The Diplomacy Review, Volume Two, March 2021

THE

DIPLOMACY REVIEW The Global South Corruption 101 The Dividing Line Dear Western media, Get Your Narratives Straight Latin America: The New Battleground for the Sino-American Rivalry Hirak, Episode II

10 Years Later Unrest in India Over Farming Laws From Historic Struggles to an Unmatched Harmony The Noisy Neighbours Gone Quiet Rwanda: From Genocide to Being the World's Nr. 1 “Ending Forever Wars” or US Diplomatic Hegemony?

The Pressing Problem of Mexican Drug Violence and Instability

Dedication from the head editor Deontology requires us to question our work, what we write and what we fail to cover. The Global South is a subject that allows our team to counterbalance the preponderance of articles on the West. The Global South may sound like a geographical designation, however these countries are only set aside from that of the North by the shackles of political economy. The Global South pertains to: Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Pacific Islands, developing countries in Asia, and the Middle East. Often staged as supporting acts in articles covering Western dynamics, adequate coverage of countries and policies of the south are missing from European journalism, and mea culpa, from our work. To speak of the Global South is to avoid the lure of exoticisation and to offer space and visibility to the socio-political dynamics of southern countries.

In an exercise of journalistic introspection, our writers turn to The Global South. We hope that you will discover these countries as the cradles of political innovation, martyrs of Western struggles, hybridizations of social and religious norms and that hopefully, it will instill a desire to more holistic journalism coverage in the future.

To Abigail Paige

Editor Maeva Bleicher Designer Kiril Radovenski

CONTENT

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CORRUPTION 101

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BY OMAR KHAN

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DEAR WESTERN MEDIA, GET YOUR NARRATIVES STRAIGHT

BY SAM FOLWER

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BY LEA WOWRA

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HIRAK, EPISODE II

BY LUCIEN ENEV

THE DIVIDING LINE

LATIN AMERICA: THE NEW BATTLEGROUND FOR THE SINO-AMERICAN RIVALRY

BY HECTOR MCKECHNIE

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10 YEARS LATER

BY AFEK SHAMIR

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UNREST IN INDIA OVER FARMING LAWS

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BY SAULET TANIRBERGEN

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FROM HISTORIC STRUGGLES TO AN UNMATCHED HARMONY

BY PRATHAMESH JAGTAP

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BY ANOUSKA JHA

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“ENDING FOREVER WARS” OR US DIPLOMATIC HEGEMONY?

BY HUGO MCCULLAGH

THE NOISY NEIGHBOURS GONE QUIET

RWANDA: FROM GENOCIDE TO BEING THE WORLD'S NR. 1

BY VICTORIA KRÜGER

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THE PRESSING PROBLEM OF MEXICAN DRUG VIOLENCE AND INSTABILITY

BY JOHN MORGAN

Portrait of a Man in a Traditional Costume, Papua New Guinea

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CORRUPTION 101: HOW TRULY DAMAGING IS IT AND CAN IT BE STOPPED?

BY OMAR KHAN

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magine you’re in Sipopo, just outside the capital of Equatorial Guinea. You see a five-star hotel and fifty luxury villas standing empty while villagers dry their

clothes on the billion-dollar highway no-one drives on. A wealthy, oil-rich nation where the schools have no electricity and the ceilings collapse, where the hospitals are so expensive, according to Equatoguineans, they are “not there for us”, and where people are so poor, they are forced to drink directly from polluted rivers that flow right next to enormous government palaces.

Where there’s an economy, there’s corruption. $2,000,000,000,000 is lost to corrupt activities globally every year. Corruption is a betrayal of trust. It’s a crime that can affect nations and economies for decades. It victimises generations. Corruption is a cancer that is arguably more prevalent in the Global North but nonetheless has the most painful symptoms presenting in the South. Just ask the 700 victims of the 2021 explosions in Bata, Equatorial Guinea’s main city, caused by government malpractice and neglect. To fully understand the cancer, though, would require volumes of neverending studies. However, a brief and simplified overview of how rampant corruption is, how devastating its impacts are, and the efforts to tackle it across the Global South is possible using various case studies. After all, if it were as easy as saying that corruption is bad and all the perpetrators are criminals, Equatoguinean strongman Teodoro Obiang wouldn’t have shaken hands with a Nobel Peace Prize-winning US president.

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INVISIBLE BORDERS Azerbaijan, the Congo & Yemen Over one hundred tons of mortar shells and rockets was bought by the Republic of the Congo (or Congo-Brazzaville) from Azerbaijan in January 2020, sold through a Bulgarian company on a ship registered in Vanuatu and clandestinely received via Derince, a port 1,000 kilometres southeast of Istanbul. No official public record of the purchase exists. A confidential cargo manifest, however, shows that the shipment is the latest in a series since 2015 that have exported over five hundred tons of hand grenades, explosives, mortar systems, millions of bullets and more to the Central African state.

The largest shipments listed Saudi Arabia as a “sponsoring party”.

FARDC Patrol, Beni, Democratic Republic Of Congo, 2013 Reuters

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Congolese President Denis Sassou-Nguesso has held power for 36 years in part due to his highly-armed security services – his notorious Republican Guard received a cache of weapons from the Azeri Defence Ministry before launching the bloody 2016 postelection Pool offensive against the opposition Ninja militia which killed hundreds, displaced tens of thousands and saw “an unlawful use of lethal force by the country’s security forces” according to Amnesty International. Though the weapons, responsible for the helicopter bombing of a school, cannot be traced back to Baku, many agree with Incarner L’Espoir party leader Andréa Ngombet Malewa:

“[The] regime deployed a scorched earth strategy.

The weapons that they bought from Azerbaijan went straight to that operation.”

A chilling statement considering another election is due in March 2021, with the Brazzaville government preparing for another possible massacre more than a year in advance. Before understanding how corruption works or how to stop it, it is important to appreciate the very real human cost.

Now to spot the corruption in this case. It goes without saying that Sassou-Nguesso is a hardened dictator, but the key is noting that Congo-Brazzaville is currently suffering from arguably the worst debt crisis in its history – so how did it pay for the shipment whose estimated value is tens of thousands of dollars? Well, now we know what Saudi Arabian sponsorship entails. Though not official, financial statements in Jeddah indicate that the Saudi regime either paid for the cargo deliveries or the weapons themselves. Why? It’s no coincidence that these payments coincided with the negotiations for Congo-Brazzaville’s eventual accession to OPEC in 2018, the Riyadhdominated oil-producer’s club. Saudi Arabia’s dangerous presence in the global arms trade is protected by the United Kingdom, France, and the United States, up until Pre-

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President Joe Biden’s decision to stop supplying the bombs used to annihilate Yemen.

The blatant corruption of keeping all assets of Aramco (the world’s largest company) within one family and having journalists assassinated for disagreeing with the Crown Prince (also in Turkey) cannot be exposed as long as the West continues to support the regime.

As for the Azeri connection, it is suspected that the private Silk Way Airlines, connected to the family of President Ilham Aliyev and registered in the British Virgin Islands, has not only flown weapons to the Congo but also to multiple embargoed conflict zones using diplomatic clearance to smuggle arms. Azeri opacity is an asset for authoritarian leaders looking to purchase weapons under the radar – it’s no surprise that Serbia and Bulgaria have also been implicated in selling weapons to CongoBrazzaville through companies such as Transmobile and Yugoimport.

When Raymond Malonga, a satirical cartoonist, was kidnapped from hospital by plainclothes officers in Brazzaville in February 2021, Ngombet went on to say that they “are worried that the weapons that Sassou-Nguesso’s regime bought from Azerbaijan could be used to crack down on the opposition during the upcoming election.”

Although firms in Europe and North America are often linked to corruption and secretive arms deals, the trail of blood and tears seems to stop everywhere else. Note that corrupt leaders are not precluded from doing business with so-called champions of democracy and freedom. As long as the West protects them, activities like these cannot be stopped. More significantly, it stops any possibility for positive change – as Ngombet put it: “They don’t want the world to see how much the Congolese people are eager for political change.”

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SOCIALISTS GET GREEDY TOO Brazil, Myanmar & South Sudan For such a complex crime, how corruption works is relatively simple. Transparency International explains it clearly: “corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain.” How this happens depends on how creative you are – unsurprisingly most crooks are not all that imaginative. Bribery, theft, and violence are common at all levels from landowners extorting people in Punjab to cabinet ministers taking bribes in Delhi. Of course, the higher up the bad apple, the more opportunities that arise and more damage that can be done. Offshore tax havens, cronyism, stealing and hiding public funds, arbitrary imprisonment, and a violent suppression of human rights are all on the table.

Three examples can be used to demonstrate the typical means by which nationwide programmes of corruption are initiated, with their crucial differences underlining the ever-important effects of cultural and historical influences.

Protests, Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2015 Reuters

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First, Pindorama. “If I talk, the republic is going to fall.” Operation Car Wash revealed the largest corruption scandal in Latin American history, took down three Brazilian presidents and changed some of the world’s biggest economies forever. So how did Car Wash, led by young judge Sérgio Moro, pull it off? Alberto Youssef, who ran a small petrol station and car wash complex in Brasilia, was arrested on suspicion of money laundering – “doleiros” would declare black market money as petrol station earnings, a common activity. However, the reason he claimed the republic would fall if he confessed was the fact that his clients were not just common criminals but politicians, executives and some of the wealthiest, most influential people in Brazil. Consider an example of how corruption typically worked: Petrobras, the largest state-owned oil company on the continent, plans to build a new factory so normally construction firms would compete for the contract. Instead, a “cartel” of firms, led by the largest Odebrecht, would join together and receive a ridiculously-larger sum than before. In exchange for receiving the contracts, the “cartel” agreed to siphon off 1-5% (via laundering sites such as the car wash) of the share into a slush fund used to bribe politicians and executives to keep giving contracts to them. For instance, Rio de Janeiro

Petrobras, Brazil

mayor Sergio Cabral received over $800,000 for a refinery in Itaboraí that was never built, and whose cost was pushed up $8,000,000 by the “cartel”.

When it was discovered that these “doleiros” were also working for Petrobras executive Paulo Costa, the gloves went off and Car Wash was launched with Moro and hero cop Newton Ishii uncovering the shocking truth that: more than $2,000,000,000 was siphoned off Petrobras in bribes and secret payments for contract work, $3,300,000,000 was paid in bribes by Odebrecht, more than 1,000 politicians were on the take from meat-packing firm JBS, 16 companies were implicated, at least 50 congressmen were accused, and every living president since 1985 was under investigation. The operation also implicated three Peruvian presidents, the Venezuelan government and influential individuals in seven Latin American countries, shutting down at least 17 projects and laying off millions. After the ruling Workers’ Party senior senator Delcído do Amaral was arrested after a humiliating sting operation, the incarceration of popular former president Lula da Silva was inevitable. You see, despite his laudable work on poverty and the environment, Brazil’s political structure makes corruption a necessity for any politician: federal, state and city elections across the fifth-biggest country on Earth means campaigns are inanely expensive and that it is practically impossible for any one party to win a majority. Therefore, appointing executives (to companies like Petrobras) to secure illegal campaign finances is an unfortunate necessity. Moreover, to gain the cooperation of other parties, money must be spent. When this “mensalão” scandal was discovered in 2004, Lula was forced to work with the most corrupt party in the country, Michel Temer’s PMDB which spelled his demise. Ironically, the anticorruption efforts of his successor President Dilma Rousseff enabled Car Wash to go ahead. PMDB politician Eduardo Cunha wanted the operation to stop before it got to him and thus orchestrated the impeachment of Rousseff, though he went to prison anyway. She was succeeded by Temer, who epitomises the sort of person Car Wash was supposed to stop but he was only charged. Coinciding with the drop in commodity

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prices, Brazil’s economy collapsed, and unemployment doubled. Understandably, farright Jair Bolsonaro’s anti-corruption mandate appealed to voters in 2018 and brought in an equally, if not more, destructive administration, though this is mainly due to the president’s conservative, homophobic and sexist rhetoric as well as his government’s COVID-19 failures – in spite of this, he is still popular and has been praised by NGOs for his anti-corruption work. Even still, Bolsonaro’s family have been implicated in a number of corruption and interference scandals that could be Car Wash-related proving that very few in Brazil are immune. One unemployed citizen of Itaboraí, who planned to work at the unfinished refinery said: “We don’t know the people we elect.

They come in disguise.”

It is important to appreciate that we only know the true extent of Brazil’s ongoing battle with corruption because of the unprecedented success of Car Wash, which was enabled by the Workers’ Party itself – as a Federal Police union representative said: “They lost power because they did the right thing.” However, in most countries, anticorruption efforts are either non-existent or mere facades and the criminal activities themselves work in different ways.

