Europe

Women_and_children_among_Syrian_refugees_striking_at_the_platform_of_Budapest_Keleti_railway_station._Refugee_crisis._Budapest,_Hungary,_Central_Europe,_4_September_2015._(2)

Women and children among Syrian refugees striking at the platform of Budapest Keleti railway station. Mstyslav Chernov/Wikimedia Commons, 2015; goo.gl/m7Vl5N. CC0 3.0

Europe Featured Immigration

How the EU’s internal dysfunction is complicating the migrant crisis

written by Da Eun Choi

Since the Arab Spring in 2011, the already heavy flow of migrants from Africa and the Middle East to Europe has spiked. Over half of those seeking asylum and braving the risky journey to reach safer European borders originate from countries engulfed by civil wars, persecutions and repressive governments such as Syria, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Eritrea, and Iraq. The problems within the European Union (EU) arising from this increased migration flux depend mainly on the sensible and arduous compromise between managing the rising number of refugees entering the EU and the attempts to ensure that these refugees are settled through legal and official channels. The issues are deepened further when analyzing the humanitarian conditions of these asylum seekers. Once they reach what they believe to be a safer location, the efforts to legitimate their presence on European soil is often in contrast and sometimes even in violation with the EU asylum standards.

In order to understand why the EU is undergoing so many obstacles when dealing with the arrival of refugees, we have to introduce two important arrangements: the Dublin Regulation and the EU-Turkey deal on the migrant crisis. The Dublin Regulation is an EU law that determines the EU member state responsible for processing those applying to receive international protection. Approved in 2013, the Dublin Regulation requires the country in which the asylum seeker first entered to be responsible for either accepting or rejecting the request. It also blocks asylum seekers from renewing the application process in other locations in order to avoid the phenomenon of “asylum shopping,” which occurs when an applicant submits multiple applications in several EU member states. In fact, because of this law, if an asylum seeker tries to move to another state, they will be transferred back to the member state where they first arrived. The regulation is also supposed to prevent what is commonly known as “asylum orbiting” where asylum seekers are moved from one country to another with no member state taking responsibility for them.

The Dublin Regulation appears to be a solution to the chaotic situation of migrants, but there are several problems that can be pointed out. Firstly, many humanitarian organizations criticize the fact that the regulation obstructs the legal rights and personal well-being of the asylum seeker, such as the right to a fair examination of their asylum claim, and once accepted, the right to effective protection. Secondly, countries that are more likely to receive migrants initially, are the ones closer to the refugees’ countries of origin. Therefore, this law creates an unequal distribution of asylum claims among member states by placing too much responsibility and often burden on member states that serve as the main points of entry to the EU, like Greece, Italy and more recently Hungary.

The second solution finalized on March 20, 2016 by the EU, in cooperation with Turkey, is the EU-Turkey deal. Under this arrangement, established because Greece was unable to manage the increased influx of refugees, migrants arriving to Greece would be sent to Turkey if they came through illegal channels or their application for an asylum was denied. An exception would be made for Syrian refugees, as according to the deal, every time a clandestine Syrian migrant is sent back to Turkey, one Syrian already in Turkey would be transferred to the EU, provided that their documents are officially approved. This cooperation between the EU and Turkey, supported by mutual benefits (legalization of migrants’ arrival for the EU, financial aid and inclusion in the Schengen zone for Turkey) is highly criticized. First, it guarantees a resettlement to Syrian migrants only, without taking into account the many refugees who find themselves between the pre-deal and post-deal situation. Moreover, in addition to the EU breaching the UN refugee convention by expelling such a great number of asylum seekers, Turkey cannot be considered a safe third country for the temporary accommodation of refugees. Recent reports by Amnesty International reveal that Turkey did not grant temporary work visas, healthcare and education to its refugees as promised, and that the country also expelled many of them, leading them back to the situation they were trying to escape.

These two arrangements show how poorly the refugee crisis is being managed by European authorities. Additionally, the crisis has also contributed to three main issues: poor internal organization of the EU, economic hurdles, and the rise of populism and nationalism within each member state. The organization of the EU has been problematic since the establishment of the Union. The root of the matter lies in the fact that there is no sovereign authority that can actually force every member state to cooperate and implement EU laws. In 2015, Germany tried to apply the sovereign clause by suspending the Dublin Regulation in order to better accommodate both the interests of the immigrants and those of the entry-point states. However, the influence of opposing domestic political parties led to an unstable and imprecise intake of refugees, with no clear rules on the costs and numbers of the ones accepted. One solution would be to enforce mutually coercive contracts that would hold each member state accountable to the agreements made in the European Parliament. But the Dublin Regulation and the EU-Turkey law illustrate how unsuccessful international cooperation can be, as those two agreements led to conflicts within the EU and with many humanitarian organizations.

Another issue is of economic nature. The main factor that triggered negative reactions from European governments to accept asylum seekers was based on concerns with the costs associated with the responsibility. For instance, the migrant crisis will cost around 28 billion euros a year for Germany alone. However, if we calculate how much the alternatives would cost, we can see that they are equally high. There is the financial aid allocated to Turkey amounting to 3.5 billion euros. There is also the so-called “Operation Triton,” a border security operation that gathers intelligence and conducts identification processing, which costs around 3 million euros per month. These numbers show that even if the initial costs of taking in asylum seekers for each individual state seem really high, they are costs that would expire in the long run and that could even get returned if a clear and organized integration program for migrants is created. For instance, former Ambassador to Germany John Emerson, whom The Generation interviewed before he gave the 2016-2017 Bernard Brodie Lecture on the Conditions of Peace at UCLA, discussed how Germany may improve their immigration policies and provided four suggestions:

bilateral commitment that on the one hand requires refugees to learn the language of the host country, and on the other hand it urges the government to provide them an education by hiring people who can speak in their native tongue;
immediate inclusion of immigrant children in schools in order to speed up the process of integration, as children are able to integrate much more rapidly than their parents by speaking the host country’s language without an accent, joining local clubs and supporting local sports teams;
employment of the refugees who are of military age, a group that includes around 70% of male refugees;
a guaranteed path to citizenship which is still very complicated in most European countries.

On the contrary, the cost of temporary measures, like the Turkey Deal or Operation Triton, will simply keep adding up, as they do not include research for a better system of integration for the arriving refugees. If assimilation does not succeed, or is not attempted, temporary solutions will only further disenfranchise the newly arriving immigrants, making them more vulnerable to the influence of terrorist and extremist movements. In fact, Ambassador Emerson remarked that ISIS used many European, home-grown individuals to carry out the recent terrorist attacks in France and Germany.

Finally, another phenomenon is appearing out of the migration crisis, especially since Brexit in 2016, namely the rise of nationalist and populist movements. This is best exemplified by the dynamics of the 2017 French presidential elections which saw the fierce competition between the candidate of the populist National Front, Marine Le Pen, and the new President Emmanuel Macron. Other examples of this are the Italian Five Star Movement, characterized by its willingness to close international ties in order to reinvigorate domestic markets and workers, and Germany’s opposition coalition to Merkel’s administration which has fervently requested the closure of German borders from the arrival of more asylum-seekers. All these parties represent what is becoming increasingly clear: European citizens’ desire to stop the migration flow by closing its borders. This for now would mainly affect migrants, but in the future, it could mean the end of the EU as we know it, since the discontent towards the management of clandestine refugees is becoming more and more intertwined with the growing Euro-skepticism of several popular European political parties.

May 20, 2017 0 comment

Blandine Le Cain/Wikimedia Commons, 2012; (https://goo.gl/O4mxfH). CC BY 2.0 (https://goo.gl/d02on1).

