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      Britain Fails Its Exams

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      The Advanced Level Certificate (A-level), together with the General Certificate of Education (GCSE), is one of two sets of exams students across England, Wales and Northern Ireland (Scotland has its own system) sit in the summer. The GCSE is a ticket to spending two years studying for A-levels, itself a ticket to university, where 40% of England’s schoolchildren end up. The results are released in August by the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual.)

      This year, there were no exams because the United Kingdom locked itself down against COVID-19. Instead, teachers supplied predicted grades. Teachers make these predictions every year, and it is with these in mind that universities make the offer of a place. Offers are made either unconditionally or with the proviso that the predictions are realized or bettered. In recent years, more and more offers have been made unconditionally, and these now comprise around a third of the total.

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      Universities do this because they are dependent upon the fees each student pays: no students, no fees, no university. The pressure rises as universities expand, and each finds itself having to attract a greater share of a shrinking number of school leavers. Restrictions imposed by a hostile immigration service on international students’ movements, and now in response to COVID-19, have made matters worse.

      The Algorithm

      This year was also different because, when the results were issued on August 13, it was obvious that Ofqual had intervened. The grades awarded to many students bore little resemblance to the schools’ predictions. Worried that teachers were being too generous and that this would undermine the credibility of the exams, Ofqual devised and applied a mathematical formula to moderate the results. The algorithm took account of the students’ mock results and the performance of each school in previous years, amongst other variables. The calculations determined that 40% of grades should be reduced. This threw offers and plans into doubt, causing umbrage among students, parents, teachers and universities.

      Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, stuck resolutely to his guns. By August 17, he had abandoned them, and the original predicted results were reinstated. Williamson had been blindsided by Ofqual, he claimed, and only became aware of the full implications of the recalculations over the weekend. Ofqual struck back, saying that Williamson had known difficulties were brewing ever since March, when he ordered the regulator to adjust grades if they appeared inflated.

      It was then made known that the head of Ofqual, Roger Taylor, established and ran a firm implicated in the Mid Staffs Hospital scandal. His firm, Dr Foster,  had come up with an algorithm enabling the hospital to present its mortality rates as low when, in fact, they were dangerously high and its patients were being dreadfully mistreated.

      Just what had Gavin Williamson been levelling at? The entire mess was completely avoidable and unnecessary. No exams had been taken, so there were no exams to be brought into disrepute. And there had been no exams because of exceptional circumstances. So why treat the teacher’s predictions as an assault on standards, especially when predictions are made every year and unconditional offers are issued to a fair proportion of students as a matter of course?

      Whatever the answer, the response was immediate. Gasps of disbelief at the secretary’s sheer incompetence (“He’s fucking useless,” declared one vice chancellor) were combined with emotional outbursts from students worried that their lives had been ruined, from parents trying to deal with the fallout at home, and from university staff whose summer breaks were interrupted.

      All parties most likely suspected that things would eventually sort themselves out if only because chancellors are desperate to fill seats. Having said that, the government and Ofqual displayed a complete absence of trust in teachers and schools. Most disgraceful was the treatment of students with potential and drive who had worked hard against the odds in schools assessed as poor over the last few years. At a macro-level, it meant that the proportion of the most deprived pupils (the bottom third) who achieved a Grade C or better fell by nearly 11%, while the independent schools saw their proportion of A and A* grades increase by nearly 5%.

      An education secretary, whose only claim to the job is that he was not educated at an independent school and did not go to Oxford or Cambridge, willfully took away the ladder from the very kids it is meant for. A more callous and spiteful decision in the name of equality is difficult to imagine. However, the farrago matters for another, even more important, reason. It illustrates just how superficial education has become.

      Grades Are Everything

      The A-levels are not just a passport to university. A school whose students’ average grades fall too far will come under greater scrutiny from the government, which can end in sanctions of one sort or another. These include changing staff pay and conditions; removing staff and governing bodies; turning the school’s budget over to an interim board; closing the school; or handing it (minus its former staff) to an academy. Academies, though state-funded, have more control over management, curriculum, pay, the selection of students and staff, and the freedom to attract money from private sponsors.

      Of the 3,400 or so state-funded secondary schools (3.25 million pupils), nearly three-quarters (about 2.3 million children) are now academies. If an academy fails, then it, too, is either absorbed by a more successful one or closed. Independent schools judged to be failing can also find themselves in trouble. For instance, they may be prohibited from taking on new pupils, fined or closed. Proprietors who do not respond adequately to enforcement notices can end up in prison.

