to converge on peaceful alternatives and a different narrative than the Kremlin’s is the key to de-concentrating political power, and incubating real participatory reform.

It may also be the key to preserving world peace.

 

[1] Ivashov, Leonid, on behalf of the All Russian Officers’ Assembly, Letter “Eve of War”, 28 January 2022: http://www.ooc.su/news/obrashhenie_obshherossijskogo_oficerskogo_sobranija_k_prezidentu_i_grazhdanam_rossijskoj_federacii/2022-01-31-79

[2] UNGA resolution ES‑11/1, of 2 March 2022 deplored Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and demanded a full withdrawal of Russian Armed Forces and a reversal of Russia’s recognition of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic. The tenth paragraph confirmed the illegal involvement of Belarus.

UNGA resolution ES11/2, of 24 March 2022 reiterated its demand that Russia withdraws from Ukraine’s recognized sovereign territory; it also deplored, expressed grave concern over and condemned attacks on civilian populations and infrastructure.

UNGA resolution ES11/3, of 7 April 2022 suspended the membership of Russia in the United Nations Human Rights Council over grave concern at the ongoing human rights and humanitarian crisis in Ukraine […] including gross and systematic violations and abuses of human rights committed by Russia.

UNGA resolution ES11/4, of 12 October 2022 declared that Russia’s so-called “referendums”  in the Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts and the subsequent attempted annexation are invalid and illegal under international law. Furthermore, it demanded that Russia “immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw” from Ukraine.

 

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Event overview: Global Governance – Breaking down or breaking new ground?]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19824 2022-10-29T14:20:20Z 2022-10-25T16:00:13Z An event under the title “Global Governance: Breaking down or breaking new ground?” was convened by the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS) and the Global Crisis Information Network (GCINET), with support from the Global Challenges Foundation, in New York City on 23 September 2022, on the sidelines of the high-level week of the...

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An event under the title “Global Governance: Breaking down or breaking new ground?” was convened by the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS) and the Global Crisis Information Network (GCINET), with support from the Global Challenges Foundation, in New York City on 23 September 2022, on the sidelines of the high-level week of the United Nations General Assembly. The event’s purpose was to consider whether global governance, as currently structured and practiced, is capable of effectively dealing with multiple and cascading environmental, economic, social, and security crises, and if not, what can be done to address inefficiencies and gaps. Participants included representatives of governments, CSOs, academia, think tanks, and former and current UN officials. To facilitate an open exchange of views without public attribution, the Chatham House Rule was observed.

The first part of the event considered ideas to strengthen the global governance architecture to effectively address existential threats to human security. Presentations were made on the UN Secretary-General’s report “Our Common Agenda” (OCA) and its aftermath, the case for a Global Resilience Council (GRC), a UN Charter amendment and/or creative reinterpretation, and what is effective multilateralism. The second part discussed the war in Ukraine and what is being done about it. Presentations were heard on the implications of the war from a big-picture perspective, the role of the UN in the war thus far, a possible framework for negotiations, and the humanitarian and peace-building role of local and international civil society.

Participants overall agreed the current multilateral governance architecture is incapable of managing concurrent and multidimensional global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, biodiversity loss, and the food and energy insecurity exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine war. Discussants proposed a number of solutions, ranging from amending the UN Charter using Article 109 to convene a Charter review conference, to making more practical adjustments to existing UN multilateral bodies and their modus operandi. Regardless of preference in terms of reform modalities, all agreed that a more agile, inclusive, equitable, people-centered, and “grounded-in-reality” global multilateral system is required.

With respect to the war in Ukraine, there was broad agreement that the UN Secretary-General (UNSG) had an important role to play in bringing it to an end. There were divergent views, however, on how exactly the UNSG should perform this role: whether he should remain impartial in order to broker a peace deal, or whether he should maintain a vocal stance against Russia given its breach of the UN Charter and international law.

While all agreed that aggression is unjustifiable, there were different views on the appropriate response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Some were of the view that condemning and isolating Russia was the only morally acceptable response, while others favored a more practical approach that would facilitate a “rapprochement” between the parties to end violence and destruction as soon as possible.

Throughout the event, many highlighted the role that women, youth, local communities, and other grass-root groups play in the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and indicated that they could also support humanitarian assistance and de-escalation of the Russia-Ukraine conflict through personal contact and communication on the ground and also at the negotiating table.

