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      in World Politics

      Third Countries Are Invited to Join European Military Projects

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      As the European Union comes to terms with a changing strategic environment, it needs to do more to provide for its own defense and security. This includes better and more comprehensive EU-NATO coordination but also the participation of non-EU members in projects and processes initiated within EU structures. This discussion is especially important now, when the EU, while coping with COVID-19, is simultaneously seeking to build its open strategic autonomy.

      Current gloomy economic projections indicate that the impact of the pandemic will neither spare the defense sector nor alleviate geopolitical tensions. Therefore, the EU, under certain conditions, should be open to cooperation with like-minded states, especially those with which member states already have a track record of cooperation. It is worth noting that discussions concerning third-country participation distinguish between various structures and pillars of European defense integration.

      Is Europe Really Ready for Its Own Military Force?

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      Specifically, the European Defence Fund (EDF), the European Defence Agency (EDA) and Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) have different rules and are at varying stages of adopting them. While rules on third-country participation were established for the EDF and EDA in 2019, EU member states have only just agreed to a regime covering the politically more sensitive area of PESCO projects.

      Why Cooperate With Non-EU Countries?

      According to the latest agreement of the European Council, third parties will be allowed to participate if their inclusion were deemed to add substantial added value to respective projects being carried out and when such participation will not lead to dependencies on third states. Any third country participant need also to share “the values on which the EU is founded” and “respect the principle of good neighbourly relations with Member States.”

      The general conditions, consequently, of a fairly restrictive approach toward participation, undoubtedly satisfy only the closest partners of choice like the United States, Norway and the United Kingdom. In other words, the doors will remain closed to, for example, Turkey and China. Leaving open the possibility for Turkish participation was a sticking point, and some countries, including Greece and Cyprus, are wary. Some view a prior Finnish proposal as not sufficiently exclusionary on the matter. It is notable that neither PESCO nor the EDF alter the EU’s existing rules on defense procurement.

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      Third countries can contribute relevant capacities for military operations, technological know-how as well as research and development. Their participation also facilitates closer EU working relationships with neighbors and non-EU NATO allies, helping safeguard NATO unity. Take the example of Norway — an EU-oriented country with a third of its exports going to the bloc. As the only member of the European Free Trade Association that is both part of the European Economic Area and host to a notable defense industry, Norway would be a substantial contributor to PESCO projects, from research programs to the joint development and acquisition of defense capabilities initiatives.

      Norway indeed maintains a diversified and high-tech defense industry, spanning communication technology to air defense, from undersea systems to state-of-the-art missiles like the renowned Norwegian Advanced Surface to Air Missile System (NASAMS). Moreover, Norway is home to numerous EU defense contractor subsidiaries and production plants like the multinational Airbus, Spain’s Indra, Sweden’s Saab and France’s Thales. At a time when the EDF and PESCO provide a vehicle for fostering EU partnerships and consortia in the defense sector, Norway would be a particularly pertinent addition. Norway could, for example, contribute to the Modular Unmanned Ground Systems (MUGS), a PESCO initiative already supported by seven EU member states.

      Cooperation in Times of COVID-19

      But the benefits of joining PESCO initiatives are not limited to the positive economic impact that occurs from defense cooperation. Projects can also serve as platforms for nurturing resilience and improving preparedness for future pandemics. In this regard, military mobility, one of PESCO’s core projects, can aid, for example, in facilitating the movement of troops and military equipment, including sanitary and medical materials, across borders. Progress on the simplification and standardization of cross-border military transport, a key PESCO priority, would further enable a speedy and swift deployment of military personnel and equipment like food, doctors and field hospitals, for instance, from one country to the other, thereby strengthening EU solidarity.

      While the impetus for European defense integration is undeniable, we should not take for granted that it will translate into enhanced capabilities for Europe to provide security for the continent. To move closer toward achieving this goal, the EU needs to intensify efforts to develop politically sound, organizationally efficient and industrially complementary relations with like-minded countries. 

