Book of the Week: Putin: From Oligarch to Kleptocrat

The independent media was Putin’s first target. Newspapers, and TV and radio stations, often funded by wealthy oligarchs, were playing an increasingly important part in Russian politics by the late 1990s. One media organization in particular, NTV, had attracted Putin’s ire by airing a satirical puppet show ahead of the 2000 presidential election in which a Putin puppet played Little Zaches, an evil changeling from a fairy tale by E.T.A. Hoffman. In Hoffman’s story, the people of a village are so manipulated by Zaches that they mistake him for a gentleman and scholar, and award him the job of minister to the prince. Putin’s supporters reacted fiercely to the caricature; a letter was published in St. Petersburg’s Vedomosti newspaper signed by the rector of St. Petersburg State University, calling for charges to be brought against the producers of the show. [...]

By the end of his second term in office, in 2008, Putin had altered the criteria for judges serving on the Qualification Colleges that can dismiss judges from their posts, a move that enabled him to pack this oversight body with his appointees. He had also signed an edict extending his executive powers over all law enforcement and securities agencies, and made several watchdog bodies subordinate to the very ministries they were meant to monitor. Meanwhile, his political party, United Russia, had abolished elections for regional governors and replaced them with a system of presidential appointments—any of which could be rescinded by the president if he deemed a governor to be disloyal. Russian autocracy was back. [...]

A month ahead of the March 2012 presidential election, some 100,000 Russians demonstrated in -18° C temperatures in Moscow, calling for a rerun of the disputed December parliamentary elections—to no avail: Putin won his third term. But the day before his inauguration, violent clashes erupted between police and some 20,000 protesters in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square. He responded by signing a law criminalizing public protests without a permit. Even so, on June 12, about 70,000 brave demonstrators marched in defiance. The war between Russian civil society and the Kremlin was on. Unfortunately, it received limited attention outside Russia, much less any credible coverage on traditional media inside Russia—which the government already controlled. [...]

Oligarchical capitalism destroys legitimate competition and eats away at the resources of a nation like a cancer. Any semblance of dynamic, healthy competition is strangled by fake competition based solely on firms’ relationships with people in power. When a shrinking private sector is entirely owned by the oligarchical elites, this precludes ordinary citizens from having a stake in the real economy and increasing their personal wealth over time. As the nation’s wealth becomes more concentrated in fewer hands, there is less incentive and fewer resources to resist the momentum of this disparity. The twenty or so oligarchs in Putin’s Russia do not get access to powerful people in government because of their wealth, as is the case, say, with many billionaire political donors in America, but rather the reverse: Russian oligarchs get access to obscene amounts of wealth because of their affinity with those most powerful in government. Men become oligarchs in Russia (there are no women oligarchs) because they are loyal to the only person in government who matters: Vladimir Putin.

read the article

The Atlantic: How Muslim Women Use Fashion To Exert Political Influence

On the surface, modesty in Tehran requires concealing the shape of a woman’s body, especially her waist, hips, and chest, as well as her hair. But pious fashion in this city also expresses a number of related values. For instance, because women’s dress is legally regulated, pious fashion exemplifies the wider cultural value put on stability and conformity. Other values displayed in hijab, however, serve to unsettle this stability and conformity. This is evident not only among women who let a significant amount of hair peek out from under a headscarf, but also in the bohemian look of some styles that reveal a more carefree and informal aesthetic value.

Consider the “Arab chador,” a flowing overcoat that became fashionable in Tehran around 2007. Unlike the traditional chador, it is meant to fall open and has billowy sleeves. One popular style among upper-class Tehrani youth is to wear an Arab chador with a very big headscarf. The Iranian authorities endorse this type of overcoat in part because it is long and loose, and in part because its name links it to the culture and geography of Islam. But the women I interviewed described the Arab chador as a “bohemian” form of dress, popular especially among “artist types.” More than just a breezy look, this style conveys a vision of public femininity that, despite the strict rules of the Islamic Republic, valorizes a free spirit and sense of ease in the face of authoritarian rule. [...]

For most of the last 100 years, sarong-style skirts and blouses were the clothes officially promoted by the government. That changed dramatically three decades ago when the popularity of modest dress—jilbab—skyrocketed after former president Suharto resigned. This style arose as an aesthetic critique of a regime that was repressing Islamic belief and practice. As young, college-educated women increasingly adopted pious fashion, it became a sign of a cosmopolitan woman. And since a headscarf and modest outfit were not historically part of Islamic practice in this country, women were free to wear these items to express a thoroughly modern identity that is entirely compatible with national development and progress. [...]

I was struck by the distinctive look of pious fashion in Indonesia: It often incorporates tight, form-fitting garments, like an undershirt called a manset, or a belt to emphasize the waist. Modesty is achieved by covering oneself with cloth, not by disguising one’s womanly shape, as is legally mandated in Iran. Softness and lightness are the prominent visual values expressed in pious fashion. Chiffon and pastel colors are popular. This fabric and color combination creates a distinctive aesthetic of primness, wholesomeness, and whimsy. Crystal and sequin embellishments are highly valued; they visually link women to jewels. The influence of Asian clothing, especially from Malaysia and China, is particularly prominent, as seen, for instance, in the mandarin high collars. This valuing of Eastern aesthetics is connected to a view of femininity that takes its lead from Asian and not Western visions of proper womanhood.

read the article

The Atlantic: Can Europe Step Up?