Europe Featured Populism

To Resist Le Pen, France Must Overcome A Nationalistic Precedent

written by Sarah Wyman

2016 was a productive year for the populist far-right. With Great Britain’s decision to leave the European Union and Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 U.S. presidential election setting a dangerous precedent, the French electorate will vote on their own far-right, hyper-nationalist candidate for president on April 23rd.

Marine Le Pen, the leader of the National Front (FN) has more than a little in common with her populist contemporaries in the United States and Great Britain. She has advocated for a French “Brexit” since she declared her candidacy last September, and her political momentum is built on xenophobia and a nativist response to financial globalization. It’s tempting to lump Le Pen’s presidential campaign in with the populist forces credited with approving Brexit and electing Donald Trump. However, to do so would be to radically underestimate the longevity of her movement and its profound appeals to a marginalized component of the French identity.

Marine isn’t the first Le Pen to run for France’s highest office. In 2002, her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, upended pollsters’ projections by leading the FN to France’s second round of presidential voting. Although Le Pen’s showing in the final round of the election was far from successful by traditional metrics—he lost to Jacques Chirac by over 80% of the vote—it was enough to propel the FN to the forefront of political conversation in France and cement its relevance nationwide.

However, Le Pen’s brazen rhetoric and total disregard for political correctness ultimately proved too extreme even for the far-right. In 2015, his remarks characterizing Nazi gas chambers as a “detail” of World War II—the latest in a series of anti-Semitic slurs—led to a public outcry and prompted legal action from his own party. The ensuing legal effort, led by his daughter Marine, ultimately relegated Le Pen to the position of “honorary president,” formally expelling him from the party he founded. Marine Le Pen capitalized on media coverage of the highly-publicized fallout to further distance herself and the FN from her father’s extreme views.

While Marine Le Pen’s cosmetic fixes to the FN’s damaged reputation may have been enough to fool a quarter of French voters, the party remains firmly planted in the extreme right. Le Pen’s rhetoric—though less abrasive than her father’s racist gaffes—is no less extreme. On the campaign trail, she has repeatedly characterized multiculturalism as dangerous to France, perpetuated racist and xenophobic generalizations about immigrants, and marginalized first and second generation French communities by implying that their cultural values pose a threat to France’s national integrity. In a recent televised debate, Le Pen denied French responsibility for Vél’ d’Hiv—a Nazi directed raid and mass arrest of Jews in Paris by the French police for which Jacques Chirac formally apologized in 1995. The comment garnered criticism from other presidential candidates, including centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron who observed “no one has forgotten that Marine Le Pen is Jean-Marie Le Pen’s daughter.”

However, thanks largely to the precedent set by her father, Le Pen gets away with these remarks. She has played the French political conscience to perfection, positioning her party and her platform as a “lite” version of what Jean-Marie Le Pen stood for fifteen years ago and gaining traction with voters who were hesitant to openly embrace the blatant extremism he spouted. In today’s France, it’s possible to publicly declare support for Marine Le Pen without provoking allegations of anti-Semitism. An expressed desire to curb immigration and halt the perceived degradation of French values isn’t necessarily equated with racism. One can maintain a nostalgic conception of French identity without appearing totally out of touch. These trends are xenophobic, and they are dangerous.

Calling Le Pen “France’s Trump,” as some political commentators have done, is a gross oversimplification. Unlike Trump, Le Pen is not a political outsider. She has spent years fine-tuning her message and positioning her party for success within the political arena. The FN currently controls mayoralties in twelve French cities, and 40% of voters aged 18-24 support her candidacy for president. As a result, Le Pen does not have to contend with the questions of legitimacy which have plagued Trump’s administration, nor will the FN have to build up a political presence from nothing should she be elected president. Le Pen will almost certainly advance to the final round of voting in early May, and the FN stands only to gain from her time in the limelight.

While the FN’s rhetoric has softened under Marine Le Pen’s leadership, it remains focused on the superiority of French values and the threat posed to France’s international standing and sovereignty by foreign powers. These appeals are Le Pen’s greatest asset. Instead of reinventing French national identity, she draws upon century-old currents of nationalism deeply ingrained in the popular conscience. For instance, when Le Pen speaks reverently of a France opposed to multiculturalism—which she calls an “immigrationist religion”—she privileges French values and traditions over foreign ones, echoing the ideology disseminated by imperialist propaganda in the late 1800s. Furthermore, her insistence that the religious values of Muslim immigrants are fundamentally incompatible with France’s secular society is informed by the French law of laïcité. Although intended to prevent religious discrimination in France, laïcité ultimately reaffirms the cultural superiority of secular and Catholic French while forcing other groups to choose between their religious and national identities.

The strain of populism which produced Brexit and Trump is fundamentally different from the ideology driving the rise of Le Pen and the FN. There are similarities, of course—all three movements draw their support primarily from economic losers of globalization. They exploit fear to inflame nationalistic sentiment and enact xenophobic policy. They are nativist and deeply suspicious of the world outside their borders. But these currents run deeper in France, and Le Pen’s success is testament to the degree to which historically-rooted nationalism and the strength of France’s exclusive national identity are intertwined with its future.

The tenets providing the FN’s ideological foundation were incorporated into French politics long before Jean-Marie and Marine Le Pen capitalized on their prevalence to catapult their party to power, and they will continue to enfranchise the far-right for years to come. However, Le Pen’s candidacy and the threat of her victory provide an opportunity for the French populace to confront the problematic notions residual in their national identity. Win or lose, the FN’s presence in the runoff of France’s presidential election justifies a national discussion about the shared values that paved the way for Le Pen’s success.

April 21, 2017 0 comment

Federal Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel and President of France Francois Hollande meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Source

Europe Featured Geopolitics Uncategorized Women's Rights

The Double-Edged Sword of Female Leadership

written by Katie Linder

The 2016 presidential election will no doubt remain a controversial subject in the coming years. Many feminists, excited at the prospect of America’s first female president, must now come to terms with the reality that the “highest and hardest” glass ceiling will remain unbroken for at least four more years. However, the United States is not alone in its continued failure to elect a woman to its highest government office. Despite the progress made around the world to expand the rights of women, a lack of gender parity remains painfully clear in the realm of leadership. Women occupy around 10% of the highest offices in national governments around the world, with 19 women currently serving as head of state/government. One of the most formidable female leaders today is Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel. Merkel’s unconventional rise to power serves as an inspiration to aspiring female leaders and further dismantles society’s male-centric conception of power and leadership. However, her legacy also highlights the many double-edged swords facing women in power that make the glass ceiling so difficult to break through.

As a politician in Germany, Merkel is an outlier. She grew up in East Germany during the Cold War and was originally trained in the sciences. Her origins made her an outsider in German politics, which were dominated by men from the West. Nevertheless, she turned her perceived weaknesses into strengths. She used the patience, intellect and inconspicuousness that she cultivated in the East to propel her political career. Furthermore, her background in science allowed her to grow more comfortable working in a male dominated field, and has influenced many aspects of her political style. She is an unanimated public speaker; her speeches are devoid of the pompousness and inflated rhetoric that are characteristic of many other world leaders. She is notorious for delaying her decisions for as long as possible in order to analyze all the available data, and has developed a political style that is based on pragmatism and facts rather than any ideological convictions. In fact, it has been said her only deep seated conviction is her value for freedom, everything else “is negotiable”.

Merkel’s unique style of leadership has allowed her to cultivate a level of respect among the German people that secured her three consecutive terms as chancellor. However, despite her success, she has faced more than her fair share of obstacles in the form of both overt and subtle sexism. While she has risen above the insults and criticism admirably, her experiences reveal the contradictory attitudes surrounding female leadership, and the fine line women in power must walk. While every country and culture has a unique set of standards for their leadership, many of the challenges faced by Merkel are universal to women seeking power.