      *[This op-ed is part of the project, Enhanced European Opportunity Partners in the EU’s Defence and Security Initiatives: Study Case of Norway. The support of the Royal Norwegian Ministry of Defense for the production of this publication does not constitute endorsement of its content, which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Norwegian Ministry of Defense cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in Elections

      End of Trump era deals heavy blow to rightwing populist leaders worldwide

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      As the Donald Trump era draws to a close, many world leaders are breathing a sigh of relief. But Trump’s ideological kindred spirits – rightwing populists in office in Brazil, Hungary, Slovenia and elsewhere – are instead taking a sharp breath.The end of the Trump presidency may not mean the beginning of their demise, but it certainly strips them of a powerful motivational factor, and also alters the global political atmosphere, which in recent years had seemed to be slowly tilting in their favour, at least until the onset of coronavirus. The momentous US election result is further evidence that the much-talked-about “populist wave” of recent years may be subsiding.For Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, who has yet to recognise Joe Biden’s victory, Trump’s dismissal struck close to home. “He was really banking on a Trump victory … Bolsonaro knows that part of his project depends on Trump,” said Guilherme Casarões, a political scientist from Getulio Vargas Foundation in Brazil.As the reality of a Trump-free future sunk in last Thursday, Bolsonaro reportedly sought to lighten the mood in the presidential palace, telling ministers he now had little choice but to hurl his pro-Trump foreign policy guru, Filipe Martins, from the building’s third-floor window.The election result represented a blow to Bolsonarismo, a far-right political project modelled closely on Trumpism that may now lose some of its shine. And on the world stage the result means Brazil has lost a key ally, even if critics say the relationship brought few tangible benefits. It brings an end to what Eliane Cantanhêde, a prominent political commentator, called Bolsonaro’s “megalomaniacal pipedream” of spearheading an international rightwing crusade. More

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      in US Politics

      The Guardian view on Johnson's Biden problem: not going away | Editorial

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      The Irish question has played havoc with the best-laid plans of hardline Brexiters. Since 2016, successive Conservative governments have struggled to square the circle of keeping the United Kingdom intact, while avoiding the reimposition of a hard border on the island of Ireland. The border issue has been the achilles heel of Brexit, the thorn in the side of true believers in a “clean break” with the EU. So the prospect of an Irish-American politician on his way to the White House, just as Boris Johnson attempts to finagle his way round the problem, is an 11th-hour plot twist to savour.
      Joe Biden’s views on Brexit are well known. The president-elect judges it to be a damaging act of self-isolation; strategically unwise for Britain and unhelpful to American interests in Europe. But it is the impact of the UK’s departure from the EU on Ireland that concerns Mr Biden most. This autumn, he was forthright on the subject of the government’s controversial internal market bill, which was again debated on Monday in the House of Lords. The proposed legislation effectively reneges on a legally binding protocol signed with the EU, which would impose customs checks on goods travelling between Britain and Northern Ireland. In doing so, it summons up the spectre of a hard border on the island of Ireland, undermining the Good Friday agreement. Mr Biden is adamant that the GFA must not “become a casualty of Brexit”. He is expected to convey that message, in forceful terms, when his first telephone conversation with Mr Johnson eventually takes place.
      This is somewhat awkward for the prime minister. Mr Johnson badly needs to establish good relations with the new regime in Washington, ahead of crucial trade negotiations. In light of that, Mr Johnson may choose not to insist on the clauses relating to Northern Ireland when the bill goes back to the Commons. That would certainly be the wise move, although the noises coming from the government remain defiant. But the prime minister’s challenges in dealing with the coming regime change in Washington go well beyond Brexit.
      The personal dynamics between Mr Johnson and Mr Biden and his team are, to put it mildly, unpromising. The prime minister’s insulting remarks four years ago, about Barack Obama’s Kenyan ancestry, have not been forgotten. Mr Johnson seems to be viewed by many senior Democrats as a kind of pound-shop Donald Trump. There is also little regard for the consistency or sincerity with which Mr Johnson holds his views. At the weekend, when the prime minister instagrammed his congratulations to Mr Biden on his victory, a Biden ally witheringly referred to Mr Johnson as “this shape-shifting creep”.
      So in the race to make friends and influence people in the new Washington, Britain has the very opposite of a head start. The smart money is on Paris becoming the first European capital to receive President Biden. That reflects both good relations with Emmanuel Macron and a concern to rebuild diplomatic bridges, after four years in which Mr Trump rarely ceased to disparage and seek to undermine the EU. Mr Biden means to bring back a sense of diplomatic propriety and integrity to America’s relations with European friends and allies.
      Britain, having left the EU, cannot be a central player in this restoration project. But it can avoid making unforced errors. The government should urgently start to read the runes of new, more internationalist times. The politics of disruptive confrontation, as exemplified by the internal market bill, suddenly looks dangerously dated. When the Northern Ireland minister, Brandon Lewis, confirmed in September that the bill would break international law, senior Conservatives such as Sir Michael Howard and Theresa May expressed their dismay at the damage to Britain’s reputation that would result. They were ignored.
      But faced with an Irish-American president who is determined to rehabilitate relations with the EU, and is deeply suspicious of Mr Johnson’s Trumpian tendencies, to continue with the bill as it stands would be folly. With Mr Trump on his way out, Mr Johnson needs to sober up and start shifting some shapes on this and other matters. More