All concurred that the UN Summit for the Future, to be convened at the ministerial level in 2023 and at the Heads of State level in 2024, is a prime opportunity to re-think, re-tool and re-skill the UN for today’s challenges and tomorrow’s opportunities.  Reforming the UN to make it more effective and relevant is indispensable because of its unique legitimacy derived from the membership of 193 states.

The UN was formed to maintain international peace and security, to develop friendly relations among nations, and to promote social progress, better living standards, and human rights. Looking retrospectively, in many ways the UN has fulfilled its promise because life expectancy and living conditions for many have improved since 1945, human rights are increasingly reflected in countries’ legal frameworks, and a nuclear war has been averted – until now.

The threat of the escalation of the war in Ukraine is real, as the rapidly evolving situation is clearly demonstrating; and so are the consequences of climate change and increased biodiversity loss. The world is at grave risk, which is why we are at the threshold of another foundational moment for the UN and global governance – either we seize the opportunity to revive it now, or face potentially irreversible consequences for humanity and the planet in the years ahead.

A more detailed summary of the discussions held at the event can be found — along with the programme, information on the distinguished moderators and speakers, and background material on the topics covered — in the report prepared by the event’s rapporteur, Paola Bettelli, and issued by FOGGS in October 2022. The report is available here.

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 7: Grassroots activism and NGO-government interplay in India | Srishti Sharma]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19820 2022-11-25T10:30:44Z 2022-10-21T20:47:21Z Unfortunately, the more layered and complex a governance system is, the harder it gets to make sure that policy is being implemented correctly and addresses the issues it set out to fulfill. This leads to laws not achieving their purpose, and problematic situations remaining as they are, even after being “mended” by legal means. Often,...

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Policy is not (or better, should not be) a one-way process; effective policymaking requires feedback and adjustment so that the ground reality actually corresponds to the policymakers’ intentions.

Unfortunately, the more layered and complex a governance system is, the harder it gets to make sure that policy is being implemented correctly and addresses the issues it set out to fulfill. This leads to laws not achieving their purpose, and problematic situations remaining as they are, even after being “mended” by legal means.

Often, grassroots organizations and NGOs are implicitly tasked with picking up the slack, as governmental measures fall short of the task. On this episode of the Global Citizen podcast, I had the pleasure of interviewing Srishti Sharma, a serial entrepreneur and social activist from India. Srishti has been extremely active not only in the world of business but also in social activism through start-ups and non-profit organizations that aim to tackle problems ranging from protecting women and compromised workers to getting children back into school.

Our conversation revolved around her own experience in setting up and running these social projects, as well as what role the government plays in supporting (or obstructing!) the work of such initiatives. I was super happy to have her on, and I felt like I left the conversation much more knowledgeable about the interplay between grassroots organizations and the government, especially in the multi-layered and complex environment of India. Tune in to hear all about it!

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 6: (Young) World Federalism | Eston McKeague]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19814 2022-10-28T20:45:58Z 2022-10-21T20:29:20Z My guest for the day was Eston McKeague, the president of the Young World Federalists and a member of the Board of Citizens for Global Solutions. Eston is a passionate world federalist and advocates for a youth-led movement to unite the world. We had a great conversation about his organization, the Young World Federalists, how...

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Today’s show is about one of my favorite topics around politics, one that fascinated me ever since I was a student of political science. That topic is federalism, more specifically world federalism, the idea of uniting the entire world under a federal system of governance.

My guest for the day was Eston McKeague, the president of the Young World Federalists and a member of the Board of Citizens for Global Solutions. Eston is a passionate world federalist and advocates for a youth-led movement to unite the world. We had a great conversation about his organization, the Young World Federalists, how that initiative came to be and what it’s all about, and some of its notable work.

We also covered federalism in general, examining its history, its current state, and how it might work as a globalized system, which is the ideological basis of the world federalist movement. Many thanks to Eston and the YWF! Links:

2022 Week for World Parliament

Global Challenges: 75 Years After Montreux – Register here

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Katoikos http://katoikos.world/ <![CDATA[Episode 5: Inclusion and equitability in policymaking | Sudha S. Reddy]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19810 2022-10-28T20:41:36Z 2022-10-21T20:22:29Z Today, Sudha Reddy was kind enough to join me on the podcast to talk all about policy from the unique perspective of India, which serves as a great example of how extreme centralization and top-down solutions can lead to misguided decisions from policymakers. Our conversation revolved around the relationship between the local level, the grassroots...