      Grades, then, have come to mean everything. And because they mean everything, what they are supposed to signify has come to mean very little at all. The education system — and “system” is a good description — barely manages to educate. Where a good education is found in English schools, it is provided by teachers and parents despite the vast amount of nonsensical instructions (misleadingly entitled “guidelines”) issued by the government. In these oases of levelheadedness, staff teach outside the system’s narrow confines, helping children to explore more rounded and deeper understandings of the world, introducing them to new ways of thinking.

      The problem is not just that teachers are weighed down and worn out by red tape. To avoid falling foul of the government and its quality enforcers, teachers must consume millions of words of legislation, statutory instruments, notices and guidance that lay out in extraordinary detail everyday practice within the school. It is that education — or rather the fulfillment of standards dictated by the government — has become a bureaucratic procedure, a glorified exercise in form-filling, in which content, imagination, experimentation and sustained and unconventional thought no longer matter.

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      Children and teachers must do what they are told to do in the way they are told to do it. “Best practice” holds sway over fresh thought. The student must see the world as directed. Thus, for instance, a play is a composite of meaning shaped by literary and dramatic devices. History is an unstable melange of constructions arrived at by historians through their interpersonal relationships. The economy must be studied through the application of the correct economic models. Only by breaking the mind into a kaleidoscope of skills through which patchworks of information are collected and assembled, declare geography teachers, can social and natural worlds be understood. Facts, interpretations and evidence are set out in neat bullet points so they can be memorized and marshalled in the correct way and in the correct place.

      All of this and more — such as precisely defined “command words” like “analyze” and “suggest,” and the marks to be awarded for each correctly placed fact or argument — is found in thick, glossy volumes of “specifications,” “amendments,” “sample assessments,” published “resources,” “mark schemes,” “specimen papers,” “exemplar material,” “schemes of work,” “skills for learning and work” and “topic materials” produced by exam boards for each subject.

      Officialism smothers all schools. But when parents are well educated and bring up their children to read, learn, write, talk and think coherently, teachers have an easier time of it. Children are confident, and this shows in class and in their work. Teachers know that as far as the exams are concerned, their students can, to all intents and purposes, teach themselves. A teacher’s immediate job is to make sure a child is practiced in the bureaucracy and is given the required information. This will deliver the grades.

      The second, and more important job, is to lead their children out and well beyond those limitations. It is this — a passion for their subject and a willingness to go further — that really prepares the child for university and beyond. Most, though not all, of these schools are independent and selective.

      State-funded schools are far more constrained by the system, and it is all they can do to meet its demands. The bureaucracy does not allow them the time, freedom, money or incentive to instill in children and parents the outlooks, values, beliefs, practices and confidence that will enable them to see beyond the government’s petty world view.

      I should say that the distinction I make between independent and state is too stark. There are some excellent state schools, and there are some terrible independent schools — unhappy little communities tucked away in some old building in the countryside. My point is simply that education, rather than its bureaucratized version, is found unevenly and rarely, and is more likely where teachers and parents have the wherewithal and determination to play the system and so keep it from dragging them and their children down into a mire of niggling and pointless tasks, boredom and despondency.

      Not Much Help

      British universities have not been much help. Rather than find common cause with schools and encourage them in fostering a university-style education, universities have gone along with government reforms all too easily and are becoming more like brash, over-confident schools. The university has become a brand, an experience, a rite, designed to extract as much cash as possible from students. Walk away with a good degree, the student is told, and our brand will confer upon you a charisma, a light, a duende that will set you up for life or at least give you a foot in a door so that you show an employer what you can do. Meanwhile, behind all the pizzazz, the content of the degree is scratched away at and the process through which the certificate is awarded becomes more bureaucratic.

      The trend is especially obvious in universities without a well-established pedigree. Why should a student pay tens of thousands of pounds for a certificate from a university no one has heard of? The answer is “relevance,” and relevance means “skills.” As the degree is hollowed out, the space is filled with an omnium-gatherum of skills: cognitive skills, intellectual skills, key skills, transferable skills, employment-related skills, practical skills, applied skills, inter-personal skills, writing skills, reading skills, thinking skills, networking skills, team-working skills, observational skills, speaking skills, speech-making skills, analytical skills, editing skills, note-taking skills, research skills, computing skills, entrepreneurial skills, lab skills, creative skills, leadership skills, work ethic skills and ethical skills.