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      in Elections

      What will President Biden's United States look like to the rest of the world? | Timothy Garton Ash

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      What is the best the world can now hope for from the United States under President Joe Biden, now that the election has been called for him? My answer: that the US will be a leading country in a post-hegemonic network of democracies.Yes, that’s a, not the leading country. Quite a contrast to the beginning of this century, when the “hyperpower” US seemed to bestride the globe like a colossus. The downsizing has two causes: the US’s decline, and others’ rise. Even if Biden had won a landslide victory and the Democrats controlled the Senate, the United States’ power in the world would be much diminished. President Donald Trump has done untold damage to its international reputation. His disastrous record on handling Covid confirmed a widespread sense of a society with deep structural problems, from healthcare, race and infrastructure to media-fuelled hyper-polarisation and a dysfunctional political system.In a recent eupinions survey, more than half of those asked across the European Union found democracy in the US to be “ineffective”. And that was before Trump denounced as “fraud” the process of simply counting all the votes cast in an election. When the US lectures other countries on democracy these days, the politest likely answer is: “Physician, heal thyself!”. Even compared with the grim period of Vietnam and Watergate, this must be an all-time low for American soft power.Europe has many problems of its own, but set against the record of US regress over the last 20 years, our European story looks like triumphal progress. The same can be said for Australia, New Zealand or Canada. Still more dramatic has been China’s rise, facilitated by years of American strategic distraction.Even assuming that all legal challenges to his election will have been dealt with when the 46th president is inaugurated next January, he will face an almost bitterly divided country, an almost certainly divided government and a far from united Democratic party. Thanks to Trump’s shameless mendacity, millions of Trump voters may not accept even the basic legitimacy of a Biden presidency. His ability to push through desperately needed structural reforms will be hampered, if not stymied, if the Republicans retain control of the Senate.Fortunately for the rest of us, the area in which he will have most freedom of manoeuvre is foreign policy. Biden has immense personal foreign policy experience, as a former vice-president and before that, chair of the Senate foreign relations committee. He has an experienced foreign policy team. Members of that team identify their greatest strategic challenges as the “3 Cs”: Covid (including its global economic aftermath), climate change and China. That’s an agenda on which allies in Europe and Asia can happily engage. Rejoining the Paris climate agreement, which the US formally left on Wednesday, will be an important first step.Nato remains essential for Europe’s security against an aggressive Russia, but the key to winning back disillusioned Europeans will be to offer a new quality of partnership to the European Union. Even before he becomes president, Biden might like to express his appreciation for the way the EU has kept the flag of liberal internationalism flying while the US under Trump was awol. His first presidential visit to the old continent should include the EU institutions in Brussels. (Perhaps an address to the European parliament?) A bipartisan reference back to President George HW Bush’s 1989 “partners in leadership” speech in Germany could be helpful, but applying it now to the entire EU. In this partnership of equals, the US will not always sit at the head of the table. That’s what I mean by “post-hegemonic”.Europeans should do more for their own security, but Biden would be unwise to start by hammering away at the old “Spend 2% of your GDP on defence” theme. The German strategic thinker Wolfgang Ischinger has suggested a good way to reframe the issue: think of it rather as 3% on 3D – that is, defence, diplomacy and development. A self-styled “geopolitical” EU must assume a greater burden in its wider neighbourhood, which means to the south, across the Mediterranean to the Middle East and north Africa, and to the east, in relations with Belarus (currently in peaceful revolt), Ukraine and Vladimir Putin’s aggressive but also fundamentally weak Russia.A new emphasis on the EU will leave the ultra-Brexiters who dominate Boris Johnson’s government in Britain feeling slightly miffed. But the Johnson government does have one good idea, which is to extend the G7 meeting it will host next year to major democracies in Asia.This chimes perfectly with a central leitmotif of the Biden team: working with other democracies. The US already has the Quad format, linking it with Australia, Japan and India. They will be at least as important as the EU and Britain when it comes to dealing with China.If the Biden administration is wise, it will envisage this as a network of democracies, rather than a fixed alliance or community of democracies. Even a “summit of democracies”, reportedly a pet scheme of the president elect, would pose tricky questions of who’s in and who’s out. Think of it as a network, however, and you can keep it flexible, varying the coalitions of the willing from issue to issue and finessing the difficult borderline cases. For example, Narendra Modi’s India is anything but a model liberal democracy at the moment, yet indispensable for addressing the “3 Cs”.On every issue, both the US and Europe should start by identifying the relevant democracies; but of course you can’t stop there. You have also to work with illiberal and anti-democratic regimes, including China. China is the greatest geopolitical challenge of our time. It is itself one of the “3 Cs”, yet also crucial for addressing the other two: climate change and Covid. It is a more formidable ideological and strategic competitor than the Soviet Union was, at least from the 1970s onward, but its cooperation is also more essential in larger areas.In pursuing a twin-track strategy of competition and cooperation, the US has unique strengths. Although the “greatest military the world has ever seen” ended up losing a war against technologically inferior adversaries in Iraq, the US is the only military power that can stop Xi Jinping’s China taking over the Chinese democracy in Taiwan. The US still leads the world in tech, which is the coal and steel of our time. We watch French series on Netflix, buy German books on Amazon, contact African friends on Facebook, follow British politics on Twitter and search for criticism of the US on Google. In the development of AI, Europe is nowhere compared to China and the US.Yet, especially given its domestic travails, the US cannot begin to cope on its own with a China that is already a multi-dimensional superpower. It needs that network of partners in Europe and Asia as much as they need it. So let the world’s democracies stand ready to grasp the outstretched hand of a good man in the White House. What a change that will be. More