On 1 February 2021, civilian government leader Aung Sang Suu Kyi and President Win Myint were arrested in Naypyidaw by the military, known as the Tatmadaw, led by General Min Anh Hlaing on charges of electoral fraud. The coup ended Myanmar’s short-lived dalliance with democracy, led to mass demonstrations, hundreds of deaths and injuries, but also the exposure of the Tatmadaw’s illicit funding. Similar to nations such as Pakistan and Thailand, the military has always had great influence in the government of Myanmar, and also akin to these countries, it does not just receive funding from the national budget. When militaries have powers independent of a civilian government, a useful way of maintaining their influence is securing independent funding; this way, generals can pay their men, bribe politicians, extort tax-

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Gen. Ne Win and Chinese Foreign Minister Zhou Enlai Review an Honor Guard

payers, push around lawmakers and control governance behind the scenes. When General Ne Win overthrew the government in 1962 and enforced his Burmese Way to Socialism, he set up a system where battalions had to fund their own operations by taking stakes in local businesses. Surviving the 8888 Uprising and the right-wing State Peace and Development Council dictatorship, this idea led to two large conglomerates being established in the 1990s, Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd (MEHL) and the Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC), which have stakes in businesses and industries across the country including banking, mining, tobacco, tourism and even an indoor skydiving centre in Yangon.

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Critically, the Tatmadaw top brass runs these conglomerates with a third of shares held by military units and the rest by former and current personnel, including Min Anh Hlaing and his son Aung Pyae Sone who owns a beach resort and a majority share in the national telecommunications company Mytel. Leaked reports showed that MEHL paid out $16,600,000,000 in dividends from 1990 to 2011, and stripped 35 individuals off their shares for crimes such as desertion indicating its use for punishment as well as rewards. Undoubtedly, these funds obtained illicitly enabled the 2021 coup – according to the United Nations, the conglomerates allow the Tatmadaw to “insulate itself from accountability and oversight.” While some companies and individuals such as Japanese drinks firm Kirin and Singaporean tobacco investor Lim Kaling have suspended cooperation with MEHL, the Tatmadaw is still secured by China and Russia’s paralysis of the UN Security Council and the abject failure of the UK, New Zealand and Canada to follow the US’s example of sanctions targeted at the conglomerates. Though this is a different means of corruption to Brazil, the result is similar – the people and small businesses suffer, with many Burmese comparing themselves to Sicily under the Mafia.

Anna Roberts, from Burma Change UK, explained that the people “want the military back to barracks, and they want a civilian economy and a civilian federal government that respects their wishes.” Unfortunately, a ruthless military junta continuing to get rich despite international sanctions doesn’t exactly have a motive for respecting the people’s wishes.

The previous examples have all happened in peacetime, but what effect does war have on an already damaged system? When UN official Yasmin Sooka returned from South Sudan in 2016, she warned that something as horrifying as, and possibly worst than, the Rwandan genocide would probably happen again in a country already ravaged by war – her latest report now shows that the government and senior politicians have embezzled $36,000,000 since 2016, robbing the South Sudanese of a stable future. Corruption

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perpetuated the fighting in a vicious cycle that killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions during a brutal civil war that technically ended in February 2020 though shocking violence continues throughout the fractured nation. The youngest country in the world consists of over 60 disparate ethnic groups who were previously united against the Khartoum government until their autonomy was gained in 2005 and finally independence in 2011. The largest groups are the Dinka and the Nuer – Stetsonwearing President Salva Kiir, a Dinka, invited Riek Machar, a Nuer, to become his deputy in a show of unity. Two years later, their personal rivalry escalated into a terrifying ethnic conflict that saw war crimes, humanitarian emergencies and a populace brought to the brink of starvation.

South Sudan Militants, 2016, Shutterstock

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The hidden element, however, is how oil comes in. Being an oil-rich nation, it was assumed that South Sudan would survive on its own but in truth the mismanagement of the reserves and senior rulers fighting over resources was a long-term cause of the civil war. The Sentry argues that the civil war and ongoing violence is “largely the result of conflicts among the elites who are desiring to “re-negotiate” shares of politicaleconomic power balance, including natural resources, through war.” Infamous examples include:

... the spending of nearly $1,000,000 of public money on famine-relieving cereals that never came in 2013; the military’s tens of thousands of “ghost soldiers”, troops who exist only on payroll documents, said to be the primary method of military and security officials to divert wealth to private accounts; and, most disturbingly, the soldiers in this conflict over resources who are offered the chance to abduct and rape women in lieu of their salaries

Sooka alleges that several “international corporations and multinational banks have aided and abetted in these crimes,” supported by Kiir’s family’s links to Asian oil giants, British tycoons and traders from Ethiopia, Uganda, Eritrea and Kenya. Every example has one clear thing in common: the people were those who suffered. Again, due to Western influences, even in a perpetuating cycle of war and corruption, true justice is hard to find.

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BLOWING UP A COUNTRY Lebanon & South Africa Sometimes corruption goes further. Sometimes corruption itself singlehandedly destroys a country, or in the case of Lebanon, literally blows it up. The 2020 explosion at the port of Beirut, killing 210 people and destroying the main source of food imports, was the result of years of systemic corruption. Lebanese protestors are not calling for the resignation of one politician – they want the entire political system dismantled and cleansed of corrupt practice. But how does the system work? Based on confessionalism, it was set up by French colonists aiming to ensure equal religious representation in politics by making the president a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim and the speaker of the house a Shiite Muslim. However, factionalism caused a civil war from 1975-1990 ended by the Taif Agreement that divided parliament into religious groups which allowed militia leaders and oligarchs to entrench themselves at the top of their respective factions with power usually handed down from father to son.

Each group essentially became a fiefdom based on patronage and self-enrichment.

Critically, they each took charge of certain government services, but these were neglected as the rulers stole public money: the Sunnis’ waste management cost the taxpayer $420,000,000 a year, yet garbage would pile up in cities to ridiculous amounts; the Maronites’ electricity and water utilities saw regular blackouts and undrinkable water coming out of taps. However, any attempt to criticise one section of government was tantamount to attacking the entire religious sect it belonged to meaning reform became excruciatingly difficult. Consequently, debt skyrocketed. Then Syria happened.

Lebanon’s economy depends on imports and its banks’ famously high interest rates that quickly became sustainable only by constantly attracting more deposits – when the Syrian civil war broke out, investors withdrew their money and the financial system collapsed. When the Saudi regime kidnapped prime minister Saad Hariri, forced his resignation then sent him back to Lebanon to resume his post, the markets lost confidence and poverty and unemployment rose substantially. The IMF could not provide help without reform and naturally this did not come.

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Explosion Site, Beirut, Lebanon 2020, Reuters

One consequence of the blatant corruption among the Lebanese elite was the 2,700 tons of explosive ammonium nitrate that sat in the port of Beirut for seven years, neglected by the government, before it exploded on 4 August 2020 causing $15,000,000 worth of damages and rendering a quarter of million people homeless. Immediately, President Michel Aoun, Prime Minister Hassan Diab and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nusrallah traded blame and accused each other proving to the people that the system was broken.

Now with similar government failures in response to COVID-19, it is clear that a country destroyed by religious factionalism in the last century seems to have been destroyed by the unity of the elites to protect and enrich themselves and their cronies in this century.

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Tsamina mina zangalewa. This time for Africa? At the time of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, South Africa was coming to the end of its “golden age” of sustained economic growth, a rising black middle class, and one of the fastest rates of development in the world. The Rainbow Nation that anti-apartheid leaders such as Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki had spearheaded was an example for the rest of the continent to follow.

Then it all came crashing down; a recession hit, unemployment rose, racial tensions resurfaced, and gun violence increased, all primarily due to the cancer of corruption spread mainly by President Jacob Zuma. Already a controversial character who actively practiced polygamy and had standing allegations of organised crime and even rape against him before he became president in 2009, Zuma quickly polarises opinion: on the one hand, he is an esteemed anti-apartheid campaigner, but on the other, since he entered politics, it is clear his one objective has always been to enrich himself above all else. Siphoning off billions from the public coffers for him and his inner circle caused foreign investment to plummet and national services to suffer. Revelations about the 1990s South African Arms Deal with multiple European firms which cost over $3,000,000,000 exposed Zuma for abusing his position as deputy president to increase his personal wealth. This was one of the first of many corruption cases brought against him. State institutions such as housing and education have failed miserably due to corrupt activities, unqualified teachers bribing their way in and government-built houses collapsing being some examples. Hundreds of other cases involve billions officially spent on developing the poorest areas of the country without any development projects going ahead. The result of scandals such as that involving the Gupta brothers, who enjoyed lucrative contracts from Zuma whilst involved in money laundering and other financial crimes, is a rise in poverty and violence.

The legal cases against Zuma have popularised an important term: state capture, defined as “a form of corruption in which businesses and politicians conspire to influence a country's decision-making process to advance their own interests.” It also involves weakening anti-corruption institutions in a country. State capture in South Africa and Lebanon are stark examples of the unending devastation malpractice in a 19

public office cause. It is perhaps the worst kind of corruption, to not only cause the people’s immediate suffering but to victimise their children and grandchildren, to wipe away hope for a better future. Though major systemic change is still to come, President Cyril Ramaphosa maintains his unwavering anti-corruption stance and there is growing hope that South Africa can turn the corner on this dark chapter of its post-apartheid history. However, as long as the criminals remain in expensive suits, shaking hands with world leaders and multinational executives, it makes it hard to put the handcuffs on.

Pres. Ramaphosa and Jacob Zuma, 2019, Bussines Daily

WE KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRDS SING Israel, China & Malaysia So how do we stop corruption? It goes without saying that having law enforcement and the judiciary on side is a major asset. Many corrupt officials have been removed from power and even imprisoned, including presidents (such as Lula in Brazil, though he was recently controversially released) and prime ministers (such as Nawaz Sharif in Pakistan 20

Pakistan, after his illegal finances were exposed in the Panama Papers). But how can we separate a corruption case from politics? Well, truthfully the answer is we can’t, but that does not always have to be a bad thing. Take the case of prime minister Najib Razak who was arrested and sentenced to 12 years in prison for abuse of power and a further 10 years for money laundering in 2020. The 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal alleged that Najib, who set up the 1MDB sovereign wealth fund in 2009 (that is, a government-owned investment fund built with state earnings used to improve economic development), knowingly transferred $10,000,000 from the fund to his private account. The scandal involved American and Malaysian authorities estimating $4,500,000,000 to have been siphoned from the fund, with the money being linked to luxury properties, van Gogh artwork and multinational banks – Goldman Sachs was forced to pay $3,900,000,000 for its involvement. As for the politics, the scandal was the main reason for Najib’s humiliating election defeat in 2018 to 92-yearold Dr Mahathir Mohamad who went on to lead a dangerously-fragile coalition. When this coalition dramatically collapsed in early 2020 and Najib’s pro-Malay party, UMNO returned to power under Muhyiddin Yassin, the former prime minister felt confident that the trial would end in his favour. Fortunately, internal politics had more sway since Muhyiddin had previously been fired by Najib for his objections to the scandal meaning that rather than use his influence to acquit Najib, he left the young anticorruption forces to it and saw a criminal conviction.

Unfortunately, politics can also be an obstacle for the judiciary as is the case for serving prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu who was indicted in 2020 for fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes on three separate occasions. Unlike Najib who maintained that he was misled by advisors, Netanyahu prefers to label his ongoing corruption trial a “witch hunt”, unsurprisingly reminiscent of President Donald Trump’s rhetoric. In a court appearance in May 2020, he said that the trial was trying to “depose a strong, right-wing prime minister, and thus remove the nationalist camp from the leadership of the country for many years.” There are three main cases against him: Case 4,000 alle-

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ges Netanyahu granted regulatory favours worth around $500,000,000 to telecommunications company Bezeq and in return, he sought positive coverage of himself and wife Sara on a news website controlled by the company’s former chairman, Shaul Elovitch (he and his wife, Iris, have been charged with bribery and obstruction of justice); Case 1,000, in which Netanyahu and his wife wrongfully received almost 700,000 shekels worth of gifts from Arnon Milchan, an Israeli Hollywood producer, and Australian billionaire businessman James Packer for help with their business interests; and, case 2,000 that alleges Netanyahu negotiated a deal with Arnon Mozes, owner of Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, for better coverage and that, in return, he offered legislation that would slow the growth of a rival newspaper. The case has polarised the electorate. Thousands of demonstrators gather weekly outside his official residence and across Israel under the banner of “Crime Minister”, demanding he quit, but his right-wing base has stayed loyal. Supporters see the man they call King Bibi as strong on security and foreign affairs. Since he has survived three elections despite being on trial, the fourth one in March 2021 due to another failed coalition is not set to

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Jerusalem, 2020, Flash 90

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be any different. Of course, the trial itself could take years unless sufficient evidence is found to force Netanyahu into a plea deal but at the moment, this seems unlikely.