Merkel developed an ability to restrain herself and lead from behind through her experience studying alongside primarily male colleagues at Leipzig University. She once joked, “The men in the laboratory always had their hands on all the buttons at the same time. I couldn’t keep up with this, because I was thinking. And then things suddenly went ‘poof,’ and the equipment was destroyed.” Throughout her political career she has stood her ground and dealt with the particularly “macho” male leaders, such as Vladimir Putin, in a similar fashion. Merkel’s tactics can serve as a model for other aspiring female leaders, but her experiences also reveal a troubling truth. Female leaders must remain composed in order to avoid being labeled emotional or abrasive, but if they are too diffident they risk having their voices drowned out. Merkel’s lead from behind style of leadership has allowed her to work around this double-edged sword, but it is not necessarily the most efficient way to lead. Ultimately, placing rigid expectations on women hinders their ability to be effectual leaders.

Contradictions between expectations of Merkel’s femininity and masculinity also came into play during her rise to power. The now popular and affectionate nickname “Mutti” (German word for mother), was originally thrown at her as an insult. She has since gracefully reclaimed the name, arguing that it implies her responsibility to the German people. Her appearance has come under scrutiny as well, particularly at the beginning of her career. She has updated her style over time but has largely ignored the critics and maintained a plain and unassuming wardrobe. In this way she has sent the message that she prioritizes her work over her appearance and wants to keep the focus on her policy. These experiences reveal another double-edged sword: as a woman Merkel is expected to be feminine, matronly and stylish, although these traits are often seen as incompatible with strong leadership. After centuries of primarily male leaders, our notions of masculinity and leadership are intimately intertwined. In order to be taken seriously, a woman must adopt more traditionally masculine traits such as resoluteness and aggression. However, acting too masculine often makes a woman less likeable to a broad audience.

Merkel has also received criticism at the other end of the spectrum from feminists who are dismayed by her failure to adequately address women’s issues in Germany. Merkel herself has said she doesn’t consider herself a feminist. Although she has made efforts throughout her career to advance women’s rights, such as adding gender equality in the workplace to the G7 summit agenda in 2015, women’s issues have remained largely on the periphery of her policy goals. The harsh criticism Merkel has received from feminists is fueled in part by the idea that women understand the challenges posed by gender barriers, and thus have an obligation to help each other whenever possible; as Secretary of State Madeleine Albright once said, “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other”. Merkel’s actions reveal another troubling double-edged sword: those with the most power to advance women’s rights—women in the highest offices of government—often adopt passive stances, perhaps because acting otherwise could amount to political suicide. When a woman seeking a high leadership role champions women’s rights and runs on a feminist platform, it is seen with suspicion by many and cast as self-serving. Thus, it is very difficult for an outspoken feminist to get elected to a high office. There is no doubt that having more female leaders is a positive step towards gender equality. However, their power would be much more consequential if it were wielded to directly advance women’s issues.

While more active advocacy for women’s issues from Merkel is necessary, her contributions to the women’s movement must still be recognized and appreciated. She garnered respect in boardrooms dominated by men as she led Europe through the Eurozone Crisis and continues to tackle the Refugee Crisis; thus she has expanded respect for female voices in important international policy discussions. Ultimately, Merkel can serve as both an inspiration and a sobering lesson to other aspiring female leaders. She is an example to women everywhere of strong female leadership that has risen above sexist criticism and “macho men”. However, her legacy is riddled with the double-edged swords that have prevented many other women from achieving the same success. Hopefully, America’s aspiring first-female-presidents will learn a lesson from Merkel and shatter the highest glass ceiling once and for all.

February 9, 2017 0 comment

Swedish police officers observe as refugees arrive at a tram station in Malmö, Sweden. Source

Crisis Relied Europe Featured Geopolitics Immigration Religion Society and Culture

A closer look at refugee integration in Europe (Part II)

written by Sarah Wyman

The first part of this article addresses integration policies in France and may be read in full here.

Sweden: A multicultural model

Sweden has struggled with sub-replacement fertility since millions of Swedes fled poverty and religious persecution during the great emigration, a wave of migration which endured between 1850 and 1939. The process of accepting and integrating refugee and immigrant populations in Sweden has therefore been a mutually-beneficial one. In exchange for asylum, refugees augment Sweden’s dwindling population of young laborers. As highlighted in a 2015 article about a hospital in Gävleborg where around 10% of doctors are refugees, their contribution has been significant.

Sweden is developing a reputation abroad for being particularly hospitable to immigrants and received over 160,000 individuals in 2015 alone. In many ways, Sweden’s response to the refugee crisis has been exemplary. The country has instituted a number of integration programs aimed at easing immigrants’ transitions into Swedish society by teaching them about Swedish culture and instructing them in the language. The government extends a multitude of benefits to refugees including welfare and housing. Progressive legislation demonstrates Sweden’s commitment to “diversity, multiculturalism, and international cooperation” and communicates to immigrant populations that their cultural traditions are welcome and valued by the Swedish population.

Despite these victories, Sweden too has experienced social turmoil as a result of immigration. According to an annual survey conducted by Gothenburg University this year, 53% of Swedes identify immigration and integration as the most pressing social issue facing their country, marking a nearly twofold increase from last year’s result of 27%. This rising concern is likely correlated to the dramatic increase in the volume of immigrants entering the country, many of whom Sweden is struggling to acommodate.

Like France, Sweden is home to a number of densely populated, urban, and largely immigrant-inhabited cities riddled with poverty and violence. For example, Malmö, Sweden’s third largest city—where 32% of the population is foreign-born (the national average hovers around 14%)—made international headlines last year for its sudden spike in violent crime, and the community remains unstable. Sverigedemokraterna, Sweden’s right-wing conservative party, is responding in full force with xenophobic rhetoric and anti-immigration policy.

However, contrary to what critics of immigration in Sweden are suggesting, the rise of violence in major metropolitan areas like Malmö is not evidence of the failure of multicultural integration programs. The fact that violence and crime perpetrated by immigrants occurs almost exclusively in isolated urban communities instead speaks to the success of integration programs operating in small villages. The meaningful, one-on-one interactions taking place in rural communities are simply less feasible in rapid-pace city environments where etiquette demands less from people to begin with.

Sweden would do well to implement the sort of one-on-one, community-led mentorship efforts which have been successful in smaller towns and cities in urban areas. In order to prevent the formation of socially isolated immigrant communities, genuine channels of communication between native and immigrant populations must be open from the start, and they must remain so throughout the integration process.

A European model for integration

When the EU begins—as it must—to design European guidelines for integration, it should consider the strengths and weaknesses of existing models. Like Sweden, it should encourage mentorship programs that allow native and non-native individuals to get to know one another. However, it also should improve the efficacy and reach of these programs by ensuring that they are successfully implemented in urban environments as well as villages. In the French vein, the EU must ensure that its legal systems are prepared to serve individuals of all ethnic and cultural backgrounds equally. However, it must also be wary of assimilationist policy and prepared to accept that the process of integration will involve reciprocal cultural exchange. If Europe fails to take these steps, poorly-integrated immigrant communities will continue to grow in size and scope and social isolation will increase accordingly.

Europe’s plan to redistribute refugees and asylum seekers proportionally across Europe is a good one. As the success of small-scale programs in Sweden has demonstrated, integration is most successful where the ratio of immigrants to native population is low enough to allow for meaningful interaction between the two groups. However, if, like in France, enough is not done to facilitate this sort of cross-cultural exchange in the first place, the EU’s redistribution plan will do little to resolve the social turmoil unleashed by the inundation of refugees into Europe and will further deteriorate inter-cultural relations moving forward.