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      in World Politics

      The Real Scandal of Jeremy Corbyn’s Exclusion

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      Earlier this year, an internal report from the UK’s Labour Party revealed that some of its influential members worked to sabotage former leader Jeremy Corbyn’s electoral chances in 2017, the election in which he nearly achieved an unexpected victory against Prime Minister Theresa May. 

      Over the next two and half years, leading up to last December’s election, a group of diligent party members, echoed by much of the media, including The Guardian, collaborated on undermining Corbyn’s chances in the 2019 snap election called by Boris Johnson. They did so by focusing on the theme of anti-Semitism.

      How Do You Fix the Soul of the Nation?

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      After Labour’s defeat last December that confirmed Johnson as an elected prime minister and led to Corbyn’s resignation as the party leader, Labour’s establishment elected Keir Starmer to replace him, but apparently that wasn’t enough. As discreetly as possible, they continued relentlessly to shame Corbyn. Last week, exploiting the anti-Semitism theme thanks to the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) report, Labour took the extraordinary initiative of suspending Corbyn from the party in an act that Joseph Stalin’s politburo could only have admired.

      With a tone resembling a subdued cry of victory, The Guardian announced that “Labour has suspended its former leader Jeremy Corbyn after he said antisemitism in the party was ‘overstated’ following a damning report from the equality watchdog.” The article contained this somewhat surprising assertion: “A separate issue for Labour officials to work out is their precise legal culpability for online sentiments expressed by officials and others.”

      Here is today’s 3D definition:

      Online sentiments:

      Ideas, opinions or feelings expressed on the dangerous borderline between public and private discourse known as on social media, which means that random utterances in that medium can be targeted by groups specialized in shaming individuals who fail to agree with or conform to their own agendas.

      Contextual Note

      By suspending Corbyn, Labour has demonstrated that today’s technology has enabled Stalinist tactics far more sophisticated than Uncle Joe could have imagined. It provides them with the power to neutralize opponents without the bother of having to eliminate them physically.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Perhaps a better comparison to today’s public shaming would be to the Spanish Inquisition, immortalized in modern times by Michael Palin who famously cited its three weapons, “fear, surprise and ruthless efficiency,” before adding a fourth, “an almost fanatical devotion to the pope.” Labour’s equivalent to the pope is, of course, Tony Blair, the former prime minister. In terms of papal politics, Blair could best be compared to Benedict XVI as a quiet voice in the wings, who shouldn’t even be there, working discreetly to undermine his successor. 

      Starmer demonstrated his ruthless efficiency when, as The Guardian reports, he “spoke at a press conference where he said those who ‘deny there is a problem are part of the problem … Those who pretend it is exaggerated or factional are part of the problem.’” Like the Spanish Inquisition, the Labour Party has seized on a hint of criticism of the true faith (the EHRC report) that brooks no criticism but stands as infallible dogma. Suggesting that the report — which identified a total of two culprits in a party of 500,000 members — may have “overstated” the case or that there may be factions in the political church can only be deemed heresy.