      Choose a verb or adjective, put the word “skill” after it, and it becomes teachable, assessable and marketable. To write an essay or a thesis or to take an exam is to engage in a piece of bureaucracy, an updated form of medieval scholasticism, in which all these skills are stitched together, tracked and traced.

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      By lifting a corner of the veil, the A-level fiasco exposes a little of the humbug swirling around the government’s education system and something of the cynicism with which the government treats the people it claims to represent. Just how deep this cynicism goes, however, is revealed by a matter from which the farce distracted public attention over the last week — a week that I suspect will prove deadly. I say deadly because it will be difficult in the time left to deter the government from repeating the same mistakes it made at the start of the pandemic that cost over 40,000 lives.

      At present, the UK government and its scientific advisers are busy saturating the press with its claim that the “life chances” of children will be damaged irreparably if schools stay closed. A generation of children will “fall behind,” many of those who rely on schools to feed them will go hungry, and many others, forced to stay at home, will be at greater risk of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.

      The government’s chutzpah is breathtaking. To indict the produce of its own policies and then use that indictment as cheap blackmail in support of those same policies is surely the height of contempt. A fifth of the population is poor because of government actions and inactions over many years. It is these “ordinary” people, as ministers like to call them, who are most under pressure to go work because of cuts to welfare, changes in benefit rules and threats from government.

      It is also they who, last time around, suffered most from a virus allowed to run loose. And it is their children who are most likely to bring it back home after struggling on public transport and spending hours in crowded classrooms working on pointless and soul-destroying bureaucratic techniques. The only strand of reasoning that makes some kind of sense in this tangled web of lunacy is a ruthless one: the primary function of the education system is to keep Britain’s labor force — and especially its cheaper end — at work.

      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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      How Global Britain Confronts the Asian Century

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      On February 3, Prime Minister Boris Johnson laid bare his long-awaited vision of a “global Britain” in a world after Brexit. Speaking amidst the imperial grandeur of Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, Johnson’s message was that the United Kingdom, liberated from the straitjacket of EU membership, would be free to carve out a confident, dynamic and outward-looking role on the world stage in a post-Brexit era — even as the first handful of COVID-19 infections took root on British soil.

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      Six months and a global pandemic later, Britain faces the unique and unprecedented challenge of redefining its place in a world that is in the midst of a historic watershed moment. The COVID-19 pandemic has served as a catalyst for deep-rooted trends that have long been evident to politicians, policymakers and analysts alike — none more so than the tectonic shift in the globe’s geopolitical center of gravity from West to East.

      Whether it be China’s much-publicized “wolf-warrior” diplomacy against states criticizing its initial response to the outbreak, or the initial success of East Asian states in confronting the pandemic using artificial intelligence and digital surveillance, COVID-19 has shown that the much-hyped “Asian century” is not merely a future prognosis but a present-day reality.

      Brexit Britain on the World Stage

      If the pandemic has served to boost Asia’s image on the world stage, the opposite is true for Brexit Britain. The UK’s bumbling response to the COVID-19 crisis has confirmed many of the suspicions of ill-placed grandeur held in foreign capitals since the referendum to leave the European Union in 2016.

      Despite Johnson’s boastful confidence in Britain’s “world-beating” response to the novel coronavirus (which causes the COVID-19 disease), fatal early errors by the government — notably the initial refusal to enforce a lockdown in a forlorn effort to preserve the economy — have resulted in Britain suffering the worst of both worlds. Not only is the UK facing one of the highest per-capita death rates and the worst economic fallout as a result of COVID-19 in the developed world, but the situation has been exacerbated by the looming threat of no post-Brexit trade deal being agreed with the EU by the end of 2020.

      In this context, a global Britain’s success in navigating the increasingly volatile “new normal” of the post-pandemic geopolitical order will hinge more than ever on the government’s ability to leverage ties with partners old and new across the Asian continent.

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      Johnson’s vision of a buccaneering global Britain on the world stage is fundamentally predicated upon two core pillars: trade and security. Whitehall is acutely aware that Britain’s ability to harness the ascendance of Asia’s emerging powerhouses hinges upon striking a fragile balance between these two, often inconsistent, objectives.

      On one hand, Britain’s strategic planners look hungrily toward contemporary geopolitical hotspots like the South China Sea as testing grounds for a new forceful security footprint in the Indo-Pacific region. Britain’s armed forces already possess a string of strategic outposts, from the Brunei-based Gurkha garrison to Royal Naval logistical hubs in Singapore and Diego Garcia. The recently formed UK Defence Staff (Asia Pacific) has outlined plans for a further base in Southeast Asia in a bid to affirm Britain’s commitment to upholding the regional security architecture.