Unlike most of the world, in China, if you are found guilt of corruption, you are not sent to prison. You are executed. Of course, the death penalty, which was awarded to Lai Xiaomin for bribery, embezzlement and bigamy in January 2021, is reserved for the few special cases. Most of those arrested are forcibly disappeared, purged from the party and incarcerated in the harshest conditions – unsurprisingly, a number attempt suicide before they are caught. Paramount Leader Xi Jinping came to power in 2012 with a solid ambition to root out corruption in the Communist Party and end factionalism in the Politburo and military. The benefit of ruling with an iron fist is anti-corruption actually seems quite successful: since 2012, authorities have investigated more than 2,700,000 officials and punished more than 1,500,000 people. They include seven national-level leaders and two dozen high-ranking generals. Prosecutors have tried 58,000 officials and sentenced two to death. Despite these efforts and the widespread domestic popularity gained, independent review (such as Transparency International) has suggested that they have done very little to improve the situation – China still scores 40/100, even though 87% of citizens say they believe things to have gotten better. One possible explanation was offered by professor Zhang Ming: “Once you establish and empower agencies to investigate, they will inevitably find more and more people to lock up. Eventually, it hurts the party’s prestige and the public confidence in it.” Alongside the blatant disregard for human rights, Beijing has been careful to marry its anti-corruption efforts with its evermore important economic policies with analyst Wu Qing commenting that “the financial industry is the focus of the anti-corruption campaign. It’s in line with the government’s economic policies such as ‘de-bubbling’ and stabilising the finance sector.” Evidently, there are a several different ways law enforcement can handle anti-corruption, but the key step is at least having them commit to it.

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IT’S TIME TO GET ANGRY Algeria, Kyrgyzstan, Nicaragua & Burkina Faso Most of the time, the establishment, including law enforcement, is either silently or actively complicit in corrupt activities therefore justice must be achieved in other ways, one being popular unrest. Mass demonstrations against corruption are common across the world and attention is often drawn to cases such as in Russia, Belarus, or Romania.

In the Global South, however, it is commonly assumed that nothing will actually change despite the protests and while this can be true, stand-out examples prove that this is a wrong assumption to make.

Change takes different forms, goes at different paces, and produces disparate results depending on where you are. To show this, consider the ongoing protests in Algeria that toppled President Abdelaziz Bouteflika in 2019 and those in Kyrgyzstan that removed President Sooronbay Jeenbekov in 2020. These are both examples of partial change due to popular uprisings – in Algiers and Kherrata, the Hirak movement called for the end of the political elite and although the ruler of almost twenty years resigned, the people see no difference with his successor Abdelmadjid Tebboube and continue to protest. Similarly, in Bishkek, though Jeenbekov resigned after protestors stormed the presidential palace, his successor Sadyr Japarov continues to lead the pro-Moscow elite.

In both cases, the powerful figureheads of corruption left but the system stayed on.

Managua, in recent years, saw protests against the stealing of public funds by Sandinista President Daniel Ortega, an example of little or no change – Ortega continues to rule corruptly. Finally, Burkina Faso in 2014 saw the people rise up against corruption and overthrow the brutal dictatorship of Blaise Compaoré, an example of more positive change from mass demonstrations.

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THE DRUGS, THE VIRUS & THE CANCER Imagine you’re in Kassumba, in the south of Guinea-Bissau. You see the white sand on the beach, the calmly-swaying palm trees, the crystal clear water and the bag of cocaine washed up by the tide. Although Guinea-Bissau is classified as a “narco-state”, BissauGuineans simply want what most people do: “we just want fresh water and better schools,” says one village elder. The illegal drugs trade is one of the many instances where corruption thrives, and people suffer. The Syrian government uses illegal Captagon production to finance the bloodshed and Central American nations like Mexico and Honduras have long been plagued by narco-politics. Where there’s an economy, there’s corruption. Even in the COVID-19 pandemic, corruption stews. Cases of people bribing their way out of lockdown restrictions in Cameroon and Uganda inevitably caused further spread of the disease, and allegations of PPE and vaccine corruption in both the Global North and South are becoming more common. It is not possible to root it out for good, but we can make it difficult to get away with it – ultimately, scaring public officials is the only way to prevent corrupt practices. As long as there is someone still advocating for justice, there is always hope.

FIN.

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THE DIVIDING LINE WHERE IS THE ‘GLOBAL SOUTH’?

BY SAM FOLWER

T

he Global South a phrase we use today generally to indicate countries in certain regions which are deemed low or middle income. These regions tend to be

Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean and Oceania. Notice my use of ‘tend to be’ and ‘generally’. This ambiguity is intentional as there is no definite list of which countries do or do not come under the Global South banner and the map provided with this introduction is only an estimate. The label has a complicated history running back to the earliest days of European exploration, leading right up to the modern day and contemporary debate. By following this path through how the world has been divided and nations sorted by academics we will be able to answer our two key questions: how did so much the world become a part of this Global South and is the phrase even useful?

LABELLING DEVELOPMENT: As with many discussions rooted in scholarly debate, the origins of the argument on how different areas of the world should be labelled began in the period of European colonisation, culminating in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The journeys taken

by European explorers, soldiers and administrators effectively determined which countries were ‘close’ and which ‘distant’, of course from the perspective of imperial capitals. Accompanying this was the process of ‘logical’ Westerners trying to understand some of the ‘primitive’ societies far from home. Such a mentality prevailed throughout colonisation and only began to change as these territories across the world began to gain their independence after the Second World War. Many of these new nations needed assistance former colonial powers to build infrastructure for transport, trade and communications. Programmes were set up by nation states such as the US 26

Gold Mine in Brazil, 1986, Sebastiano Salgado

27

but also by new international organisations like the International Monetary Fund and the United Nations. Thus was created the difference between ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ countries – i.e. those giving the help and those receiving it.

Whilst many of these development plans continued, a new conception of the world was devised in the 1960s based around an economically central set of countries and those other nations which served their interests. The ‘Core-Periphery’ model singled out wealthy, industrialised and mostly former-imperial states in the West as remaining very much in control of the global economy despite the wave of independence days sweeping large parts of the globe. The often newly autonomous ‘periphery’ was set up to support this core by providing cheap commodities for processing and markets to purchase back much more valuable manufactured goods. Now not only were parts of the planet more or less ‘developed’ there was the new question of agency – did poorer countries really have control or were they simply manipulated for the good of the longstanding elite?

A GLOBAL PUPPET SHOW ?

Cold War politics and divisions between capitalist and communist went some way to leaving direct imperialist legacy behind. The new split was between those countries allied with the US (the First World) and those supporting the USSR (the Second World). In between was a final and uninspiringly named group, the Third World – for those who supported neither side distinctly or were not targets of either American or Soviet wooing. So ubiquitous this phrase would become to describe countries with poor standards of living that its’ original purpose has largely been forgotten. Now it is rather out-dated as the fall of the USSR removed most traces of the Second World, and many former members of the Third World became extraordinarily productive. Namely these were countries such as India or the ‘Asian Tiger’ economies (Singapore and the Philippines amongst others).

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Scholarly attention turned away from the old rivalries of the Cold War and focussed more closely on the idea of globalisation. This is the process by which countries, often great distances apart, become economically interdependent on one another due to increasingly close trade links and agreements. Initially concerns rested on the prospect of the creation of a homogenous global identity which would wipe out smaller social characteristics which didn’t suit the mould. Later they turned to the idea that globalisation, which whilst enriching some nations and revolutionising economies, was leaving some others behind – reinforcing and not reducing international inequality.

THE EMERGENCE OF THE GLOBAL SOUTH: This is where we see the ‘Global South’ emerge. The map should make clear that ‘south’ is not entirely a geographical designation, instead reflecting a contrast hanging over from imperialism. This is insomuch as ‘northern’ states such as the US and Europe were where development occurred earliest and therefore acted as a model for subsequent industrialisation. Any phrase which covers such a broad, unspecified set of nations is going to reduce nuance regarding the complexities of individual cases. However, the Global South does represent a genuine step forward in describing broad phenomena in the world’s varying levels of development whilst respecting the history of often systematically disadvantaged countries and simultaneously their present inequality. By covering a large area in a sweeping statement, it also removes the internal barriers of nation states in this group, allowing for comparisons across this immensely diverse cohort to be established and studied with greater ease.

Map of the Global South

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Going forward there are new challenges. Even nations tagged with the Global South label have their own domestic inequalities, and trends in many of them suggest the gaps between the richest and poorest in society are increasing. A new description may need to be established instead to more clearly differentiate between these groups and how certain internal groups have common experiences across national boundaries due to their income, a great challenge without returning to communist ideas of class theory and struggle. It must also be remembered that many states in the Global South now wish to assert themselves, aware of how they are perceived and how they got into that position. In this case the Global South might become a group for resistance against the processes of globalisation which many governments feel have failed and manipulated them in the past. The debate over how the world should be descriptively divided is now over a century old and it shows no sign of waning – if anything it is more complicated than ever.

FIN.

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DEAR WESTERN MEDIA, GET YOUR NARRATIVES STRAIGHT

BY LEA WOWRA

I

n early February, amid BBC headlines on ethnic clashes in Nigeria, new Ebola outbreaks in Guinea, and individual fates in the conflict-ridden region of Tigray,

Ethiopia, a strikingly positive one stood out: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the former Finance Minister of Nigeria, was appointed as the first female, African director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO). While this was happy news, it certainly clashed with the overarching theme of chaos and disaster prevailing over BBC’s Africa News.

But Africa is much more than a continent ridden by poverty, disease, conflict, and corruption. Unbalanced reporting about the continent makes a lot of good news go unnoticed. Africans – wherever they are – pay the price.

Logo of BBC's Africa Eye Series

Overly negative media coverage of Africa persists in large part because non-Africans are setting the global news agenda. A new study commissioned by the donor collaborative Africa No Filter found that due to a lack of resources, African media outlets source one-third of all their stories relating to the continent from Western news services. If Africa currently lacks a microphone on the global and domestic stage, it follows that Western media outlets have extra responsibility to report in a diverse and balanced manner and even to reconsider how they conduct their reporting. Given the historical debt that rest upon Western shoulders, Western media must make sure to report accordingly and fight colonial biases.

CONSEQUENCES OF MISPERCEPTIONS: In the United Kingdom, misperceptions fuelled by the media have grave consequences for people of African descent. The skewed power dynamics resulting from all the “bad news” Westerners consume – or the donations they make after witnessing disaster on TV in their living rooms – feed into systemic discrimination inherent to many societies.

In a 2019 Nuffield College survey, 19% of respondents agreed some ethnic groups were born less intelligent than others, while 38% found that some ethnic groups were inherently less hard working. The manifestation of such racist beliefs reaches from high levels of disciplinary and exclusion measures at school, to discrimination in job application procedures, to anti-Black violence.

On the African continent, negative media coverage inhibits economic development.

High lending rates weaken African positions in the financial market. The continent continues to receive less foreign direct investment than other developing regions despite constituting the fastest growing middle class.

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The solution to this is more balanced reporting, and that starts with serious selfreflection by Western media. Even good news about African countries is often given a negative slant. In September, the BBC promoted one of its articles about the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa on Twitter: “Coronavirus in Africa: Could poverty explain mystery of low death rate?”. While the article only glanced over the fact that early reactions by African governments accounted for lower death tolls, the headline said a lot about the type of news Western audiences expect on Africa.

Of course, this problem is not limited to the United Kingdom and even less to the BBC. In 2019, a New York Times job advertisement for the head of its Nairobi bureau sparked outrage as it proclaimed the post would delight its readers with “unexpected stories of hope”. A 2019 review of Australian opinion pieces by the anti-racism organisation All Together Now found an unacceptably high number reflected racist attitudes towards African Australians.

'Fuck Off We're Full' Sign on Australian Border, 2020, Ann Foo

LET’S SWITCH THE NARRATIVE: So, what positive stories on Africa have gone relatively unnoticed? Recently, Zimbabwe banned coal mining in all its national parks. Kenyans have been using M-Pesa – a mobile banking service – for more than a decade. The number of women serving in parliaments in many African countries far surpasses that in Europe and North America.

And, again, while Covid-19 began to spread in the West, Africans were highly proactive, scaling up medical equipment, closing borders, churches, and mosques before the first case on the continent had been detected. There certainly is a lot Western countries can learn from Africa.

As Africa correspondents, Western media should employ more local journalists to provide more in-depth and nuanced coverage of their countries’ developments.

Reporting on disastrous events is important, but it is as important to offer context.

Coverage of ethnic clashes, for instance, should offer a sense of how the colonial design of borders has fostered instability. Local journalists are better suited to provide this context as they understand their country’s circumstances and have a serious interest in avoiding colonial stereotypes.

If non-Africans set the global news agenda, Western media outlets must be held responsible to tell all stories in their entirety. Otherwise, they contribute to the persistence of colonial stereotypes that have wrongfully portrayed many Africans as inferior to Europeans. Shifting media narratives on Africa will be crucial to remedying blatant biases and inequalities in society. So, read that article on the WTO’s new African lady-boss before you open the next one on conflict in Nigeria. It might shift some perceptions.

FIN. 34

LATIN AMERICA MAY BE THE NEW BATTLEGROUND FOR THE SINO-AMERICAN RIVALRY NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN

BY HECTOR MCKECHNIE

A

t its core, history can be defined as a power competition between two actors.

