Spring 2010

Harvard Political Review Volume XXXVII No. 1, Spring 2010 Harvardpoliticalreview.com

Africa

Ready to Play? the world cup Can soccer save South Africa? p. 9

open for business China invests in Africa. p. 7

Special occasion?

Let Keezer’s help.

Keezer’s was founded in 1895.

Max Keezer bought high quality and custom made suits from Harvard students and sold them to other Harvard students and local people. The main idea was, and still is, to sell high quality suits, sportcoats, overcoats, tuxedos and accessories at discount prices.

Complete & New Tuxedo Package

$219 for purchase

Includes: 100% Wool Tux Jacket and Pants, Cotton Blend Tux Shirt, Satin Bow Tie and C Bund Set, Studs and Links

Tux Rentals

$50

all styles

Central Square: 140 River Street, Cambridge (Just a 15 minute walk from Mather) Hours: MON-SAT 10-6. Free Parking. Phone: 617-547-2455. Visit us online at keezers.com

Harvard Political Review

VOLUME XXXVII NUMBER 1 SPRING 2010

UNITED STATES 19 The Times Charges Ahead JEffrey Kalmus

21 Excessive and Irrelevant Talking Colin Shannon

23 A New Approach to Immigration JIMMY WU

24 Taking a Pickup to D.C.

Peter Bozzo and John Prince

WORLD 26 Putting a Price on the Climate

Thomas Hwang and taylor lane

28 The End of a Leftist Era Casey Thomson

30 Of Burqas and Rosaries Ioana Calcev

BOOKS & ARTS 32 Invictus

Jonathan Hawley

33 Crisis and Command JEFFREY lerman

Africa: Ready to Play?

7 Africa Open for Business A critical look at China’s investment in Africa. Victoria hargis 9 Can Soccer Save South Africa? High expectations mask tough realities. Taylor Helgren and Kathy Lee 11 Darfur: To Be Continued Don’t be fooled by Darfur’s disappearance from the front pages.

Tyrell Dixon and Mason Pesek

13 Cycle of Corruption Corruption in Africa will not end until civil society repairs itself.

Isabelle Glimcher and Timothy Lambert

15 A Reflection on Ourselves Media narratives about backwards Africa say more about us than them.

Will Rafey

17 Beauty in the Beast My life in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe. Dalumuzi Happy Mhlanga

34 The Hidden People of North Korea

18 Health Insurance in Ghana Lessons from a trip home during J-term. Timothy Kotin

ENDPAPER

INTERVIEWS

40 Bring Back the West

36 Thomas Ricks

Paul Mathis

Zoey Orol

Robert Long

37 Stephen Walt

Felix De Rosen

Volume XXXVII, No. 1, 2010. The HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW, a nonpartisan journal of politics, is published quarterly through the Institute of Politics at Harvard University, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge, Mass., 02138. Annual subscription: $25.00. Email: editor@hpronline.org. ISSN 0090-1030. Copyright 2010 Harvard Political Review. All rights reserved. Image Credits: Cover — ktnl (Flickr); 1-Shine2010 (Flickr); 2-Hitchster (Flickr); 6-wandering_angel (Flickr); 9-John Mitchell (Flickr); 11, 15-hdptcar (Flickr); 13-Futureatlas.com (Flickr); 17-Julien Harneis (Flickr); 18-nite_owl (Flickr); 19-jphilipq (Flickr); 19-Funky Tee (Flickr); 23-laverrue (Flickr); 25-vince alongi (Flickr); 34-ryuugakusei (Flickr); 26-Americagov (Flickr); 28-Sebastian Pinera (Flickr); 29-Mcpig (Flickr); 37-Justin Ide Harvard Staff Photographer; 40-Hlkljgk (Flickr);

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

1

Harvard Political Review A Nonpartisan Journal of Politics Established 1969—Vol. XXXVII, No. 1

EDITORIAL BOARD Editor-in-Chief SAMUEL J. BARR PUBLISHER CATHY x. SUN Managing Editor ALEXANDER SHERBANY Covers Editor CHRIS DANELLO United States editor JEREMY PATASHNIK World Editor JONATHAN YIP Books & Arts Editor ROBERT LONG Interviews Editor BEN WILCOX ONLINE EDITOR MAX NOVENDSTERN Business Manager HENRY SHULL Asst Business Manager Giulio Galliani DESIGN EDITOR GAUTAM KUMAR Circulation Manager JAMES L. WU Graphics Editor NEIL PATEL Staff Director KATHY LEE WEBMASTER JEFFREY KALMUS

senior writers Alec Barrett, DANIEL BARBERO, kenzie bok, CARLOS BORTONI, Anthony Dedousis, jonathan hawley, sarah j. johnson, Joey Michalakes, Tejas Sathian

STAFF JakE Auchincloss, Peter Bacon, Elizabeth Bloom, Peter Bozzo, Gabby Bryant, Rachel Burns, Stacy Carlson, Alex Chen, Richard Coffin, Catherine Cook, Mary Cox, Ivana Djak, Ray Duer, Sarah Esty, Farha Faisal, Tremayne Gibson, Candice Kountz, Daniel Kroop, Taylor Lane, Alex Lavoie, Elise Liu, Russell Mason, Peyton Miller, Laura Mirviss, Colin Motley, Caitria O’Neill, Brad Paraszczak, Samir Patel, Mason Pesek, Will Rafey, Ashley Robinson, Jacob Rus, Ashin Shah, Allison Swidriski, Nicholas Tatsis, Hannah Trachtman, Gabriel Unger, Pooja Venkatraman, Daniel Wallach, Tiffany Wen, Alethia Williams, Kevin Zhou

ADVISORY BOARD Jonathan Alter Carl Cannon E.J. Dionne, Jr. Rick Berke Walter Isaacson Maralee SChwartz

From the Editor In this issue, the HPR has stepped outside its comfort zone by choosing a Covers topic on a region which often gets short shrift in political circles around Harvard and the Institute of Politics. Africa might not seem as current as health care reform, and it might not seem as sexy as drug politics or financial reform, our two most recent Covers topics.

But it is important, influential, and interesting—perfect Covers material.

The HPR is also experimenting with new forms of content in this issue, and I’m not just referring to the Obama Mad Libs (p. 5). In addition to five traditional, interviewsbased articles, the Covers section features excerpts from two personal essays by African Harvard students (p. 17-18). We think that this new sort of content remains true to the magazine’s political focus while providing a fresh style and a new perspective. The full versions of these essays are available on our website, harvardpoliticalreview.com.

The other sections of the magazine have stayed closer to their traditional roots, but they are no less interesting for it. In the U.S. section, we cover a couple of political hot topics du jour: the filibuster (p. 21) and the election of Scott Brown in Massachusetts (p. 24). Clearly the Senate is the fulcrum of American politics right now; the country will go one way or another, depending on what happens there. At press time, it looks like the Democrats may have found a way around the filibuster.

But the last year has surely reminded

2 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

us that it ain’t over ‘til it’s over.

In the World section, we have one country-specific article (on Chile’s presidential election, p. 28), one regional article (on Europe’s integration of Muslims, p. 30), and one worldwide article (on the Copenhagen climate change conference, p. 26). The theme is challenge: the challenge of spurring collective action on global warming, the challenge of adapting the Old World to new realities, and, in the case of Chile, tragically, the challenge of recovering from a natural, economic, and human disaster.

In Books & Arts, we have a review of Clint Eastwood’s Invictus (p. 32), which is an interesting read especially in light of the Covers article on South Africa and the upcoming World Cup (p. 9). Sports can be inspiring, our writers conclude, but do they hold as much potential for real change as some have ascribed to them?

Finally, rounding out this internationalist issue of the HPR, we have a couple of foreign policyrelated interviews: one with Thomas Ricks, author, journalist, and Foreign Policy blogger (p. 36), and another with Stephen Walt, Harvard professor, author ... and Foreign Policy blogger (p. 37).

But before you delve into the deep stuff, check out our special feature in the Front Section, “10 Things You Didn’t Know About Africa.” We hope that this issue of the HPR provides you with many more than that.

FRONT SECTION

10

THINGS YOU didn’t KNow ABOUT AFRICA

1 2 3 4 5

Drew Faust became the first Harvard president to visit Africa this past November, touring an AIDS clinic in Botswana run by Harvard-trained researchers.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the President of Liberia, studied at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, graduating in 1971 with a Master’s in Public Administration.

Liberia has the lowest student-teacher ratio in Africa, at 19:1; in Mozambique the ratio is 67:1.

According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Cote d’Ivoire is home to the largest church in the world: the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro.

Uganda was the first country in the world to have more cell phones than fixed phone lines.

6 7 8 9 10

LORD OF ALL THE BEASTS OF THE EARTH AND FISHES OF THE SEA

Idi Amin, the military dictator and President of Uganda from 1971 to 1979, styled himself “His Excellency, President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Dr. Idi Amin, Victorious Cross, Distinguished Service Order, Military Cross, King of Scotland, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular.”

The Nile River was not navigated in its entirety until 2004, when the White Nile Expedition led by a South African national named Henry Coetzee became the first to complete the feat.

Nigeria is the largest single overseas source of oil for the United States — larger than Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, and Iraq.

Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu both have homes on the same street in Soweto, South Africa, making it the only street in the world to house multiple Nobel Peace Prize winners.

According to the World Bank, the probability of an African country experiencing acceleration of growth increased to 46% in the last decade, up from 21% in the previous decade.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

3

obamacare timeline of a bolshevik plOT February Presidential campaign 2007 begins. “Yes We Can”

narrowly chosen over “All Power to the Soviets.”

November Barack Ilyich Obama 2008 elected Chairman of United States by majority vote of People’s Commissars.

Wins due to widespread belief in predecessor’s incompetence. Promises to end unpopular war and fix recession.

January Quickly establishes cult 2009 of personality. Plants collectivist garden at presidential palace.

December Extra rations of borscht 2009 given to Comrade Nelson from Nebraska Commissariat.

January 5, CSPAN censored, leading 2010 to public outcry.

January 6, Death panels introduced.

2010 January 20, Scott Brown elected.

2010 Promises glasnost,

perestroika, and frontal nudity.

February 19, Obama threatens “nuclear 2010 option”, spurring twomonth crisis. Tyranny of simple majority leads to uprising.

November 6, 2012 Obama regime collapses

in wake of popular insurrection led by former Governor of Siberia.

4 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

obama mad libs!

My fellow Americans: It is with great pride that I stand before you today, (COUNTRY) could the son of a woman for only in ___________ (EXOTIC PLACE) and man from (EXOTIC PLACE) from ______________ ____________ (TITLE) If there is anyone out there grow up to be _______. who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

I am here this day to address the subject of (CONTROVERSIAL SUBJECT) Now let me be clear. _________________________.

There are those who say that we must choose between (GOOD ____________ THING) and _____________.

(GOOD THING) Make no mistake­—In the middle of the worst crisis (CATACLYSMIC EVENT) we cannot afford to since ______________________, (#) years. maintain the failed policies of the past ____

As Abraham Lincoln once said, our country is

POLICY INITIATIVE) Let me be clear; I do not blame my predecessor only as strong as its (MAJOR _______________________.

EVENT) ____________, (BAD EVENT) and ____________.

(BAD EVENT) I did, however, inherit the worst crisis since for (BAD ___________,

(APOCALYPTIC EVENT) The unprecedented strain these events have placed on _____________________.

(CRUCIAL ELECTORAL SWING GROUP) are clear throughout the country. This is our moment. This __________________________________ GOVERNMENT PROGRAM) for is our time—to put our people back to work and enact (MASSIVE ________________________________ our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth that while we breathe, we live, and where we are met with (BAD FEELING) and (BAD FEELING) and those who tell us that we can’t, we will respond _____________, _____________, (CORPORATE SLOGAN) with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people: _____________________.

God Bless America!

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

5

COVERS

URBAN AMERICA

AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? CHRIS DANELLO

“The darkest thing about Africa,” said the geographer George Kimble, “has always been our ignorance of it.” Kimble’s words have held true for longer than they should have. As far back as Ptolemy and Plato, one finds depictions of Africa as a place of bizarre rituals and repellent practices, strange governments and stranger men. The inscrutability of the continent in Western eyes is not a new phenomenon.

Stereotypes of Africa have grown more refined, but they are no less pernicious. In almost every depiction, Africa appears as a land of coups and corruption, economically stagnant and socially backwards. The echoes of Kurtz—“the horror”—still define Africa for the Western world. These portrayals are, in large part, the product of media depictions carrying their own sets of biases (p. 15). And the viewer is no passive victim; indeed, Western audiences contribute to a vicious cycle by demanding that Af-

rica be portrayed as it has always been. When people hang on to preconceived notions, the real Africa slips away.

It is true that Africa today still suffers from the weight of conflict, as the ongoing tribulations in Darfur illustrate (p. 11). Foreign powers like China are taking note of the continent’s potential, but not always for the best (p. 7). Democratic institutions remain a sad rarity, and endemic problems of corruption based in tribal politics plague many countries.

Still, as Kenya’s experience in tackling the corruption problem illustrates, Africa is not without hope (p. 13). Indeed, the very grassroots which appear to be corruption’s cause in fact offer the means of fixing it. Solutions do not come easy, of course. Addressing Africa’s problems demands prudent government at all levels and a hard-nosed real-

6 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

ism at the grassroots. The hubbub surrounding the 2010 World Cup in South Africa illustrates the danger of relying on marketing and imagemaking to solve real problems (p.