      In a symbolic gesture, the scheduled deployment of the Royal Navy’s brand new state-of-the-art aircraft carrier, HMS Queen Elizabeth, to conduct “freedom of navigation” patrols in the disputed South China Sea during 2021 is indicative of a wholesale rejection of the strategic retrenchment from east of Suez that has typified British security policy in the Indo-Pacific since the 1960s.

      Beijing’s Sphere of Influence

      Nevertheless, such grandiose ambitions of a more assertive military and diplomatic footprint in Asia do not come without their costs. Given China’s increasingly assertive posture on the international stage since the outbreak of COVID-19, it is not unreasonable to expect the diplomatic blowback from Britain’s perceived meddling within Beijing’s sphere of influence to grow stronger in the post-COVID era.

      In July, after the UK offered citizenship to almost 3 million Hong Kong residents following Beijing’s implementation of a controversial new security law in Britain’s ex-colony, China issued a strongly-worded yet ambiguous threat of “retaliation.” China’s response is illustrative of the fact that Brexit Britain’s ability to fully harness the Asian century is dependent upon London playing second fiddle to the preferences of Tokyo, Beijing and New Delhi.  

      Despite Johnson’s lofty rhetoric hailing Britain’s post-Brexit transformation into a “great, global trading nation,” such a vision is not exactly conducive to geopolitical maneuvers that can all too readily be perceived as antagonistic by prospective partners. For instance, Whitehall’s backpedaling over the contracting of Huawei, a Chinese technology company, to construct large tracts of Britain’s 5G infrastructure over national security concerns does not bode well for a future UK–China free trade deal. Similarly, efforts to introduce restrictions on immigration via the adoption of an Australia-style points-based system have proved to be a sticking point in post-Brexit trade negotiations with India, the former “jewel of the empire” with whom Britain shares extensive historical, cultural and linguistic ties.

      As a global Britain seeks to navigate a post-pandemic order characterized by increased great power antagonism, retreating globalization and resurgent authoritarianism, Whitehall’s strategic planners must be prepared to make hard-headed compromises between geopolitical and economic objectives in Asia in a manner that has been sorely lacking from Brexit negotiations with Britain’s European partners. Cut adrift from Europe at a time when the global order is becoming increasingly fragmented into competing regional blocs, a rudderless Britain lacking a coherent, sustainable vision of how it seeks to engage with Asia’s emerging superpowers risks becoming caught in the middle of an escalating cold war between the US and China.

      Reason for Optimism

      Despite the gloomy prognosis for a global Britain standing at the dawn of the Asian century, there remains reason for optimism once the short-term shockwaves of the pandemic have receded. Britain’s elite universities retain a mystical allure for ambitious young Asians seeking a world-class education. China, India, Hong Kong and Malaysia account for four of the top five countries of origin for international students in the UK. In addition, with two leading vaccine candidates in development at Oxford and Imperial, a British breakthrough in the fight against COVID-19 would further bolster Britain’s reputation as a global hub of research and innovation.

      Such cutting-edge academic expertise — combined with London’s enduring status as a global financial center, post-2021 visa and immigration reforms targeting highly-skilled professionals, and the cultural imprint of large Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Chinese diasporas — ensures that even post-Brexit Britain possesses the latent potential not only to attract top-class Asian talent, but also to emerge as one of the Asian century’s biggest winners outside of the Indo-Pacific. Whilst Brexit has undercut the Blairite vision of Britain as a “pivotal power” bridging the gap between the US and Europe, the United Kingdom’s deep-rooted historical, cultural, linguistic and economic ties with Asia’s rising powers provide ample scope for recasting Britain as a pivot on a grander scale: as a global hub bridging East and West.

      However, such aspirations remain little more than wishful thinking unless British policymakers can formulate a coherent approach toward the Asian century, which has so far been absent. Nevertheless, tentative steps have been taken in such a direction over recent months. Whitehall’s merging of the Department for International Development with the Foreign Office is likely to deal a blow to British influence in less-developed corners of Asia, at least in the short term. Yet Johnson’s renewed commitment to spend 0.7% of GDP on foreign aid enables a more cohesive, long-term approach with developmental issues, allowing funding to be streamlined toward teams of world-class specialists, such as the UK Climate Change Unit in Indonesia or the Stabilisation Unit supporting post-conflict reconstruction in fragile states like Pakistan and Myanmar.