The ‘winner’ sets the rules to which the ‘loser’ must adhere. Now well into the 21st

century chapter, can we surmise that little has really changed?

Make no mistake, new actors replace old ones, technology advances, cultures die and social practices evolve. In the grand scheme, these are minor adjustments in comparison to the actors who control the technology, the actors who make historic decisions, and the actors who define social behaviours. Those who wield power are the history-makers.

WHY LATIN AMERICA? This power contest takes place continually all over the world. For two reasons, Latin America is a particularly inviting example. First, the actors in the arena are gargantuan.

In one corner, the US stands stoic as the winner in its Soviet struggle, the talisman of the democratic system and the traditional financial bedrock of our free-market economy. Rising eerily but forcefully in the other corner is China, a competitor enriched by the US-led economic system, and with unprecedented access to the apparatus of global power.

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To accompany the enormous power-capabilities of these global behemoths is something of greater importance: the social, technological, and ideological consequences of such a contest. This article endeavours to explore the key facets of this ongoing, but already historic, Latin American meeting: its context, its outcome and its wider impacts on our history.

Since the independence wave swept through Latin America in the 1800s, the US has maintained a regional hold on power. Of course, at that time, the apparatus of power limited the ability of other actors from ever competing with the US. Technology meant that communication was reliant on geography: your neighbour heavily influenced your foreign policy. For Latin American nations, their northern neighbour with its enormous consumer demand and wealth, never ceased in its ability and capacity to satisfy trade quotas. Even as technology advanced into the 20th century, the Soviet Union could never match the US in these ways.

CHINA’S REGIONAL RISE Now the situation has changed. China is a real and present alternative. It desires and demands Latin American products: nearly 30% of exports from Brazil, Peru and Chile are bought by China. This trend is increasing with other countries following step, and Sino-Latin trade has risen from $10 billion in 2000, to $300 billion in 2018. In sum, China has demonstrated both its capability and willingness to fulfil the US’ traditional role in the region.

For China to reach this point, in a game of stratospheric stakes with the US as a worthy adversary, has undoubtedly required supreme caution, calculation and cunning. Behind these complexities however, the fundamental basis of China’s Latin American strategy is simple. China has targeted investment toward infrastructure, the sector with which Latin America has typically struggled. For years, trends in Latin American economic

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Sailors Waving Chinese and Panamese Flags, Panama, 2018, Reuters

growth have been stagnant, roughly 2.2% in 2018. Why? Because there is no framework to support growth, no labour force that can efficiently and sufficiently drive productivity, and too little tax revenue to fund internal projects. Consequently, insufficient infrastructure exposes Latin America to China, a weakness upon which any great power might feast and capitalise.

Thus, to remain economically competitive, attractive and afloat, Latin American countries must confront their infrastructure issues with haste. Chinese investment promises to suture these wounds with a rapidly expanding regional portfolio of rail, dam, port, and canal projects. In Argentina for example, nearly $5billion has been invested in rail projects to connect the Northern and Western agricultural territories with its Eastern ports.

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Without the context of this greater power game, one might view these events as fair, perhaps altruistic. Surely, more money for these countries is beneficial for all those involved, and the US can have no basis for objection if people’s lives are improved? But we cannot adopt this simplistic approach. Whilst Latin America seizes this financial offer and the subsequent infrastructural and economic opportunities for prosperity it brings, a niggling question remains: what is this agreement really going to cost?

The answer is: your sovereignty. The financial term for it is ‘collateral’. Depending on areas of investment, collateral can be taken in different ways. Perhaps this year it will be oil assets in Ecuador, or next year beef and pork quotas in Argentina? Regardless of form, collateral ensures that money must return to its lenders. We start to see China pressing its advantage in the regional power play.

AN INEFFECTIVE RESPONSE Whilst China’s developments have provoked a US response, these reactions have either been blocked by domestic agendas or ineffective in their strategies. There is bi-partisan consensus that China is the US’ geopolitical rival. Outside this agreement, domestic attitudes have varied. In 2015, President Obama created the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), promoting and liberalising trade between 12 countries on the Pacific Rim. This was quickly scrapped by President Trump in 2017, a manoeuvre in-line with his mistrust of foreign engagement. In his 2020 campaign, President Biden called for $4 billion to be invested in Central America to “catalyse growth and reduce poverty”.

Thus far, his administration has put regional strategies on hold, prioritising the passing of the American Rescue Plan instead. Similar rhetoric from former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo when visiting regional neighbours, reflected the meekness of the American response. When choosing between real investment offers from China, and pleas from the US not to engage, the choice is clear and obvious. Post-pandemic, it will be interesting to see how the US rethinks its approach to regional diplomacy, and whether Latin America will continue to be a hotly-contested Sino-US battleground.

Undoubtedly and regardless of outcome, humanitarian projects funded by both sides are facades. The true intentions lie within strategic gamesmanship.

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CONCLUSION Latin America is a new battleground for the great-power competition of our era. Far from being in a position to object or resist, Latin American countries are within the grip of the global giants. For the past decade, they have been increasingly susceptible to the political will of China. The US recognises the existence of the Sino-sovereigntystealing strategy in Latin America as an extension of the Chinese international support network. Also recognised is the need to counter it. Why? Because strategically the US cannot afford otherwise. Whilst the US and China both wield immense power, they are prisoners to it. Each actor’s decision-making is shrouded within constant paranoia.

It is increasingly likely that this contest will define the chapter of human history.

Conversely, it is unlikely to last, because we are simply witnessing another reiteration of a game as old as time. Yes, the technology has changed, social attitudes have adjusted, and military confrontations may subside to cyber-attacks. Ultimately the rules of the game never change: the one who holds the power is the winner, albeit temporarily. No matter how much influence China wields over Latin America, or the methods the US exploits to regain it, this game is destined to be repeated a long time hence.

Ultimately, the US and China are governed by humans. They are limited in their ability to rewrite the human narrative.

FIN.

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HIRAK, EPISODE II: THE ARDUOUS FIGHT FOR DEMOCRACY IN POST-BOUTEFLIKA ALGERIA.

BY LUCIEN ENEV

O

n the 22nd of February, thousands of protesters gathered in the streets of Algiers to mark the two-year anniversary of the “Hirak” movement, a wave of pro-

democracy demonstrations which shook Algeria almost continuously since February 2019, with the exception of most of the year 2020 when, like the rest of the world, Algerians were forced into lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But how did this popular mobilization, the size of which Algeria had not seen for decades, emerge?

It all started when Former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced that he was going to run for a fifth term in the elections which were to be held in April 2019. This announcement outraged the Algerian population, and understandably so: Bouteflika – a man in his eighties, riddled with sickness to the extent of not being able to walk alone, and hence startlingly unfit to rule – had come to power in 1999 and held onto it ever since, his regime being one dominated by a corrupt elite within the military.

The prospect of a fifth mandate was simply the final straw for the Algerian people, who began descending into the streets in millions demanding that Bouteflika resigns; and he ultimately did on the 2nd of April, pressurized by his own army which understood that demonstrators would not go home unless satisfied.

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Abdelaziz Bouteflika with Henry Kissinger, 1975, AP

Algeria, so it seemed then, was on the path of a democratic recalibration. Bouteflika had been ousted, and the protesters had even managed to twice postpone the presidential elections, so as to give time to the opposition to present a credible candidate against whichever one the National Liberation Front (FLN) – the party dominating Algerian politics since the country’s independence from France in 1962 –, in agreement with the army, would favour.

The FLN’s candidate, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, was nevertheless the victor of the December 2019 elections, which many have claimed to be yet another charade of change organised by the ruling elite. Tebboune was, after all, a friend of General Gaid Salah, the army’s top chief (before he died a few days after the elections); but most strikingly Tebboune had also been part of Bouteflika’s successive governments before the latter’s resignation. Tebboune’s election was therefore a blatant demonstration of the élite’s stranglehold on power and of the difficulty for grass-root movements to shake up the status quo.

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WHAT FUTURE FOR THE HIRAK? Although today the Hirak is still alive, as the new series of protests since February have shown, it is struggling to regain the momentum it had two years ago.

The obvious reason for that is the pandemic; the sequence of lockdowns and the consequent wave of unemployment have shifted people’s attention away from a cause principally concerned with political freedoms rather than socioeconomic issues.

But more crucially, the Hirak is structurally weak, hence ill-equipped for a constructive, long-run struggle. It emerged spontaneously and lacks the ideological cement which holds together any robust political organisation; its initial goal, around which there was a widespread consensus, was the ousting of Bouteflika. Once Bouteflika had been deposed, the movement therefore had lost any substantive programmatic compass beyond the vague commitment to defend democracy. Today the leaderless Hirak, as an entity, appears unable to bring forth a precise set of grievances, and seems to be immobilised in a posture of contestation.

The Hirak Protests, Algeirs, 2021, AP

What is more, the movement is beginning to divide itself along generational lines. In 2019 people of all ages were protesting with a common voice; this is not the case anymore: the composition of the rekindled Hirak has changed. Today the most zealous members of the movement are found amongst students, who categorically reject a political system which they view as a military dictatorship and as having no popular legitimacy whatsoever: they still relentlessly chant the slogan “A civil state, not a military one” which came to symbolise the Hirak since its inception.

Older people, however, are increasingly feeling uncomfortable with this incessant attack on the military. What had pushed them to join the movement in 2019 had mainly been the unpleasant prospect of being governed for another five years by a sick, incompetent elderly man rather than a rejection per se of the entire military cast.

Indeed, many people who remember Algeria’s independence war against France from 1954 to 1962 struggle to bridge their democratic aspirations and their patriotism, as the army is still somewhat bathed in prestige for the role it played in delivering the country from its colonial subjugation: disavowing the army, as they see it, is tantamount to being unpatriotic. Therefore, the social cleavage tearing up Algerian society is slowly evolving from one of democrats against “un-democrats”, to a subtler one opposing past and future: “Building a state with young people, not with old ones”, read a placard waved by a protester last February. Such a radical regeneration, however, fails to involve everyone.

But the Hirak’s lack of a clear political programme and its heteroclite composition are not the only factors impeding its credible resurgence; truth be told, Tebboune’s government, despite its questionable legitimacy, has been somewhat forthcoming in meeting protesters’ demands for reform – or at the very least in feigning to meet them.

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After his election, President Tebboune set to appease his country with a constitutional reform meant to rebuild people’s trust in their political system. And on paper the reform appears to be a real step forward: amongst other things it reintroduces a limit to the number of terms a president can serve (in 2008 Bouteflika had managed to suppress that limit) and includes pledges in favour of civic freedoms. Furthermore, it stipulates that the Prime Minister should be drawn from the parliamentary majority of the lower chamber rather than be appointed directly by the President, which theoretically makes the executive more accountable to the people.

Algerians were called to decide the fate of this constitutional reform in a referendum held on the 1st of November 2020 – a highly symbolic date commemorating the beginning of Algeria’s liberation struggle in 1954, therefore reinforcing the idea of the country being at the dawn of a new social contract and of a new, bright beginning. The reform was approved by 66% of voters, but with a voter turnout of only 23.7% – most Algerians, not blinded by historical symbolism, knowing that the governing élite cares little of legal frameworks. But the referendum results nevertheless advantaged the government by allowing it to display an active effort of reform.

Insurrection, Algeria, 1960, Getty Images

More recently last February, Tebboune seemed even more forthcoming as he announced the presidential pardon of dozens of political prisoners – Hirak militants – and the dissolution of the lower chamber, meaning that anticipated legislative elections should be held in the following five months instead of 2022. He also announced a reshuffling of his government, with major ministries such as that of the economy, the industry, and tourism seeing a change of leadership, in what again seems like an attempt to showcase dynamism and reformative spirit, especially considering the recession linked to the pandemic.

Whether or not the all these seemingly positive changes are part of a grand scheme to stifle the Hirak by destroying its raison d’être is hard to tell; if it is, however, it is only successful insofar as recent demonstrations are smaller than they were in 2019. But one thing is certain: despite being fractured and having lost momentum, the Hirak and the pro-democratic message it carries is alive; only the future will tell us its fate.

FIN.

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A girl attends Friday prayers in front of an army tank in Tahrir Square, 2011, Reuters

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10 YEARS LATER WHY AND HOW EGYPT’S REVOLUTION FAILED

BY AFEK SHAMIR

The brave men are brave The cowards are cowardly Come with the brave Together to the Square

T

AHRIR, EGYPT: If one could assume the perspective of a bird wistfully flying above Tahrir Square during the 25th of January 2011, they would probably say

that they mistook the gathering of protestors for the congregation of ants in an ant farm. Picture mothers, children, farmers, street vendors, all staggered painfully close to one another. All of them, whomever they are, amalgamating into one identity that echoed resistance, anguish and dissatisfaction with the status-quo. All of them viciously chanting the words at the top of the page. That was Midan al-Tahrir. These lyrics were inspired by the revolutionary poet Ahmed Fouad Negm, a man of the people, and a willful source of resistance against Mubarak’s regime. The message was strikingly succinct, brutally powerful, yet ten years onwards signifies virtually nothing.