10). The tournament seemed a perfect launch vehicle for the country’s and the continent’s ambitions, yet the record reflects as many opportunities missed as made.

But policy analysis only gets one so far, which is why we asked Harvard students from Africa to share their perspectives (p. 17-18). Their efforts to understand and improve their home show us why we should do the same.♦ Chris Danello ’12 is the Covers Editor.

africa open for business

A critical look at China’s investment in Africa. VICTORIA HARGIS Despite China’s emergence as an economic powerhouse and political force, Western leaders still frequently decry China’s authoritarian regime, trade violations, and human rights abuses. But there is one region of the world that does not judge China by the same demanding standards: Africa.

The partnership suits both sides.

Africa has tremendous natural resources and is in dire need of development. And China’s redhot economy gives it a voracious appetite for resources. To Africa, Chinese investment is particularly appealing because the Chinese do not demand political preconditions before making economic agreements, assuring African leaders that their national autonomy will be maintained. This no-stringsattached policy allows African countries to make fuller use of their natural resources, and enables China to gain a significant competitive advantage over the United States.

Unless Western countries improve their African development strategies, China may soon become the dominant economic actor in this vital region.

The Courtship Period Harvard Kennedy School professor Dwight Perkins explained that China’s interest in Africa traces back to the late 1960s and early ’70s, when the People’s Republic needed the votes of African countries to supplant Taiwan in the United Nations. That issue was resolved in the PRC’s favor, and China’s support for liberation movements in Africa further solidified its relationships in the region.

China’s interests evolved during the 1980s and ’90s as it began to develop rapidly under Deng

Xiaoping’s reforms. Derek Scissors, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told the HPR that China continues to boost its relations with Africa. “In 2005, China inaugurated an official ‘Going Out’ program, which was a function of it having a lot of money to spend—more than $2.5 trillion—and it went looking to acquire mineral resources all over the world,” he said.

Africa became an obvious target, and China became a serious suitor.

Princeton Lyman, a former U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria, told the HPR that China has three main objectives for its investments: “to secure continued support from the Africa bloc in international forums; to increase their supply, and access to, natural

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

7

resources; and to use Africa as an untapped area of investment, a food production source, and a way of expanding China’s entrepreneurial and business opportunities.”

Today, China is not only interested in mining and natural resources, but it also invests in almost every development sector, including telecommunications, energy, tourism, agribusiness, and electronics.

These investments manifest themselves in several ways. For many ventures in mining and other industries, China builds much-needed infrastructure which remains in place even after Chinese workers depart.

China also purchases part-ownership in companies, as well as debt from African

“China may soon be the sole significant actor in the region—a dire prospect for Western economic vitality and political values.” governments. For instance, Lyman noted, China has a 40 percent equity position in Sudan’s major oil company, and the Angolan government borrows Chinese money collateralized by Angola’s oil supply.

The Investment Honeymoon These arrangements offer advantages to both Chinese and Africans. Harvard economics professor Philippe Aghion told the HPR that China’s investments help African countries develop because they are “bringing a culture of methods and a culture of work” to the region. Perkins agreed, adding that “China did not create the unstable African political conditions; China merely deals with governments that are willing to deal with it.”

Lyman explained that, ultimately, “China is making an economic contribution and is happy to engage in infrastructure building and provide commercial loans and aid.”

Initially, Africans opened their arms to this investment because China offers enormous sums without demanding political liberalization. Lyman explained that “stability is the most important thing for the Chinese, and since democracy can be destabilizing, the Chinese attitude is to let Africans decide how to develop.” Aghion

8 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

agreed, saying that “African countries often reject Western values and may fear China less, which does not judge them on freedom or levels of democracy.” Thus it is not surprising that African leaders have enthusiastically embraced Chinese deals: “African leaders welcome Chinese involvement because they are a source of capital, a bargaining chip for use with the West, and an alternative when Africa is being pressured by Western donors,” said Lyman.

The Morning After Nevertheless, the Chinese investments also have clear downsides for Africa. Scissors noted that China’s hypocritical development methods remain a major source of friction with African workers. Africans doubly suffer when “Chinese workers are brought into Africa to complete projects, but China … does not allow foreign workers into its own borders,” Scissors said. In addition, almost nonexistent environmental regulations and lax labor standards mean that environmental destruction and displacement of the poor are common phenomena.

China’s economic impact on Africa runs even deeper than these obvious problems.

Lyman explained that Chinese goods being imported into Africa “have a negative impact on African industries that cannot compete, and this produces feelings of resentment.”

Some Africans worry that their economic potential is being undercut. Finally, Chinese transactions often lack transparency. Capital flowing into Africa is often “siphoned off by government officials,” Scissors noted, which increases already high levels of corruption and decreases the benefits of development for the poorest Africans. In short, the euphoria of the honeymoon may be wearing off. catching Africa on the Rebound China’s “no preconditions” policy allows it to collaborate with African governments that Western countries find distasteful, and thus gives it a competitive edge over the United States in African development.

An alternative to U.S. assistance and to the Western development model is attractive to Africans because it comes with a seemingly unlimited supply of funds and the long-term drawbacks are easy to ignore.

Chinese competition should nonetheless give Western countries motivation to improve their development relations with Africa. As Scissors said, the United States in particular “needs to raise its game.

Democratization will sell itself if American assistance is superior to Chinese assistance in Africa.” Harvard political scientist Robert Bates suggested something similar: “the West has a lot to learn from China about how to handle relations with Africa, since benevolent aid has its place, but it’s certainly not the only thing that [the West] should be doing.” Aghion pointed to “institutions, technology transfers, schools, and capital investment”

as areas where Western assistance could be vital.

If the West does not improve its efforts at wooing Africa, however, China may soon be the sole significant actor in the region—a dire prospect for Western economic vitality and political values. The Chinese economic juggernaut has found a winning formula with its no-strings-attached investment model in Africa.

The United States can learn from China’s example, but set a better one as well. ♦ Victoria Hargis ‘11 is a Staff Writer.

CAN SOCCER SAVE SOUTH AFRICA?

High expectations mask tough realities. taylor helgren and kathy lee On May 15, 2004, Nelson Mandela wept on stage when South Africa was chosen to host the 2010 World Cup, and then-president Thabo Mbeki declared that “South Africa’s time has come.” Experts worldwide predicted that the World Cup would be a transformative and unifying moment in the country’s history and a harbinger of political, economic, and social change. Nearly six years later, however, these expectations continue to cloak a sobering reality. The development thought to be associated with sporting mega-events often fails to materialize, and South Africa seems to be no exception to this rule. Any changes derived from hosting the soccer tournament will be more symbolic than real, more mental and sentimental than economic or quantifiable.

Great Expectations With more member nations than the United Nations, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) has the potential to exert great influence in the international arena. After announcing South Africa as the host of the 2010 World Cup, FIFA launched the “Win in Africa with Africa” campaign “to provide the continent with tools to progress and the skills with which it can continue its own development.” FIFA’s optimism was immediately embraced by the African National Congress, the United Nations, and the European Union, each of which hailed the tournament as a promising developmental and political project for South Africa and for the entire African continent.

The idea that the World Cup will remake South Africa’s image both at home and abroad may be one of the most prevalent expectations.

Scarlett Cornelissen, professor of political science at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, told the HPR that successfully hosting the tournament “could signal to the outside world that South Africa is at the forefront of development and modernity.” And Peter Alegi, the author

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

9

of Laduma!: Soccer, Politics, and Society in South Africa, told the HPR that the tournament may bring South Africans together in the manner of 1995 Rugby World Cup, recently dramatized in Clint Eastwood’s Invictus (see p. 32).

“There is the likelihood that the World Cup tournament will generate enough national pride that it will temporarily unite South Africans in a society that is still very much divided due to the legacy of apartheid and racism,” Alegi explained. By changing the way that the world sees African cities and cultures, the World Cup presents a prime opportunity to reshape perceptions of South Africa and the continent.

Expectations of an economic boon have also been widespread.

Any economic improvements will hang on the success, both during and after the tournament, of ten newly built and renovated mega-stadiums around the country. Orli Bass, coeditor of Development and Dreams: The Urban Legacy of the 2010 Football World Cup, told the HPR that many South Africans celebrated stadiumconstruction projects as sources of immediate job creation, local investment, and increased tourism, with “many of the poorer people who have few job prospects looking towards the World Cup as a cureall.” For many South Africans, the tournament seems to offer a stage, not only for the display of national pride and community, but also for showcasing the country’s economic progress.

Beyond Expectations The 2010 World Cup has thus been hailed as the seed for South African revival. But the soil remains relatively infertile. South Africa continues to face a host of challenges: from poverty, homelessness, and unemployment to violent crime, HIV/ AIDS, and a fragile race and class structure lingering from apartheid.

The urgency of these issues calls into question the feasibility and

appropriateness of South Africa’s campaign to host the World Cup. As Chris Bolsmann, co-author of South Africa and the Global Game: Football, Apartheid, and Beyond, told the HPR, “South Africans are very, very aware of what the cost of the World Cup is actually going to be to us and has been to us when we have serious issues of unemployment, inequality, HIV/ AIDS, and very little access to basic services.” Genuine and sustained development will mean addressing these issues, and the World Cup will likely fail to achieve significant change in this regard. According to the South African National Treasury, various levels of government have spent over $3.8 billion on infrastructure projects for the tournament. These expenditures have diverted resources from government programs tailored to tackle poverty, unemployment, crime, and the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

As Alegi noted, “spending for the World Cup is a drop in the ocean” for the national government, but “spending on the local level has a huge impact on things like providing health care access to poor people and building adequate homes for the homeless.” This diversion of funds, according to Bass, has sparked local resentment and controversy. “In many of the big cities, there have been increased riots and demonstrations with people demanding delivery of services,” she observed. There are also doubts about the wisdom of investments in hostels, roads, and stadiums from which few South Africans are likely to benefit in the long run.

Even the anticipated economic boost from increased tourism seems unrealistic in light of historical precedent. A study conducted by economics professors Robert Baade and Victor Matheson after the 1994 World Cup found that nine of the 13 U.S. host cities actually experienced declines in income growth after the tournament. Likewise, studies have shown that, apart from breweries,

10 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

money-exchange offices, and producers of tabletop football, few domestic businesses experienced long-term benefits from the 2006 World Cup in Germany. It seems likely, then, that the 2010 World Cup’s supposed contributions to economic development have been overstated.

Legacy 2010 The run-up to the 2010 World Cup has revealed a South African government more concerned with political advertising and imagery than the hard tasks of governing.

Following FIFA’s lead, the South African government has used the World Cup to construct an image of a modern and progressive South Africa, implying that the returns on this marketing will act as a panacea for the country’s social and economic problems. Unfortunately, the failure to integrate this campaign with other social-service and development programs may undermine everyone’s high expectations. The 2010 World Cup has been marked by an infectious optimism that encourages big-picture thinking above local issues and needs.

Nonetheless, the South African marketing campaign is more than baseless hype, at least on a symbolic level. Even the emptiest rhetoric can bring common purpose to a still fragmented country and continent. South Africa’s most pressing problems, however, remain entrenched in its social and economic fabric. Problems such as high unemployment and HIV/AIDS demand solutions that go beyond stoking national pride. The World Cup promises 31 days of exciting soccer and an invigorated and confident host country. But unless South Africa’s infrastructural and economic preparations are better integrated into a broader social program, the tournament will fall short of lofty expectations. ♦ Taylor Helgren ‘11 is a Contributing Writer. Kathy Lee ‘13 is Staff Director.

Darfur: to be continued

Don’t be fooled by Darfur’s disappearance from the front pages.

Tyrell Dixon and Mason Pesek An ominous calm has fallen over Darfur. The guns of the militias are mostly silent, and the roving bands of village raiders have all but disappeared from the western Sudanese province. But these developments are far from signs of peace or security. Seven years into the conflict, over 2.7 million Sudanese remain crowded into disease-ridden refugee camps.

The war has left Darfur a barren wasteland with little left to plunder. Despite this devastation, the militias, rebel groups, and Sudanese military remain trapped in stalemate, with little indication that any side will reach out for negotiations. International organizations might have been expected to step in, but China has blocked any efforts at intervention, and seems likely to continue to do

so even as the intractable tensions remain. While the international community turns its attention to other crises, the crisis in Darfur remains unsolved and will likely continue to deteriorate.

The Origins of Genocide Since its independence in 1956, Sudan has been wracked by internal violence between the country’s Arab north and semi-autonomous African south. These conflicts entered a new phase in 2003 when African rebel groups in Darfur orchestrated raids on government centers in Gulu, the capital of the Jebel Mara district in western Sudan.

The rebels were motivated by the perception that President Omar alBashir’s government in Khartoum was favoring Sudanese Arabs over Darfur’s African population.

The two major groups in the rebellion remain the Justice for Equality Movement and the Sudan Liberation Army. Although SLA and JEM fight government forces together, the two groups have differing ideologies and conduct negotiations separately. SLA aims to unify Sudan under one democratic government, whereas JEM consists of African Muslims who seek to establish an Islamic government.

The rebel attacks were effective at first. Eric Reeves, an English professor at Smith College and an anti-genocide activist, told the HPR that the initial success of the rebellion prompted an extreme reaction from the government of Sudan. “The Khartoum government had to turn to the use of militias and genocidal tactics in order to pacify the rebel forces,” Reeves explained.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

11

The government-backed Arab militias soon began a systematic genocide against the people of Darfur. These forces, the most prominent and notorious of which is the Janjaweed, slaughtered the populations of entire villages before burning their dwellings to the ground. The violence led to rapid emigration. The United Nations reports that two million refugees fled to the relative safety of the camps, while countless others died on their journey. U.N. estimates point to a death toll of 300,000, but many experts consider that figure much too conservative. “The death tolls reported by the media are vastly understated,” Reeves argued, noting “there is no way of recording the deaths that occurred outside the villages or camps.”