      Similarly, the Foreign Office’s recent adoption of an “All of Asia” strategy is indicative of a more comprehensive approach to forging partnerships across the continent, balancing conflicting security, diplomatic, trade, developmental priorities, as illustrated through the establishment of the UK’s first permanent mission to Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) bloc in January 2020.

      Before It Sets Sail

      As the nature of post-pandemic global order emerges over the coming months and years, a global Britain will find itself navigating a turbulent geopolitical environment made infinitely more challenging by the aftershocks of the coronavirus. This includes a worldwide economic crisis, decreased globalization, declining faith in multilateral institutions and rising great power tension, all of which threaten to derail Johnson’s post-Brexit voyage into the unknown before it has even set sail.

      Whilst Britain and its Western allies have bungled their response to the public health crisis, Asia’s dynamic rising powers are already bouncing back from the pandemic and laying the building blocks to ensure that the 21st century truly is Asian. From Beijing’s “Belt and Road Initiative” to New Delhi’s “Make in India” to ambitious future vision projects such as Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, Vision of Indonesia 2045 or Kazakhstan 2050, Asia’s emerging powerhouses all champion integrated strategic frameworks to harness the unprecedented shift in global wealth and power eastward, which the COVID-19 pandemic has catalyzed.

      A global Britain’s greatest mistake would be to supplement such a long-term calculated strategy with the half-baked geopolitical gambits that have so far typified Brexit Britain’s approach to the world’s largest continent. Indeed, for the UK to truly unleash its full potential in the dawning Asian century, it must look to Asia itself for inspiration.

      *[Will Marshall is an intern at Gulf State Analytics, which is a media partner of 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 World Politics

      Boris Johnson Takes England, and COVID-19, Back to Square One

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      Not only has UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson failed to learn from other countries’ dealings with COVID-19, he has stubbornly refused to learn from his own experience. He is the true king of fools. It would be laughable were it not for the tens of thousands of deaths he and his government are responsible for.

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      On March 23, Johnson led England into a lockdown. It was far too late. In May, he led the country out of lockdown in what was supposed to be an incremental fashion. It was far too early. It was also confusing, chaotic and only encouraged people to abandon all pretense long before the final restrictions were lifted in July and August. Johnson is now back where he started, declaring, as he did before March 23, that normality and the economy must be preserved at all costs. As before, infection rates are on the rise, especially in London and parts of the north. As before, these facts are being ignored. Under no circumstances will a second lockdown be contemplated, nor will schools close after September 1. Responses to any future outbreaks will be localized and short term.

      If Possible

      The guidance being handed to England’s hapless schools is remarkably similar to that issued back in January, February and March: wash your hands, clean surfaces and, if possible, keep your distance from each other. (The government adds “if possible” to its documents because it knows full well that such distancing is impossible in most schools and in most classrooms.) As before, teachers or children who are clinically vulnerable — or who are shielding a husband or wife, a mother or father, a daughter or son who is clinically vulnerable — can attend school and should do so when the new term starts in early September.

      If you are a parent who is determined to keep your child at home, you will be fined, as before, by the secretary of state for education. And, as before, there will be no testing unless someone displays symptoms. There is, however, one innovation being introduced this time around: children, parents and staff who do show any symptoms are asked to get themselves tested, to trace contacts and to report their findings to the school.

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      Johnson’s motivation for all this nonsense is the economy. He is seemingly and willfully unaware that it tanked by a whopping 20% of GDP in the first quarter, compared to just under 12% across the EU. This is not because Johnson locked down too early and for too long, but because he didn’t lock down early enough or for long enough and didn’t take that breathing space to organize an effective track-and-trace regime or institute a mask-wearing culture. He also failed to engage with local governments and instead treated them with contempt and withheld from them the information they needed to protect the vulnerable. He has, in other words, assiduously ignored the best strategies that are on public display in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao and South Korea. These include the restriction of movement and physical distancing, rapid identification of positive and suspected cases through mass testing, and the immediate isolation of positive and suspected cases with appropriate treatment rendered.

      The pillars of Seoul’s response, for example, are promptness and transparency, and a willingness to learn from the 2015 MERS outbreak. Government, local and national, did not hesitate: It tested aggressively, launched epidemiological investigations and imposed quarantines, shared information and began disinfection efforts.

      South Korea saw its first confirmed case of COVID-19 on January 23. Within a week, hand sanitizers and disposable masks were being distributed for free on public transport, and seats and handles were being disinfected. Within 16 days of the first case, museums, galleries and other cultural venues, along with taxis, subways and buses, were being sterilized with ever more frequency, and people who had been exposed were quarantined and given specialist medical care. Within four weeks, screening stations were up and running around the clock. Risky venues such as bars and cafes were closed, and treatment was being extended to citizens with suspected COVID-19 symptoms. Within five weeks, public facilities were shut.