Some initial answers are suggesting themselves already. Europe stuck to the Paris climate accord despite the U.S. retreat and—through French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in particular—mounted a defense of a more tolerant, less nativist form of politics and a rules-based international order. Europe’s own internal challenges, from economic woes to the difficulties in managing migration, are far from resolved. They require European leaders to balance foreign priorities with those at home. But 2017, in some ways and with some exceptions, was the year of the dog that didn’t bark: Populists and anti-immigrants didn’t prevail in elections in France, the Netherlands, or Germany. The wave many feared was only beginning to gather force with Brexit and Trump’s election in fact appears, for now at least, to have crested with them. The space this has created has allowed for several European leaders to voice their support for norms the U.S. is in danger of discarding. [...]

The third category is trickiest, for it would entail Europe breaking ranks not only with the U.S., but also with some of its own habits. Over the past several years, European foreign policy has progressively defined itself more and more as an extension of domestic anxieties, chiefly concerning terrorism and migration. That’s understandable. Political leaders can ill afford to come across as divorced from public opinion and its apprehensions—however revved-up and exploited for partisan purposes. And so they must make the public’s angst at least partially their own. [...]

Examples of what Europe might do to counter this trend are legion. To mention a few: European leaders might use Europe’s position as Africa’s chief peace and security partner to help nudge the continent’s long-serving incumbents toward peaceful transitions of power. They might assess more critically the performance of strongmen who promise aggressive counter-terrorism military operations in the hope of external leniency toward their repressive behavior at home. They could give diplomacy a try where the U.S. approach appears to be wanting, pressing Saudi Arabia and Iran to open a channel of communication, say, or stressing the need to negotiate with the Taliban if the Afghan conflict is ever to come to an end. And they could match their criticism of rivals’ abuses—from Syrian President Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons to the Taliban’s horrific attacks against civilians—with a rebuke of those committed by Western allies.

read the article

The Conversation: Spanish use is steady or dropping in US despite high Latino immigration

Language and immigration have long been politically linked in the US. When Farmers Branch, Texas, passed an English-only “requirement” in 2006, then-Mayor Tim O’Hare justified it by saying that “we need to address illegal immigration in our city and we need to do it now.” [...]

But these figures don’t tell the whole story. As a linguist, I have studied Spanish-English bilingualism in Texas, California, Florida and beyond, and I can attest that Spanish is not taking over the United States. Far from it: Political fearmongering notwithstanding, Spanish actually holds a rather tenuous position in the country. [...]

If one looks only at immigration patterns over the past half-century, it is true that the US has been gaining Spanish-speakers. From 1965 to 2015, roughly half of all immigration has come from Latin American countries. This trend added some 30 million people, most of whom came speaking Spanish, to the American populace.

But this is only half the story. While new immigrants bring Spanish with them, research shows that their children tend to become bilinguals who overwhelmingly prefer English. As a result, the same immigrants’ grandchildren likely speak English only.

read the article

openDemocracy: Why are women joining far-right movements, and why are we so surprised?

The core question posed by such pieces is: Why are women joining far-right movements? But we must also ask: Why are we so surprised? After all, these issues are not new. “What attracts women to far-right movements that appear to denigrate their rights? This question has vexed feminist scholars for decades,” is how one historian put it. [...]

“There’s no reason to expect women to be less bigoted than men,” historian Linda Gordon concluded. Her research into the Klu Klux Klan (KKK) estimated that at least 1.5 million American women were members in the 1920s, including one third of all white Protestant women living in Indiana. [...]

“Fascism’s relationship with women has been neither consistent nor predictable,” is Durham’s conclusion. While men may have been more visible in such movments, large numbers of women also participated as voters, members, fundraisers, marchers, party officials, and more. [...]

“Women's roles in far-right and neo-Nazi groups have in the past been underestimated,” she writes. Reports may focus on movement leadership and parliamentary politics, for instance, or front-line acts of violence, while underplaying the importance of emotional and reproductive labour. When one of the Golden Dawn Girls tells her grandchildren “to go play with guns,” Seth-Smith notes that this is also performing a key role for the party.

read the article

Political Critique: Polyamorous and Islamophobic: we are the cool ones!

Racists that we are, polygamy seems terrible to us. But as polyamorous people, unions of more than two seem great. How do we resolve such a conflict? The Canadian Polyamory Advocacy Association is clear: “We are NICE”, says its website, “negotiated, individualized, consensual, and egalitarian.” We are nice people, we are the cool ones. In a single sentence here they labelled the ones that are “not cool”, the bad ones, are the Others. The polygamists. [...]