Great Wall OF CHINA With no signs of an incipient peace agreement between rebels and the Sudanese government, the responsibility for establishing long-term peace rests on the shoulders of the international community. As Reeves explained, “Peace will require massive international intervention, mediation, and diplomacy.” But despite several years of negotiations, the U.N. Security Council has failed to settle upon a response to the crisis.

There are a number of dynamics that prevent the United Nations from taking swifter action, but the primary one remains a lack of political incentive. Colin ThomasJensen, policy advisor at the antigenocide Enough Project, told the HPR, “No one cares enough about Sudan to apply political pressure.

It’s on the laundry list of political problems for the international community. Sudan doesn’t have the geopolitical significance of other places.” Most countries have little to gain politically or economically from supporting peace measures in Darfur.

And even if the international community were to muster the necessary will for substantial intervention in Darfur, one insurmountable obstacle remains: China. As Princeton Lyman, former U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria, told the HPR, “China has played a major role in holding back the Security Council and shielding the Khartoum government from criticism.” Since the beginning of the conflict, China has often abstained from voting on resolutions proposed by the United Nations and has threatened to veto any substantial sanctions or deployments of peacekeeping forces. China remains one of the Sudanese government’s top arms suppliers, despite a U.N. embargo on arms-trading with the regime. The energy-hungry People’s Republic is also one of Sudan’s most important trade partners in general, thanks to Chinese investment in Sudanese oil reserves.

Over the past two years, the Chinese government has taken some small steps towards supporting an end to the conflict.

But these were largely facesaving efforts, Lyman argued.

China had been worried about international opinion leading up to the Olympics. There have been glimpses of hope, Lyman acknowledged: “China appointed a special envoy on Sudan and has been marginally helpful in getting U.N. aid off the ground.”

However, these meager contributions to the peace process remain overshadowed by China’s support for al-Bashir’s government.

“The Chinese don’t care about human rights in Darfur,” said Thomas-Jensen.

“The Chinese don’t care about the human rights of Chinese people.

How we can expect them to care about human rights in Darfur is beyond me.”

12 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

The Eye of the Storm?

Despite the lack of major peace negotiations, violence in Darfur has declined to relatively low levels. In 2009, the United Nations estimated that between 130 and 150 people were dying each month as a result of the conflict, compared with 10,000 per month at the height of the conflict. However, this brief hiatus is not a sign of long-term peace.

According to Lyman, the low level of current violence “reflects the fact that most people have been displaced from their villages that the government wanted displaced, and the rebels are divided and thus less of a direct threat.”

All efforts on the part of the United Nations to find a peaceful solution have failed due to the threat of a Chinese veto, making a resurgence of violence an open possibility, perhaps with even greater consequences than the last bout of intense conflict.

“We’re probably heading toward another round of war in Sudan between the North and South.

It will probably be bloodier than the last war,” predicted ThomasJensen. Southern rebel groups, led by JEM, are fighting to take control of the region’s oil industry because they claim that China’s oil purchases fund the Sudanese government, but the violence may spill over and engulf the country.

Thus, Darfur may be out of the headlines for now, but it is far from a settled issue. Given Sudan’s long history of internal violence and China’s ongoing efforts to skuttle the possibility of peace, it seems almost certain that the conflict in Darfur will continue, in one form or another, for many years to come. ♦ Tyrell Dixon ‘13 is a Contributing Writer. Mason Pesek ‘12 is a Staff Writer.

Cycle of corruption

Corruption in Africa will not end until civil society repairs itself.

Isabelle Glimcher and Timothy Lambert In the 2002 Kenyan presidential campaign, Mwai Kibaki promised his countrymen an end to the corruption that had defined Kenyan leadership for decades. The message resonated with voters and earned Kibaki an astonishing 62% of the vote. But after eight years, corruption in Kibaki’s Kenya seems only to have worsened. As Maina Kiai, former head of the Kenyan National Human Rights Commission, told the HPR, “It is now a free-for-all, no accountability.”

Kenya’s experience with corruption is not unique; indeed, the problem of African corruption has become a cliché. Of course, it would be wrong to sweep too broadly with generalizations. As Daniel Kaufmann, an anticorruption expert with the Brookings Institution, told the HPR, “there are 53 countries in Africa, and the extent of corruption and the quality of governance varies greatly.”

Nonetheless, Kenya’s experience offers insight into the predominant causes of African corruption: excessive tribalism, as well as what Kiai calls a “personalization” of public goods and public services.

These problems are home-grown and must be homesolved. Western nations can assist the struggle through smarter direction of foreign aid and innovative new forms of assistance. But to truly reduce corruption, Africans, and Kenyans in particular, will need to confront the salience of ethnicity in politics, and reshape civil society from the ground up, emphasizing political education and empowerment.

Tribalism and Sources of Corruption In Kenya, tribalism creates and defines governmental corruption. Michaela Wrong, author of It’s Our Turn to Eat: The Story of a Kenyan Whistle-Blower, told the HPR that corruption in Kenya, as in other African nations, “takes a shape which is extremely ethnic.” Politicians routinely operate as ethnic patrons, doling out favors and benefits to members of their own ethnic communities. But this behavior does not strike leaders or their constituents as improper. According to Wrong, “they only mind about corruption when they’re excluded from it. It’s only bad as long as it doesn’t benefit your own community.” Chantal Uwimana, the regional director for Africa and the Middle East at Transparency International, echoed Wrong. She told the HPR that in many African nations, “people think that corruption is a way of life,” rather than a harmful process to which they all contribute. Few individual actors perceive the broader consequences of a political system based on patronage.

Ethnic politics in Kenya thus consists of a reciprocal relationship between politicians and voters, which makes the problem extremely difficult to remedy. “In a sense,” said Kiai, “the leadership question in this country is a chicken and egg story.” Ethnicity pervades all aspects of politics, including “the psychology of elections.” An aspiring leader can gain no political traction, and negotiate no political deals, without gaining local support, which inevitably entails appealing to his ethnic community. Voters, in turn,

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

13

come to expect and solicit bribes from their candidates. As Harvard political scientist Robert Bates explained, “The way the political game is played makes it almost impossible not to have politics that we would interpret as being ethnically driven.”

The Impact of International Aid Some commentators, notably the Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo, argue that international aid may actually be fomenting corruption throughout Africa because of these ethnically-based motivations. According to Moyo, aid money makes African politics a high-

“The international community can indeed help the anti-corruption cause, by giving more responsibly and by refusing to cooperate with corrupt leaders.” stakes playing field and thus contributes to the corruption it seeks to eliminate. The structure of foreign aid may even exacerbate the problem if it diminishes a government’s accountability to and reliance on the people.

Still, if all that is true, international aid only aggravates the problems already inherent in the patronage system of politics. Kiai questioned the existence of any direct causal link between aid and corruption. “What [aid] has done,” Kiai said, “is freed up taxpayer resources for the personalization by public officials.”

Wrong, too, emphasized that while “aid itself may not be stolen,” the simple fact that more money is coming into the government’s coffers “does make it possible for the government to steal elsewhere with impunity.” Problems of accountability arise not because of aid per se but because of where aid frequently goes. “The waste,” Kaufmann said, “can be dire among those official donor agencies that channel the bulk of their assistance through the central government.”

If international aid does not inherently cause corruption, the international community can indeed help the anti-corruption cause, both by giving more responsibly and by refusing to cooperate with corrupt leaders. Instead of channeling aid through governments, anticorruption organizations such as Transparency International advocate donations through

14 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

citizens or local groups. Assistance can come in non-monetary forms. Kiai praised one international effort to recognize honest officials and said that “the international community [should] continue white-listing, rather than black-listing, these people.”

Kenyans are well attuned to their leaders’ international reputations, and when a leader is forbidden entry to the United Kingdom or the United States, domestic condemnation inevitably follows.

Solutions from Below Ultimately, the Kenyan experience shows that government-led efforts are most successful in curtailing corruption when they fundamentally change the way funds are allocated at the grassroots. As Kaufmann argued, governments must “work on improving governance across the board, which is hard both in terms of politics and institutional capacity.”

Progress requires governments to demonstrate a real commitment to the enforcement of otherwise theoretical advances.

Kenya provides a positive example of such changes: its Constituency Development Fund. The CDF impartially provides money to parliament members for development projects among their constituencies, which has created, according to Kiai, “a direct link between members of parliament and their constituents directly around resources.” This link, in turn, means “a lot more people who are conscious of anti-corruption ... and becoming anti-corruption watchdogs in their own way.”

As the success of the CDF suggests, the most effective movements to end corruption will be those that engage the citizenry directly. “A lot more emphasis on a bottom-up approach, of empowerment of the community, understanding and taking action against corruption, is critical,” Kiai said. The mere passing of laws that formally protect citizens’ rights will do nothing to change the civic culture. Through programs that encourage education and civic engagement, the populace can learn to challenge leaders and hold them to their promises. While government reforms can help curb corruption, ultimately, according to Bates, “you have to have a civil society group that says no más, this has got to stop.” ♦ Isabelle Glimcher ‘13 and Timothy Lambert ‘11 are Contributing Writers.

A Reflection on Ourselves

Media narratives about backwards Africa say more about us than them.

Will Rafey Almost without exception, the images that frame the Western portrayal of Africa are horrifying. Africa, Americans are told and shown, is a barren place of unimaginable poverty, starvation, disease, and violence. Rather than seeing the secondlargest continent in the world with a dynamic collection of fifty-six different countries and over a billion people, people see a savage chaos, bristling with tribal warfare, machetes, and bloodlust, with shattered hopes and impossible dreams. The talking points in popular nonfiction and public dialogue are tribal conflict in Congo, pirates in Somalia, and genocide in Darfur—not the remarkable development successes in Ghana, Botswana, or Mozambique, nor the trend towards democratization across the continent. Media depictions of catastrophe and tragedy color our assessment of African politics, whether

consciously or not.

Of course Africa has suffered a great deal. Since decolonization, sub-Saharan Africa has declined in almost every indicator of relative development. But images of anarchy from certain places in Africa should not stand in for the entire continent.

Nineteenth-century European cartographers, who had not yet ventured into the interior of Africa, dubbed it the “Dark Continent” because they blackened out the unknown on their maps. Despite our immeasurable advances in the gathering and dissemination of information, and Africa’s own very real advances, the continent is still too often painted with a broad brush as foreign, dangerous, and chaotic.

These one-dimensional images are more than simply unfortunate misinterpretations: they frame political decision making, economic calcu-

lations, and even academic research.

Any substantive attempt at reversing Africa’s plight must therefore include an ideological reversal, one that involves restructuring the field of our imagination as well as the landscape of politics.

Obscuring the Dark Continent The problem of Africa’s distorted image has plagued the continent since the colonial era. And, “if anything,” University of Alabama-Birmingham professor Beverley Hawk told the HPR, “it is only getting worse.” Studies of media coverage show that positive trends in Africa—higher levels of education, regional economic growth, and greater stability—are chronically underreported, while disasters in places like Somalia and Sudan dominate the reporting. The closing of international bureaus and declining news budgets for those re-

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

15

maining have made coverage of Africa even more unrepresentative in recent years. Stories of disaster are often the only sources of information about the African experience.

These media stereotypes frame political reality in concrete, dangerous ways; sensationalist reporting leads to inaccurate and crisis-induced policy making. Politicians respond to constituents, who mobilize around the particular disasters the media sensationalizes. The “media’s vocabulary becomes [America’s] vocabulary,” Hawk explained. Defenders of the media often argue that at the very least they catalyze public support for action. But the effectiveness of public action to “help” Africa is questionable at best.

The “classic controversial case,” according to Michael Walton, lecturer in international development at the Harvard Kennedy School, concerns the media coverage generated during the 1984-85 Ethiopian famines. Worldwide press led to a huge influx of donations and the first Live Aid concert. As Walton, who was working for the World Bank at the time, explained, it was “not at all clear that [the aid] improved the situation,” as it was funneled into a “very distorted environment.” Famine scholar Alexander de Waal famously went so far as to say that the “humanitarian effort prolonged the war, and with it, human suffering.”

The misrepresentations of the media have other unanticipated consequences. Not only do these depictions create the conditions for compassion fatigue—a backlash against an overload of disaster images—and entrench racial stereotypes, but they also can engender devastating economic repercussions. The absence of foreign investment remains one of the largest obstacles to Africa’s development, and it is due in part to media-driven misperceptions that scare off Western corporations. According to the

U.S. government’s Overseas Private Investment Corporation, Africa provides the highest return in the world on direct foreign investment, but attracts the least capital due to exaggerated fears of instability, violence, and corruption.

Corrupt Narratives In the development community, practitioners are more likely to do independent research and so media biases still may be less influential.

But those biases may account for a particularly disturbing trend in the development community over the past decade: the movement away from the African state. Development programs have shifted away from direct dealings with African governments and into the private realm. Microfinance initiatives give out loans, circumventing state banks, and public-health NGOs collect their own demographic information rather than financing a Ministry of Health and improving government capacity.

For Charlotte Walker, a lecturer on African history at Harvard, this anti-state movement is about “circumventing corrupt Africa.” As she put it, the “hot new political topic” at all levels—the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations, the State Department, NGOs—is corruption. Everyone has become very concerned that well-intentioned aid will go straight into the pockets of African dictators.