The urgency of the refugee crisis demands an immediate response from Europe. However, it also presents an excellent opportunity for countries like France and Sweden to reconsider their models of integration, identify their weaknesses, and construct the foundation for societies richer in empathy and culture.

June 24, 2016 0 comment

A young boy plays in the abandoned complex where he lives with more than 135 other refugees in Toulouse, France. Source

Crisis Relied Europe Featured Geopolitics Immigration Religion Society and Culture

A closer look at refugee integration in Europe (Part I)

written by Sarah Wyman

In 2015, over 1.3 million people displaced by war and conflict sought asylum in Europe. Of this number, only 292,540 were refugees—individuals approved for asylum and guaranteed protection by the European Union (EU)—and one million were migrants—individuals who have not completed the legal process of claiming asylum. This massive wave of forced migration has proved a challenge for the EU, whose member states have responded with varying commitments to accepting displaced people. Thus far, Greece and Italy have borne the burden of processing applications for asylum, and the vast majority of refugees have settled in Germany, Hungary, and Sweden.

When David O’Sullivan, Ambassador of the European Union to the United States, spoke at UCLA earlier this month, he emphasized the need for a unified European response to the refugee crisis. According to O’Sullivan, the solution to what many Europeans perceive as an insurmountable problem is the proportionate redistribution of refugees and asylum seekers between the European member states. This perspective is the driving force behind recent EU legislation outlining redistribution procedures and controlling the safe and legal arrival of refugees by land and sea.

However, the EU has failed to address a third, equally necessary response to the refugee crisis: integration. Europe does not currently have an integration plan for the millions of people resettling across the continent, a fact which is made more disconcerting by Europe’s long history of unsuccessful immigrant integration.

Over the course of the past few decades, isolated and predominantly immigrant communities have become an increasingly common feature of European suburbs. One such community, Molenbeek St. Jean—the so-called “jihadi capital of Europe” in western Brussels—has been under scrutiny in the wake of terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels. Five individuals involved in November’s Paris attacks were tied to the community, and it was implicated again during the investigation of the Brussels attacks in March. Molenbeek St. Jean and its association with a violent and poorly-integrated immigrant population represents a larger European problem: the social segregation of native and non-native populations.

While the refugee crisis differs from Europe’s tradition of immigration in many respects, the process of refugee integration will face many of the same challenges. Namely, in order for successful integration to take place, native and non-native communities must overcome the profound socio-cultural divides which separate them. There is no apparent answer for how to address this problem. However, there are lessons to be learned from legislation and policies already implemented by European nations.

Two particularly interesting targets for comparison are France and Sweden, which have adopted opposing methodologies with respect to immigration. France, commanding a clearly-defined and longstanding national identity, expects immigrants and refugees to assimilate to French culture and traditions. Meanwhile, the Swedish government has adopted a multicultural approach, incorporating the customs of refugees and immigrants into a broader Swedish identity. Neither strategy has been wholly successful in producing social harmony, and closer study reveals why: both models fail to produce organic social interaction between native and immigrant populations. Without this crucial ingredient, Europe will not arrive at a sustainable solution for the refugee crisis.

France: An assimilationist model

Any discussion about immigration in France must begin with the French tradition of laïcité. The term, which was coined during the French Revolution and ultimately formalized in a 1905 law, can be loosely summarized as an equivalent to the United States’ separation of church and state. However, its definition relies on a different set of principles which, in practice, render its implementation problematic on a social scale.

While the American tenet of separation of church and state seeks to protect freedom of religion and individual liberty, laïcité’s end goal is to achieve social equality by preventing religiously-motivated discrimination. It draws a sharp distinction between private and public life and decrees that while individuals are free to practice whichever religion they choose in their private life, religion shall in no capacity infringe on the public sphere. Unlike the separation of church and state in the United States—which seeks to grant equal religious liberty to all US citizens—laïcité promotes equality by preventing anyone from practicing their religion in the public sphere. The strategy here is to achieve equality by removing religion from the social equation. Laïcité privileges French identity over other cultural and religious identities so as to ensure that all French citizens are viewed as French first and foremost and that their status in the eyes of the law is protected from religious bias.

Laïcité achieved international controversy following a March 2004 law banning students from wearing symbols or clothing denoting religious affiliation in schools. Other laws apply this precedent to all public institutions, ranging from government offices to post offices. This legislation has proved particularly problematic for French Muslim women who wish to wear headscarves in accordance with their religious values, making laïcité’s incompatibility with current societal truths clear.

Laïcité is a system designed for a mono-cultural, Catholic—or Christian at best—French society. It was not conceived during a time in which multiculturalism was prevalent, nor has it evolved to match the needs of France’s diversifying population. Instead, it is reinforcing a narrow definition of French national identity which does not include the multi-faceted racial, cultural, and ethnic dimensions of modern France.

The ideology which shaped laïcité is a deeply-ingrained component of the French identity. Although its ramifications on the reception of immigrants in France are complex and far-reaching, they may be condensed broadly into two categories:

Firstly, the restrictive cultural norms imposed by laïcité make little room for immigrants’ diverse religions and cultures. While studying in France, I asked a French person I knew well to explain to me what one had to do to “be French” in modern France. His answer was simple: “you just have to obey our laws.” That’s precisely the problem. French laws, as they stand, are not feasible for segments of the population that don’t resemble the sort of French people they were designed for. This is especially true for France’s growing Muslim population, which continues to challenge France’s cultural norms. Most recently, a Muslim student in Northwestern France was sent home for wearing a long skirt—a choice which her school’s administration interpreted as a religious statement. There has also been controversy surrounding French schools’ refusal to serve Halal food in cafeterias. These incidents stand in sharp contrast to the norm of institutionalized Catholicism in France, where many schools hold mass daily and nearly all Roman Catholic holidays are observed by the French state.

However, those aspiring to earn the social status of citizen in France have no choice but to assimilate to French cultural and religious norms. This is made difficult by the popular disdain of many native French for immigrant communities, perpetuating a vicious circle of social isolation. The French are inclined to distrust and disapprove of growing immigrant neighborhoods like those in Seine-Saint-Denis and Marseilles because they perceive their failure to integrate as an affront to French tradition and hospitality rooted in immigrants’ lack of interest in integrating. This attitude contributes to the stigma which makes it difficult for immigrants and refugees to integrate in the first place, widening the social gap between these populations and attesting to the inefficacy of laïcité as a strategy for integration.

Secondly, because religion—and, by extension, religious and cultural differences—are taboo in France, relations between the ethnically French and the multicultural “new French” are plagued by a fundamental lack of mutual understanding. Lines of communication between these increasingly isolated populations are cut in part because their social spheres do not overlap, but also because dialogue about the issues which separate them is made uncomfortable by prevailing cultural norms.

France’s policies, built around the notion of laïcité, reinforce the ideological divide between native and non-native populations before they have an opportunity to interact. The sociocultural repercussions of this method have already posed a problem in ethnically-divided France, and the addition of hundreds of thousands of refugees and asylum seekers is likely to escalate existing tensions within France if efforts are not made to bridge these polarized communities.

The second part of this article details Swedish integration policy and proposes a model of integration for Europe. Visit The Generation website later this week to read more.