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Policymaking is the art of rules. Handled correctly, it can be an incredible tool that has allowed us to organize ourselves in cells of millions (sometimes billions!) of people, as it orchestrates the rules of the game, ensuring a society with well-oiled gears and robust functions. However, if mismanaged, the policy can be a major driver of exploitation, inequity, and injustice.

Today, Sudha Reddy was kind enough to join me on the podcast to talk all about policy from the unique perspective of India, which serves as a great example of how extreme centralization and top-down solutions can lead to misguided decisions from policymakers. Our conversation revolved around the relationship between the local level, the grassroots level, and the top levels of governance, from local and regional governments to international bodies like the UN. India’s power structure is deeply characterized by these bottom-up and top-down dynamics, as it is a massive country in terms of population with many different levels of government, from the local and regional governments up to the centralized power that resides with the government in New Delhi.

So: how does one create effective and equitable policy within this context? Are all groups treated equally in the policymaking process, or is there preferential treatment? How could we ensure that people actively take part in making the decisions that affect them?

Sudha was kind enough to join me on the podcast to help me shed some light on these questions. She is the Founder and Director of the Eco Foundation for Sustainable Alternatives (EFSA) based in Bangalore, India, focusing on the holistic empowerment and sustainable development of the underprivileged and marginalized rural, urban and indigenous communities, with an emphasis on women, children and youth at the grassroots through direct intervention. She has more than 25 years of experience in social action and the development sector in India and worldwide, academic research and teaching on capacity building and organizational development, advocacy, and campaigning. Sudha is passionately striving for sustainable alternative models of governance, gender, environmental and social justice, eco-spirituality, human and nature interconnectedness, rights and responsibilities, and a nonviolent approach to peace and harmony.

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Yoriko Yasukawa https://www.foggs.org/yoriko-yasukawa/ <![CDATA[Gaming for a Better World]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19794 2022-10-21T13:23:10Z 2022-10-21T13:12:21Z Panel Discussion Summary by Yoriko Yasukawa* Today, over 3 billion people worldwide play video games, which span a hugely diverse range of forms and content. The industry generates more than US$ 180 billion a year in global revenues – about seven times as much as the global music industry. On 29 June 2022, I had...

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Panel Discussion Summary by Yoriko Yasukawa*

Today, over 3 billion people worldwide play video games, which span a hugely diverse range of forms and content. The industry generates more than US$ 180 billion a year in global revenues – about seven times as much as the global music industry. On 29 June 2022, I had the opportunity to moderate a virtual panel discussion titled ‘Gaming for a Better World,’ hosted by the Foundation for Global Governance and Sustainability (FOGGS). In this dialogue with leading figures in the video game industry and a peacebuilding specialist, we explored how video games can contribute to building a more peaceful, inclusive, and sustainable world.  Here are some of the ideas and information coming out of the discussion.

The Panelists

Asi Burak: An award-winning videogame and digital technology executive, named one of the “Digital 25: Leaders in Emerging Entertainment” by the Producers Guild of America (PGA) and Variety Magazine. Asi currently serves as Chief Business Officer at Tilting Point, a world-leading game publisher, as well as Chairman of Games for Change (G4C), which produces the Annual Games for Change Festival, New York City’s largest gaming industry event.

Latoya Peterson: Named one of Forbes Magazine’s 30 Under 30 rising stars in media, she is cofounder, Chief Experience Officer, and Director for the Culture at Glow Up Games, a game studio engaged in innovative storytelling about the lives and culture of people of color, particularly women, non-binary, and queer and trans people. Latoya has been a race and culture writer for major outlets like the New York Times, NPR, Jezebel and Kotaku, as well as a three-time judge for the World Video Game Hall of Fame.

Helena Puig Larrauri: A governance and peacebuilding professional with over a decade of experience advising and supporting UN agencies, other multilateral organizations, and NGOs working in conflict contexts and polarized environments. Helena is co-founder and strategy lead at Build Up, a global non-profit that identifies and addresses emergent challenges to peace, where she focuses on the integration of digital technology and innovation into peace processes and on the analysis of digital conflict drivers.