While some state-avoiding programs have been successful on a small scale, they are ultimately dangerous when they risk distracting attention from building up governmental capacity. As Walton explained, these programs tend to focus “on tackling the symptoms” of underdevelopment rather than the causes. Cutting out the state, Walker argued, “can only lead to further underdevelopment.” The nationstate is the bulwark of domestic and

16 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

international order; it is needed to enforce the rule of law, sign treaties, and protect its citizens. In the developed world, amidst omnipresent talk of globalization, it is easy to forget that, in Walker’s words, “you need a state to survive.” It may be difficult to work with African states, but, as Walton concluded, “that it’s genuinely hard doesn’t mean we can’t give it a try.”

Building a New Narrative Western mischaracterizations reveal more about the West itself than the true state of affairs in Africa. The perpetual imagery of an Africa-in-crisis—always implicitly juxtaposed with the achievements of the West—is a new form of the same old dichotomy which defines “us” in opposition to “them.” “The whole corruption narrative is very much self-congratulatory. We have transparent institutions, you have nepotism,” Walker argued. This narrative frames the inability of Africa to conform to particular Western standards of transparency as a moral failing. As Hawk explained, “It is really just this century’s version of the 150-year-old missionary’s ‘godless savage.’ … It is that paradigm that shapes and directs policy.”

Perhaps this explains why, even during coverage of the most publicized African disasters, Americans rarely ever hear Africans themselves talking about Africa. Articles on Zimbabwe in the 1980s, for instance, cited white authorities over black authorities at a ratio of 22:1, despite an almost inverse proportion of whites and blacks in the population. Helping Africa in the 21st century requires breaking our narrow-minded view of the continent. It does not mean inaction, but it does mean a different sort of action, based on close reflection on our own biases, ideologies, and perceptions. ♦ Will Rafey ‘13 is a Staff Writer.

perspectives

beauty in the beast

My life in Mugabe’s Zimbabwe.

DalumUzi Happy Mhlanga When I join in one of those omnipresent ice-breaking sessions, I am sometimes asked to share my most embarrassing moment. I always draw a blank. This is not because I have never been embarrassed in my life.

Rather, I have too many stories of embarrassment.

While many of my middle-class friends were having fun on their Play-Stations, going out on dates with their girlfriends, and driving around in their parents’ cars, I stood in the blazing sun queueing for scarce cooking oil, sugar, or money. I walked for miles to grind the little maize we had harvested into corn meal. My heart sank every time my mother called us to dinner, because it meant yet another helping of the same old meal: cooked corn meal with boiled cabbage. My breakfasts were no better: thin porridge, which rarely had any sugar in it. I did not have any fashionable clothes; I was a prisoner of my own self-consciousness every time I walked out of our house.

At school, my father had earned a reputation for begging for mercy since he was almost never able to pay my school fees on time. Our cherished color television and fridge went under the hammer as the family tried to make ends meet. From one week to the next, we robbed Peter to pay Paul. We barely survived. Even more embarrassing, my family’s struggle was there for all to see and ridicule. This was life for me in Zimbabwe when the economy plummeted in 2004 and the political scene grew more and more ugly.

“Our Land is Our Prosperity!”

All of these struggles were not punishment for my family’s lack of financial discipline. They were shared by the vast majority of Zimbabwean families. We were

all under the thumb of a despotic government attacking us in all conceivable ways. The houses of the poor were destroyed during a cold, calculated Operation Murambatsvina— “Operation Clean-up” in translation— which razed many houses of low-income citizens, who were suspected of supporting the opposition, to the ground. We could not speak out against the tyranny of the government because of laws which ensured that any uprising landed its participants behind bars.

Innumerable human rights abuses took place, lives were taken arbitrarily, and all the while, propaganda in every form of media overwhelmed us. Every half hour, we were reminded that “Our Land is Our Prosperity!”

The land is where our misery began. In 2000, President Mugabe issued an order allowing war veterans to seize the farms of white farmers. Many owners were given an ultimatum: vacate within 24 hours, or die.

These people being kicked out of their homes had been among the biggest engines of economic growth. And now the farms were occupied by unskilled individuals who had no clue what to do with the fertile land and advanced equipment at their disposal. With time, the seizures began for white-owned and foreign-owned factories. These actions would wipe out almost 17% of the GDP and cause widespread unemployment.

89.7 sextillion percent Inflation made life even more difficult. In 1997, all surviving war veterans and the families of the deceased had been granted ZIM $50,000 packages and promised $2,000 monthly allowances. At the time, $50,000 was a huge amount of money, enough to pay the deposit on a house. The decision to issue these benefits was a result of pressure from the war veterans, who wanted to be compensated for the sacrifices they made to win Zimbabwe’s independence. Yet there was little to compensate them with. Rumor has it that the government was forced to print money just to pay the thousands of war veterans. From then on, the government developed the habit of printing money in order to temporarily bail itself out. As any economist will tell you, this quickly leads to hyperinflation. The highest annual inflation rate reached 89.7 sextillion (89.7 x 1021) percent on November 14, 2008. By then, the highest-valued note was worth $100 trillion.

The Great Division I look back and draw at least this lesson from Mugabe: there has been a pervasive division in Zimbabwean society and culture, between “we” blacks and “they” whites. There was virtually no point of convergence: it

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

17

was a hierarchical relationship, with blacks at the bottom of the food chain. Considering our colonial history, this was not fair. Something had to be done.

But force was not the answer. I have learned that if we are ever to address the effects of our colonial history, we need to take a collaborative, unified approach in which both parties acknowledge the mistakes they have made.

And this principle has wider application, beyond the local case of Zimbabwe. Many Western nations have to

acknowledge that they have exploited Africa, and many African leaders have to own up to their greed, corruption, and poor leadership. Only from that point can we proceed, unified and ready to deal with Africa’s problems. ♦ Dalumuzi Happy Mhlanga ‘13 is a Contributing Writer. The full version of this essay is available on harvardpoliticalreview.com.

health insurance in ghana

Lessons from a trip home during J-term.

Timothy Kotin This past winter, I returned to my home country of Ghana after over a year and a half away at school. I spent the month engaged in an anti-malaria project in some slum communities near Cape Coast, Ghana. This project was the brainchild of Ahoto Partnership for Ghana, a non-profit organization I co-founded in early 2009 with students from Harvard, Cornell, and McGill University. One of Ahoto’s main projects in January 2010 was the registration of families for the government’s National Health Insurance Scheme.

For various reasons, a significant number of Ghanaians still remained unregistered for the NHIS. In Akotokyir, for instance, a survey we conducted in July 2009 found that over 65% of the inhabitants were unregistered. For most people, the reason is financial: many found even the subsidized price (about $9) to be prohibitively expensive. For many others, the inconvenience of registering annually at an NHIS office, only to have to wait for several months before enjoying the benefits, was a sufficient deterrent.

Ahoto arranged for NHIS officers to carry out registrations during our events in Akotokyir. A total of 210 individuals were registered in just three days.

We discovered that inefficiencies in the insurance scheme still challenged the health delivery system. For example, there were significant delays between payments to health providers. As a result, health posts were often reluctant to provide treatment, especially to NHIS-registered individuals who could not pay upfront. It is reassuring that changes are being made to reduce inefficiency in the current scheme, and that the government is working to make the scheme more centralized.

While individuals and non-profit groups similar to Ahoto may try to minimize contact with government agencies so as to avoid bureaucracy, our experience at Ahoto showed that the right level of governmental involvement can actually go a long way. For instance, our meeting with the National Malaria Control Program in Accra proved very helpful in ensuring that our anti-malaria strategy was consistent with the national malaria-control policy of Ghana. ♦ Timothy Kotin ‘11 is a Contributing Writer. The full version of this essay is available on harvardpoliticalreview.com.

18 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

UNITED STATES United States

The times charges ahead

New online business model will help the press serve the public good.

JeffREY kalmus Early next year, when the New York Times begins to enforce a metered system in order to charge for its online content, millions of readers will have to decide if that content is worth the price. For a few short years, the Times has been available at no cost online, even as it and the entire journalism sector have suffered major financial difficulties. The new online business model may help put the ailing newspaper industry back on track, and without hurting access to information.

The Times has given itself a year before it implements the recently announced change, and it provided few details in its announcement, in part because the “logistics are being worked out and decisions are still being made,” as Richard L. Berke, the national editor, told the HPR. What is clear is that there will be a metered system, meaning that a user’s first few articles up to a monthly limit will be free, after which the user will have to pay.

Such a system is more similar to that of the Financial Times than to the paywall of the Wall Street Journal, which makes some articles free and requires

subscriptions for others.

The number of free articles and the price of additional articles or subscriptions may change over time, but the metered system should not be considered experimental.

As Berke told the HPR, “This isn’t something I think we’d turn back on anytime soon.”

Changing What You Read Naturally, a price on access to the Times website will decrease its readership among those least willing and able to pay. But this does not necessarily mark the end of equal access to information. Although many news organizations are expected to charge for online content if the Times’ restructuring proves profitable, not all will. Maralee Schwartz, political editor of the Washington Post, told the HPR that Katherine Weymouth, the Post’s publisher and CEO, “does not believe in charging for online content.” Schwartz also said that the Times’ decision to charge may be “an advantage for the Post.” Indeed, some online news sources may stay free precisely because they are looking to pick up

traffic from metered sites.

The Post’s decision not to charge for online content should quell any fears that we are headed into an era in which independent bloggers will be the only free online news sources.

Professor Nolan Bowie of the Harvard Kennedy School explained the dangers of such a scenario: “Journalists, not newspapers, are the essential public goods, and we can’t rely on unpaid professionals.” Opinions may differ on just how necessary paid, old-school journalists remain, but in any case there is no reason to think that the Times is spelling the end of accessible and credentialed journalism.

For these reasons, access to broadband Internet, rather than access to the New York Times’ online articles, will remain the main obstacle to equal access to information. As Walter Isaacson, President and CEO of the Aspen Institute, told the HPR,

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

19

“Online newspapers, even if they charge, will be much less expensive than paper. …

The main issue is getting broadband Internet access to all levels of society.”

Free online content is not actually free; it just has no marginal cost. As more of our press moves online—for example, the Detroit Free Press has limited home deliveries and shrunk the size of its physical paper—broadband access will become ever more important for staying well-informed, and a subscription to the New York Times’ website, compared to

“If the Times’ online business model proves profitable, it may even subsidize the paper’s primary public service, investigative reporting, where recent financial troubles have led to cutbacks.” broadband, will cost relatively little.

Changing What They Write?

As newspaper readerships and revenue sources change, it is important to consider whether and how content may change. The newspaper industry insists that readership and revenue do not affect content; as Berke said, “[We] want an audience, but our basic journalistic decisions are based on journalism.”

Even if business considerations actually do affect content decisions, the shift to new revenue streams could actually improve the quality of news coverage. Isaacson explained that a shift towards dependence on users—rather than on advertisers—could lead to an increase in the number of sites serving “an audience that wanted straight and credible news” instead of an audience seeking articles “telling where the best golf course is.” Advertisers want rich people, and so news outlets that want advertisers often need to cater, at least in certain sections, to the tastes of the wealthy.

If the Times’ online business model proves profitable, it may even subsidize the paper’s primary public service: investigative reporting. For decades, newspapers’

20 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

advertising and subscription revenues supported such services, but recent financial troubles have led to cutbacks. For example, the San Diego Union-Tribune closed its Washington bureau shortly after winning a Pulitzer Prize for its investigations into former Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham.

Now, if new sources of revenue are effective, news organizations may be able to afford their investigative bureaus.

As Schwartz explained, “Every news organization has to do what’s going to support its own type of journalism best.”

Journalistic Diversity But each organization defines its type of journalism differently, and that diversity is important to ensuring that information is widespread, accurate, and not subject to control by a few. Big media corporations, Bowie explained, have large professional staffs and “safety nets through litigation insurance,” and thus maintain a comparative advantage in investigative reporting. Small media outlets help ensure that the flow of information is not controlled by a select few. If different sources of revenue do not lead to different journalistic decisions, then a profitable new business model will help support the existing types of journalism.

But if the source of revenue does affect content, then, according to Isaacson, “a mix of models—some free, some ad-supported, some user-supported, and some a mix—will give us the greatest diversity [of content].”

In the history of America’s free press, free access to a newspaper of good repute is an unusual phenomenon to say the least.

And the experiment with free access has severely hurt the journalism industry; for the past few years, it has become increasingly clear that newspapers must either change their revenue tactics or face extinction. Now, the New York Times’ new online business model may give us the best of both worlds: the diversity of the Internet, and the trustworthiness and professionalism of the old media.♦ Jeff Kalmus ‘12 is the Webmaster.

Excessive and irrelevant talking

How the filibuster evolved and why it’s here to stay. colin shannon “In the older and better times of the Senate, it was supposed that the representatives of sovereign states … would restrain themselves from the excessive use of irrelevant talking.” Speaking over 150 years ago, Senator Willie Mangum of North Carolina deplored what he saw as the shameful use of obstructionist tactics in the U.S. Senate. Recently, the frustration caused by the filibuster has grown dramatically, and today we face a Senate that is paralyzed by gridlock as members of the Republican minority have fallen into the habit of filibustering, or threatening to filibuster, on nearly every major issue. The idea that every bill needs 60 votes has become commonplace. But a look at history

reveals that the filibuster is simply a quirky tradition that evolved over time, not a fundamental principle of congressional procedure. Still, though the call for reform has been forceful, the “irrelevant talking” is probably here to stay. the Filibuster’s evolution Though the founders intended the Senate to be a bastion of free debate, the filibuster was never part of the body’s original design.