“Polygamy” is a Greek word that was used until the second century to refer to serial monogamy. Later it disappears from European languages ​​only to return in 1558 in French, and in 1590 in English. 800 years of Islam in Europe certainly gave enough space for the reappearance of the term, yet even the medieval chronicles of the Iberian Peninsula speak of “multiple marriages” among Muslims and I have not found the term “polygamy” anywhere. [...]

All right. But what these websites forget is the aspect of biopolitics that governs our sexualities and our loves. And so, although polyamorous groups say that “men and women can do it equally”, the reality is that there is a higher criminalization of women’s sexuality and non-binary identities, as well as an exclusion of dissident sexualities that make cisgender men the biggest beneficiaries of this new revolution. We know that biopolitics exists, but it always exists for others. We are so sure of our “post-superiority” that we believe that reading Foucault makes us impervious to Shakira’s influence. Actually, biopolitics is precisely about Shakira, and not Foucault.

read the article

Al Jazeera: Trump and the Evangelical electorate

Incidentally, when we use the word "Evangelicals" here, we are using it in the manner it is most used in US political commentary, to refer to conservative, white Protestants. There are white Evangelicals who are politically liberal. But they are few. They are so few that 81 percent of white Evangelicals who voted in 2016 voted for Trump.

There are also African American Evangelicals. They vote for Democrats. There are some Latino Evangelicals, though most are not Protestants.

Such Evangelicals have long been self-described "values voters" and the "moral majority". The idea of "values" here does not refer to paying taxes for more and better public education, medical care, social services and the like that benefit the society at large and should stem from the Christian values of compassion and care for the poor. It does not refer to defending the oppressed or welcoming refugees.

Rather, it refers to a very singular idea of "family" and what needs to be done in order to "protect" it. Two of the more powerful religious-political organisations in the US are called Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council. Evangelicals oppose any policy, behaviour or practice that they deem threatening to a monogamous two-gender marriage. [...]

The fervent commitment of Evangelicals, like Pence, to Israel, seems to be rooted in a belief that it is necessary for Israel to be back in the hands of the Jews for the second coming of Jesus Christ to take place. According to this belief, the Rapture would send all the good true Christians to heaven and leave behind the bad and non-believers - including the Jews - in an all-inclusive hell on earth. That means that Christian Zionism concludes with an act of the ultimate anti-Semitism. 

read the article

The Guardian: Robots will take our jobs. We’d better plan now, before it’s too late

A robot tax – a levy that firms would pay if machines were taking the place of humans – would slow down the pace of automation by making the machines more expensive but this too has costs, especially for a country such as Britain, which has a problem with low investment, low productivity and a shrunken industrial base. The UK has 33 robot units per 10,000 workers, compared with 93 in the US and 213 in Japan, which suggests the need for more automation not less. On the plus side, the UK has more small and medium-sized companies in artificial intelligence than Germany or France. Penalising these firms with a robot tax does not seem like a smart idea. [...]

In some ways, the debate that was taking place between the tech industry, politicians and academics in Davos last week was similar to that which surrounded globalisation in the early 1990s. Back then, it was accepted that free movement of goods, people and money around the world would create losers as well as winners, but provided the losers were adequately compensated – either through reskilling, better education, or a stronger social safety net – all would be well.

But the reskilling never happened. Governments did not increase their budgets for education, and in some cases cut them. Welfare safety nets were made less generous. Communities affected by deindustrialisation never really recovered. Writing in the recent McKinsey quarterly, W Brian Arthur put it this way: “Offshoring in the last few decades has eaten up physical jobs and whole industries, jobs that were not replaced. The current transfer of jobs from the physical to the virtual economy is a different sort of offshoring, not to a foreign country but to a virtual one. If we follow recent history we can’t assume these jobs will be replaced either.”

read the article

VoxEurop: Immigration: Europeans favour intra-EU mobility

The 88th Eurobarometer survey, published in December 2017, finds that most Europeans (64 percent) have a positive opinion about immigration coming from other EU countries. In May 2015, as recently noted by the think-tank Bruegel, "51% of persons asked had a 'very' or 'somewhat' positive view of intra-EU immigration. 40 percent expressed a 'very' or 'somewhat' negative view, while 9 percent had no opinion. Since then, support for intra-EU immigration has continued to climb".

According to Bruegel this means that "more than two-thirds of European citizens have a positive view of the free movement of people within the EU". This feeling is shared across almost all European countries – even the UK, committed to leaving the EU – with the only exception being Cyprus, where 50 percent of residents think the opposite. [...]

"Luxemburgers, Irish and Swedes are the most favorable to intra-EU migrations, and they also remain relatively supportive of extra-EU immigration. More than half of Spanish, Portuguese and British citizens also support extra-EU immigration. [...] Conversely, support is very weak in certain countries of central and eastern Europe (Czechia, Slovakia, Latvia, Hungary and Estonia)", notes the Brussels research institute. It adds that this perception of extra-EU immigration did not deteriorate during the refugee crisis, remaining more or less stable.

read the article