We were also joined from the audience by Matthew Farber, Associate Professor of Educational Technology at the University of Northern Colorado, and the founder of the Gaming SEL Lab. His research is at the intersection of game-based learning (GBL) and social and emotional learning (SEL). He studies how playing and making games can cultivate empathy, perspective-taking, and ethical decision-making. He also works in youth initiatives around game design as a form of self-expression.

 

There is enormous diversity in video games – they are not just about shooters.

Before entering into the discussion, Yorgos Dritsas, a FOGGS collaborator based in Athens, gave us a quick glimpse of a variety of video games. These games were all designed to promote empathy, but each had very different themes and stories and distinct mechanics of gameplaying:

  • The Last Guardian is an adventure game in which the player takes the role of an unnamed boy who must cooperate with a half-bird-half-mammal creature to solve puzzles and explore. The player must learn to understand the animal rather than control it.
  • Dys4ia (pronounced dysphoria) is an autobiographical video game that Anna Anthropy, a trans woman, developed to recount her experiences of gender dysphoria and hormone replacement therapy. The player comes to understand Anna’s experience by accompanying her on this journey.
  • In Signs of the Sojourner, the player communicates their feelings to the characters through a simple card game. The conversation can lead either to a negative or a positive interaction, though neither is a loss or a win. The purpose is to see the different ways in which the relationship can develop.
  • In Papers, Please the player takes on the role of a border crossing immigration officer in a dystopian country. The player will be faced with making moral decisions that will decide the fate of immigrants, as well as his or her own fate.
  • Insecure, produced by the company founded by Latoya, is a game based on a TV series of the same name, centered on the career and relationship experiences of Issa, a young African American woman living in Los Angeles. The game lets players rap, create their personal style, and interact with the kind of friends

While none of these games fit the stereotype of the shoot ‘em up game, they are all commercially successful or aspire to be so.

Asi pointed out that while many of the successful games are so-called ‘shooters,’ many are not, particularly the mobile phone-based games which make up more than half of the video game market. ‘A lot of the games are about building or nurturing or crafting,’ he said.

Asi pointed out though, that many of the commercial game developers resort to shooters as an ‘easy solution’ and because it is a mechanic that is technically easy to replicate.

Video games provide a virtual space for people to come together.

One of the important characteristics that distinguish online video games from other media is that you can play with other people regardless of where they are. Hence, it is an ideal medium to bring people together.

Helena has used this function precisely to bring together young people in Syria as part of her peace-building work there: ‘We look for new ways to bring people together and to try and shift narratives or make conversations more complex and essentially build social cohesion. This is the area of work where video games are a lot more. Video games can be used as a place where conversations can happen. ‘

Latoya mentioned the game Sky, in which players explore a fantasy world above the clouds using a cape that gives them the ability to fly:  ‘I love that game and I have a nine-year-old son who is now independently exploring on his own. One of the things that happened was, I didn’t realize there was a chat function and that he was talking to people all around the world. It’s so beautifully designed to be safe and to be an area of participation.’

There are many games designed to have a positive social impact. Some of them have also been commercially successful.

In addition to some of the games mentioned earlier, the better-known ones include This War of Mine, which focuses on the civilian experience of war, TerraGenesis, which animates entire planets with changing biospheres, based on real data from NASA, and Plague Inc. a simulation game in which the player attempts to control a contagious disease outbreak. Papers, Please, for example, was released in August 2013, and had sold 500,000 copies as of March 2014.

Asi pointed out that, in seeking to develop games intended for social good that are at the same time commercially viable, we should not dismiss the blockbuster shooter games but rather learn from them about what makes them attractive to players.

Games not specifically meant for social good can have a positive educational impact depending on the way they are used.

Helena spoke about the organization Games for Peace, which has used Minecraft, the bestselling videogame of all time, in which players gather materials to build whatever they want, and various esports to bring Jewish and Arab Israeli youths together.

‘There was a classroom full of Jewish Israeli kids and a classroom full of Arab Israeli kids and they were in the same Minecraft space and one of the children marched up a little mound and built an Israeli flag and then there was this kind of outburst of conversation of, like, “wait, hang on a minute, what are we trying to do here?” But it created this venue for a conversation to happen and they use esports in a similar way.’