The quality and length of debate in the Senate was meant to come as a result of its small size and senators’ relatively long terms.

In an interview with the HPR, Columbia professor of political science Gregory Wawro explained, “There is not clear guidance from

the Framers on this. The Framers thought the Senate was meant to be a check on the democratic whims of the House. If the Senate worked exactly as the House, [that would] run contrary to the Framers’ vision.” In short, the Framers never suggested we should have a filibuster rule, but they also never said we couldn’t have one.

The filibuster evolved over many years. As UC Berkeley professor Eric Schickler told the HPR, “[The filibuster] was not designed intentionally. It developed over time in part due to the absence of rules.” The filibuster can trace its heritage to 1806, when the Senate got rid of an obscure rule that would have helped the majority party retain

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

21

greater control over the legislative process. Without this rule, the Senate never achieved a means to end debate, and over time, this tradition evolved into a right of free speech for every member of the Senate.

In the early 19th century, the small size of the Senate and its limited agenda made drawn-out debate pointless, but gradually the use of the filibuster expanded as a tactic for minorities to slow things down. A cloture rule, setting a certain number of senators that could override a filibuster, was only adopted after an 11-senator filibuster in 1917 put the kibosh on a popular bill to arm the U.S. Merchant Marine during WWI. Under the new rule, the Senate could cut off debate on a bill with the permission of two-thirds of its members, and in 1975, this was reduced to its current mark of three-fifths.

The Filibuster Today Thus, the filibuster itself is not new, but it has certainly become more widely used in recent years, and experts identify several factors that have contributed to this phenomenon. First, as the Senate’s workload has increased, the filibuster has become more effective. The majority can no longer afford to wait for long periods of time to pass key legislation, as was the case in 1964 when the Civil Rights Act was held up for months. Second, as Professor Sarah Binder of George Washington University told the HPR, the “ideological polarization of the two parties [means there is] not a lot of overlap in terms of policy proposals.” The two parties have little common ground on which to compromise, and this makes the filibuster a more attractive option. Third, the stigma that used to be associated with the filibuster has dissipated.

According to Schickler, “People didn’t used to want to admit that they were filibustering.

[Today] the idea of self-restraint, [of ] not making full use of your prerogatives, has faded away.”

Indeed, many senators face the threat of primary challenges if they shy away from filibustering on those issues most important to their base constituents.

Perhaps the most important consequence of the increased use of the filibuster is that it allows both parties to “obscure accountability,” as Professor Steven Smith of Washington University in St. Louis told the HPR. It’s possible, Smith explained, for the minority to blame gridlock on the radical, partisan tendencies of the majority, while the majority, in turn, can accuse the minority of being deliberately obstructionist.

For the public, then, it is difficult to see who is really at fault.

In any case, if the minority can prevent the majority from achieving legislative successes, then the majority is vulnerable to accusations of incompetence and weakness, and will likely lose big in upcoming elections.

Binder suggested that “cloture votes become rallying cries for parties and are treated like party tests.” In this way, the Senate has become more polarized, leading to a decline in bipartisan collegiality among members. And the polarization is self-fulfilling: both parties, when in the minority, have immediate incentives to continue with scorched-earth politics and forestall any achievements by the majority.

Avenues of Reform Despite these concerns about the abuse of the filibuster, serious reform is likely a non-starter.

The main reason is simply that the Senate requires a two-thirds majority to alter its rules, an

22 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

unrealistic goal for reformers considering how difficult it has become to muster the requisite three-fifths to invoke cloture.

To circumvent this, some are proposing a return to the days when filibustering senators were forced to actually stand on the Senate floor and debate (or read from the phone book) for hours on end. Wawro addressed this proposal bluntly: “[It] is a ridiculous idea and ignorant of the historical development of the filibuster. Being a Senator is more than a full-time job. They have far more on their plates than former Senators did.”

Another possibility is the so-called “nuclear option,” in which the Senate’s presiding officer (the vice president, for instance) would nullify the rules that support the filibuster. This maneuver would require only a simple majority’s approval, but such a heavy-handed tactic may be labeled undemocratic or overly antagonistic. As Smith said, “The minority still has the opportunity to make trouble for [the majority],” and one would expect even more intense obstruction, lasting for months or years, should the nuclear option be employed. In short, full-scale reform is simply not politically feasible at this point.

Moving forward, then, the first step is to recognize the filibuster for what it is: an accident of history. It has a long and interesting history, but the founders never intended for a senator to hold up the business of the U.S. government simply because he or she can.

Unfortunately, the filibuster has become so entrenched that it will require changes of heart by individual minority senators in order to effectively change the rules of the Senate. ♦ Colin Shannon ‘11 is a Staff Writer.

An enlightened approach to illegal immigration The politics of immigration needs to be reconciled with the reality.

Jimmy Wu Immigration always seems to be a hot-button topic, but despite President Bush’s second-term attempts at comprehensive reform and President Obama’s campaign promises to address the issue, the past two decades have seen little meaningful immigration legislation. While it is convenient to point to the economic recession and to Obama’s health care proposal as roadblocks to immigration reform, those explanations only scratch the surface. When it comes to immigration, politicians have shied away from asking the relevant questions.

In order to enact meaningful reform, policymakers must shift the emphasis from border security to the underlying economic causes of illegal immigration, and they must evaluate undocumented workers’ true impact on the job market. Without concrete

strategies for addressing these issues, immigration reform will continue to languish in political limbo.

Border Buildup?

Politicians have historically tackled the immigration issue by emphasizing border security, but this approach obscures the larger questions underlying the debate.

As Kim Williams, a professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School explained, “What you find is that we’ve had this balance struck between employer sanctions and border security.

Since we haven’t been able to deal with employer sanctions … it’s much easier to talk about cracking down on border enforcement.” But this security-focused approach cannot successfully address the flow of immigrants across the Mexican border, a complex

pattern of movements based on economic conditions and even seasonal changes. Douglas Massey, a sociology professor at Princeton and the author of Beyond Smoke and Mirrors, told the HPR that “the paradoxical effect of the border fence … is to make people who are already here not go back because it is so hard to come in.”

For immigration reform to go forward, then, policymakers must turn their focus to the economic incentives that bring people to this country in the first place. Poverty in Latin America is at least as important as border insecurity in explaining the influx of immigrants from our south.

Business interests also factor prominently in the immigration question. Perhaps the most immediately effective measure for reducing illegal immigration would be to impose a hefty fine on

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

23

businesses for every undocumented worker they hired. Yet, Williams explained, “Since we have this laissez-faire business attitude … at the end of the day what happens is we ratchet up border security.”

Employment-related proposals are likely to be poorly received compared with “tough” crackdown measures on the borders.

Furthermore, according to Massey, practices like subcontracting have made it harder to hold businesses accountable and discipline them when they employ illegal immigrants. Katherine Vargas, press secretary of the National Immigration Forum, an immigrant-rights organization, told the HPR that she expects any reform bill “will have an employment verification system, an electronic system matching Social Security numbers with records.” Such a system may be both more effective and more humane than border security.

Jobs Available To enact effective immigration legislation, policymakers must also evaluate the true impact of illegal immigrants on the American jobs market.

Some politicians claim that—especially given our high unemployment rate—undocumented workers are taking up Americans’ jobs. “There are an estimated eight million jobs done by illegal immigrants. … We’ve seen in the past that when they started to do some enforcement, you saw American workers lining up to apply for the jobs,” Ira Mehlman, media director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, told the HPR. Others, however, contend that migrant workers and American citizens occupy fundamentally different job markets. According to Vargas, “The reality is that [unemployed Americans] are not in direct competition for jobs immigrants are doing. …

You can’t expect a middle-class worker in Michigan to move and pick cherries or tomatoes in the California desert.”

At the end of the day, meaningful immigration reform will need to address the economic incentives that motivate hundreds of thousands of people to cross the border illegally each year. Politicians must look past politically palatable measures like border security; they must focus on long-term solutions and ask difficult questions about why immigrants come here, and what effect they have on American workers.

Only when the reality of the situation is faced will it be possible to enact immigration reform that actually accomplishes it goals.♦

Taking a pickup to d.c.

How Scott Brown pulled out a victory in New England.

Peter Bozzo and John Prince

Jimmy Wu ‘13 is the Circulation Manager.

24 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

Campaign season came early for residents of Massachusetts this year. The January special election to fill the seat of the deceased Edward M. Kennedy pit the Massachusetts Attorney General, Democrat Martha Coakley, against Republican state senator Scott Brown. Despite Massachusetts’ history of Democratic leadership (all ten of its congressional representatives are Democrats), the contest ended with a solid Brown victory. While Coakley faced an unexpected upsurge of discontent with the Obama administration, a poorly run campaign only compounded her problems. Furthermore, the Democratic Party’s failure to step in and help the flagging Coakley campaign suggests that Democrats will have to change their tactics following this experience if they want to be competitive in the midterm elections.

Obama and the DNC Many view Brown’s victory as a referendum on Obama’s first year in office and a reflection of disappointment with Democrats in Washington. As William Galston of the Brookings Institute told the HPR, “There is an enormous amount of discontent in the country with the condition of the economy. That has resulted in a climate that is very difficult for Democrats.”

And Alan Khazei, a Coakley competitor in the Democratic primary, told the HPR, “There was frustration with Washington, and Washington is not being responsive to people’s everyday needs.” But Republicans are more eager to highlight the fact that Brown positioned himself as the man to stop Obama’s health care plan in the Senate.

The Democratic leadership has also been criticized for not coming to Coakley’s aid when polls in early January showed her numbers sliding. For a party that just ran one of the most disciplined presidential campaigns in history, this was a surprising misstep. Nonetheless, Robert Blendon, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, emphasized to the HPR that Massachusetts wasn’t “really the president’s territory. In the past, presidents have not been that helpful in state races.” Therefore it’s hard to say whether anything could have been done to save Coakley, but more of a fight no doubt could have been made, if only for purposes of morale.

Campaign Tactics In addition, Coakley was heavily criticized for appearing to take victory for granted after the primary, while Brown’s pickup truck became a symbol of his populist appeal.

Brown’s ability to connect with voters was crucial in his contest against a candidate widely criticized for her emotional distance.

Michael Barone of the American Enterprise Institute suggested that Coakley lost votes by taking a “six-day vacation” in December, while Harvard Kennedy School professor David King bluntly told the HPR, “The Coakley campaign was a colossal disaster. …

Coakley’s arrogance was her downfall. Her campaign was defined mostly by her absence from it.”

Harvard students saw the results of Coakley’s poor campaign firsthand. The Students for Khazei group was an active presence during the Democratic primary, but Coakley’s campaign never reached out to the group to mobilize campus support during the general election. Jack Cashion, a campaign coordinator for the Khazei campaign at Harvard, told the HPR, “I believe that Khazei or someone else would have continued to campaign pretty hard after the primary in a way that would have engaged individuals much more.” Jason Berkenfeld, president of the Harvard College Democrats, said

that “working for the Coakley campaign was really a challenge. She wasn’t the most inspiring candidate, and we struggled to get our membership fired up. She never really reached out to college students properly.”

Coakley’s failure to excite—throughout the state and on the Harvard campus in particular —foreshadowed the results on election day.

Looking Ahead While many have made predictions about what this election means for the Democrats’ midterm prospects, Elaine Kamarck, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, says it’s too soon to tell. “Obama’s team is smart and they definitely got the message,” she explaiend. “They are already adjusting, and his State of the Union speech showed that.” Khazei is similarly optimistic: “For Democrats, this is a wake-up call. … If Democrats respond to this, they’ll be fine in November.” And Berkenfeld emphasized that the Harvard Democrats are rethinking their role in the midterm elections following Coakley’s defeat. Perhaps the only clear lesson of the Coakley defeat is that, if the Democrats are to be successful in the midterms, they must instill in their supporters the same sense of urgency that they felt in the 2008 presidential election. ♦ Peter Bozzo ‘12 is a Staff Writer. John Prince ‘13 is a Contributing Writer.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

25

WORLD putting a price on climate change

Copenhagen postmortem and the question of climate aid. thomas hwang and taylor lane After two years of intense negotiation and eager anticipation of a new international climatechange framework, the Copenhagen Conference in December 2009 delivered weak progress towards a legally binding treaty. Conflict and stalemate characterized the negotiations in Copenhagen, often revealing deep-seated divisions between the developed and developing worlds. The widespread consensus on the seriousness of man-made global warming failed to overcome the immense collectiveaction problem—getting almost 200 nations to act in concert to reduce their emissions. Most of all, the conference was undermined by the failure of industrialized countries to uphold their end of the climatechange bargain.

The Road to Copenhagen The Copenhagen Conference was the 15th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The purpose of “COP 15” was to develop and ratify a new treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol, the only existing

global treaty regulating greenhouse gases, the first phase of which expires in 2012. At Copenhagen, the Obama administration was seeking a new model in which countries would agree to national schedules for mitigating emissions, with legally binding commitments from China, India, and other emerging economies.

Far from realizing the Obama administration’s dream of a new treaty to succeed Kyoto, the parties at Copenhagen refused to ratify even the watered-down Copenhagen Accord after a week of bitter negotiations.

Instead, countries merely agreed to “take note” of the Accord, an interim agreement stating their intent to begin taking action on global warming.

