The chief virtue of multiculturalism is that different cultural perspectives help us to understand our own culture better. Things we take for granted or don’t notice are often picked up by people who don’t share the same cultural detritus. As Americans try to figure out the meaning of the long list of gun massacres that have occurred in the US, it is useful to see how other cultures interpret the American gun culture. Der Spiegel offers one such opportunity.
It doesn’t appear as if the world ended today (but one can never be too certain about such things–after all, reality itself is a low probability event). The Economist had a great graph today on various end of the world prophecies over the years.
It seems as if doomsday predictions have a poor track record. Regardless, we can be certain that we will experience many more.
The world is supposed to end tomorrow, so this post shouldn’t really have much effect. But the predictions made in 1972 by the model developed in The Limits to Growth are turning out to be fairly accurate. Those predictions essentially pinpoint the real apocalypse to occur sometime around the middle of this century. Actually, the doomsday scenarios seem to be a little optimistic.
French President Francois Hollande acknowledged that the 132-year colonial rule of France over Algeria was “brutal and unfair.” In a speech to the Algerian Parliament, Hollande did not apologize for colonial rule, but conceded hat France had forgotten its commitment to “universal values” in the Algerian war for independence. The speech was given on the occasion of a new bilateral treaty of friendship between France and Algeria.
The NATO intervention in Libya is regarded by many in the US as a success: the deaths of perhaps thousands of Libyan civilians were prevented, and Qaddafi was overthrown. Those objectives were indeed laudable, but hardly sufficient. The turmoil left by the power vacuum caused by Qaddafi’s death has led to great instability within Libya, and the attack on the American Consulate in Benghazi was only a small manifestation of the turmoil being experienced on a daily basis by Libyans. The international community needs to understand that the Responsibility to Protect also demands effective follow-through.
Park Geun-Hye is the new President of South Korea, and its first female president. She is the daughter of a former military ruler of South Korea and the election was a closely-contested one. But it was also an election that focused on domestic economic issues. Her party, however, is a little more hawkish and there might be a stiffening of the policies toward North Korea.
The UN Security Council has been debating a resolution condemning Israel’s decision to built additional settlements in East Jerusalem, the E1 area. It seems clear that 14 of the Council’s members support the resolution, but the US has threatened to veto it. In a rare show of diplomatic pique, the Council members decided to make separate speeches supporting the resolution. The speeches were directed toward the US in an attempt to demonstrate how isolated the US position had become. The US, however, said it still intends to veto the resolution.
When it comes to guns, the US is clearly different from every other country in the world. The gun culture in the US is based principally in the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution which states that “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Most Americans believe that the 2nd Amendment has to do with hunting and self-defense, and this belief is true of a majority of gun-owners as well. But there are some Americans who believe that the 2nd Amendment’s primary purpose is to safeguard the right of violent revolution against the government, in a manner consistent with the writings of John Locke and the spirit of the American Revolution. This smaller subset of the American population is the group most adamantly against any ban on the military-style assault weapons.
The situation in Syria remains muddled even after the US recognition of the rebel forces. Even though the US was careful to isolate one of the more radical groups within the opposition, al-Nusra, it is clear that many other radical elements remain within the coalition. How the liberal states intend to forge an alliance with such a disparate government is unclear, so their next steps remain murky. All the while, many continue to die in the violence in that country.
Extremists have killed medical personnel who were attempting to vaccinate children against polio in Pakistan. This sad event is a consequence of the subterfuge used by the US to find and kill Osama bin Laden. The US relied on a Pakistani doctor who was using a vaccination alibi to collect information about the whereabouts of bin Laden. Now efforts to eradicate one of the worst childhood illnesses is being set back by the suspicions against all who claim to be vaccinating children. The children who contract polio because of these suspicions can legitimately be considered victims in the war on terror.
South Korea will hold its Presidential election on the 19th and the contrast between the two primary candidates is quite striking. The US has an important stake in the outcome of the election but it doesn’t appear as if foreign policy concerns are a high priority in the election. There is, rather, a strong consensus in South Korea on the broad parameters of foreign policy. Nonetheless, the election will affect American interests quite directly.
Poland’s role in world history has often been pivotal, but one would hardly know that if one only read the traditional European histories. As the critical state between “east” and “west”, Poland has often served as the watchtower for liberal values. Foreign Policy has run a great, short article on Poland’s history.
On the same day as the school tragedy in Newtown, CT, China suffered a similar incident, although less horrific because the weapon used was a knife. The difference between how the US addressed the matter and how the Chinese addressed theirs, is interesting, although one shouldn’t make too much of the comparison.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of Iran now has a Facebook page. Although Facebook was banned in Iran in 2009 as political unrest swept through Iran, it now seems as if the Ayatollah does no wish to be behind the Pope who just established a Twitter account. The world is clearly going mad.