Based on his teaching experience, Matthew pointed out, ‘You need to hook and engage students first. I think a really good narrative comes first and then the education comes second.’ He raised the example of Assassin’s Creed, a bestselling action-adventure game, in which players must carry out assassinations to advance. He felt that the moral dilemmas posed in the game were useful for teaching ethics.

He also stressed the importance of the ‘inefficient route’ to learning that games offer. ‘They’re inefficient on purpose and they’re playful on purpose. That’s where learning happens. It’s the same tension between teaching with PowerPoint and project-based learning. Project-based learning looks overwhelming to lots of teachers and it’s an inefficient route to learning but it’s deeper.’

Insecure, the game created by Latoya’s company, while not intended to be an educational tool, provides a glimpse into the lives and culture of strong and vibrant African American women – elements that tend to be absent in mainstream games.  ‘We were also trying to reach a new audience that games historically haven’t spoken to,’ Latoya said, ‘which is women and players of color.’

There are interesting experiences of using video games in unexpected ways to further social good.

Asi created Peacemaker, a game that simulates the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, back in 2007.  In this game, players can choose to play the part of the leader of either side of the conflict, and deal with events presented using real-world pictures and footage.

‘We were a small team and compared to the technologies and the art that you see today, it was very simple,’ Asi explained, ‘but what we did succeed in doing is simulating the conflict, tackling something super-complex, so even though it was a lot of text and very simple, we took videos and footage from the news, and it was believable. People really got out of that game with the feeling that they understood more the dynamics of the conflict, and they understood more how the other side is thinking about it. So, that was pretty interesting and that was the first time that they felt, “oh wow, this medium has so much potential!” People came to us again and again with the same quote: “we played your game for two hours and we understand more about the conflict than by watching the news for two years.” It’s the medium, it’s the fact that people can actually have agency and they can try things on their own and connect the dots. That sometimes gets lost in the news when we just watch passively.’

Asi also mentioned that the former United States Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day O’Connor, created an online games-based learning platform for civics education called iCivics. The games are offered for free and are now used by more than 9 million students annually. While a good narrative can certainly draw young people into a game, Asi felt that when a game is created for an explicit educational purpose as in the case of iCivics, it is perfectly fine for that intent to be upfront.

Helena shared her experience of getting young people in Syria to create a game together: ‘In Syria, a lot of young people have had their identity shaped by the conflict and have grown to believe that there are really big differences between different people living in different areas of Syria.  They wanted to tell a story about this, but they wanted to tell a story that also engaged people in a conversation. Another thing that they were saying is that there were a lot of gamers in their generation and a lot of people who went to games as a way of finding an outlet and a different narrative. I remember one of them describing it as a more hopeful narrative. So, they ended up creating a game that basically explores differences between different people in Syria and it’s a role-playing game with different possible ways that it can end. The game is structured so that you progress more easily if you show empathy and curiosity toward others. They would play the game and then they would have conversations with people about what that brought up for them, and it would always end up being about the conflict and how they had experienced the conflict as young people.’

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Perhaps the clearest conclusion coming out of the discussion was that video games have proven to be an effective way to promote learning, particularly about topics that might otherwise be remote and difficult to understand. Games can also instill empathy for, and curiosity about those who are different from us. Given the enormous reach of the industry, we should probably be doing much more to harness this capacity toward building a more inclusive, empathetic, just, and sustainable world.

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Renata Juliotti <![CDATA[The forgotten: people with disabilities in the Ukrainian war]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19789 2022-10-11T17:52:38Z 2022-10-11T17:52:38Z War undermines the lives, health, and safety of all human beings, but for approximately 2.7 million persons with disabilities and their families living in Ukraine, the situation is much worse. Although accurate statistics are hard to come by, many Ukrainians with a disability, especially those with the most severe conditions, have not been able to...

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War undermines the lives, health, and safety of all human beings, but for approximately 2.7 million persons with disabilities and their families living in Ukraine, the situation is much worse. Although accurate statistics are hard to come by, many Ukrainians with a disability, especially those with the most severe conditions, have not been able to flee the war and have been struggling to find safety. 