Ten years ago, Tahrir was a beacon of hope, and comprised the epicentre of what many considered to be an overdue revolution against the ruthless dictator, Hosni Mubarak.

Beginning from the 25th January, mass crowds left designated mosques after prayer and joined forces with other protestors in public squares, the most notable of which being Midan al-Tahrir. Civilians performed occupations, sit-ins, demonstrations and marches in unprecedented numbers, whilst a game of cat and mouse kicked off between police 47

forces and protestors in Cairo’s squares and backstreets. Outside of Cairo, and most predominantly in the Suez, Egyptian protestors attacked almost 84 police stations during the 18 days that ensued. Neil Ketchley, writer of Egypt in a Time of Revolution argues that Mubarak’s security forces were compromised by ongoing attacks on police stations, opening up a ‘security vacuum’ that allowed nonviolent protestors in Tahrir to coordinate and execute demonstrations in jaw-dropping numbers.

In 2021, though, cynicism takes over. It is obvious that the revolution did not culminate in democratic change, nor did it decrease corruption or restore freedom. Today, Abel Al-Sisi continues his violent reign as the President of Egypt after grasping power 8 years ago from the unstable rule of the

democratically

elected

Muslim Brotherhood. In some respect, the condition that Egyptians

live

under

deteriorated further in the post-Mubarak era. Journalists are routinely persecuted, basic freedoms restricted, repression amplified,

and

economic

conditions dire. So, was the 25th of January revolution even a revolution? Did it make an impact?

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Well, the 25th of January revolution initially appeared to be a resounding success.

Inspired by the courage of the Tunisian people and the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, mass groups began a wave of protests that ousted Mubarak as Egyptian President on the 11th of February 2011. It took a mere 18 days of protesting to dismantle a remarkable 30 years of Mubarak’s rule. Crowds often used fraternization – the attempt to friendly associate with an enemy or opposing group – as a means to protest effectively. A popular chant was heard all around Egypt, emanating from Tahrir: The army and the people are one hand!) (el-geysh we-l-shaʿb iyd wāhda!). Photos of elderly female protestors kissing soldiers of the Central Security Forces (CSF) during rallies began circulating around social media. Protestors also began sleeping in the path and around the curvature of the wheels of tanks and other army vehicles. A Facebook trend even gained traction, in which people took a photo with tanks and captioned it with the sarcastic remark:

“I didn’t take a photograph next to the tank” (ana matsawartish ganb al-dabāba).

Yet, despite the movement’s success in pressuring Mubarak to resign, the democratic transition that followed was an utter catastrophe. Muhammad Mursi and the Muslim Brotherhood, who won Egypt’s first democratic elections, were rebuffed for being opportunistic, politically inept, ideologically shallow, and organizationally poor. It only took two years, until 2013, for Egypt to return to military rule; this time under Al-Sisi.

Following initial outcries of discontent at the Brotherhood’s leadership, Egypt’s Interior Ministry and military forces seized the opportunity by spreading the Tammarod petition and encouraging citizens to take to the streets. Tammarod was launched – symbolically enough – in Midan al-Tahrir; denouncing Mursi’s rule and calling for new presidential elections so that Egyptians can claim “the Revolution’s goals of bread, freedom and social justice.” The military distanced itself from the Brotherhood, and publicly professed that they would not disperse protestors, but rather encourage them 49

A Man Sleeping on top of Tank Wheels, Tahrir, 2011

to take to the streets and voice their discontent. The headline of the opposition newspaper al-Dostor professed: “Go into the streets for the army is with you and will protect you!”. And, sure enough, the streets were once again filled with protestors, this time chanting and screaming alongside the military rather than against it. Two years after, it was no longer Mubarak, but rather the Muslim Brotherhood that triggered nationwide protests. An astonishing 14 to 30 million protestors took to the streets, comprising of roughly 25 to 50 percent of Egypt’s adult population. On 3 July 2013, the military took power.

Now, Tahrir is different. As the New York Times coined in a recent article, Tahrir is now a field of broken dreams; it is an inescapable reminder of failure. Concrete has replaced the grassy circle where protests once took place, new lights were installed at every step, and security guards routinely stroll up and down the perimeter of the square. If one were to time travel from 2011 to today, the disparity in noise levels alone would be inconceivable. Whilst at one end of their trip through time they will have heard the raging unrest of half a million people, in 2021 they will likely encounter car horns and a 50

disorderly traffic arrangement. Buildings have been repainted, trees planted, and four grandiose sphinxes from the ancient temple at Karnak now lay in the heart of the square; but this is simply an attempt to colour in the darkness. As an anti-coup activist in Neil Ketchley’s book Egypt in a Time of Revolution states:

“Squares are the symbol of the revolution. But now if you go there on a march, it’s a suicide mission. They fill the square with informants who report to security if more than ten people gather.

So, we have made squares out of the side streets.”

- 26 Feb. 2014

Put plainly, Egypt is at a standstill, pertaining no prospect of imminent change and no real opportunity for protestors to take to the streets in mass numbers. The only conceivable way for Al-Sisi to lose his grip on power is from within the army ranks itself, rather than through protests or revolution. What, then, can we learn from the failure of the 2011 revolution? Put simply, we can discern that the most important cog in the political machine in Egypt is the military. The military was incremental in encouraging Mubarak to resign, setting the Muslim Brotherhood for failure, and positioning Al-Sisi in a comfortable seat in power. If any change is to occur, it is to occur from within, rather than externally. Today, Tahrir is only a symbol of fleeting hope. It is a melancholic reminder of a missed opportunity, a gut-wrenching what-if.

FIN.

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Farmer's Protest, India, 2020, Times

UNREST IN INDIA OVER FARMING LAWS CAN INDIA’S IMMENSE DIASPORA INFLUENCE GOVERNMENT ACTION?

BY SAULET TANIRBERGEN

“O

ur objective is that the black laws enacted by the Modi government are repealed,” Baljinder Singh, a 52-year-old farmer participating in the protests that

gripped India, told Reuters in February, 2021. The protests began in November, in response to laws that the Indian government passed in September to deregulate the country’s agricultural market. More than a 100,000 farmers from the nearby states such as Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh abandoned their homes and decided to camp out 53

on the outskirts of New Delhi, India’s capital, in an attempt to block the major roads.

More than 60% of India’s 1.3 billion population depends on agriculture as a primary source of income but farming is only responsible for a sixth of the country's GDP. Agriculture has gone from accounting to nearly 50% of the economy during the 1970s to just 15% in the recent years. Not to mention the fact that most farmers are very small, with nearly 70% of them owning less than a hectare of land, and earn an average annual income of only about 20,000 rupees ($271; £203), according to the 2016 Economic Survey. These recent laws introduced by the Modi-led government have only made situations worse for an already vulnerable class of people by loosening the rules around the buying and selling of agricultural produce. With the government removed as the middleman, the agricultural sector will be fully exposed to the free market, where fluctuating prices can lead to devastating outcomes.

WATERSHED MOMENT: All in all, the parliament passed three different bills on September 27th , 2020. They all work together to lessen the role of the government in the agricultural market. Some of the changes being introduced include allowing produce to be sold directly to private actors at market price. This is especially monumental, since 90% of farmers sold their products at government-controlled wholesale markets (mandis) which have guaranteed minimum prices for crops. This government support of farmers has existed since the 1960s, when India was embroiled in a harrowing hunger crisis. Among other things, the new bills also eliminate the storage limits of essential commodities, allowing private to stock up, which only government-authorised agents could do before. Prime Minister Narendra Modi called this ‘watershed moment’ for the agricultural sector but various political factions, mostly opposition parties, have accused him of hurrying the passing of the bills in the middle of a pandemic without much consultation of the players involved. Many believe that these bills expose the farmers to the greed of big corporations, which could exploit them and drive down prices for produce.

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While protests have mostly remained peaceful in the last few months, things did escalate into violence when thousands of protesters attempted to force their way into the city on Republic Day, January 26th, the day when India officially adopted its constitution in 1950. Some of the protestors managed to storm the Red Fort, a historic monument that served as a seat of Mughal power. One protestor died and 300 policemen were injured in the process. However, the most casualties of these protests do not stem from violence but other causes — ranging anywhere from health issues to suicide. Reuters reports that as many as 248 protestors died since they began to camp out outside of New Delhi in November.

Farmer's Protest, India, 2020, Getty Images

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While protests have mostly remained peaceful in the last few months, things did escalate into violence when thousands of protesters attempted to force their way into the city on Republic Day, January 26th, the day when India officially adopted its constitution in 1950. Some of the protestors managed to storm the Red Fort, a historic monument that served as a seat of Mughal power. One protestor died and 300 policemen were injured in the process. However, the most casualties of these protests do not stem from violence but other causes — ranging anywhere from health issues to suicide. Reuters reports that as many as 248 protestors died since they began to camp out outside of New Delhi in November.

THE RED FORT OF DEMOCRACY:

The unrest in the country can have significant implications to the world’s largest democracy. Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who’s been in power since 2014, can lose out majorly in the next elections in 2024. This is not the first time India’s prime minister faced domestic and international criticism — most notably for his attempt to exclude Muslim in his citizenship laws.

However, what has been most interesting about the recent protests has been the dialogue between India’s government and members of their global, immense diaspora.

India has one of the largest diasporas in the world, with 18 million Indians living outside of their homeland. A number of high profile celebrities of Indian descent — including poet Rupi Kaur, politician Jagmeet Singh, author Meena Harris (and also niece of Vice-President, Kamala Harris), comedian and commentator Hasan Minhaj — expressed their concern over the protest. Some have even taken to protecting themselves. The response got even more heated when news reached that the internet was shut down in some parts of India due to the protests. Celebrities like Rihanna,

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activist Greta Thunberg and former adult movie star, Mia Khalifa, were all vocal about their outrage on their social media. A number of demonstrations, mostly in the UK and the US, occurred in front of Indian embassies and consulates as a way to object to the bills. This has earned the ire of many nationalist Indians, some of who even went as far as burning the picture of Meena Harris while filming it. In December, Anurag Srivastava, an External Affairs Ministry spokesperson said the following: “We have seen some ill-informed comments relating to farmers in India. Such comments are unwarranted, especially when pertaining to the internal affairs of a democratic country.”

British lawmakers recently had a debate about the ongoing protests in India on March 8th, in response to an online petition that garnered over a 100,000 signatories. Most of the points raised focused on human rights and democratic freedoms of the protesters.

The Indian High Commissioner in London denounced the debate, calling it “one sided” and the protests “a domestic matter”. On the other side of the ocean, in the US, more than 40 lawyers of South Asian descent have expressed their concern in an open letter to President Joe Biden, urging him to condemn and denounce Modi’s government. Back in February, the US government came in support of the farm bills, embracing improvements in efficiency and more private sector investment. However, so far, neither leader has released an official statement on the unrest going on in India, much to the displeasement of many of their citizens of Indian descent.

The recent debate surrounding the actions or, rather, inactions of governments with large populations of Indian descent pushes us towards an interesting question: how far can diasporas influence the domestic actions of their homeland? Can the power of the diaspora come into play in the future as movement across borders increases? By looking at the international response around the events in India, we can attempt to piece the answer together.

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THE NOISY NEIGHBOURS GONE QUIET INDIA-CHINA-PAKISTAN

BY PRATHAMESH JAGTAP

T

he announcement by India and Pakistan of “strict observance of all agreements, understandings and cease firing” along the Line of Control is a welcome step.

Combined with the de-escalation on the LAC with China, it provides a sense of relief.

In the case of India and Pakistan, the protracted history of the conflict, punctuated by fleeting moments of hope that are frittered away, always imposes a caution on reading too much into developments. With China, there is still a tense standoff.

Security Personnel in Indian-controlled Kashmir, 2019, USIP.

It is also the case in international relations that intentions, doctrines and capabilities can be subverted by a conjunction of events. So, it is premature to conclude what all this will amount to in the long term. But if all three powers, China, Pakistan and India, can draw the appropriate lessons in humility, there is hope for regional politics to turn over a new leaf.

In the case of India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has immense political capital to make bold foreign policy moves. Many of these, including the strike on Balakot, were milked for domestic political use. They were also an attempt to signal a change in status quo. But two years later, a few things have become palpably clear to India. First, the belligerent use of foreign policy in domestic politics has unintended effects on your international standing. In 2019, the official rhetoric was promising India retaking PoK and putting more military pressure on Pakistan. In contrast, the discourse on foreign policy since the Chinese pressure on the LAC has been one of marked sobriety scaling back all expectations of a flippant militarism.

Second, the standoff with China has brought home some stark realities. We can speculate on Chinese motives. It is unlikely that India’s moves with Pakistan are a result of some package deal with China. But there is no denying that the LAC standoff considerably released the pressure on Pakistan. It cut out all of India’s loose talk on cross-border adventurism. China may have not particularly cared about Article 370; it did care about casual signalling that India might want to alter the status quo on borders with Pakistan. We were reminded that the LAC and LoC can be linked; that the zone around Kashmir was a trilateral and not a bilateral contest, and that India will need significant resources to deal with China. The fact of the matter is that status quo ante has not been restored on the LAC with China, and costs can be imposed on India.