The New York Times has an article on the bloodshed in Central Africa that is truly moving. The violence in that region is perhaps the worst the world has experienced since World War II, and we know precious little about it. No solutions are offered in the article, but both the complexity of the crisis and the depth of the violence needs to be exposed so that we can all be spurred on to find a solution.
Shinzo Abe of the Liberal Democratic Party is likely to be Japan’s next Prime Minister as a result of the elections yesterday. He ran on a hard-line platform against China, and will be buttressed by the emergence of the Restoration Party, a far-right party, as a strong party in Japan. The results will test China’s patience, but also put considerable pressure on the US to balance its commitments in East Asia.
Race is an issue in every society. Some societies attempt to face those issues squarely; others ignore the matter completely. as the world becomes more globalized, the latter choice is becomingly less of an effective option. As an index of how far some societies have to go, one need only go to a drugstore and look at how some products are labeled.
The US will engage in some sort of a conversation about gun control over the next few weeks. The debate is a good way to interpret the how Americans interpret the liberal tenet of freedom (and, on the issue of guns, the American interpretation is profoundly different from most other liberal societies). The Atlantic has run a good article with some very good data on the types of restrictions on the freedom to own guns that Americans support and oppose.
India and Pakistan are moving toward warmer relations, after a long freeze after the terrorist attack on Mumbai in 2008. Relations between the two states will never be truly easy, but a step back from the deeply hostile stance of the last few years is welcome. Much of the change has to do with the changing geopolitical environment in South Asia, but the recognition of the interdependence of the two states is indispensable toward a more stable world order.
The European economic crisis has moved off the front page of most global media and that reflects a sense that there is no imminent threat to the Union. That may be true, but the underlying problems remain and it does not appear as if the Union is making any substantial progress. The most recent European summit ended without an agreement on the unification of the banking system. Muddling along is not necessarily a bad strategy if one believes that, over time, the situation will improve. There is no reason to believe that economic growth will return to Europe any time soon.
The US is sending 400 troops and Patriot missiles to Turkey in an effort to beef up Turkish defenses against spillover from the Syrian civil war. This escalation of the US presence in the region will only be interpreted negatively by the states that continue to support President Assad, Russia and Iran.
The horrific shooting in Newtown, CT is not something I would normally post on this blog. But President Obama’s statement on the tragedy is an impressive example of something that moves world politics all the time: leadership. Listen carefully to his words and examine how those words resonate with your own sense of community and common purpose. Such is the rhetoric of a person with incredible power that one hopes will always be used for good.
Japan scrambled 8 fighter jets as Chinese vessels neared the Diaoyu/Senkakus Islands. The heightened tension comes as the Japanese election nears, and it could have the effect of enhancing the electoral chances of Shintaro Ishihara’s Restoration Party which seeks to revise the anti-militarist clauses in the Japanese constitution. Indeed, there are a number of new parties in the Japanese election (to be held this weekend) that could be characterized as right-wing. Not a good time for a crisis with China.
Globalization leads to a certain degree of homogenization in human culture. The internet has accelerated this trend, particularly in the realm of language. There is a variety of English that is permeating the internet, perhaps leading to the first universal language.
The UN has been debating an international treaty primarily concerned with technical standards for phone calls under the aegis of the International Telecommunications Union. The proposed treaty, however, deals with definitions of communications and government controls over those communications that the US believes interfere with freedom of speech on the internet. Right now, the internet is controlled by a private organization based in the US, and many governments wish to move governance of the internet to a more public, international forum. It doesn’t appear as if this treaty will go very far.
Happy 12/12/12. It won’t happen again. But, then, neither will any other date. We’re still waiting for the end of the world on the 21st.
The US National Intelligence Council has issued one of its reports on the future issues facing the United States. The report predicts a world in 2030 which will be radically different from today (hardly a new prediction), but its words are pretty emphatic: the world is “at a critical juncture in human history.” It is actually a fairly chilling report–one should read it after the holidays.
“North Korea has successfully launched a satellite into orbit” OR “North Korea has successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile.” You can choose which sentence you prefer because they both accurately described what happened yesterday. The launch took the satellite directly over Japanese territory, raising all sorts of concerns in East Asia. The UN Security Council had earlier passed resolutions condemning missile tests, but North Korea defended its actions as purely scientific.
The world now pays little attention to Afghanistan since the US has declared that it is going to withdraw in 2014. The attention span of the global media is reprehensible since there are so many issues left outstanding in this long-suffering country. It is precisely because the US is going to withdraw that we should pay greater attention to events in Afghanistan.
World Politics News 