According to the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities requires states to ensure the inclusion of people with disabilities when meeting their obligations under international law, including international humanitarian and human rights law.  Ratified by both the Russian Federation and Ukraine, the Convention requires (Article 11) to state “States Parties shall take, in accordance with their obligations under international law, including international humanitarian law and international human rights law, all necessary measures to ensure the protection and safety of persons with disabilities in situations of risk, including situations of armed conflict, humanitarian emergencies and the occurrence of natural disasters”.

However, Ukraine, in particular its Eastern part, has been experiencing a humanitarian emergency since 2014. Even before the recent escalation of the conflict, many persons with disabilities experienced difficulties accessing humanitarian aid, healthcare, and basic resources for safety (for example, living in a displacement camp with no clear footpaths and no accessible information for persons with a visual impairment or places with no accessibility for wheelchairs or people with mobility reduction). The 2021 report on the humanitarian needs of Ukraine by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), estimated that out of the 3.4 million people in need in Eastern Ukraine, at least 13 percent had some type of disability. In addition, it is extremely important to consider that this report has been developed during the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, which means that the urgent humanitarian situation for this vulnerable group has only gotten worse after the conflict started, mainly because more people could have developed new disabilities as they got injured during the attacks. 

Daily, persons with disabilities face significant barriers in accessing healthcare and other social services, food, employment, and education in Ukraine. Now, with the escalation of the conflict and Russian troops in the country, they are facing a high risk of losing their lives because of not having access to safe evacuation, shelter, and humanitarian assistance.

According to representative organizations of persons with disabilities in Europe, the situation “is appalling. For example, shelters in Kyiv are inaccessible, so people with disabilities are forced to stay at home, not knowing where they can go“, as stated by Yannis Vardakastanis, President of the International Disability Alliance (IDA) and the European Disability Forum (EDF). 

The ableism (discrimination against persons with disabilities) and the lack of proper training of humanitarian aid staff are also some of the challenges faced by the Ukrainians with disabilities in the war. When they manage to flee to another country these individuals also need to deal with the absence of accessibility, as well as healthcare and social security. 

Even though disability is a complex and multidisciplinary issue, it is important to ensure that all people with disabilities are accounted for, protected, and provided with immediate access to humanitarian aid, taking into account their individual support requirements. Refugees and internally displaced people with disabilities, and people with disabilities in refugee-like situations, need to be provided with support tailored to their individual requirements at border crossings, reception and accommodation facilities, and to also be provided with relocation assistance. 

Children with disabilities should be provided with individualized support to ensure they are not separated from their families and are protected from institutionalization and other harmful practices, such as trafficking. Therefore, the risk management protocols must be revisited and the concept of inclusion should be revised in the humanitarian aid field to fully understand and embrace the needs of people with disabilities, who are particularly vulnerable in situations of active conflict and war.

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Johnatan Santos <![CDATA[A Rebranded Russia After Sanctions]]> https://katoikos.world/?p=19774 2022-10-04T21:16:22Z 2022-10-04T14:40:56Z Western forecasters predicted that Russia’s economy would collapse after unprecedented sanctions were imposed on Moscow as a result of the conflict in Ukraine. However, the Russian statistics office (ROSSTAT), recently reported that the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the first half of the year fell by only 0.4%. According to official data, capital expenditures...

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Western forecasters predicted that Russia’s economy would collapse after unprecedented sanctions were imposed on Moscow as a result of the conflict in Ukraine. However, the Russian statistics office (ROSSTAT), recently reported that the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the first half of the year fell by only 0.4%.

According to official data, capital expenditures increased, the ruble recovered, and inflation, which had skyrocketed when the conflict began, started to decline. As anticipated, oil and gas revenues, primarily from other global players such as  China and India, continue to bolster the nation’s finances.

Despite the fact that European countries like Germany and Italy have reduced their reliance on Russian energy the state-owned energy behemoth Gazprom reports significant gains, and new sales records have already resulted in a 30% increase in the price of its shares, even after substantial discounts offered to Asian buyers.

Notwithstanding the good performance of the Russian economy, Western sanctions have begun to take their toll. In a study published last month by Yale University[1], it was determined that imports to Russia have plummeted and that Russian manufacturers are struggling to acquire components such as semiconductors and other high-tech parts.