June 21, 2016 1 comment

The Eiffel Tower lit in blue white red-Fluctuat nec Mergitur, Flickr (CC), Source

Europe Featured Geopolitics Middle East Security Security and Conflict Terrorism Uncategorized

In the Shadow of Terror—The Global Response to Terrorism in Light of the Paris Attacks

written by Arturo Siguenza

November 13, a day that will surely be ingrained in the nightmares of thousands, began as any other day in Paris, with the promise of an exciting evening of friends, food, and music. No one predicted the horror that would ensue as the sun set, namely that a group of strategically organized terrorists would infiltrate various locations throughout the city. At 9:20pm explosions erupted in the locality around the Stade de France, triggering the beginning of multiple attacks. Over the next four hours, cafes and restaurants were targeted in a slew of bombings and shootings, culminating at the Bataclan Concert Hall. Those hoping to enjoy an evening of rock music headlined by the American band, Eagles of Death Metal, instead faced a group of armed militants that entered the venue and opened fire at unsuspecting crowds. Within a few hours, the city of Paris was consumed by panic and terror as thousands fled these targeted centers in search of safe havens from the attacks.

The city of Paris lost 130 lives throughout the course of the night and 351 people were left injured. An attack meant to indiscriminately stir fear not only in France, but globally, has successfully shaken spirits worldwide. Empathy for France was instantaneous as social media reacted in support. Facebook instituted a safety check system, a tool previously reserved for natural disasters, allowing users in Paris to notify their loved ones of their status. Feeds flooded with profile pictures donning a blue, white and red filter in solidarity. Across all social media platforms, people showed their support using the hashtag #prayforparis, and governments worldwide showed their solidarity, projecting the French flag over their monuments and gathering to discuss collective action. Just two days after the attacks, world leaders met at the G20 World Summit in Turkey, vowing to increase military response against IS. Since the World Summit, an international coalition including the USA, France, the UAE, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and recently Britain, has formed using air strikes to bomb IS targets in Syria aiming to weaken the organization’s strongholds. With the ever-increasing support for France and the reactionary discussions among government heads, the Paris attacks marked a pivotal point in the war against IS and its affiliates. Claiming responsibility for the horrific attacks, IS has demonstrated its ability to not only effectively inflict its militant terror tactics within its territorial strongholds but also to extend this destructive reach internationally.

But what does this social response and acceleration in government action tell us? The terrorist attacks in Paris and the response that followed showed a collective empathy that cut across national boundaries, but also conversely emphasized the stark contrast in the attention garnered by terrorist attacks in other regions. With everyone from celebrities to prominent government officials making statements and sending their condolences and prayers to Parisians, one begins to wonder why other countries do not receive the same treatment. For instance, earlier last year a suicide bomber killed 12 people during a funeral in eastern Afghanistan. In April, al-Shabab militants attacked and killed 147 at Garissa University in Kenya, most of whom were students. Just a day before the attacks in Paris, a suicide bombing orchestrated by ISIS hit the city of Beirut killing 43 people. These are but a few of the acts of terrorism this past year and the majority of these brutal incidents share one common factor: none garnered the outpouring of global attention and empathy that the Paris attacks had.

My intention is not to shame the solidarity shown for Paris, but to highlight the stark contrast between how these events are treated. This contrast makes it impossible to continue ignoring the chronic perception that terrorism occurring in countries situated in regions more prone to violence, such as in the Middle East and Africa, can be waved aside as normal or habitual occurrences. At the G20 Summit in November, President Obama referred to the events in Paris as not just an attack on France but as “an attack on the civilized world.” This raises the question as to how and what we can identify as “the civilized world?” This loaded statement calls forth the idea that world governments, popular media, and ordinary individuals dismiss some regions as backwards and their confrontations with violence as the unfortunate but dismissible status quo—until bombs go off in their own backyards. What is most distressing is that attacks subsequently launched against terrorist organizations often result in the upheaval and loss of many innocent civilian lives; consider the civilian death toll in the War on Terrorism following 9/11 and the warzone that Syria has become. Civilians in countries that seem to be too “uncivilized” to foster global attention or completely lost in micro-aggression, are often neglected and their already chaotic surroundings decimated.

So what does this mean for the future in the aftermath of the Paris attacks? It is clear that IS and its affiliates will not stop anytime soon in their ongoing terror rampage. They have already claimed sequence of more attacks, since the Paris events. In Nigeria two bomb attacks carried out by Boko Haram killed 31 and injured 72. This past week a suicide bomber—and suspected member of IS—killed 10 in Istanbul’s Sultanahmet Square and the organization also orchestrated a series of attacks in Jakarta leaving 2 dead and 20 injured. A new IS propaganda video, titled “Paris Has Collapsed,” was released on November 20th glorifying the Paris attacks and vowing continuation of threats to not only France, but also the U.S. The hacker-activist group known as Anonymous also released a list of future IS targets it claims to have uncovered suggesting plans for strikes in the U.S., Indonesia, Italy, and Lebanon. Additionally we also see the domino effect IS attacks have on its ongoing rivalry with Al Qaeda for Islamic supremacy. Shortly after the Paris attacks, Al Qaeda launched an attack that killed 19 in a Mali hotel on November 20th. A dangerous future of competition between the two organizations is becoming progressively more apparent.

The West, or the “civilized world” as described by President Obama, is entering a state of emergency as the war against terrorism escalates indefinitely. The next steps will undoubtedly bring massive change to the international sphere. In this, we must remember that government and social response can empower terrorism as much as it can end it; justice is our duty but retaliation is not. We cannot permit ourselves to repeat the mistakes following 9/11 with an emergency response that does not consider further consequences in war-torn countries. For every innocent life lost in distant battlefields and each person at home that allows their fear to turn them away from the idea of human rights, plays into the hands of terrorist organizations moving us towards an increasingly militant global climate fueled by terror.

My prayers go out to all those affected by the recent terrorist attacks and those who continue to experience the aftermath of past episodes. Your stories will not go forgotten.

January 15, 2016 1 comment

Crisis Relied Europe Featured Geopolitics Globalization Immigration Internet Middle East Religion Security Security and Conflict Society and Culture Territorial disputes Terrorism Uncategorized

An Interview with Mubin Shaikh: Former Jihadist Turned Counter-Terrorism Operative

written by Madison Weil

In light of recent radical Islamic terrorist attacks worldwide, individuals everywhere are feeling uneasy and unsafe. The topic of national security has moved to the forefront of political agendas and has become an integral part of international discussions. In the United States, 49% of citizens are worried that they, or someone in their family, will become a victim of terrorism. This percentage is the highest it has been since the year following 9/11. According to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, “Over three-quarters of Americans doubt the nation’s ability to stop ‘lone wolf’ terrorist attacks by individuals acting on their own.” Additionally, 59% of Republicans, 38% of Independents, and 15% of Democrats support a ban on all Muslims wishing to enter the United States. For a nation that prides itself on freedom and equal opportunity for all, these are surprising numbers, which reveal the success of radical extremists in their ability to create widespread fear and anti-Muslim sentiment.

In an effort to learn more about the goals and recruitment strategies of ISIS, a colleague and I recently interviewed Mubin Shaikh—an ex-extremist turned counter-terrorism operative, and author of the book Undercover Jihadi. Born in Canada, Shaikh was raised Muslim and became influenced by the radical ideas of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. He began actively recruiting other young Muslims for the cause of jihad. After the events of 9/11, however, he questioned Islamic extremism and travelled to Syria, where he underwent deradicalization—a process he defines in his interview as “a full cognitive shift away from extremist thinking.” Upon his return home, he began working undercover with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in the “Toronto 18” case, in an effort to prevent extremist attacks. Today, he works to stop radicalization using social media to directly engage Islamic State sympathizers, while also speaking out against Islamophobia, which he believes only fuels and encourages radicalization.