The Copenhagen Accord conspicuously lacks a deadline for passing a binding treaty next year at COP 16 in Mexico, lowering the expectations for and likelihood of a comprehensive action plan to address climate change in the near future. Yet the agreement at Copenhagen represented at least a modicum of progress. Alden Meyer,

26 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

director of policy for the Union of Concerned Scientists, told the HPR, “The Copenhagen Accord is clearly a work in progress. It is a voluntary framework, with negotiations to continue in 2010 towards a legally binding instrument that would either accompany or supersede the Kyoto Protocol.”

Still, the Copenhagen Accord lacks several essential elements necessary to halt the rise of global greenhousegas emissions. One glaring omission is a firm target for mid- or longterm reductions in emissions. In an interview with the HPR, Ben Lieberman, a specialist in energy and environmental issues at the Heritage Foundation, highlighted the lack of legally binding mechanisms. “In fact,” he said, “all that the Copenhagen Accord contains is vague aspirational language to the effect that it would be nice if each country decided on its own to reduce emissions. Even this

face-saving language had to be pared back at the behest of China and other developing nations that didn’t want any hint that they might be obligated to do something.”

But David Doniger, the policy director for the Natural Resources Defense Council, told the HPR that the perception of Copenhagen as a failure is a reflection of unrealistic expectations. Doniger argued that the Copenhagen Accord successfully “provides for real cuts in heattrapping carbon pollution by all of the world’s big emitters. It establishes a transparent framework for evaluating countries’ performance against their commitments. And it will start an unprecedented flow of resources to help poor and vulnerable nations cope with climate impacts, protect their forests, and adopt clean energy technologies.”

Show Me the Money The Copenhagen talks ultimately hinged on the highly divisive issue of “climate aid,” or financial commitments to help developing countries combat climate change.

Going into COP 15, major donor countries acknowledged the need for climate aid. Faced with increasing public scrutiny and a desire to build momentum for negotiations, many outlined tentative aid plans in the weeks before Copenhagen.

Nevertheless, just days into the conference, negotiators at Copenhagen were trapped in a stalemate. China and India opposed any meaningful targets for cutting emissions and inspection by international agencies. The deadlock persisted until Dec. 17, the penultimate day of the conference, when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the Obama administration’s intent to work with other nations to “jointly mobilize $100 billion per year by 2020” and to contribute $10 billion annually to the fast-start funding pool by 2012. Clinton invigorated the

ailing negotiations, and delegates scrambled to draft a new working paper.

But the cautious optimism that percolated at the close of COP 15 would be short-lived. New statements from developed countries

after the conference suggested that the funds promised as part of vague climate-aid pledges would not be truly “new and additional.” They would count existing aid for poverty, food, and emergency programs.

For developing countries, this revelation was a slap in the face, confirming longstanding fears that the burden of climate change, physically and fiscally, would be

on their shoulders. Without a constituency that can lobby for a fair accounting procedure, donor states will continue to leverage their financial and political clout to minimize their true contribution levels.

As James Hansen, the director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, told Yes! magazine, the proposals discussed at Copenhagen were “like the indulgences of the Middle Ages. … The sinners are the developed countries, which are responsible for most of the excess greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

They want to continue business as usual, by buying off the developing countries.”

Between COP 15 and COP 16 The overall failure of Copenhagen points to the nearly insurmountable challenge of bringing together almost 200 countries with varying degrees of economic development to agree on concrete emissions-reduction targets. The standoff between developing and developed countries can be broken only with increased commitments to climate aid. American credibility now hinges on whether President Obama can act on his promise to raise tens of billions of dollars to help developing countries adapt to global warming, a possibility only if Congress passes cap-and-trade legislation.

Obama, then, must lead the charge for developed nations to take responsibility for the huge burden that climate change imposes on developing nations.

Without true financial leadership from the G8 countries, backing up their rhetorical commitments to a new treaty, breaking the deadlock at COP 16 will likely be nearly impossible.♦ Thomas Hwang ‘13 is a Contributing Writer. Taylor Lane ‘11 is a Staff Writer.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

27

the end of a leftist era

Why Chile’s new conservative leader isn’t much of a change.

CASEY THOMSON On Jan. 17, the Chilean presidential runoff election concluded with the victory of a former Harvard economics teaching fellow, Sebastian Piñera. The Conservative Piñera, the third-richest Chilean and the holder of a Harvard Ph.D in economics, ended two decades of uninterrupted rule by the center-left Concert of Parties for Democracy with his defeat of Eduardo Frei, 52 percent to 48 percent.

Piñera’s victory may seem an anomaly in an increasingly leftist Latin America and in a country still harboring memories of right-wing dictator Augusto Pinochet.

But Piñera’s ascension is not a sign of a fundamental conservative shift in Chilean politics. It is rather a testament to the long reign of the incumbent coalition, commonly known as the Concertación, and the desire for change after two decades of this coalition’s dominance. Frei’s personal weakness as a candidate and Piñera’s personal popularity were also major contributing factors to the upset. The future of Chilean politics will not be warring coalitions and divergent platforms, nor a lurch to the right, but an era of greater electoral competition and centrist two-party poli-

tics.

Change is Constant “It had to happen,” Steven Levitsky, a Harvard government professor, told the HPR. “No matter how well the incumbent party does, electorates tire, and they want a change. It’s no big surprise.” And Frei was a particularly weak representative for the ruling party. As former president of Chile from 1994 to 2000, Frei governed unremarkably, allowing his term to be dominated by high unemployment rates. Many voters were also torn by the entrance of third-party Socialist candidate Marco EnriquezOminami, who broke off from the Concertación and won support from those dissatisfied with the ruling party but unwilling to support the right. He drew a strong 20 percent in the initial election and meekly endorsed Frei a week prior to the run-off. At the same time, Frei lacked the smooth, well-financed campaign effort of the billionaire Piñera, who owns the national Chilean airline LAN. The defeat of the Concertación was also a function of Chile’s particular set

28 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

of electoral rules, which restricts incumbents from pursuing immediate reelection. Were it not for these rules, the Concertación might have been able to capitalize on the strength of its incumbent, Michelle Bachelet, who has been President since 2006 and has accumulated an 80 percent approval rating. As Peter DeShazo, director of the Americas program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the HPR, “Her background, her life story, and her efforts to encourage consensus politics have made her exceedingly popular.”

Bachelet’s strong response to the Chilean economic downturn in 2006 also bolstered her reputation. José Raúl Perales, an expert on Latin America at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, told the HPR, “She was effective at keeping the pain of adjustment as far from the Chilean people as possible. The ability of the government to respond effectively was the result of [her] specific efforts to save funds from commodity exports, especially copper.”

However, DeShazo reiterated, Bachelet’s popularity did not translate into

enthusiasm for Frei. “Michelle Bachelet was key in that she injected more energy into the Concertación and that helped her popularity. But with Frei, it looked like a repeat of the past and the Chileans felt that they were ready for change, for new ideas.” Memories of Pinochet’s harsh dictatorship had long prevented party change, but “real democracies turn over,” Levitsky quipped. Chile, after twenty years, has finally turned over.

Center Consensus Despite this turnover, Bachelet’s tenure will have a lasting impact on Chilean politics. Under Bachelet, Chile experienced remarkable economic, social, and political success; she revitalized the copper industry, completed the institutionalization of universal healthcare, and legitimized the place of women in politics.

Indeed, Frei and Piñera agreed on most major campaign issues. Aside from minor discrepancies in economic policy, the only sticking point was their commitment to human rights. Frei’s attacks on that score were powerful and poignant, but ultimately ineffective. His father, the president of Chile from 1964 to 1970 and a staunch critic of Pinochet, was mysteriously poisoned in 1982. Bachelet, a victim of torture during Pinochet’s reign, had supported judicial efforts to prosecute the Pinochet government’s crimes against humanity. As such, the two tried to exploit Piñera’s support for an amnesty bill that would have halted the investigation into numerous Pinochet-related deaths, including that of Frei’s father. Piñera’s position on allowing Pinochet supporters into his cabinet and party was also controversial; only after intense political and media pressure did he come to reject their inclusion in his coalition.

Nevertheless, concerns over Piñera’s dedication to human rights failed to have a significant impact on Chilean voters. As Levitsky argued, “certainly he’s got support from the left and he will not want to be perceived as leaning too far to the right, particularly on human rights.” DeShazo

Harvard House of pizza

agreed that human rights had become a consensus issue in Chile. “Those issues have been widely dealt with over the last twenty years. ... [Human rights are] not an issue at stake.”

It’s the Economy Piñera’s strongest campaign plank was economic reform, and on this issue bipartisan consensus was especially evident. Piñera promised to create a million jobs, increase annual economic growth by six percent, and privatize part of Chile’s national copper industry. But no matter how much change Piñera may want, his policies cannot stray too far from the center. “He’s going to have to worry about having both his big legislative support and the support of the center voters who are not voting left for the first time,” said Levitsky. “He will be very sensitive to the electorate and I don’t think you will see him move dramatically to the right.” Indeed, Perales argued, “Piñera is very aware of the fact that he cannot rule Chile without the input of the Concertación.

With a country so highly entrenched in the system of two major governing coalitions, it is impossible to rule without their input.” To do so would jeopardize the conservatives’ prospects in future Chilean elections.

While there is no possibility of direct reelection of presidents, Bachelet would be free to run again in 2014. Competition will likely be tougher then; Piñera has finally proven that Chilean conservatives can win national elections, opening the door to an entire new slate of presidential candidates.

Given the voters’ current trust in Piñera’s business savvy, the winner of the next election will probably be determined to a large degree by the success of his economic policies. As for the immediate future, change will be less revolutionary than might seem likely. There will be no great shift rightward, but the election of Piñera represents a step in a broader trend towards greater electoral accountability and political consensus-building in Chile. ♦ Casey Thomson ‘13 is a Staff Writer.

Special #1: one large cheese pizza and two 20 oz. sodas for $11.45, and Special #2: two large one-topping pizzas for $19.45.

Serving Harvard Since 1973

Delivers daily: (617) 864-8090 1706 Massachusetts Ave.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

29

Of burqas and rosaries

The EU’s Islamic identity crisis. IOAna Calcev President Obama’s address to the Muslim world in Cairo last June called for a new beginning between the United States and Islam, one based on tolerance, dignity, and mutual respect for religious differences. Just two weeks later, French President Nicolas Sarkozy stood before parliament to justify France’s infamous ban on burqas. “It will not be welcome on French soil.

We cannot accept, in our country, women imprisoned behind a mesh, cut off from society, deprived of all identity. That is not the French republic’s idea of women’s dignity.”

There is a fundamental divide in the West over the definition of religious tolerance. Anti-Muslim sentiments and legal restrictions in

Europe are often attributed to the Old Continent’s general aversion to public displays of religion.

But secularism alone cannot fully explain the French burqa ban or the Swiss minaret ban. These high-profile controversies reflect a continent that has been shaken by recent demographic changes, one in the throes of a collective identity crisis. And multiculturalism in Europe is in peril as a consequence.

Immigration and Integration When Europe opened its borders with the creation and expansion of the European Union, Europeans found themselves asking one question: “What does it mean to be one of us?” Since 2004, the European

30 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

Union has extended membership to twelve new countries and is currently considering Croatia, Macedonia, and Turkey. With the number of member states nearly doubling in the last four years, the European Union has seen a large spike in nonWestern immigration. The European Commission estimates that as of 2006, there are about 18.5 million non-E.U. immigrants living in the E.U. zone.

New immigration has inflamed old questions of cultural identity and evoked memories of early European encounters with Islam. From the Muslim conquest of Andalusia in 756 C.E., through the Crusades and the Ottoman capture of the Balkans in the late 14th century, Islam and

Christianity have had a long and violent history on the continent.

Karl Kaiser, professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, pointed to Europe’s long history of conflict with Islam as an important context for contemporary tensions. “Don’t forget European history. Europe almost became a Muslim continent. Only two great battles prevented it,” Kaiser explained to the HPR. “Somewhere in the collective consciousness there is this background of the enormous battle between Christianity and Islam in the Crusades.”

This history manifests itself in the fact that Muslims are singled out in the European consciousness as alien. Forecasts indicate that Europe’s Muslim population will more than double by 2015. Still, Muslims make up just a small proportion of European immigrants.

Jocelyne Cesari, an associate at Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies, told the HPR, “The larger problem is this [false] idea that most immigrants … have Muslim backgrounds.” Non-Muslim Europeans also tend to overestimate the cultural uniformity of Muslim immigrants, both reflecting and perpetuating the fear that the influx of Muslims might be threatening to Europe’s identity.

Isselmou Ould-Deilahy, a French Muslim Ph.D, told the HPR that “the French have problems accepting new citizens. You now have third-generation Muslims in places like France that are still designated as immigrants. How can someone who is born as a third generation French not be accepted as a French citizen?”

Faith and Fear Fear of Islamic terrorism has also fueled anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe. “9/11 was of course a game changer,” Kaiser said. Incidents such as the 2004 Madrid train bombings, the murder of filmmaker

Theo Van Gogh, and the London bombings in 2005 reinforced the link between terror and Islam.

Todd Gaziano, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told the HPR that “many Western nations are at war with Islamic terrorism … so [religion] is not an unreasonable factor to take into account when determining immigration policies.”

Terrorist attacks have thus helped politicians to justify exclusionary legislation. OuldDeilahy explained, “Anti-Muslim feelings are kept alive by political movements and the press.” He continued, “Some political parties use fear as their capital. The way for them to get ballots and votes is to create fear.” Fear no doubt played a large role in Switzerland’s November 2009 referendum, in which nearly 60 percent of voters supported a constitutional amendment banning the construction of minarets.