One of the report’s co-authors, Management Professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, recently told The Times Radio that Russia’s economy could only “survive with great difficulty for about two years” so long as the West maintains its sanctions[2]. Others believe that a complete economic collapse will take much longer to occur.

In addition, Alexander Mihailov, an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Reading in the United Kingdom, believes that Putin won’t run out of money for war until the West is able to end its reliance on Russian energy, which he estimates will take at least two years.

Rebranded Starbucks. Photo by Johnatan Santos

Rebranded MacDonalds. Photo by Johnatan Santos

Though Mr. Mihailov might be right at some extent it is important to note, however, that many nations in Asia, Latin America, and several African nations have not imposed sanctions on Russia, with some countries even benefiting from the retreat of the West from Russia’s economy. Despite so-called secondary sanctions that are imposed on those countries helping Russia; China, for instance, benefits from the sanctions by selling surplus Russian gas to Europe.

Apart from sanctions on Russian oil & gas, foreign brands such as Coca-Cola, Visa, and Mastercard decided due to the West’s pressure to leave Russia en masse, thus further impacting the Russian economy.

To mitigate this effect and give the economy a boost, deals are being made across Russia to acquire foreign assets from well-known international consumer brands to relaunch them under new brand names. Even though Western brands have left Russia and no longer permit their products and brands to be sold there, their supply chains, manufacturing facilities, and point-of-sale infrastructure remain in place, thus, allowing Russia to promote a full-scale rebranding.

In the case of the new CoolCola [former Coca Cola], Fancy [Fanta], and Street [Sprite] drinks in Russia, the descriptions are concise and straightforward.

Rebranded Coca-Cola. Photo by Johnatan Santos

CoolCola is described by many locals as “an expressive and refreshing drink with the iconic flavor of cola,” while Fancy is “a highly carbonated soda drink with natural orange juice of  a recognizable flavor.” Even with the name changes, the colors of the drinks and the look of their labels remain similar to the originals.

McDonald’s and Starbucks were two other major chains that left Russia. However, in the Russian capital MacDonald’s has reopened under a new name, Vkusno & Tochka (“Tasty and that’s it”), the reopenings took place on Russia Day, a holiday celebrating national pride.

Vkusno & tochka is definitely an effort to reassure Russians that they can continue to live the Western lifestyle. Even though Big Macs have been removed from the menu, the taste and quality of the products have been maintained.

Starbucks, which helped popularize coffee in a traditionally tea-loving society, has been rebranded as Stars Coffee and now offers almost every beverage from the American franchise menu, but now, with a Russian touch to it.

Even though goods and services that left Russia are being rapidly replaced by non-Western suppliers or rebranded, some industries are not following the same speed. The health industry for example, has been experiencing medicine shortages because much of it was imported from Western countries such as Germany. And, reports that Russians could not find certain medications in pharmacies started surfacing early.

Russia’s health care watchdog Roszdravnadzor, however, said in a statement that “the situation on the drug market is gradually returning to normal, panic-buying of pharmaceuticals is decreasing.” Experts and health authorities in Russia say drug shortages are temporary owing to panic buying and logistical challenges from sanctions, but some worry high-quality medicines will keep disappearing from the market.[3]

To conclude, it is essential to note that the sanctions being imposed by the West, might ultimately bring the Russians more benefits than disadvantages, as the Russians build their own networks of products and services decreasing their reliance on the West.

In principle, to some extent, life in Russia may have changed and the country is currently facing some logistical and economic challenges, which, will take some time to resolve. Nevertheless, the “new rebranded Russia” looks a lot like the pre-sanctioned one.

[1] Sonnenfeld, Jeffrey and Tian, Steven and Sokolowski, Franek and Wyrebkowski, Michal and Kasprowicz, Mateusz, Business Retreats and Sanctions Are Crippling the Russian Economy (July 19, 2022). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4167193 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4167193

[2] The Times Radio: Is Russia on the verge of economic collapse? | Jeff Sonnenfeld https://youtu.be/UeP0QwSHKr8

[3] https://www.euronews.com/2022/04/04/panic-buying-or-a-long-term-problem-russia-suffers-drug-shortages-amid-sanctions-over-ukra

La entrada A Rebranded Russia After Sanctions aparece primero en Katoikos.

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