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And there is a seemingly unrelated matter of the CAA(Citizenship Amendment Bill).

Again, no one is against granting citizenship to minority refugees from neighbouring states. But the belligerent rhetoric of evicting Bangladeshis has been starkly checkmated by the need to placate Bangladesh, which is vital to our strategic interests.

The chest-thumping bravado of 2019 has been replaced by the sober realities of international power politics.

But equally, there are humbling lessons for Pakistan as well. India now has enough weight in the international system that any attempts to internationalise Kashmir are a non-starter. Second, even Modi’s critics will have to acknowledge that the revocation of Article 370 did not unleash the kinds of fissures and cycle of violence within the Valley that Pakistan might have been hoping to exploit. There are important questions about Indian democracy, and the rights of Kashmiris. But Pakistan can hardly show a candle on these issues. Pakistan’s infrastructure of terrorism has been a net liability to Pakistan itself, and its vulnerability in FATF is a constant reminder of that fact.

But we are at a moment in international politics where so long as India’s moves are within international understandings, it will have free rein to work out whatever political arrangements it wishes. And there is the perennial question of whether Pakistan can realise its full economic potential if it remains so thoroughly dependent on the coat tails of one or the other superpower. In fact, the pandemic is a great opportunity for Pakistan to recognise that opening up to the South Asian region at large buys it more room for manoeuvre in the long term than acting on the coattails of China.

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A Chinese and an Indian soldier, Nathu La border, 2008, Getty Imges

It might seem that China is the victor in all this. It signalled how it can ratchet up the pressure on India. But while India may not have, in a literal sense, restored the status quo ante on the LAC, the fact of the matter is that it has stood up with enough firmness to send the signal that it will not be a pushover. India’s economic measures may have been nothing but a pin prick to China for the moment. But India signalled a resolve that Chinese military and economic hegemony can be resisted. China cannot wish away considerable Indian power. In fact, by concentrating India’s mind on the China challenge, it may have unwittingly done India a favour.

So, this moment can be a constructive one if everyone understands the one lesson of this conjuncture in world politics: There are diminishing returns to belligerence. Three things can derail this moment of de-escalation. The first question is: How much does the Pakistani deep state buy into this de-escalation? The second is that there is always

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the risk that some fringe group will try to test the waters by precipitating an incident.

Are the diplomatic channels now robust enough to withstand such a possible test?

Third, Chinese intentions still remain relatively opaque and the deep currents of distrust that authoritarian regimes like Xi Jinping’s generate will not be easy to overcome.

With Pakistan, India should seize the moment and build on the de-escalation. The pandemic offers an opportunity for greater economic cooperation. For the long term momentum to be sustained, political establishments of both countries will have to think of what a win-win political narrative is they can legitimately offer their citizens.

The challenge has always been that the one plausible candidate — making the de facto realities the de jure settlement — has always been seen as a loss in Pakistan.

Nationalism is a perennial derailing ideological force in all three countries. But the one thing we have also learnt is nationalism is protean in character: The ability of regimes to spin nationalism to convert even defeats into victories should never be underestimated. It requires some creative organised hypocrisy.

The truth of this moment is that the world will not run according to a Modi doctrine, a Bajwa doctrine or a Xi doctrine. The region will be better off with a humility that tries to align them, rather than a hubris that exults in unilateral triumphalism.

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FROM HISTORIC STRUGGLES TO AN UNMATCHED HARMONY THE COMPELLING STORY OF INDIANAFRICAN DIPLOMACY

BY ANOUSKA JHA

The real essence of this kinship [between Asia and Africa] its social heritage of slavery; the discrimination and insult; and this heritage … extends through yellow Asia and into the South Seas. It is this unity that draws me to Africa. (W.E.B Du Bois)

W

hy is it that the term ‘Global North’ is less frequently used, or has less of a ring, yet the ‘Global South’ is immediately identifiable? Perhaps this is because there

is no such idea of the ‘Global North’. The northern and western countries themselves paradoxically constitute the ‘center’ of the world, with many disciplines such as history, philosophy, politics, and law being abstracted from western ideologies. The term ‘Global South’ was itself coined in the 1980s, when the term ‘the Third World’ was being contested as a replacement for post-colonial countries, pointing to its depiction as somewhat side-lined in the front-line world of political affairs. However, in dissecting the relationship between India and Africa in the post-colonial era, we can view the Global South as more than just a navigation point relating to the ambitions of the North, rather providing it with an agency and metaphorical significance that reflects the inextricable links between history and modern-day diplomacy. Their contingent agendas are marked by post-colonial identities emanating from historical struggles between the metropole and colonies, and this collective sense of ‘transpatriotism’ has led to a unique diplomatic relation between the two.

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Jawaharlal Nehru, Getty Images

After India’s independence from Britain in 1947, an event which marked a turning point in British confidence in the imperial endeavour, Prime Minister J.Nehru pledged to support nationalist movements and anti-colonial resistance in Africa, which lasted throughout the African decolonisation period of 1956-63. The famous 1955 Bandung Conference, which India led, resulted in the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) between the Asia-African region. The NAM had three goals; i) promote economic development in the region, ii) to enhance cultural ties that may have been severed by European colonial rule, and iii) to promote the extension of human rights and self-determination.

In essence, the NAM symbolised something much deeper- a transfer of agency to the ‘Global South’, who had for a long period of history been confined into a subservient 63

framework. This article looks at how the legacies of diplomacy promised in 1955 have carried on into today, particularly in the field of nuclear and technology relations, politico-economic diplomacy, and healthcare. It aims to bring into question the nature of shared experiences, geographical reputations, and the ethical power of such diplomacy.

TECHNOLOGY AND HEALTHCARE- A HUMANITARIAN MECHANISM FOR PROGRESS The exchange of scientific innovation and technological progress across the field of international relations is vital now more than ever. One need only look at the rapid global effort in producing vaccinations against COVID-19 infections, to discover how these intellectual transactions between countries signify a sense of humanity amidst the chaotic world in which we live. Afro-Indian ‘scientific diplomacy’ has certainly surpassed much of the criteria needed for successful innovative diplomacy. One of the most well-known initiatives is that of the Pan African e-Network, launched in 2008.

This allows a network of communication between Indian and Africa on tele-education, tele-medicine and VVIP connectivity. It was intended to provide a ‘seamless/integrated’ satellite to connect both countries together through wireless network, allowing for premier educational and healthcare institutions across India and Africa. As of 2017, the PAeN project has allowed 22,000 students obtained degrees in graduate and undergraduate disciplines from various Indian universities through the network, and there has also been a number of further initiatives such as a pre-feasibility study on Continental Mass Education TV (CMETV) and setting up of an African Virtual (e-) University. In addition, as part of the program, over 67,000 Continuous Medical Education sessions were held virtually with both Indian and African students since 2017, providing training for doctors and nurses to advance the transactions of medical knowledge and modernisation.

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Subsequently, innovations in healthcare and pharmaceutical industries remain unmatched in light of India and Africa’s cooperation. Since the 1990s, there has been a seismic shift from post-colonial socialist states to an emergence of economic liberalism, to encourage private entrepreneurship and facilitated corporation programmes. Africa and India have become imbricated into this process, harnessing their new strategic interests as a result of free market policies. The new Millenium Development Goals (MDG) adopted by the United Nations in 2000, has been wholeheartedly embraced in Africa and India, wherein health makes up a large portion of the plan’s targets. Since its implementation, both countries have leveraged their knowledge-based and high-skill industries, resulting in exchange of research for the generic drug market and low-cost therapies. Currently, 90% of HIV drugs in Africa are sourced from Indian pharmaceutical companies such as Cipla, revealing how the Indian-African health agenda reflects a stabilizing structure of healthcareinnovation and economic progress.

Health worker collecting blood from pregnant women for HIV testing, India, 2020, AIDS MAP

Inevitably in light of the past year’s events, COVID-19 has created a new window of opportunity to put this trans-national cooperation to the test. The Indian External Affairs Minister in April of 2020 had assigned an ‘Africa-focus working day’, in which a series of innovative conversations with Nigeria, Niger, Burkina Faso, Uganda and Mali, were held to discuss joint ventures in providing medical assistance between the borders.

Medical assistance was provided by India to twenty African countries and the Heads of State of Egypt, Uganda and South Africa also took personal initiative to ensure that all claims made were backed by the exchanges of drugs and medical devices on a humanitarian basis.

Therefore, the ‘crisis’ of today’s world is in fact a pivotal check on how far this South-South cooperation can stretch, and it is indisputable that because of decades-long nurturing of this diplomatic synergy, India and Africa are only strengthened by such challenges.

NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY- WHERE POSTCOLONIAL CONSCIOUSNESS COMES INTO QUESTION. So far, all appears well. Science and technology, the driving forces of global prosperity, seem to propel India and Africa in the same expedient direction. However, can this diplomatic cooperation ever be regarded as giving too much leeway, to the point where national security comes into question? In order to explore the nature of this debate , it is important to establish a contextual background. Nuclear energy is now an invaluable resource in the global machine. India’s rapid rise as a global power has inevitably brought on an increased demand for nuclear energy to sustain its technology-heavy economy, with the Nuclear Power Corporation of India predicting the use of 8000 66

tonnes of uranium (the main element of nuclear power) by 2035, 10 times its current usage. Since 2005, where the USA began to work towards full civil energy and trade with India, the country had struggled to maintain efficient stockpiles of uranium to contribute to the partnership. Africa’s role becomes pertinent here; the country provides 20% ofthe world’s recoverable uranium and is well positioned to meet India’s needs.

However, the obstacle lies in the fact that in 1996, African nations signed the Pelindaba Treaty, a non-proliferation nuclear treaty which aimed to limit military use of nuclear power, and only use it to promote human security through peaceful nuclear cooperation. India’s increasing military concerns regarding China and Pakistan have placed the notion of ‘diplomacy’ into a contestable field. The non-proliferation decrees codified in the Pelindaba Treaty come into conflict with the post-colonial consciousness of Indian-African relations, and the imperatives of African national law, suggesting perhaps that this diplomacyis a delicate balancing act that can founder in the face of political pragmatism. For example, whilst since 2007 India undertook uranium exploration in Niger, Namibia (2009) and Malawi (2010), regions such as Egypt resisted the regularising of nuclear cooperation, letting the weight fall in favour of national priorities. Indian media outlets even claimed that ‘India today is very different from the India of the Cold War days. We are now recognised as an emerging economic power, no longer dependent on the charity of others for our economic progress. In these circumstances, does it make sense to cling to old shibboleths and slogans such as ‘‘non-aligned solidarity’’ in a vastly transformed world order?’. Hence,it is clear that ‘post-colonial consciousness’ and diplomacy can take on different meanings for India and Africa. More importantly, it suggests that the ‘Global South’ is perhaps not as unified as the term evokes, and it is rather that when it comes to economic and legal self-interest, cooperation may not necessarily take precedence. Yet, focussing for too long on nuclear relations can strain our eyes to the point where the true nature of a flourishing ‘Global South’ humanity is obscured. As will be evident below, a harsh 67

severing of diplomatic ties between the two countries is highly unlikely, as when it comes to the determining moments of politics that go beyond energy and power, India and Africa remain anchored in an analogous identity.

POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC DIPLOMACY- PROMISES OF THE FUTURE. W.P.Sidhu of New York University claimed that up until 2014, ‘Africa has remained a neglected continent for India’. We have already discussed some limits of Indian-African cooperation regarding the terms of their nuclear exchange, and there are certainly other points which may give credence to this view. For example, the India-Africa Forum Summit of 2015 has largely been seen by Sidhu and others as a panicked response to the 2000 Forum on China-Africa cooperation. Undoubtedly, China has flexed its economic muscle on Africa, financing US$ 143 billion worth of African businesses and governments between 2000-2017. However, here the clear South-South connection is revealed, wherein India’s role in Africa is instead based on liberating, communicative and demand driven policy.

If there is one connecting thread in this discussion, it is the thread of a collective consciousness, one that has its roots entrenched in the darker abysses of history. During colonial rule in the 19th century, over 3 million Indians were forcefully sent to Africa, in order to serve as indentured labourers (a form of extra-constitutional slavery).

Hence, since the 1830s, as migration continued from both sides, both cultures became imbricated into one common narrative regarding similar constitutional structures and territorial identity. It is fascinating that these shared experiences of the past are reflected in contemporary relations, highlighting how history exists on one long dynamic continuum, faintly or unsubtly embedding itself into every cavity of the global political realm. The third IAFS held in September 2020 is revelatory of this. The summit was held to discuss additional cooperation between the countries and the key takeaways from the meeting include an ongoing grant assistance of US$700 million, 68

the maintenance of various big-ticket projects completed by India in Africa (such as the Rift Valley textiles factory in Kenya and the Presidential Office in Ghana), and the completion of over 80% of the scholarship and capacity building schemes operating between both countries. Additionally, in a globalising world, India and Africa again cooperate to increase their participation in UN Peacekeeping missions. Africa has a number of military personnel training in India, whilst India has maintained successful defence partnerships with regions such as Zambia, Botswana and Uganda. Both countries also continue to combine efforts to contain piracy on the Somalian coast, and combat international terrorism. M.Nozomi's theory that beneath the ‘soft’ diplomacy strategies of both countries, lies the powerful underbelly of a ‘hard’ core security and political interests, is therefore pertinent to our understanding of their unique SouthSouth power relations.