What many people do not understand is that the fulfillment of ISIS’ agenda is actually dependent upon worldwide discrimination against Muslims—all Muslims, even moderate, peaceful, law-abiding Muslims. According to Shaikh, “It would be laughable if it wasn’t so serious how easily people are falling into that trap. ISIS has actually written a document in which they wrote and said ‘we will commit these attacks so as to create retaliation on Muslims to make them feel so isolated and marginalized that they will be pushed into our waiting arms.’”

Shaikh is referring to both a manifesto called “The Black Flags from Rome,” as well as the February edition of ISIS’ online magazine, Dabiq, in which the Islamic State warned, “Muslims in the West will soon find themselves between one of two choices.” This statement was published in the weeks following the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris—an abhorrent act that only heightened the pre-existing tension between French Muslims and their fellow citizens. The group boasted that the attack had “further [brought] division to the world,” and “eliminated the grayzone,” representing the coexistence between Muslims and their non-Muslim neighbors. The text further explains that Muslims living in the West will soon feel so isolated and marginalized, they will be forced to “either apostatize … or [migrate] to the Islamic State, and thereby escape persecution from the crusader governments and citizens.” The term “crusader” is the title given by ISIS to every Western soldier, civilian, and politician, regardless of party or nation.

In the weeks following the most recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California, ISIS has seen their goal come to fruition—innocent Muslims everywhere have been experiencing acts of violence, hatred, and discrimination at the hands of angry, fearful Western citizens. Many in the West believe that Islam is a religion that promotes violence, without understanding that the majority of Muslims are peaceful. Shaikh explained that ISIS manipulates the Quran, “cherry-picks” verses, and uses phrases out of context in order to piece together an outline for their violent mission.

In a more recent interview with VICE, Shaikh reemphasizes that widespread Islamophobia provides a major advantage to ISIS recruiters: “The sad reality is, you have people on the right who might as well directly take the marching orders from ISIS because they’re doing the work for them.” ISIS targets individuals who feel isolated and rejected. Youths are an easy target given their desire to formulate their own identity and find a community to which they belong. Shaikh comments, “Your brains are still developing until your mid-twenties. That’s a time when you’re susceptible to influences from adults, community members, and religious members.” ISIS preys on the vulnerability of ostracized youths, reaching out to them via social media platforms such as Facebook, Skype, Twitter, Instagram, etc. “They’ll take screenshots and continue to engage you until they feel like they can successfully recruit you,” says Shaikh. He also solemnly discusses the impossibility of quitting ISIS once an individual has been recruited: “Their lives are destroyed. And it will be very, very difficult for them to leave that place. Some of them have been executed because they were creating ‘too many problems’ because they wanted to go home.”

While widespread fear and anger might seem inevitable in light of current events, Shaikh encourages individuals to educate themselves on the goals and strategies of extremists, and to resist the temptation to perpetuate the anti-Muslim sentiment which only further fuels radicalization and polarization.

December 28, 2015 1 comment

Europe Featured Geopolitics Globalization Humanitarian Aid Immigration Middle East Religion Security Security and Conflict Society and Culture Terrorism Uncategorized

Nationality vs. Humanity: The Stranger’s Case

written by Madison Weil

“It is nationalism which endangers nations, and not the other way round.” –Ernest André Gellner (British-Czech philosopher and social anthropologist)

French President Francois Hollande recently issued a statement that his country is prepared to open its borders and welcome 24,000 migrants seeking asylum over the next two years. This statement, issued on September 7, 2015, is part of a new plan designed by the European Union to accept and appropriately distribute the massive exodus of refugees fleeing from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and other surrounding nations. When asked to comment on French polls that indicated 55% of the national population was opposed to accepting more refugees, Hollande responded that asylum is a constitutional right and a moral duty, and that “France’s image and standing in the world were at stake.”

In light of the recent terrorists attacks on Paris, and amid reports that one of the attackers held a Syrian passport, Hollande has emphasized the necessity of making proper background checks prior to accepting these refugees. Hollande has declared war on ISIS, but made it clear that France will maintain its “humanitarian duty” and promise to welcome refugees over the next two years.

While many refugees initially identified Germany as the most ideal place to relocate with supposed security and job opportunities abound, other European countries are now offering comparable conditions and welcoming the migrants. In fact, because Germany has been accommodating such a massive influx of individuals in recent months, France has offered to help by offering an expedited asylum application to migrant families arriving in Munich: temporary housing in France along with a two-week approval process as opposed to the usual six-month process.

These recent political and cultural strides made by France are particularly notable given the nation’s sticky history with immigration and ethnic tension. Having just spent a month living and learning in France, I can attest that it is challenging to go more than a day without hearing an allegation that the presence of ethnic minorities, foreigners, and immigrants creates a grave problem for the nation. A commonly held belief among French traditionalists is that these groups directly threaten and compromise the very essence of true “Frenchness.” Many harbor a sense of nationalism that transcends the concept of national pride and actually results in extreme and egregious discrimination—for example, some believe that to be truly “French” is to be white, Catholic, and multi-generationally French. This statement parades as protectionism when in reality it is rooted in racism. This has created an ongoing and very heated dialogue surrounding immigration policy in the last century.

This French perception of nationalism (hopefully) seems foreign to us in the United States. Our nationality law is based on the principles of jus soli (Latin for “right of soil”), meaning that individuals gain immediate citizenship upon being born in the U.S. This has subsequently created the notion that America is a mixing pot of racial identities—our sense of national pride comes from being united as American, not from being one united race. In contrast, most states in Europe, Asia, and Oceania grant citizenship based on principles of jus sanguinis (Latin for “right of blood”) or a restricted version of jus solis—as is the case in France. Under this philosophy, individuals become citizens depending on their parents’ citizenship and not by birthplace. This has fostered and accentuated the cultural division in France between natives and immigrants which has resulted in the emergence of a perceived social hierarchy. Because of this heated history and conflicting cultural dynamic, President Hollande’s decision to welcome refugees in spite of opposition (and in spite of recent events) deserves recognition.

France’s situation forcibly evokes a particularly challenging set of questions: at what point should international leaders place a greater emphasis on obligations to humanity than on obligations to their own national interests? How do leaders of the Western community in particular negotiate or reconcile national interests with moral duty? Is there such a thing as a moral duty to the international community? According to the UNHCR: “Since, by definition, refugees are not protected by their own governments, the international community steps in to ensure they are safe and protected.” In fact, in the past few decades 142 nations have signed on to both the 1951 Refugee Convention and the 1967 protocol. By signing this international treaty and its 1967 amendment, the UNHCR states nations are essentially agreeing that “refugees deserve, as a minimum, the same standards of treatment enjoyed by other foreign nationals in a given country and, in many cases, the same treatment as nationals.”

While we have historically seen that most national actions, even humanitarian ones, are often out of self-interest, it is my sincere hope that international authorities will continue to improve and open their borders to those in need. Afterall, those of us born in Western nations with relatively safe conditions could have just as easily been born into a nation experiencing a crisis. Wouldn’t we then hope and pray for assistance and asylum in the E.U.? In the U.S.?

This debate reminded me of an excerpt from Shakespeare’s play “Sir Thomas More.” Sir Thomas More is a lawyer, sent to address an angry crowd of individuals rioting to get rid of “those immigrants” or “strangers.” Shakespeare delivers a powerful message that transcends time and place when More challenges the natives to consider what they would do if they had to flee their home country:

“Whether would you go?

What country, by the nature of your error,

Should give you harbor? go you to France or Flanders,

To any German province, to Spain or Portugal,

Nay, any where that not adheres to England,–

Why, you must needs be strangers: would you be pleased

To find a nation of such barbarous temper,

That, breaking out in hideous violence,

Would not afford you an abode on earth,

Whet their detested knives against your throats,

Spurn you like dogs, and like as if that God

Owed not nor made not you, nor that the elements

Were not all appropriate to your comforts,

But chartered unto them, what would you think

To be thus used? this is the strangers case;

And this your mountanish inhumanity.”