      Unsurprising Results

      In the UK, within five weeks of the first confirmed case on January 29, Johnson, on the best scientific advice the country could muster, had done almost nothing. The government’s modeling group had advised that isolation and tracking wouldn’t do much other than delay the peak of the epidemic. Life might as well go on as normal. Masks were not needed. More proactive measures were not advised until six weeks after the first case. On March 3, Johnson’s government, having listened to the great and the good of Britain’s scientific community, declared that it would be better if people did not shake hands. That same day, Johnson proudly boasted that he had been shaking hands with everyone, including coronavirus patients.

      The results are as stark as they are unsurprising. While the UK has had more than 60,000 deaths and has taken the worst hit to its GDP year on year in the second quarter in 64 years, just over 300 people have died from the virus in South Korea, its economy grew through the first quarter and is expected to manage around -0.8% over the year. Even in the Philippines, where the government has been equally as irresponsible as Johnson’s, there are those who see the choice between keeping the economy going and tackling COVID-19 as an entirely fictitious one.

      Yet perhaps the most exasperating thing about this whole sorry debacle — surely the worst exhibition of foolhardiness and incompetence since the 1853 Crimea campaign, the First World War, Chamberlin’s policy of appeasement or Britain’s chaotic and bloody withdrawal from India (take your pick) — is the fact that Boris Johnson is still in Number 10. Not so long ago, a few weeks before the outbreak, I heard a young lecturer, a social psychologist from China, say that the English, so used to being smothered by their government and their aristocracy, are most at ease as placid and compliant followers. I’m beginning to see what she meant.

      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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      Is Europe More United Than the US?

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      During the Trump era, America increasingly seems like a motley collection of states brought together for reasons of territorial contiguity and little else. The conservative South is ravaged by a pandemic. The liberal Northeast waits patiently for elections in November to oust a tyrant. A rebellious Pacific Northwest faces off against federal troops sent to “restore order.” The Farm Belt, the Rust Belt and the Sun Belt are like three nations divided by a common language.

      The European Union, on the other hand, really does consist of separate countries: 27 of them. The economic gap between Luxembourg and Latvia is huge, the difference in median household income even larger than that between America’s richest and poorest states (Maryland and West Virginia).

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      European countries have gone to war with each other more recently than the American states (a mere 25 years ago in the case of former Yugoslavia). All EU members are democracies, but the practice of politics varies wildly from perpetually fragmented Italy to stolid Germany to ever-more illiberal Hungary.

      Despite these economic and political differences, the EU recently managed to perform a miracle of consensus. After 90 hours of discussion, EU leaders hammered out a unified approach to rebuilding the region’s post-pandemic economy.

      The EU is looking at an 8.7% economic contraction for 2020. But the coronavirus pandemic clearly hit some parts of the EU worse than others, with Italy and Spain suffering disproportionately. Greece remains heavily indebted from the 2008-09 financial crisis. Most of Eastern Europe has yet to catch up to the rest of the EU. If left to themselves, EU members would recover from the current pandemic at very different rates and several might not recover at all.

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      That’s why the deal is so important. The EU could have helped out its struggling members by extending more loans, which was basically the approach after 2009. This time around, however, the EU is providing almost half of the money in the new recovery fund — $446 billion — in grants, not loans. The $1.3-trillion budget that European leaders negotiated for the next seven years will keep all critical EU programs afloat (like the European structural and investment funds that help bridge the gap between the wealthier and the less wealthy members).

      Sure, there were plenty of disagreements. The “frugal four” of the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria and Sweden argued down the amount of money allocated to the grant program and the budget numbers overall. Germany has often sided with the frugal faction in the past, but this time Chancellor Angela Merkel played a key role in negotiating the compromise. She also managed to bribe Hungary and Poland to support the deal by taking “rule-of-law” conditionality off the table. Both countries have run afoul of the EU by violating various rule-of-law norms with respect to media, judiciary and immigration. Yet both countries will still be able to access billions of dollars from the recovery fund and the overall budget.

      Until recently, the EU seemed to be on the brink of dissolution. The United Kingdom had bailed, Eastern Europe was increasingly authoritarian, the southern tier remained heavily in debt, and the pandemic was accelerating these centrifugal forces. But now it looks as the EU will spin together, not spin apart.