      Whether the Labour Party subjected Corbyn to the rack or even the “comfy chair” remains unknown. What is clear is that after Corbyn’s claim that the case may have been overstated, the inquisitors noticed that the former leader had committed the ultimate sin: failing to “retract” his heretical statement. “In light of his comments made today and his failure to retract them subsequently, the Labour party has suspended Jeremy Corbyn pending investigation,” a Labour spokesman said.

      Historical Note

      In the guise of reporting political news, The Guardian, known as the respectable newspaper of the left, has played a major role in remodeling the Labour Party in the image of an anonymous group of improvised moralists who, through their mostly invisible lobbying, have demonstrated their sentimental attachment to the Tony Blair era and to everything Blair himself still represents.

      Labour has effectively assimilated the Stalinist tradition but given it a humanistic face. Dame Margaret Hodge, for example, offered this gentle version of excommunication: “Jeremy is a fully decent man, but he has an absolute blind spot, and a denial, when it comes to these issues. And that’s devastating.” If she believes he’s a decent man, she should object to his being accused of anti-Semitism. It’s all about perspective. If Jeremy Corbyn doesn’t see the same things as Hodge, who happens to be Jewish, it may be that he sees something else that Hodge may be blind to: the question of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.

      Corbyn has not accused Hodge, Starmer or anyone else of being anti-Semitic, which he might do on the grounds that Palestinians are also Semites and are the target of not just hatred but physical oppression. Corbyn’s anti-Semitic crime is simply that his defense of one group of Semites calls into question the unconditional support every British citizen owes to another group of Semites, a nation considered an indefectible ally.

      This sums up the hypocrisy of the entire controversy. It turns around a denial of two dimensions of historical reality. None of Corbyn’s accusers, nor The Guardian itself, dares to mention the significance of events in the Middle East and the effect they can have on judgments and opinions that may or may not entail the evocation of stereotypes.

      The second obvious but unmentioned historical dimension concerns the recent history of the leadership of the Labour Party. It is also linked to events in the Middle East. Blair has been the most electorally successful Labour Party leader in recent times. He has also been its most egregious warmonger, responsible — along with former US President George W. Bush — for a vast and ongoing humanitarian disaster, extensively documented in the Chilcot report. Clearly, electoral success in politics counts more than probity or human rights, even though the worst perpetrators of human suffering, such as Blair, claim they are acting in the name of human rights.

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      The drama of Labour leadership reveals that the entire anti-Semitism campaign had a single purpose. It was designed not just to cripple the left but to definitively crush it. The Guardian quotes Peter Mason, the national secretary of the Jewish Labour Movement (JLM), who, before Corbyn’s suspension, made the intentions clear: “Jeremy Corbyn does not have a future in the Labour party, he is yesterday’s man.”

      In an interview with Chris Williamson, Aaron Maté, the American investigative journalist, explores the historical background of the issue. Williamson had earlier been suspended from Labour on the grounds of anti-Semitism but was fully exonerated by the EHRC inquiry. His detailed testimony, critical of Corbyn on political grounds, provides some much-needed context.

      The late and deeply regretted David Graeber — an influential American anthropologist who taught in the UK before his premature death in September — provided a thorough historical perspective on the anti-Semitism question in a video apparently no one at The Guardian seems aware of. Had they seen it, they might have used some of Graeber’s historical knowledge to nuance their judgment of Corbyn.

      For a declared and condemned anti-Semite, Corbyn had a surprising number of Jewish supporters ready to claim that he “has a proud record of fighting all forms of racism and antisemitism.” Will those Jewish supporters and the 60,000 members who signed the petition also be suspended? Will they be asked to retract?

      The Guardian’s role in promoting the controversy and shaming Corbyn has been as appalling as it has been successful. The only trace of someone offering pertinent historical perspective published in The Guardian is a letter to the editor they can easily dismiss as someone’s mere opinion. 

      The New York Times at least offered a dry appreciation of the meaningless of Corbyn’s suspension: “The party did not immediately make clear what rule Mr. Corbyn had breached, though analysts said it likely had to do with bringing the party into disrepute.” Labour didn’t need Corbyn to bring it into disrepute. Blair accomplished that with panache 17 years ago. Keir Starmer has jumped on Blair’s bandwagon.

      *[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce, produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of The Daily Devil’s Dictionary on Fair Observer.]