(Sir Thomas More, Act II, Scene IV)

This is the stranger’s case—the immigrant’s case. For many, it’s near impossible to fully comprehend the plight and experiences of today’s refugees, but so important to try. While it’s challenging to reconcile national interests with humanitarian needs, our nationality shouldn’t supersede our humanity.

November 20, 2015 0 comment

Ambassador Michael McFaul with UCLA students Izabela Chmielewska and Kurt Klein.

Europe Featured Geopolitics LGBT Security Security and Conflict Territorial disputes

Putin’s Actions are ‘Not Just About Geopolitics and Spheres of Influence’–an Interview with Ambassador Michael McFaul

written by Kurt J. Klein

Generation Editors Izabela Chmielewska and Kurt Klein sat down with Ambassador Michael McFaul during his visit to UCLA last spring. Since then, Russia has conducted airstrikes in Syria that are ongoing. Russian President Vladimir Putin states that the strikes intend “to stabilize the legitimate government and to create the conditions for a political compromise.” In this interview, Ambassador McFaul gives insights on the future of Eastern Europe, Edward Snowden, recent Russian foreign interventions and how the US and allies should respond.

KURT KLEIN (KK): The New Yorker described you as a graduate student as “determined to establish liberal values and institutions – civil society, free speech, democratic norms – in a land, that for a thousand years, had known only absolutism, empire, and the knout.” What part of the world do you currently see as the place where graduate students like ourselves can effectively promote these values?

MICHAEL MCFAUL (MM): I was in the Soviet Union doing my research, but not to promote democratic values. The way that Mr. Remnick wrote about it confused two different things: my thesis was actually about southern Africa – Anglola and Mozambique – and how external actors influence internal change. And that has been a theme of mine academically off and on for about 20 or 30 years. In parallel, when I arrived in the Soviet Union for the 1990-91 academic year as a Fulbright Scholar, I was also hired as a consultant by the National Democratic Institute, an American organization that promotes democracy around the world. We were there as the invited guest of different political organizations and the government of Russia. We were partners with the newly elected city councils of Leningrad and Moscow, and brought in city council people from New York City and Los Angeles, like Zev Yaroslavsky, to interact with these new politicians. So it wasn’t a hostile place, it was a friendly one. Today, the transitioning countries like Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, as well as Burma are receptive to interaction and friendly to outside experts. Rather than promoting, which is outdated, I see it more as transmitting ideas in an effective way. That’s what I would do if I were your age today.

IZABELA CHMIELEWSKA (IC): In your opinion, what is the optimal solution for Ukraine? Will the country have to divide between East and West? Will it join the EU? What would you like to see happen in Ukraine, and what do you view as a realistic solution?

MM: Ukraine’s first challenge is to stabilize its economy. I’m impressed by what they have done so far, but I am also anxious about the road ahead. They have a big IMF program, but the external assistance is not enough to do the reforms that are required of them. Second, Ukraine has had a hard time consolidating democratic practices. They had a chance after the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, and they had a second chance after the 2004 Orange Revolution, and now they have their third chance. I believe that the economic reforms and democratic consolidation are more important tasks than fighting the war in the East because getting them right would create incentives for the people in the East to stay within Ukraine. The biggest challenge is that Russia, and more precisely Vladimir Putin, does not want them to succeed and is creating just enough tension to undermine the economic reforms and the government in Kiev. That is their struggle moving forward. Joining the EU should be a long-term goal, not a short-term one.

IC: I read your piece in the New York Times in which you said that if you want to beat Putin, you should support Ukraine, and I very much agree. So what role should the Eastern European EU states take, especially the Baltic states that have large Russian minorities, and neighboring post-Communist states that have successfully transitioned, like Poland?

MM: Poland is the poster child, the success that all Ukrainians should aspire to. If you go back to 1990 and look at GDP per capita, Poland and Ukraine very similar. Today, Poland is four times as rich as Ukraine. They did that by transforming their political and economic system at the same time. Estonia is another successful case. I think learning from the Poles and other partners in the region is a good thing. In fact, President Poroshenko and Prime Minister Yatsenyuk have brought some advisers from Poland and Lithuania to join the government to with reforms. Ukraine should work together with NATO allies to bolster its deterrence efforts vis-à-vis Russia. The Eastern European EU states should also keep diplomatic unity and stand against lifting anti-Russian sanctions prematurely as the debate rises.

IC: You have recently tweeted about Putin’s defensive statement of the WWII Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact between Hitler and Stalin, and basically called his public declaration not smart. What is the danger in Putin lauding such a statement?

MM: The historical facts surrounding this pact, which triggered World War II and the dual invasion of Poland in 1939, is now being distorted as Putin rewrites history in Russia. That is dangerous. I don’t really understand Putin’s logic trying to justify this pact. Even Soviet leaders were quiet about this fact and did not trumpet it is as some kind of necessity for the Soviet Union. There is also this phenomenon in the Russian media called “what-aboutism”. If you criticize the Ribbentrop Molotov pact, they say “well, what about Munich”? If you criticize the invasion of Ukraine, they say “well, what about Iraq”? Well, two wrongs don’t make a right.

IC: Angela Merkel met with Putin a day after Western leaders boycotted Victory Day in the Red Square. Is that a step in the right direction? How do you see her role in this political impasse?

MM: Merkel is without question the most important player. I would like to see the Americans more involved, although as we are talking right now, Secretary Kerry has just gotten out of the meeting with Putin. I am impressed with the position that Merkel has taken on Russia, and I think it’s a principled one. Even during that meeting she called out the annexation of Crimea a violation of international law, which it is. It takes courage to do that, and I also think it’s important to engage, as she is doing. Just because you meet with somebody doesn’t mean that you agree with their views. I think it’s important to understand what Mr. Putin is thinking.

IC: Is Russia’s nature as the dominant nation-state the driving force of its actions, or is it really Putin?

MM: Well, that’s the subject of my lecture tonight, that’s exactly the theme! But my bluff, as they call it in the government, is bottom line up front. So the bluff of my talk is on this balance – both are important factors, but I attribute more of the causal explanation to Putin. I can imagine a different Russia behaving in a different way, not because I have a great imagination, but because I saw it. Russia had a different set of aspirations when I was there as a graduate student in 1990-91. All of this was not inevitable in my opinion, partly due to some mistakes that the West has made, but more to do with Putin’s fear of the challenge that society demonstrated after the elections in 2011.

KK: You’ve mentioned rewriting history. What are your thoughts about RT (Russia Today), the Russian state-funded media organization. What do you think the United States should do regarding RT and its growing influence in the world?

MM: I am very impressed with RT, its strategy, and its resources. Some people criticize it and think that it’s not worth their time and attention – I disagree. They give away world news to countries that can’t afford to have reporters around the world for free. Very clever strategy. The response should be investing in local investigative journalism in Russia, rather than Voice of America on steroids.

KK: Why did Putin give Edward Snowden asylum? What did he hope to gain and what value does Snowden hold for Russia?

MM: In the immediate run, it was a giant public relations coup for Putin because it has turned the world debate on its head. Now, we were the ones violating human rights and our Constitution, and Putin had the champion seek asylum in his country. Of course all the things that Mr. Snowden complains about United States, much of which I am sympathetic to, happen in Russia all the time, though it doesn’t get much press. The second objective was intelligence gathering, especially the methods of the NSA. In his defense, Snowden says he hasn’t told them anything, but some people in the government are worried about what he knows and may share.