      The United States, on the other hand, looks ever more in disarray. As Lucrezia Reichlin, professor of economics at the London Business School, put it, “Despite being one country, the U.S. is coming out much more fragmented than Europe.”

      The Coming Storm

      The Trump administration has been all about restarting the US economy. President Donald Trump was reluctant to encourage states to lock down in the first place. He supported governors and even armed protesters demanding that states reopen prematurely.

      And now that the pandemic has returned even more dramatically than the first time around, the president is pretending as though the country isn’t registering over 60,000 new infections and over a thousand deaths every day. Trump was willing to cancel the Florida portion of the Republican Party convention for fear of infection, but he has no problem insisting that children hold the equivalent of thousands of mini-conventions when they return to school.

      Europe, which was much more stringent about prioritizing health over the economy, is now pretty much open for business.

      The challenge has been summer tourism. Vacationers hanging out on beaches and in bars are at heightened risk of catching the COVID-19 disease — which is caused by the novel coronavirus — and bringing it home with them. There have been some new outbreaks of the disease in Catalonia, an uptick in cases in Belgium and the Netherlands, and a significant increase in infections in Romania. Belgium is already re-instituting restrictions on social contacts. Sensibly, a number of European governments are setting up testing sites for returning tourists.

      The EU is determined not to repeat what’s going on in Florida, Texas and California. It is responding in a more deliberate and unified way to outbreaks leading to an average of 81 deaths a day than the United States is responding as a whole to a very nearly out-of-control situation producing more than 900 deaths a day.

      The US isn’t just facing a deadly resurgence of the pandemic. Various economic signals indicate that the so-called “V-shaped recovery” — much hyped by the Trump administration — is just not happening. More people are again filing for unemployment benefits. People are reluctant to go back to restaurants and hang out in hotels. The business sector in general is faring poorly.

      “The sugar rush from re-openings has now faded and a resurgence of domestic coronavirus cases, alongside very weak demand, supply chain disruptions, historically low oil prices, and high levels of uncertainty will weigh heavily on business investment,” according to Oren Klachkin, lead US economist at Oxford Economics in New York.

      The Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) released a report in July that offered two potential scenarios for the US economy through the end of the year. Neither looks good. The “optimistic scenario” puts the unemployment rate at the end of 2020 at 11.3% (more or less what it is right now) and an overall economic contraction of 7.3%. According to the pessimistic scenario, the unemployment rate would be nearer to 13% and the economic contraction at 8.5%.

      Much depends on what Congress does. The package that Senate Republicans unveiled last week is $2 trillion less than what the Democrats have proposed. It offers more individual stimulus checks, but nothing for states and municipalities and no hazard pay for essential workers.

      Unemployment benefits expired a few weeks ago, and Republicans would only extend them at a much-decreased level. Although Congress will likely renew the eviction moratorium, some landlords are already trying to kick out renters during the gap. The student loan moratorium affecting 40 million Americans runs out at the end of September.

      The only sign of economic resurgence is the stock market, which seems to be running entirely on hope (of a vaccine or a tech-led economic revival). At some point, this irrational exuberance will meet its evil twin, grim reality. On the other side of the Atlantic, the Europeans are preparing the foundation for precisely the V-shaped recovery that the United States, at the moment, can only dream about.

      The Transatlantic Future

      What does a world with a stronger Europe and a weaker America look like? A stronger Europe will no longer have to kowtow to America’s mercurial foreign policy. Take the example of the Iran nuclear deal, which the Obama administration took the lead in negotiating. Trump not only canceled US participation, but he also threatened to sanction any actors that continued to do business with Iran. Europe protested and even set up its own mechanisms to maintain economic ties with Tehran. But it wasn’t enough. Soon enough, however, the United States won’t have the economic muscle to blackmail its allies.

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      The EU has certainly taken a tougher stance toward China over the last couple years, particularly on economic issues. But in its negotiations with Beijing, the EU has also put far greater emphasis on cooperation around common interests. As such, expect the European Union to take full advantage of the US decline to solidify its position in an East Asian regional economy that recovers far more quickly from the pandemic than pretty much anywhere in the world.

      Europe is also well-positioned to take the lead on climate change issues, which the United States has forfeited in its four years of catastrophic backsliding under Trump. As part of its new climate pact, the EU has pledged to become carbon-neutral by 2050. The European Commission is also considering a radical new idea: a carbon tax on imports. In the future, if you want to be competitive in selling your products in the European market, you’ll have to consider the carbon footprint of your operation.