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in Elections

      Trump has not been repudiated – a Biden presidency would face obstruction at every level | Adam Tooze

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      Whatever else emerges from the US’s 2020 election, one thing is clear: it has not delivered a comprehensive repudiation of Donald Trump. The shock of 2016 has not been undone. There is nothing in the result to expiate the humiliation of the last four years, the disgraceful vulgarity and illegality. Even if Joe Biden is ultimately sworn in as president, the fact that Trump was not booed off the greatest stage in world politics in disgrace will be hard for Biden’s supporters to come to terms with. This is an inconvenient truth not for the US alone, it has implications for the rest of the world too.Rather than a rejection of Trump, the election results reshuffle the finely balanced and deeply polarised configuration that has prevailed in American politics since the days of Bill Clinton in the 1990s. As in 2016, Trump lost the overall vote, but he continues to command overwhelming majorities in small-town and rural white America. Despite his vituperative hostility towards immigrants, Trump made remarkable gains among the rather diverse group crudely lumped together under the label Latino. Confusingly, he did well not only with anti-socialist communities of Cubans and Venezuelans in Miami, but with Mexican-Americans in Texas too. And he continues to garner a majority of votes from white women and white men of all backgrounds.In the meantime no one, either inside or outside the country, should be under any illusion about the scale of the nationalist and xenophobic electoral bloc. The GOP has lurched into the territory of Viktor Orbán and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and, nevertheless, commands solid support. Indeed, for a sizeable minority of the electorate, it is precisely the stridency of Trump and the GOP that appeals. They love Trump’s aggression, and his gleeful slaughter of liberal sacred cows. Now he has modelled the style, there will be plenty of others who will want to follow.In a divided country, virtually every facet of reality is seen through a partisan lens. Not unreasonably, the Democrats tried to make the election into a referendum on Trump’s handling of the coronavirus crisis. But that did not prove to be a winning card. Almost half of Americans did not agree that Trump’s disastrous and irresponsible performance disqualified him from the presidency. This hardly bodes well for the effort to gain control of the disease, which would be the first task of a Biden administration.If there is no collective will to take preventive action, then everything continues to ride on a magic bullet: a vaccine. But even that will not guarantee success. Opinion polling suggests that no more than a bare majority will agree to be vaccinated, with Republican-leaning Americans particularly resistant. The implication is that the US will limp along, not effectively controlling the outbreak and going through repeated lockdowns. The impact on communities and small businesses is likely to be devastating.Even assuming the virus can be mastered, a Biden administration would face an uphill political battle. Its formidable foes are the GOP in Congress, led by Mitch McConnell, the sulphurous boss of the Senate Republicans. Ahead of the election, riding a wave of over-optimism about the likely result, Nancy Pelosi played a dangerous game. The House speaker held out for a gigantic second stimulus package in excess of $2tn, but no “blue wave” swept the Democrats to control of Congress. Now, with a diminished majority, Pelosi will have to return to the bargaining table to negotiate with McConnell. To the pleasure of Wall Street, he has announced that he is willing to make a deal, but this is an ominous sign. Any package that McConnell will agree to is more or less guaranteed not to meet the social crisis facing tens of millions of unemployed Americans, and struggling cities and states across the country. And yet, to save the economy from catastrophe, the Democrats may well be forced to accept McConnell’s terms.However necessary, any deal with McConnell should be regarded as a poison pill. Every item of Biden’s progressive agenda – health, childcare and education – would be on the block. The wider world would be pleased to see a Biden administration reverse Trump’s decision to exit the Paris climate agreement. But any talk of a Green New Deal would likely be cut off at the knees. The Republicans like to talk about infrastructure but in four years in office, Trump never delivered an investment programme. If Senate Republicans were won over to a Biden green energy plan, you can count on it being tailormade for the business lobby. There is no chance whatsoever that the Senate would grant Biden the formal ratification of the Paris agreement, a legal victory denied to Barack Obama as it was to Bill Clinton over the Kyoto protocol.This would leave the United States unable to credibly commit to carbon neutrality. The progress of technology and the falling cost of renewable energy may be the trump card, but a technical fix can only take you so far. Deep decarbonisation may in due course open the door to a new green growth model. But, in the medium term, it requires painful structural change that will have to be initiated from the top down.Any progress in the next four years would depend on administrative makeshift and painful compromise. The Obama administration delivered a masterclass in both the potential and the limits of that kind of governance. A Biden administration would no doubt benefit from this experience, but it would face what may be Trump’s most formidable legacy: a court system packed at every level with pro-business, anti-regulation judges. In a single term Trump managed to appoint a quarter of federal judges, who will be enacting his agenda for decades to come.Faced with obstruction in every direction, we should not be surprised if the de facto lead on economic policy continues to lie not with the elected executive branch, but with the Federal Reserve. The Fed chairman, Jay (Jerome) Powell, has been nothing if not accommodating. And, from the point of view of the rest of the world, Fed leadership may be no bad thing. Cheap dollars ease the pressure on the world economy. But there are distinct limits to what any central bank can do in responding to the economic shock caused by the virus. And there are seriously toxic side-effects of an endlessly expansionary monetary policy, notably in inflating speculative bubbles that benefit the fortunate minority who own shares.What the Fed cannot deliver is what the US desperately needs, a major upgrade in public services, starting with electoral machinery, childcare, healthcare and 21st-century infrastructure. Without that, the impasse of a divided American society and a dysfunctional politics will continue. That is the prospect that should most worry the rest of the world. Far from closing the book on the last four years, even if there is a change of incumbent in the White House, this election threatens to confirm and entrench the poisonous status quo. More