KK: You wrote in your March 23, 2014 op-ed piece: “The United States does not have the same moral authority as it did in the last century. As Ambassador, I found it difficult to defend our commitments to sovereignty and international law when asked by Russians, ‘What about Iraq?’” – the ‘what-aboutism’ – “To win this new conflict, we must restore the United States as a model.” What exactly is this new conflict? Is it referring to just Ukraine or the overall relations with Russia, or maybe more abstract ideals? How would the United States restore itself as a model? Is it just foreign policy, or it it also domestic affairs?

MM: Putinism does not have the same appeal as Communism. And therefore the ideological content of this confrontation is not the same as it was during the Cold War. But it’s also not zero-sum, it’s not just about geopolitics and spheres of influence. Putin has a set of ideas that he is propagating around the world, and they come in two broad forms. One is anti-American. He argues that the United States is an imperial country, a unipolar power, and he claims to be the leader of the anti-imperial coalition. And that’s a really smart argument. Though I think he undermined it by invading his neighbor. But he is the only leader around the world of that stature to stand up against the United States, which rallies people, especially on the left. The other set of ideas carry the social-conservative, nationalistic message. They are mostly earmarked for the right-wing parties of Europe, but also to groups in the United States, like the Evangelical churches. In that campaign, he is standing up for family values, against liberalism, against LGBT rights and gay marriage, against all things that – in his world – come from the liberal, decadent European West and the United States. So we need to be engaged in those debates on why our system of government, our pluralism, is a better system. That gets me to the second part of your question – it is both domestic and foreign policy for which we have to right some of the wrongs, like closing Guantanamo. My former boss [President Obama] is doing some of this, and agrees with me; I spoke to him about it personally. If he were here with us, I think he would say, “I wish we had done more faster” on that front. The other part is to restore the economic and political models of America. I think we are doing pretty well with rebuilding the economic model. We have come out of a very difficult recession, way ahead of most developed economies. I live in the Silicon Valley – a land of opportunity, a land of creating wealth and products, a magnet for the entire world to come work. People are not flocking to Moscow to work on technology – they are leaving Moscow. The second piece of the restoration is the political model. The dysfunction in Washington is not very inspirational right now. I think we should try to do better on that front. I don’t have a silver bullet for it, but making our democracy function a little more effectively would have positive results for our foreign policy.

November 8, 2015 0 comment

Edwin Landseer - Scene from A Midsummer Night's Dream. Titania and Bottom

Europe Featured Geopolitics Immigration Security Society and Culture Terrorism

The Tragic Murder of a Licensed Fool: Extremism, Freedom of Expression, and the Fight For “European Values.”

written by James Walker

Edwin Landseer – Scene from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Titania and Bottom

At midday on the 7th of January 2015, three masked gunmen forced their way into the offices of a French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, and ruthlessly executed ten members of staff, including the editor, Stephane Charbonnier, and his police bodyguard. The men then fled the scene into the Paris streets, killing another policeman on their way out. The motivation for this horrific massacre is very clear – the offices and personnel had been under threat of terrorist attack since 2007, when the magazine participated in the controversial publishing of cartoon depictions of the prophet Mohammed. The situation became even more intense in 2011, when the magazine issued a special edition titled “Charia Hebdo” (a reference to Sharia law), and listed the prophet as the editor-in-chief. A day after publication, the offices were petrol-bombed.

Monsieur Charbonnier (or Charb as he was known in the cartoon world) was an outspoken critic of many aspects of modern day French life, and used his position to ridicule the great and the good alike. The tagline for his magazine was “Journal Irresponsable” and it took pains to offend politicians, social commentators, and religious sensibilities across a broad spectrum of French society. In doing so, Charb looked to fulfill a venerable role within European society – that of the court jester, or fool. Dating back to ancient times, the fool has often been afforded a license to both mock and speak irreverently to power. George Orwell, another outspoken critic of European society, identified the role of the fool in Shakespeare’s King Leer as an example of how the position was necessary to provide a “trickle of sanity running through the play.”

Here in the United States, the role of the fool is filled by political comedians such as John Stewart and Stephen Colbert. They are so effective, in fact, that the Pew Research Center published a report in 2007 identifying viewers of Stewart and Colbert as the most politically informed demographic in the country. The mixture of political satire and sheer lunacy is a potent elixir, and one that a health society suffers from in its absence. Eric Idle, legendary comedian, and founding member of Monty Python, explored this notion when he stated:

“At least one way of measuring the freedom of any society is the amount of comedy that is permitted, and clearly a healthy society permits more satirical comment than a repressive, so that if comedy is to function in some way as a safety release then it must obviously deal with these taboo areas. This is part of the responsibility we accord our licensed jesters, that nothing be excused the searching light of comedy. If anything can survive the probe of humour it is clearly of value, and conversely all groups who claim immunity from laughter are claiming special privileges which should not be granted.”

Of course, the presence of humor is not, in and of itself, a justification for giving deliberate offense. The fool’s role is not to simply make you gasp in revulsion, but is intended to provoke reflection, in the same way that the apocryphal story of the servant riding behind Caesar whispering “remember thou art mortal” is intended to remind the powerful of their humanity. The question for many European societies is how to merge the strong free speech traditions of European modernity, with the resurgent influence of strongly held religious convictions.

In the coming weeks many commentators are going to focus on the so called “culture wars” of European integration. Given the highly charged political situation across the continent, that is not surprising. A mere two days before the Paris attack, tens of thousands of Germans took to the streets to demonstrate against what they see as the “Islamification of the West.” In Greece, an openly racist political party, the Golden Dawn, has begun exploiting nationalist resentment and the scapegoating of foreign immigrants, and France itself has been engaged in a never ending debate over the role of religion in an explicitly secular republic. Having outlawed the wearing of the Islamic burqa in public places (along with overt displays of Christian crosses in public schools, and other such religious symbology), the French state has explicitly attempted to assert a vision of “Frenchness” that sits outside of cultural or traditional religious boundaries.

The more alarmist observers will fall back upon such well worn tropes as Samuel Huntingdon’s “Clash of Civilizations,” regardless of the fact that no-one with any serious academic reputation has given it any credence for the past decade. Those with a more cogent perspective will attempt to fight this redundant narrative as best they can. As has all too often been the case, the Islamic authorities that represent the vast majority of European Muslims will try in vain to make their own revulsion at this heinous act known. Muslim scholars and commentators will do their best to explain that the actions of a few insane zealots do not represent the beliefs of hundreds of thousands of people who see themselves as both Muslim AND French. Perhaps this time they will be heard, although previous experience does not hold out much optimism on this point.

Hopefully, what will not disappear into the morass of hyperbole and hysteria over the coming months is the strength and conviction of the staff at Charlie Hebdo. Every day for the past few years, each individual walked into their office knowing that a small group of homicidally inclined fanatics had vowed to kill them. Initial reports from the crime scene state that the men proclaimed they had “avenged the Prophet” as they fled from the carnage. Quite why an all powerful creator and His messenger should need the assistance of three rifle wielding lunatics is never explained, but perhaps you have to have a certain kind of faith to understand such things. What is understandable is the position of Charb, and his fellow fools. – they were all true believers in their own right, with an unshakable belief in the function of satire and humor as an essential element of the public discourse.

Charb (Stéphane Charbonnier). Coyau / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-SA-3.0

When asked how he continued to face the ever present threat of attack, Charb replied that he was “not afraid of reprisals, [as] I have no children, no wife, no car, no debt. It might sound a bit pompous, but I’d prefer to die on my feet rather than living on my knees.”

In the words of one of Shakespeare’s most enduring fools:

“I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me;to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir from this place, do what they can: I will walk up and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear I am not afraid.”

Bottom – A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene 1.

January 8, 2015 0 comment

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