Indian Troops in South Sudan, 2013, Getty Images

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With regards to economic exchange, India and Africa certainly do not falter. Since India’s economic liberation in 1991, Africa has become crucial for natural resources and developments of new markets, and India remains a key market in Africa for investment, technology and capital goods. Prime Minister N. Modi contends the significance of the ‘multi-alignment foreign policy’, which has allowed India to make use of strategic partnerships with Africa and develop political ties with the region.

Some specific achievements of the policy include the Special Commonwealth Africa Assistance Program (SCAAP), which involves grants from the Indian government to finance African infrastructure and engage with its multilateral institutions. Moreover, the large network of Indian firms in Africa such as Tata and AirTel, along with both countries’ commitments to the Indo-Pacific ‘Security and Growth’ agenda, has allowed for the Indian-African partnership to transcend all expected boundaries imposed by the west. These new initiatives and increasing delivery speeds has led to a sustained momentum of diplomacy between both countries, highlighting the power of these joint economic mechanisms in modelling the importance of diplomatic statecraft in the Global South.

CONCLUSION AND THOUGHTS What we have alluded to in the course of this discussion can be traced back to the notion of the ‘development paradigm’, a concept originating in the 17th century and first established in German philosophy. This intellectual concept states that development is equated with the deployment of a pre-existing potential, a manifestation of utopian realities conjured between states and civilisations.

Unfortunately, the course of history has not always adhered to the development paradigm as a source of imposing goodness on humanity; colonialism, state oppression and racism are exemplary of this. However, from a post-colonial perspective, India and Africa’s relations offer a new meaning to the dichotomies between North and South,

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servitude and control, and progress and stagnation. Their specific development paradigm pertains to relations of cooperation, security and prosperity, which binds Indian and African policy. Mahatma Gandhi’s statement that ‘Commerce between India and Africa will be of services and ideas, not of manufactured goods in the fashion of western exploiters’ captures the essence of the uniqueness of their relations; Africa and India’s historic political engagement has elevated it beyond the conventional North-South binary, and both countries have evidently taken on an initiative, albeit with challenges in the process, to demonstrate that they no longer depend on western powers for economic or political success. Rather, together they use the past to leverage their own collective ambitions, whether that be in the form of technology, pharmaceutical progress, or political support. One thing to learn from this, therefore, is that the ‘Global South’ should not be associated with lack of agency, dependency or historical stagnation. Conversely, as we have explored, the ‘Global South’ itself is its own exclusive sphere of history, and subsequently its own passage to diplomacy, characterised by a conviction to eclipse the manacles of its past.

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RWANDA FROM GENOCIDE TO BEING THE WORLD'S NR. 1

BY VICTORIA KRÜGER

''M

y father was the first person to be killed, followed by my brothers. So my mother, my sisters and I kept hiding without knowing whether we were

going to survive or not. I also remember hearing the people who took my father talking about how happy they were to have killed him. It was one of the worst times in my life.

I wished they had killed me too. [...] I can’t find words to describe how I felt."

- Consolee Nishimwe, gender activist With greatest respect to the survivors of the Rwandan genocide in 1994, this article shall look at the impetus behind the country's enormous transformation to the world's top performer regarding women in parliament. According to UN Women, women constitute 61.3% of parliament and 38.5% of senate. Focussing on parliament, the country has by far the highest percentage of women - 7.9% apart from the second rank Cuba and 5.7% apart form the Plurinational State of Bolivia with 55.6% of women in the chamber of senators. When asking for the reasons of such comparatively high percentage, the path leads to Rwanda's past.

WOMEN AND THE GENOCIDE: The pre-colonial Rwandan society displayed patriarchal structures in social, political or economic spheres of life with women being prohibited to ownership and inheritance of land. Whereas before the colonial rule ‘limited avenues of power for women’ existed, these faded with the beginn of colonisation. Without downplaying the incredible suffering, three drivers of social change can be detected.

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Rwandan Cemetry of Genocide Victims, 2008, World Vision

Firstly, during the time of intense violence and conflict gender roles underwent change and adapted to the circumstances. The genocide tore families apart and as the society in the genocide's immediate aftermath was made up to 70% by women and girls, it was predominantly left to their device to restore their own strength and the strength of their country. With the greatest respect to the unimaginable crime, some women had to suffer from, including rape, sexual assault, and torture, their doing effected lastingly Rwandans' gender relations. Secondly, Rwanda's women's movement shaped Rwanda significantly between 1994 and 2003. Under the umbrella of PROFEMMES, women strategically lobbied at grassroots-level to empower women of all societal layers 73

whereby gradually obtaining their legitimacy within politics. According to Burnet, the movement was ‘among the most active sector[s] of civil society’. Thirdly, the Rwandan Patriotic Front pushed gender equality forward, especially under Paul Kagame's presidency. For a lengthy period, the leadership of the Rwandan Patriotic Front was in exile in Uganda. Different scholars argue that Uganda's quota system and more generally, women's appreciation in politics significantly affected the parties' stance. A combination out of these factors eventually culminated into the introduction of a 30% reserved seat quota on a national level, laws against gender-based violence, women's councils, the ratification of the 1999 Inheritance law, a new constitution in 2003, and the creation of today's Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion.

Nevertheless, questions concerning implications rise. Was the very core of Rwanda's culture and society able to be transformed from the outside in? How does Rwanda perform regarding gender equality today?

A 2018 study by Guariso, Ingelaere, and Verpoorten took a closer look at the implications of the quota introduction. It concludes that therewith "the number of female political representatives significantly increased [...], with their presence in parliament and ministries consistently exceeding 30 percent." They further argue that "while women disproportionally end up in ministries of relatively lower prestige, the gap with men has been closing over time, as more women have joined the executive branches of power" . Devlin and Elgie point out that women’s issues, i.a. issues of equality, education, childcare, violence against women, and the integration of gender equality into employment and pay are raised more easily and frequently. Women's presence continuously contributing to the normalisation of these issues as political concerns. Generally speaking, descriptive representation is often advocated for its integration of diverging perspectives and identities into the policy-making process. In contrast to studies of quotas in western countries, authors emphasis deputies' determination of national and international feminism advocacy.

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Comparing Rwanda's women empowerment and gender equality strategy in an international context, the Global Gender Gap Index 2020 of the World Economic Forum ranked the country 9th place overall and in the sub-indexes political empowerment 4th place. Over the last two decades, various sources of inequality - or women's issues - display improvements for instance the access to water, sanitation, and electricity. Although access to health and education is determined by wealth, the overall accessibility has been improving. Noteworthy, the enrolment gender gap regarding primary and secondary education has narrowed with occasionally the enrolment rate of girls overtaking the of boys.

Nevertheless, the Global Gender Gap Index 2020 also recognises deficits exemplary mirrored in the health and survival sub-index where Rwanda places 90th and in 79th in economic participation and opportunity. The overall access or graduation rates of higher education declined. Further had disparities in the economic sphere been detected: the rural labour market is highly gendered as well as the distribution of land

Rwandan Women, 2018, The African Exponent

and financial assets. Looking closer into this, a UN University working paper focusing on business performance gender gaps revealed a productivity gap of "22% and 25% for annual turnover and net revenue per worker, respectively." Rwandan female business owners are less likely to invest or seek formal credits. Beyond, they invest fewer working hours into their businesses compared to men. The authors assume that women still face capital and credit constraints and that family responsibilities limit their availability, indicating the prevalence of stereotypes.

Furthermore, women's perceived political representation had barely changed despite the increase in descriptive representation. Petra Debusscher and An Ansoms argue that such lack might indicate the persistence of power relations along ethnic lines overshadowing gender lines.

It follows that policy outputs had been little affected. Findings agree with studies around the world that despite the high presence of female politicians and mechanisms that seemingly have mainstreamed levels of policy-making efforts rarely translated into policy outputs. In the case of Rwanda, legal adjustments such as the inheritance law or the reformulation of the constitution were passed prior to the increase in female political representation.

When directing attention into the future, other factors might limit Rwanda's potential to decrease gender inequality. These might include the political disregard of 'subsistence agriculture and care work'. Women disproportionally work in these areas however its political neglect might indicate that "policy makers prefer to leave certain ‘existing gender and power relations’ intact, thus ignoring ‘one of the big causes of gender inequality'" Adding, some religious communities are reluctant to agree with women pursing careers in politics. Mirrored in the assessment of the Global Gender Gap Index 2020, Rwanda lacks grassroots consultation as mirrored in the low placing in the Global Gender Gap Index 2020. Equally important, Rwanda is under autocratic rule. Scholars rise concern abut the increasing authoritarian nature of the state with a 76

small executive with little or potentially no accountability towards citizens. Scholars predict that these structures might endanger the empowerment of women in the future.

For aforementioned reasons the question rises whether a true transformation has been realised, one targeting and rewriting deeply rooted societal norms and practices embedding gender? Keeping this in mind it is now to you to form your opinion on the path to gender equality and about Rwanda - its history, its development, and its future.

Author's note: Certainly, there are structural deficits which unfortunately continued up until today in Rwanda but the country has rightly an internationally respected position. In the end, Rwanda has a story to tell that we should listen to. How its future will look like lies in the hands of its people as well as the international community.

Rwandans continuously proved willing to tackle issues of inequality and overcome the given limitations to equality. Rwanda makes us aware of the how far other countries have to go to reach a higher degree of equality but especially gender equality. The impetus which largely enabled it however should make us think.

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“ENDING FOREVER WARS” OR US DIPLOMATIC HEGEMONY?

BY HUGO MCCULLAGH

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he West’s Reaction to the Crisis in Tigray Shows a Deep Routed Trend in Western Attitudes Towards Dealing With Conflict in the Global South.

On the 28th February of this year, Amnesty International released a grave report detailing mass killings carried out in the ancient city of Axum in the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia. The report confirms suspicions many harboured as to both the nature and the extent of the ethnic violence which is ongoing in Ethiopia’s northern region along the border with neighbouring Eritrea. The death toll of the conflict and Members of the ASF, Tigray region, Ethiopia, 2020, AFP

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the massacre itself are as yet unknown, however, what the report illuminates is the nature of the human rights abuses which are being carried out in the conflict. Through interviews with the survivors of Axum, evidence of extrajudicial killings, rape, looting and mass killings are detailed along with harrowing eye-witness accounts of the systemic and brutal nature of the violence in East Africa, alongside video evidence of gunfire directed at Tigrayan civilians. Tigrayans described events on the 28th November when “forces deliberately and wantonly shot at civilians from about 4pm onwards”.

The report puts an end to the ongoing rumours speculation as to the true character of the conflict in Tigray as the total media and cellular blackout placed on the region by the government made receiving witness accounts or detailed information about the conflict impossible. Neither journalists nor aid workers are yet allowed into Tigray making support for the Tigrayans either in terms of distributing information or humanitarian aid unachievable. However, the details of the witness accounts overwhelmingly suggest that the large part of the Axum atrocities were carried out by the Eritrean military and as well as Ethiopian government forces, adding another dimension to an already complicated civil war.

To trace the events which led to the massacre in Axum and the ongoing violence against the Tigrayan people, one must to go back to April 2018 and the accession of Abiy Ahmed, Ethiopia’s serving President who has ruled the country since the outbreak of the conflict. Abiy’s election marked the end of 27 years of rule by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front which had ruled Ethiopia since its overthrowing of the authoritarian People’s Democratic Republic of Ethiopia in 1991. Since 1991 the TPLF had essentially ruled Ethiopia as a one-party state which saw ethnocentric appointments favour Tigrayans in terms of political power. Although studies have shown that ethnic Tigrayans (who comprise 7.4% of the population) outside of government on the whole did not benefit from the system, the TPLF’s ethnonationalism sparked resentment and opposition from Ethiopia’s two largest eth79

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nic groups, the Oromo and Amhara peoples (35% and 28% of Ethiopia’s population respectively). Abiy was quick to gain recognition on the international stage, bringing Ethiopia’s twenty-year war with Eritrea to an end after less than four months in office.

After his becoming the first Ethiopian to win a Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 coupled with his progressive domestic reform, including the release of thousands of previously held political prisoners, many were optimistic at Abiy’s capacity to take Ethiopia on a new course.

Recent developments in the Abiy administration have brought this into question, particularly in regard to Ethiopia’s new relationship with its former enemy Eritrea. s.

Many accounts featured in Amnesty International’s reports described soldiers in Eritrean uniforms driving vehicles with Eritrean number plates.