Although the amendment will likely be overturned by the European Court of Human Rights, its approval “showed a degree of intolerance which is very detrimental to international relations,” according to Kaiser.

The anti-minaret campaign demonstrated a clear intent to identify Islam as subversive and dangerous. One campaign poster created by the Swiss People’s Party depicted several minarets coming out of the Swiss flag in a way that made the minarets appear to be missiles.

Redefining Europe What does all this mean for the future of Europe? Aziz AlAzmeh, professor of Islam at Central European University and the author of Islams and Modernities, told the HPR, “The earlier models of multiculturalism are not working very well. There is an emerging wall of separation between two certain kinds of people: Europeans, and on the other hand more recent

immigrants from a variety of Muslim countries.” What Al-Azmeh describes as a wall of separation, Kaiser less provocatively calls “parallel societies.”

In order to bring these societies together into a workable whole, Europeans will have to minimize their fear of the foreign, particularly through improved education about Islam. “The way to address [the insecurity] is not to fuel the Islamic concerns but to demystify them,” said Cesari.

Although many governments have tried to educate Muslims about Western traditions, Cesari argued, “if you want to make room for another component, you have to educate both sides.”

This may require not just lessons on Islam and its beliefs, but also restructuring history textbooks to include lessons on the importance of cultural diversity.

“Europe is not, as Americans believe, one thing,” Kaiser said.

But Europeans themselves have started, in many ways, to act like it is. In their attempt to become one union, they have forgotten or neglected the fact that Europe is a patchwork of nations and peoples with different beliefs, histories, and problems.

Multiculturalism is imperiled in Europe, then, in large part because Europeans seem to have forgotten the fact of their own diversity. The debate is not between secularists and fans of public religion. It’s between different conceptions of European identity: one that includes Muslims, and one that does not.

But the question of whether Muslims can be Europeans has already been settled on the ground, and settled affirmatively. Now the question is whether they will be treated like Europeans. ♦ Ioana Calcev ‘12 is a Contributing Writer.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

31

BOOKS & ARTS It is not hard to imagine a three-hour-plus biopic covering the trials and triumphs of Nelson Mandela. A life as epic as Mandela’s naturally lends itself to a lofty cinematic portrayal along the lines of a Gandhi or an Elizabeth. But to tell the complete story of a person on film entails inevitable risk. While such films are considered prime Oscar bait, they tend to feel overlong, clichéd, and predictable. With Invictus, director Clint Eastwood and screenwriter Anthony Peckham have wisely chosen to focus on one fascinating and important episode in Mandela’s life—the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa that helped the severely divided nation along the path to reconciliation and unity. This is a useful frame within which to explore Mandela’s post-apartheid efforts to heal his nation, and it provides the film with human drama and the excitement of competition.

the human factor Eastwood does Mandela Jonathan Hawley invictus, directed by Clint Eastwood, Warner Brothers, 2009.

The Human Factor The single most powerful accomplishment of the film is that, unlike biopics that idolize their subjects, Invictus thoroughly humanizes Mandela.

Following some brief historical context (the end of apartheid and the inauguration of Mandela), the first image we see is of the newly elected president waking up in the morning. He pulls himself up, makes his bed, and goes out for a walk. Seeing Mandela in such a personal light—we watch him tell jokes, get bored in meetings, and of course, feel the excitement of sport—reminds the audience that even the most impressive and courageous figure is, after all, human like us.

Indeed, the film focuses as much on Mandela’s political acumen as on his legendary spiritual generosity. Mandela uses the performance of South Africa’s Springbok rugby team, formerly a symbol of white oppression, as a tool to unite the bitterly divided black and white populations. Rather than attempt to deify Mandela, Eastwood emphasizes his political genius in using a sporting team to capture the hearts and minds of his people.

But political shrewdness never gives way to cynicism. At one point, Mandela’s skeptical aide, confused by her boss’s preoccupation with rugby, asks the president if his newfound obsession with the game is merely a political calculation. “It is a human calculation,” Mandela responds.

(The film’s working title was actually The Human Factor.) It is clear that Mandela does engage in political maneuverings to lift the spirits of the nation. However, he does not rely on his own authority or his rhetorical prowess to achieve this. Instead, he recognizes the ability of human drama to inspire people to reform and reconcile. He merges politics and sports in order to make his country cheer as one.

Sporting Goods Yet despite the inherent inspiration of the story, Invictus suffers from a curious sense of detachment and slowness. While its pacing is more often meditative than plodding, the film nevertheless lacks the fire and wit of other recent ventures like The Queen and Milk, both of which told the true stories of political leaders but with greater liveliness and humor. Fortunately, though, the simple joy of sport provides an effective antidote to the occasionally lagging pace. It is difficult to think of a genre

32 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

of film that better captures the thrill of human experience than the sports movie. From the uplifting underdog tale of Rudy to Eastwood’s own Million Dollar Baby, the sports genre has given filmmakers the ability to create enduring drama both on and off the playing field. The inherent suspense of a sporting match—even one in which the outcome is a foregone conclusion— is a joy to watch, as every hit, score, and cheer is magnified on the big screen.

Invictus is at its best not only when it captures the humanity of Mandela, but also during the film’s climactic rugby match. In Invictus, the thrill of competition is infectious.

Camera Tricks Invictus ends with images of celebration and reconciliation. The audience is left with the impression that through his genius (and with a little help from the Springboks), Mandela managed to repair the rift that had nearly torn South Africa apart.

The truth of the matter, unfortunately, is not so simple. A December article

by Barry Bearak in the New York Times revealed that nearly half of South Africa feels that race relations have not

improved since the end of apartheid.

On the national Day of Reconciliation, many Afrikaners still celebrate the Day of the Vow, which commemorates their bloody victory over the Zulus in 1838. That’s a far cry from the happilyever-after ending of popular legend and Eastwood’s portrayal. Bearak even singled out Eastwood’s film for contributing to the misconception, writing, “Viewers of the new American movie Invictus might be tempted to conclude that such racial harmony prevailed in the aftermath of a longshot upset in a rugby game.”

However, Eastwood and Peckham should not be condemned for producing a film that attempts to captivate rather than fully inform.

Special effects and camera trickery are not the only tools of cinematic illusion; motion pictures also have the power to create their own historical memories.

Sometimes the results are dangerous; D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation, a frighteningly bigoted conception of post-Civil War America, comes to mind. Other works, such as Oliver Stone’s conspiracy-mongering JFK, provoke ongoing controversy.

With Invictus, however, the purpose

is not to rewrite history, but to examine a single moment. As with all movies, the filmmakers sought to capture the audience’s imagination.

On that front, they succeeded and produced a work that celebrates the possibilities of reconciliation and renewal. Critics may endlessly debate the social responsibility of filmmakers to educate audiences as well as entertain them. But for better or worse, Invictus celebrates a moment in the past, ephemeral perhaps, but also inspiring.

Near the end of the film, Mandela appears on a television sports program and he links the challenges of governing to challenges on the field.

Rugby is a tough sport, he says, much like politics. The metaphor may be anticipated, but it is also powerful, and it stays with you. Politics, like sports, is aggressive, unpredictable, and rife with disappointment. But with the right players, and at the right moments, both have the power to capture the best of the human spirit. Invictus shows that films can do the same. ♦ Jonathan Hawley ‘10 is a Senior Writer.

the case for executive power

A legal defense of the Bush terror policies. jeffrey lerman

On Sept. 11, 2001, all but a few employees were required to evacuate the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Among the select personnel asked to remain behind was John Yoo, a young Harvard- and Yale-educated lawyer. In the weeks and months that followed, Yoo and his OLC colleagues played a central role in crafting the legal basis for the most controversial tactics employed by President George W. Bush in the war on terror—coercive interrogation techniques, which many call torture, and the indefinite detainment of suspected terrorists. In Crisis and Command, Yoo offers a defense of his legal interpretations and argues that wars and national-security crises not only warrant but even require the broad expansion of executive power. Yoo draws from a deep well of history in making his argument, tracing the expansion and use of executive power in times of crisis. Despite an overly selective reading of the past, Yoo presents an apology for executive power that must be seriously reckoned with.

A History of Power Yoo starts his history at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, where James Madison proposed an executive beholden to the legislative branch, while Alexander Hamilton proposed an executive with broad powers and life tenure. The executive branch that emerged, Yoo argues, was much closer in practice to Hamilton’s vision than Madison’s. This became

Crisis and command,

by John Yoo, Kaplan Publishing, 2009. $29.95, 544 pp.

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

33

evident as early as George Washington’s first term, when questions lingered as to whether the various executive departments would be autonomous or whether the president alone held executive authority. Though “the constitutional text is silent as to whether cabinet officers must obey presidential orders,” Yoo writes, Washington subordinated executive-branch officials to the role of assistants and thus assumed unitary authority for the president.

Yoo contends that from this point onward, there was a distinct trend towards the expansion of executive power in moments of crisis, from Thomas Jefferson’s Louisiana Purchase through Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation and Roosevelt’s New Deal.

Yoo uses this history to justify Bush’s assumption of enormous executive power. “President Bush’s actions relied on broad claims of presidential power,” he writes, “but again they fell within the precedents set by earlier presidents.” Those who find Bush’s use of presidential authority galling, Yoo suggests, must also find fault with Lincoln, Roosevelt, and Jefferson’s uses of executive power.

Choosing History Yoo’s history, however, is weakened by its underemphasis of certain key events. For instance, Yoo emphasizes Roosevelt’s willingness to assume broad constitutional authority in addressing the Great Depression and WWII. However, Yoo devotes a mere six pages of his book to the notorious Executive Order 9066, with which Roosevelt violated the civil liberties of more than 120,000 law-abiding Japanese-Americans.

Yoo also chronicles Roosevelt’s wiretapping of all communications into and out of the United States after 1940.

While Yoo concedes that these policies were misguided, he does not seem to take seriously the dangerous precedents they set. Yoo’s scant coverage of these and other ill-conceived presidential actions makes the reader question his critical balance.

Commission and Omission In his final defense of the Bush administration, Yoo argues that the greatest American presidents took on broad authority and were “responsible for some of the most explosive constitutional confrontations in American history.” But Bush could have been reckless and unsuccessful in addition to bold, a possibility Yoo does not really address. Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon seem the perfect counterexamples to Lincoln and Jefferson. Presidential greatness is invariably determined by the outcomes of executive policies, not by their constitutional novelty.

The broader message of Yoo’s work is that no executive will ever execute his authority will complete judiciousness. As Yoo noted in a recent interview with Jon Stewart, “the Constitution doesn’t prevent [executives] from making poor decisions.” And Yoo believes that “mistakes of commission” are always better than “mistakes of omission.” Put plainly, Yoo concludes that it is better for a president to act decisively to protect his country, even if he is later rebuffed by history, than for a president not to act at all when his country is in danger. This is Yoo’s most forceful argument: in crisis moments a passive president may be the last thing we want.

Jeffrey Lerman ‘13 is a Contributing Writer.

34 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

People Power in DPRK? Big brother and double-think on the peninsula.

Paul Mathis

The haunting portrait of everyday life under modern dictatorship offered in The Hidden People of North Korea should be vaguely familiar to most Americans, but the level of detail in Ralph Hassig and Kongdan Oh’s new book makes for occasionally surprising and unsettling reading. The book is a continuation of Hassig and Oh’s longer project, begun with North Korea Through the Looking Glass (2000), of exposing the political and economic deprivations of Kim’s regime. In Hidden People, the authors consider their subject from the ground up, piecing together information from a multitude of primary sources and interviews with over two hundred defectors to create a narrative of life under a stifling regime. Unfortunately, the result is often disjointed, and the book does not ultimately add much except curiosities to our understanding of North Korea.

Cognitive Dissonance The primary theme of Hidden People is that North Koreans are “double-thinkers” who balance a forced devotion to their leader, Kim Jong-il, with private criticism of the state. The forced devotion is evident: Hassig and Oh report that “three framed photos of Kim Il-sung, his wife Kim Jong-suk, and Kim Jongil … are required to be hung on the most prominent wall in every North Korean dwelling and workplace.”

The propaganda and ritual extend to all layers of society: schoolchildren are made to march to school in

soldierly fashion, while “coworkers are required to attend political meetings and self-criticism sessions.” From the perspective of Americans weaned on 1984, it all seems eerily familiar.

But Hassig and Oh firmly believe that North Koreans can see through the propaganda and identify the real cause of their nation’s deficiencies: a dictatorship as incompetent as it is predatory. The regime’s credibility was severely strained by the 1994 death of Kim Il-sung, the primary architect of the modern North Korean state. Afterward his death, the central government practically closed down for three years, during which time Hassig and Oh report that five to ten percent of the population died of starvation. North Korea’s current leader, Kim Jong-il, has never been able to reconstruct the national unity or relative efficiency that his father constructed. His father was a skilled politician and comparatively populist; he made frequent neighborhood visits in all parts of the country. Kim Jong-il, by contrast, is secretive, suspicious, and driven primarily by his “animal’s instinct for judging one’s loyalty,” as Hassig and Oh put it. In this mismanaged kleptocracy, Hassig and Oh believe, North Koreans struggle to identify with a nation that they no longer wholeheartedly believe in and that no longer provides for them.

the hidden people of north korea, by Ralph Hassig and Kongdan Oh, Rowman & Littlefield, 2009. $39.95, 296 pp.