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      in World Politics

      What Is Behind the Rise of Islamophobia in France?

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      On October 29, the French Ministry of Interior sent out a message on social media warning of “Violent radicalization, Islamism … If you have any doubts about someone you know, contact the toll-free number.” The situation in France has exploded into what is now increasingly reminiscent of 1930s Germany when Hitler sought informants on Jews.

      Muslims Will Not Kill God for Marianne

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      Samuel Paty, a schoolteacher who showed his students the derogatory cartoons of Prophet Muhammad that inspired the 2015 attack on the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, was killed by an 18-year-old Chechen refugee, Abdoullakh Anzorov. When French President Emmanuel Macron defended the display of the cartoons, which are considered by Muslims to be extremely offensive, as a matter of freedom of expression, the ongoing tension between the French state and its roughly 6 million-strong Muslim population (or 10%) is, in fact, a manifestation of a much deeper crisis, heralding what seems to be a growing trend across Western civilization.

      French Islam

      For France, the issue has its roots in the country’s domestic and international politics. The concept of radical assimilation has been a part of France’s governance tradition since its colonial reign. In the 19th and 20th centuries, in Francophone Africa, the natives were considered “French” and “civilized” as long as they rejected their own cultures in favor of that of the colonial power.

      The same mentality applies to the immigrants who have moved to France from former African colonies, particularly Algeria, Tunisia, and those countries across West Africa. This strict interpretation of the assimilation policy is further reinforced at home by the rigorous redefinition of French secularism, or laïcité, whereby the visibility of religion, particularly Islam, is suppressed in the public sphere, and the responsibility of immigrants, and Muslims in particular, is to demonstrate their attachment to French values and culture.

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      The suppression of religion in the public sphere has created enormous friction between the secular state and Muslims, whose faith requires observance around the clock. For example, the arrest of Muslims who have had to pray in the streets due to lack of mosques has become commonplace. In a striking display of French secularism, a Muslim woman was forced on a beach in Cannes in 2016 by police to remove her Islamic burkini and given a citation for “wearing an outfit that disrespects good morals and secularism.” France’s aggressive attempt to create nationwide equality has naturally led to repression of diversity, forcing Muslims to retreat to ghettoized suburbs. This in turn created discrimination and a fear of social rejection among France’s rapidly growing Muslim population.

      This brings us to how Islam is viewed in France. Much as across Europe, Islam is the fastest-growing faith in France. French Muslims are much younger and have considerably more children than other French nationals. Correspondingly, Christianity in France is in free fall. According to the survey by St. Mary’s University, London, only 25% of the French between the ages of 16 and 29 identify as Christian. What is even more concerning for the French state is that the number of people converting to Islam is on the rise as well. Out of France’s 6 million Muslims, 200,000 are estimated to be converts, among whom are celebrity figures such as the rapper Diam’s and footballer Franck Ribery. Conversion to Islam is particularly prevalent among women, which has created a body of research examining this trend.

      The increasing demographic disparity between Islam and Christianity, coupled with an increasing refugee influx from Muslim countries, has given rise to the notion that within two generations, Muslims are going to be the majority in Europe. Naturally, this argument has been used by right-wing politicians across Europe. France is no exception. Marie Le Pen, the leader of the far-right National Rally, has skillfully used this argument throughout her political career. In the first round of the 2017 French presidential elections, Le Pen garnered a sizable 21.3% of the vote against Emmanuel Macron’s 24%, only to lose in the run-off election. The 2017 election clearly showed that right-wing politics are on the rise in France and elsewhere in Europe.