The issue of Eritrea’s involvement signals a more systemic issue in the Horn of Africa in its increasingly influential role in destabilising the region. The country’s President,

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WRITTEN BY FREYA JIMENEZ. PHOTO BY CALVIN STILLER.

On the 4th November 2020, Abiy’s government signalled the initiation of civil war by declaring war on the state of Tigray, but essentially declaring a war against the armed wing of the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front. To further complicate matters, the Eritrean military appear to be playing an increasingly large and increasingly violent role in what is being described as the ethnic cleansing of the Tigray region.

Isais Afwerki and Abiy Ahmed, 2019, AFP

Isaias Afwerki, was described in an article by Foreign Policy as a king maker in Eastern Africa “constructing a three-cornered axis of autocracy in the Horn of Africa with him as its leader and Abiy and Farmajo [Somalia’s President] as junior partners”. Isaias’ Eritrea is certainly a threat to stability in the region. Its army comprises a staggering 17.5% of Eritrea’s population of 3.5 million and numerous reports outside of Axum have described Eritrean troops orchestrating the violence in Tigray. Isaias already harbours resentment for the TPLF due to his loss of the 1998 Eritrean-Ethiopian war which he lost to the party. Eritrean troops are also reported to be supporting Ethiopian troops in al-Fashqa, a disputed border region between Ethiopia and Sudan, while worries about Isaias’ authoritarian influence on neighbouring Somalia point to a significant threat to peace in East Africa.

All of the factors which have combined to create the civil war in Tigray make the Western media and political response to the crisis at best unhelpful and at worst deeply problematic. The headlines of the majority of media outlets are overwhelmingly US-

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centric, calling for the Biden administration to act via bilateral diplomatic or economic pressure on Ethiopia. This media approach can be seen more broadly across western publications on Africa and the Middle East, with the focus heavily on “Biden’s Policy” and “What Will Biden’s Approach to the Middle East Be?”. Articles in western publications have largely concerned what Biden’s policy will be regarding Ethiopia and suggest an approach either spearheaded by the USA when there are far more appropriate vehicles for instigating long-term peace and stability to Eastern Africa. The same can be seen in the American diplomatic response to the crisis. Joe Biden’s first action in response to the conflict following Amnesty International’s report was to host a one-on-one video call with President Abiy urging him to remove Eritrean troops from the Tigray and to allow humanitarian aid into the region. While the sentiments are correct, the approach is not.

This bilateral strategy was supported in a problematic article by Foreign Affairs, urging that the Biden administration should aim to increase its diplomatic presence in Africa with regional Ambassadors whose “authority could transcend national borders” and “eliminate cumbersome bureaucratic hurdles”, ending with the worrying statement that “like it or not, a twenty-first century scramble for Africa is underway. The United States might prefer to avoid becoming embroiled in African proxy wars during this new era of great-power competition, but it must be prepared for such conflicts nonetheless.”

This final statement alludes to President Trump’s insistence on disengaging America from what he termed “Forever Wars”, a policy which the Biden administration has thus far appeared keen to pursue. However, bilateral one-time diplomatic intervention is not the correct way to achieve this. Biden is expected to send Senator Chris Coons to Ethiopia on Thursday to negotiate directly with Abiy Ahmed, at a stage in the Biden administration when the President is yet to fully staff his State Department and has not appointed a team or taskforce in Africa. This points to the inadequacy of the western-saviourism being executed in Ethiopia and many parts of the global South.

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In order to foster long-term stability in regions such as East Africa, the West must aim to conduct its diplomatic efforts through regional diplomatic frameworks in order to avoid short-term Western peace arrangements. In the case of Ethiopia, this namely includes the African Union (AU) and the East African Community (EAC). The African Union comprises all 55 states in Africa and acts as a body to foster peace, security and co-operation on the continent, yet is continually overlooked when it comes to the West’s response to crises in the region. The AU’s ‘Silencing the Guns’ campaign is aimed at exactly this sort of conflict in its aim to end conflict and genocide on the African continent. Although the AU is a relatively young organisation (at 19 years old), it will only strengthen through international support for it and its use in instances where international peacekeeping is required. The US government’s approach has thus far been too black and white, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken expressed the onus to be purely on the Ethiopian government to resolve the crisis while Biden and Coons negotiate directly. The compromise, and best long-term solution, would be to give diplomatic support to the African Union so it can effectively put pressure on Ethiopia and Eritrea through its own frameworks. This solution would also leave in place an institution which would be capable of resolving future crises and in relation to East Africa would be more capable of handling the growing concerns over Eritrea’s destabilisation of the region. The East African Community (comprising Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda) would also be a useful vehicle due to its economic influence as well as its aim to foster increased political integration between East African countries. Although these institutions are young and untested, if they continue to be surpassed by the United States, long term solutions to many of the complex geopolitical and ethnic problems in Africa will not be solved and frameworks will not be in place to manage conflicts such as that in the Tigray in the future.

The African Union has thus far made moves towards trying to weigh into the Tigrayan conflict with the AU pledging at the 2020 summit of the IGAD [Intergovernmental Authority on Development] to aim to end the conflict in Tigray. Naturally the Union faces many of the obstacles which international diplomatic organisations face such as 83

countries within it opposed to intervention, as well as Ethiopia’s ongoing refusal to accept outside assistance or intervention. However, Ethiopia thus far will neither accept help from the United Nations or the USA, and an African Union effort to end the conflict combined with the weight of US diplomatic support would appear to be the best way forward in terms of both making diplomatic advances with Ethiopia and instituting a framework which could lead to future peace in East Africa.

Ultimately, in terms of the western media’s coverage of such events, a less westerncentric approach to reporting on global Southern affairs would help to foster an international attitude which looks less to America and the West to intervene and instead allows internal regional diplomacy to take care of conflicts and crises. However, the mantle now falls to the Biden administration to de-Americanise their diplomatic response to events in the global South, in particular in the Middle East and Africa, by working through regional diplomatic frameworks such as the African Union and the Arab Union, as well as more local organisations such as the East African Community. If Joe Biden is to be believed in his will to end America’s “forever wars” then supporting regional diplomatic organisations must be a foreign policy consideration above bilateral negotiating. In carrying out diplomacy the way the USA has in Ethiopia, it continues to act as a powerbroker and does not look set to withdraw from its commanding role in global Southern politics.

FIN.

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Mexican Soldiers Seizing Marijuana, Tijuana, Mexico, 2010, Contrasto

THE PRESSING PROBLEM OF MEXICAN DRUG VIOLENCE AND INSTABILITY

REORIENTING AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

BY JOHN MORGAN

T

HE BIRTH OF AN IDEOLOGY:

During the 21st century, American foreign policy has undergone two distinct shifts. The first was the 9/11 attacks and the ensuing Global War on Terror. Under the Bush 85

Administration, the US government moved to reorient its entire global posture to fight to the elusive threat of Islamist terrorism. To this end, American invaded Afghanistan and Iraq over fears that both countries were harbouring terrorists. It also dramatically shifted its relations with other countries. The US scoured the world, looking for reliable allies in the fights against terrorism. Little attention was paid to countries human rights or democratization records. All that mattered is if they were willing to get on board with this new global crusade. As President Bush succinctly put it “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists”. As the War on Terror ground on Americans became less interested in hunting down fanatical fighters around the world.

Public fear of spectacular 9/11-style attacks diminished. The US gradually shifted its focus away from combatting terrorism to Great Power competition with China and Russia. Both the Trump and Biden administrations have accelerated this shift toward new Great Power competition. Trump moved to unilaterally confront China, primarily through aggressive protectionist trade measures. The incoming Biden team has largely continued this hawkish posture towards China, although with less bluster and more multilateralism. Biden has focused on rebuilding tattered American alliances with European and Asian partners to confront what he sees as Russia and China expansionist regional aims. However, during this time, a new threat has arisen that dwarfs both terrorism and Great Power competition in direct impacts to Americans.

That is the problem of Mexican drug trafficking.

During the 21st century, when American foreign policy elites were focused on international terrorism and then Great Power competition, the problem of drug trafficking in Mexico spiralled out of control. In 2006 then Mexican president Felipe Calderon declared war on Mexico’s drug cartels. The move was meant to reassert Mexican government control against the drug cartels that had expanded their power and influence. But instead of reasserting stability, the war has accelerated the problems it was meant to prevent. Since 2006 an estimated 150,000 people have been killed or gone missing. The fighting has done nothing to decrease the flow of drugs into the United States, where over 60,000 people die every year from drug overdoses. Finally, 86

the stated goal of the campaign, to reassert government control against the cartels, has proved to be an abject failure. Cartels are increasingly coming to resemble paramilitary militias who seek to directly control territory.

A GROWING DISCORD: It is difficult to overstate how powerful the cartels have become since 2006. The war has transformed cartels into what journalist Ed Calderon calls ‘narco militias’. The cartels have moved from ordinary criminal organizations into powerful paramilitary organizations with the power to directly challenge the Mexican government. The cartel that best exemplifies this shift from criminals to paramilitaries is the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). In recent years, CJNG has risen to become the most dangerous criminal organization in Mexico. This is due to the fact that the group explicitly styles itself as a paramilitary organization. In a viral video released by CJNG, "El Pancho", operative leader of CJNG, Mexico, 2016, Reuters

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cartel members wearing military fatigues and holding assault rifles are seen in front of a convoy of armoured vehicles.

Perhaps the clearest example of the cartels newfound power was in 2019 when the Mexican military arrested Ovidio Guzmán, the son of former Sinaloa cartel leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán in the city of Culiacan. At first, this would seem like a straightforward victory for the Mexican governments fights against drug traffickers.

But then something extraordinary happened. Sinaloa cartel members armed with military-style assault rifles, body armour, and technicals blockaded the entire city of Culiacan. They also surrounded and set fire to a military housing complex in the city.

Then the Mexican government took the extraordinary step to release Ovidio Guzmán despite capturing him just hours earlier. The episode was a humiliating defeat for the Mexican government. It also signalled a depressing fact; the cartels could now fight and defeat government security forces in an open battle. In many ways, they had become more powerful than the government trying to defeat them.

The problem of cartel violence and influence has been accelerated by the stagging levels of official corruption. Indeed the former security minister, the man originally selected by former President Calderon to organize the drug war, was arrested by the US for taking millions in bribes from the Sinaloa cartel. The former Mexican defence minister under former President Enrique Peña Nieto was also arrested by American law enforcement on corruption charges. Both instances point to shocking levels of official corruption in the Mexican government that make any effective response to the cartels essentially impossible.

THE AMERICAN DIMENSION: The lack of attention American foreign policy elites pay to this problem is striking given its scale. The country with which America shares a 3,145-kilometre border has become essentially ungovernable. What’s most striking is how little political elites with88

in both parties seem to care. For politicians on the right, most notably Donald Trump, Mexico serves as a useful punching bag for racist attacks. Much of the political discourse on the right focuses on portraying Mexico as the non-white ‘other’ that must be defended against. The only time politicians like Trump seem to mention Mexico is in the context of race-baiting attacks on Hispanics. This means that few on the political right are interested in offering any practical solutions. Left-wing in-attention to Mexico is driven by a less sinister motive. Democratic politicians, like President Biden, are currently focusing most of their attention overseas to repairing America’s standing in the world and reassuring allies. So far, the Biden administrations foreign policy has mostly focused on reestablishing international alliances to take on the perceived threats of Russia and China. In Biden’s first major foreign policy address gave only one offhand reference to Mexico compared to five mentions of China and eight mentions of Russia.

It seems that both sides of the political spectrum in American are, for different reasons, content to let the many challenges posed by Mexico’s continued deterioration to go unaddressed.

Border-wall between US and Mexico, 2019, Reuters

What then would a better American approach to Mexico look like. To start, American foreign policy elites should refocus away from abstract issues of international standing and Great Power competition towards more immediate threats. Neither Russia or China have any aims to attack the US homeland. Both countries are also separated from the US by two major oceans.Mexico shared a massive land border with the United States. The instability and violence in Mexico constantly spills over into the United States in the form of drug overdoses and murder. A more realistic US foreign policy would focus more attention on the immediate problem of Mexican drug violence and allow allies to take the lead in confronting China and Russia. Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor, has spoken about making US foreign policy centred around the Middle Class. Mexico is a perfect example of putting this aim into practice. The American Middle Class is currently greatly affected by the problem of drug overdoses.

A more practical and sane US foreign policy would focus on this problem far more than the abstract threats posed by Russia and China territorial expansionist goals.

There are several steps that can be taken to reorient American foreign policy towards the immediate threat posed by Mexico’s continued instability and violence. Firstly, the media and political elites should have more informed debates about realistic solutions to this problem. Political leaders should be more open with the public about how they think American can positively impact the situation on the ground. There should also be more sustained American investment in Mexico’s security and stability. Mexico is possibly the most difficult and pressing foreign policy challenge facing the United States right now. The challenging nature of the problem provides a clear rationale for politicians to avoid talking about it. Although there are no obvious solutions, the problem will never be solved so long as US foreign policy elites remain intent on ignoring Mexico.

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