Predictions and Prescriptions Unfortunately, Hassig and Oh’s predictions for the future of North Korea are vague, unlike their particularistic accounts of North Korean life. They believe that Kim Jong-il “is neither crazy nor strange; he is just doing his job.” His abuses of power, then, result from the system that he inherited, rather than his own megalomania. Therefore, the authors suspect, Kim’s death will not change everything all at once, but rather, political transformation will come

SHAY’S PUB &WINE

BAR

ultimately from the North Korean people.

Hassig and Oh also use their account as the basis for several questionable foreign-policy suggestions. They want, for instance, to bypass the Kim regime and send North Koreans damning information about their government. The United States would then “let [the North Koreans] choose how to act on that information.”

That is, the authors suggest that the United States should subvert an openly hostile regime that claims to have weapons of mass destruction, and wait for the North Korean people to carry out a revolution—which, without U.S. military intervention, could be immediately subdued by government authorities. Perhaps it is unsurprising that this is not the consensus view on the North Korean situation.

The Hidden People of North Korea succeeds at showing us a North Korea that is strange, stifling, and in many ways frightening. North Koreans’ double-thinking is an interesting curiosity and a revealing case study of human psychology. But Hassig and Oh’s failures at the levels of prediction and prescription ultimately make their book somewhat less than it could have been.♦ Paul Mathis ‘12 is a Contributing Writer.

burgers sandwiches & salads red & white wines champagnes ports, sherries beer on tap call us (617) 864-9161 visit us 58 JFK StREET Harvard Square mon-sat 11am-1am sunday: noon - 1am

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

35

INTERVIEWS HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW: How did your views of the U.S. military change between the time you were writing Fiasco and The Gamble?

America’s Military in flux

Journalist Thomas Ricks assesses America’s armed forces.

Robert Long

THOMAS RICKS: Fiasco, which is a very angry book, an indictment, was driven by my admiration for the military. How could this institution, that I really had come to know pretty well, have screwed up so badly? These were smart, dedicated, hard-working people I knew in the military. How could this have happened? And that’s what stunned me. I mean it really was a mess in the first years in Iraq. So why was the institution so slow to respond? And that’s the question I sort of puzzled through.

The Gamble is actually a story of reclamation, wherein a minority of the military sees a new course and pursues it over the objections of the majority. People forget that the vast majority of the U.S. military leadership vigorously opposed the surge. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the head of the Army, the top American officer in Iraq, and the head of Central Command were all against it. So The Gamble is very much a story of a minority view being promulgated and going around the chain of command and the White House jumping on it. I’m not a Bush fan, but I do think that Bush’s approval of the surge and the speech he gave about it was his finest moment.

HPR: You wrote in The Gamble that the events for which the Iraq war will be remembered have not yet occurred. What will be remembered from 2010?

TR: 2009 was kind of a year of drift. I call it the unraveling in the afterword of The Gamble. But it’s a slow unraveling. The mistake I made was thinking it was a fast unraveling—especially last spring, spring ’09, when you started seeing former Sons of Iraq and awakening groups fighting the Iraqi army in the streets of Baghdad.

But now I think the big events will be in 2010. We’ll have the election, and the formation of government after the election is the crucial period. And American troops will also be leaving during this same period, so that will be important. If you don’t have a government formed by June and you’re withdrawing 10,000 troops a month, you’re going to start taking troops out of areas that are quite unstable. How Iraqi forces then perform without American support and American oversight will be crucial.

HPR: What is your opinion of the course President Obama took late last year in Afghanistan?

TR: I’m an Obama fan, but I thought the process by which he handled Afghanistan was very worrisome. There was a lot of dithering. If the characteristic flaw of George Bush was macho-bullshit, the characteristic flaw of Obama is professorial dithering—thinking that if we just go around and around one more time we’ll come up with a better

36 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

answer. Time is important, and that took a lot, a lot of time. Also, it’s still not clear to me quite what they intend to do about the biggest single problem in Afghanistan, which is the Karzai government. The Taliban is a tactical problem, but the Karzai government is the strategic problem. The Taliban we can handle militarily. The Karzai government, through its abuses and corruption, is driving Afghans into the arms of the Taliban. And until they figure out what they are going to do about it, you are not solving the basic problem.

HPR: President Obama announced in his State of the Union that he intends to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

What do you think the effects of a repeal would be?

TR: My guess is there will be some initial turmoil, and ten years from now people will wonder what the fuss was about. We have allies that have openly gay soldiers.

The question is not whether you are going to have gay people in the military. You have thousands of gay people in the military. The question is, will they be punished for their sexual orientation? And there will be some initial problems. You’re dealing with 18-year-old psyches, in vulnerable states in boot camp and stuff. But I think the military will handle it with surprising ease. It’s a question whose time has come and gone. It should have been dealt with ten years ago. ♦ Robert Long ‘11 is the Books & Arts Editor.

The real world

Stephen Walt on Israel, Japan, Mexico, and realism Felix de Rosen HARVARD POLITICAL REVIEW: Your blog is subtitled “A Realist in an Ideological Age.” When you say realist, what do you mean?

STEphEN WALT: I think that realists in general try to analyze the world as it really is and try not to be too wedded to a particular political program that follows from some normative vision about how the world ought to be. That doesn’t mean that realists don’t have moral preferences, a set of moral standards, but the central tenet of realism is that you start by looking at how humans actually behave in international politics. Realists try to make the world better, but bear in mind what’s likely to be feasible. Realists also tend to be fairly skeptical about ambitious plans to remake the human condition.

You might even say that realists have a sort of “first, do no harm” approach to foreign policy.

HPR: Is realism a sort of balance between optimism and pessimism?

SW: Not necessarily. Realism is a pretty gloomy way of looking at world politics and realists tend to highlight the inevitability of security confrontations, the pervasiveness of insecurity, and the fact that countries sometimes do really brutal things to one another. In a sense, realism is a sobering way of looking at the world. At the same time, I think realists recognize that there are certain circumstances that are better than others and that prudent statecraft can avoid some of the really big disasters. Even a realist would concede that the last twenty years of world politics have been more peaceful than the previous eighty years.

HPR: How does realism function as a lens on the situation in Israel and Palestine?

SW: You can’t understand the Middle East, either American Middle East policy or the nature of the conflicts occurring in the region, solely by applying realism, although I think realism does tell you certain things about why the conflict has not been resolved. I think that the combination of Israeli preference for land instead of peace, the dysfunctional relations within the Palestinian community, and the fecklessness of American policy are combining to make a two-state solution increasingly unlikely. However, I do think that when people are faced with SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

37

a really unpleasant future, they can sometimes find the goodwill and imagination to go in a different direction. But right now, I don’t see a lot of wisdom in any of the three parties, and particularly in the American and Israeli sides.

HPR: The Onion.com recently featured an article titled “Massive earthquake reveals entire civilization of Haiti.” Indeed, Yemen and Haiti are two countries that had been largely forgotten by the developed world. Can you think of another country that has been similarly overlooked?

SW: I think one of the things to remember about foreign affairs is there are 192 countries out there and no matter how well an administration plans its strategy and sense of priorities, there are always surprises. They always end up having to deal with something they didn’t expect, sometimes as with Haiti because of a natural

disaster, sometimes it’s because of a conflict, or a government that collapses unexpectedly. It’s almost impossible for anyone to fully anticipate where some complete surprise is going to come from.

That said, I think there are some parts of the world where it’s easy for me to imagine us suddenly being forced to pay more attention than we have been up until now.

I’ll give you two. One is Japan. The recent governmental change has clearly altered, to some degree, the relationship between Washington and Tokyo. I think some of that may have been overblown. There are many reasons the two will remain on good terms. But given that there is a somewhat different set of ideas and attitudes from the government in Japan, and given that you have an American administration that is up to its neck in all sorts of other problems, it’s possible to imagine the stakes being made in both places that put things in a much more delicate situation that we’ve

been in a while.

The second one is Mexico.

Without saying that this is going to happen or even likely to happen, you can imagine some of the internal problems that Mexico is having spilling over in the United States more than they already have.

Now, it’s one thing to have a failed state in Somalia, which generates piracy problems and other issues, but is on the other side of the world, and so most Americans don’t worry very much about it. Ditto Yemen.

But it seems to me, if we saw Mexico becoming ungovernable, or parts of Mexico becoming ungovernable, that would start to have repercussions that are a little different than what we’ve worried about in the past.

Those are two, but I’m not putting a bet down on either one. ♦ Felix de Rosen ‘13 is a Contributing Writer.

moreinterviews

@harvardpoliticalreview.com

Jo Luck

Wendy Kopp By sophie Angelis

by meredith baker

Jo Luck has been President and CEO of Heifer International, an antihunger and anti-poverty nonprofit, since 1992. She talked with the HPR about global poverty, human dignity, and accountability.

Wendy Kopp is the founder and president of Teach for America, which enlists young people to teach in low-income schools. She talked with the HPR about educational inequality and getting results.

38 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

FROM THE BLOG: Harvard’s Supposed Crisis of Faith Newsweek’s Lisa Miller spilled a lot of ink and raised a lot of dust in her article on “Harvard’s Crisis of Faith.” But her conclusion was uncontroversial: of course Harvard should offer and even require some exposure to religion and its attendant issues and debates. And I have seen no evidence that Harvard thinks otherwise.

Yes, there’s no Religion Department, but Harvard lacks a lot of majors that other schools have. Nobody complains about Harvard’s insult to journalism, or accounting, or criminal justice, or education. And yes, among the courses that would count for the new “Culture and Belief” requirement are ones that have little to do with religion. But all of Harvard’s core requirements are very loose and general. The problem is not that Harvard doesn’t require you to learn about religion; the problem is that it doesn’t require you to learn about anything, really. Read More at HPRgument.com

Sam Barr ‘11, Editor-in-Chief

VISIT HARVARDPOLITICALREVIEW.COM FOR MORE after Citizens United Gold coins tip the scales of justice.

by John He

Midterm Madness Are we looking at a Republican resurgence in 2010?

by Alexander Chen

Twisted Democracy

Puerto Rico might become a state without wanting to.

by Pablo Hernandez

UNFILLED PROMISE Evaluating Obama’s first year.

by Adan Acevedo and Damon Meng

Follow @harvardpolitics for the latest updates!

SPRING 2010 | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | HPR

39

ENDPAPER Bring Back the West The value of the Western tradition in higher education zoey orol The idea of a Western canon has become unfashionable. When I arrived at Harvard in the fall of 2006, the university offered a course on celestial navigation but no survey course in British history. The English Department recently eliminated its required course in major British writers, which included Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Romantic poets. In those courses that have insisted on the usefulness of a Western canon, in fields ranging from art history to classical music, professors have felt the need to explicitly defend their approach in lecture.

I understand that this trend away from the canon is an attempt to remedy a perceived bias in higher education toward the Western tradition, taught to previous generations of students to the exclusion of all else. I am hardly in a position to say whether a pro-Western bias exists or whether changing course offerings to combat it is a successful remedy. But what I can say is that I have always found value in the Western tradition, and that there is a compelling argument to be made that the Western—in particular the AngloAmerican—tradition is uniquely relevant to American students.

From a historical standpoint, shifting the focus away from the West creates an incomplete picture of global affairs. Imagine teaching a world history course that portrayed Britain and America as two countries like any others. Such an approach would make little sense, since the international affairs of the past two centuries—at the very

least—have been largely dominated by those two countries. When the British Empire was at its peak at the turn of the 20th century, a quarter of the world’s population was under British rule. No other country in modern history has been able to make that claim. As two world wars crippled British power, Britain passed the torch of international hegemony to its former colony across the Atlantic. Churchill famously pleaded with Roosevelt to enter World War II, knowing that Britain was unable to singlehandedly defend Western civilization from the terrorizing march of the Nazis. In this and so many subsequent world conflicts and events of the 20th century, American involvement has been vital to success. To deny the monumental and disproportionate impact of these two countries would be to ignore historical fact.

But the trend away from canonical teaching in higher education is founded more on academia’s unwillingness to assert that different cultures have unusual relevance or value to American students. To insist on the equality of all traditions is to deny the inheritance that has been passed down to Americans from the earliest civilizations. Knowledge of the Western tradition contextualizes our own country and society in an historically illuminating way: our legal system, our liberal political philosophy, and many of our social norms and cultural values were developed in the West, specifically in Britain, centuries before America’s birth. Britain, in turn, had built on tra-

40 HPR | AFRICA: READY TO PLAY? | SPRING 2010

ditions handed down from antiquity.

This cultural chain links America to previous epochs of world history, but higher education seems increasingly reluctant to acknowledge this reality.

Inconveniently for academics, America falls on a historical continuum that does not touch all nations of the world.

In earlier eras, Harvard had no trouble establishing this hierarchy of relevance. Reading knowledge of Latin and Greek was once a requirement for entrance to the college, with the understanding that classical knowledge, recognized as the foundation of our society, was best imparted by reading seminal ancient texts in their original languages. I would not argue that Harvard should reinstate these requirements, nor, of course, would I say that the university should go back to denying admission to women and minority groups. But in academia’s attempt to erase all traces of its canonical, maledominated past, we have gone to the other extreme, so eager to include that we minimize what is of greatest value.

We cannot become global citizens if we do not first understand our own national heritage. In minimizing the value of our own history and traditions, American colleges and universities are doing students a disservice. Hopefully Harvard is not condemning us to prove the truth of the George Santayana adage: “those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it.” ♦ Zoey Orol ‘10 is the Managing Editor Emeritus.