      Macron’s harsh stance toward French Muslims should also be seen from this angle. In the 2022 French presidential race, Macron is expected to seek a second term against Le Pen, his most likely contender. To the president’s dismay, the current polls suggest that at 26%, Le Pen has an edge over his 25%. This being the case, the incumbent Macron is clearly courting the far-right constituency by adopting Islamophobic policies that would be expected from a Le Pen presidency.

      More Problems

      The current atmosphere is highly conducive for a further rise of the far right across Europe. Adolf Hitler’s rise to power was facilitated by the Great Depression of 1929 and its devastating impact on Germany. Likewise, the 2008 global financial crisis jolted the West so much that we have been witnessing the demise of the center-left and the gradual rise of the radical right in Poland, Hungary, France, Germany, Italy, Britain and the United States.

      Macron’s current effort to elevate Islam as France’s biggest problem should also be seen as an attempt to distract the public from his failures at home and abroad. The rapidly deteriorating economy, austerity measures, heavy taxation and the proposed pension reform have inspired the yellow vests movement that has been staging violent demonstrations against the government since 2018. Abroad, France appears to be bogged down in its never-ending wars in former African colonies as French casualties pile up. In Libya, Macron has failed to secure warlord Khalifa Haftar’s rule. In the East Mediterranean, France has failed to secure the interests of Greece, an ally.

      There is one country that France has had to unsuccessfully counter in the above-mentioned regions: Turkey. It is for this reason that Macron has consistently perceived Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as his archrival and increased his anti-Turkey rhetoric. Furthermore, Erdogan, at the moment the most outspoken critic of the Charlie Hebdo cartoons, is the only world leader who can influence Muslims in France, and Macron knows it. Erdogan’s call on Muslims for a worldwide boycott of French products prompted the French government’s plea to the Muslim world to denounce the boycott. While the economic effect of the boycott is not known yet, Macron seems to be softening his tone on the cartoon issue.               

      France’s unsuccessful assimilation policies, rapidly deteriorating economy, failed foreign policy alongside the ensuing rise of the far right have all contributed to the current demonization of Muslims in the country. As Western values such as democracy, human rights and equality are losing relevance, there is little hope that this trend will change any time soon.

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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      in Elections

      International observers say US elections 'tarnished' by Trump and uncertainty

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      An international observer mission has reported that the US elections have been “tarnished” by legal uncertainty and Donald Trump’s “unprecedented attempts to undermine public trust”.A preliminary report by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) pointed to systemic weaknesses in US elections, as well as the stress imposed by the coronavirus pandemic and Trump’s calls for an end to vote counting in certain states based on false claims of fraud.“Baseless allegations of systematic deficiencies, notably by the incumbent president, including on election night, harm public trust in democratic institutions,” the report, by the OSCE’s Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and the organisation’s parliamentary assembly, said.“With Covid and so many things changing at the last minute practically for the voter and for the election administration, there was this feeling of unease or confusion,” the head of the ODIHR mission,the Polish diplomat Urszula Gacek, told the Guardian. “And then on top of that, you have an incumbent who is doing something we’ve never seen before, casting doubt on the actual process, and making the way you cast your ballot also a political statement.”The OSCE report pointed to efforts at the state level to adjust voting procedures in light of the pandemic, and then the raft of legal challenges to those adjustments (overwhelmingly from Republicans), as being a source of considerable confusion when it came time to vote.“There was an unprecedented volume of litigation over voting processes in the months before the elections, with over 400 lawsuits filed in 44 states, some still before the courts a few days before elections,” the report said. “The legal uncertainty caused by this ongoing litigation placed an undue burden on some voters wishing to cast their ballots and on election administration officials.”The issues caused by the pandemic and an erratic president compounded long term systemic problems, the OSCE found, many of which disadvantage the poor and ethnic minorities, such as the varying requirements for proof of identity at polling stations, which the report found to be “unduly restrictive” for some voters.“If the only thing you could possibly use would be a college student card and you’re not a student, or a driving license and you don’t drive, or a passport and you never travel anywhere, you can imagine that certain economically disadvantaged groups will be disproportionately affected, and certain ethnic minorities could be excluded,” Gacek said.The report also referred to the disenfranchisement of felons and former felons. It said: “An estimated 5.2 million citizens are disenfranchised due to a criminal conviction, although about half of them have already served their sentences.”“These voting restrictions contravene the principle of universal suffrage,” the report concluded.Gacek said that $400m federal emergency funding for states’ election administrations had not been sufficient and the shortfall had come from private sources. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, contributed $400m.“But when you look at the $14bn which has been spent on the campaign, and you juxtapose that against an administration which has been having to rely on philanthropists to help them actually run the election, I think it’s interesting,” Gacek said. More