      Of course, the EU could do better. But compared to the US, Russia or China, it’s way out in front. The European Union is not a demilitarized space. It has a very mixed record on human rights conditionality. And its attitudes toward immigration range from half-welcoming to downright xenophobic.

      But let’s say that Europe emerges from this pandemic with greater global authority, much as the US did after World War II. A lot of Americans, and most American politicians, will bemoan this loss of status. But a world led by a unified Europe would be a significantly better place than one mismanaged by a fragmented United States.

      *[This article was originally published by FPIF.]

      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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      What Has COVID-19 Done to Small Businesses?

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      Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are businesses with revenues, assets or employees below a certain threshold. SMEs are important to the health of any country as they tend to form the backbone of the economy. When compared to large enterprises, SMEs are generally greater in number, employ far more people, are often situated in clusters and typically entrepreneurial in nature. They drive local economic development, propel job creation and foster growth and innovation.

      360° Context: How Will COVID-19 Impact Our Economy?

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      According to the World Bank, SMEs represent about 90% of businesses and 50% of employment worldwide. In the United States, 30 million small businesses make up 44% of GDP, 99% of the total businesses and 48% of the workforce, amounting to 57 million jobs. In India, the SME sector consists of about 63 million enterprises, contributing to 45% of manufacturing output and over 28% of GDP while employing 111 million people. SMEs in China form the engine of the economy comprising 30 million entities, constituting 99.6% of enterprises and 80% of national employment. They also hold more than 70% of the country’s patents and account for more than 60% of GDP, contributing more than 50% of tax collections.

      Different Countries Define SMEs Differently

      Though most experts agree on the crucial role SMEs play in any economy, the definition of an SME varies by country. In the US, the Small Business Administration (SBA) defines SMEs broadly as those with fewer than 500 employees and $7 million in annual receipts, although specific definitions exist by business and sector. Annual receipts can range from $1 million for farms to $40 million for hospitals. Services businesses such as retail and construction are generally classified by annual receipts, while manufacturing and utilities are measured by headcount. In June, the Indian government revised its SME definitions, expanding the revenue caps on medium and small enterprises from $7 million and $1.5 million to $35 million and $7 million respectively. In the United Kingdom, a small business is defined as having less than 50 employees and turnover under £10 million ($12.7 million), whereas a medium business has less than 250 employees and turnover under £50 million. 

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      Proper definitions matter. If SMEs are classified well, their access to capital and other resources can improve. They can apply for grants, get tax exemptions, collaborate on research with governments or universities or access other schemes. This gives SMEs better opportunities to survive and thrive.

      Since SMEs tend to be the biggest employers in most economies, a good policy to promote them creates jobs and develops worker skills. Furthermore, proper definitions enable governments to focus their efforts regarding SMEs and level the playing field for them vis-a-vis large corporations.

      Given the scale and nature of their business models, SMEs operate at the mercy of vagaries of the economy, geopolitical events and local policies. They battle competition from multinational giants, volatile cash flows, fickle customers, demanding suppliers and constantly churning employees. But the COVID-19 pandemic has crossed all boundaries. While the 2000 crisis was a dot-com bust and 2008 was a collapse of the financial systems, 2020 is clearly the SME crisis. It is Murphy’s Law at its extreme — anything that can go wrong has indeed gone wrong.

      The coronavirus crisis started off in early 2020 as a supply shock, which has now turned into a demand shock, impacting customers, employees, markets and suppliers alike. The consequences can be potentially catastrophic with the International Monetary Fund estimating that SME shutdowns in G20 countries could surge from 4% pre-COVID to 12% post-COVID, with bankruptcy rates in the services sector increasing by more than 20%.

      SMEs are bearing the brunt of the economic and financial fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, not least because many were already in duress before the crisis. This could have a domino effect on the economy, given the pivotal role played by SMEs. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that most governments have sought to intercede legislatively with their fiscal might to ameliorate the predicament of SMEs.

      Indian and American Response

      It is instructive to note how different countries have responded to the economic crisis. India is a good country to start with. In early May, the government announced a 20-trillion-rupee ($250 billion) stimulus package called Atmanirbhar, equivalent to 10% of India’s GDP. It was a mixture of fiscal and monetary support, packed as credit guarantees and a slew of other measures. The centerpiece was an ambitious 3-trillion-rupee ($40 billion) initiative for SMEs, including instant collateral-free loans, subordinate debt of 200 billion rupees ($2.5 billion) for stressed micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), and a 500-billion-rupee ($6.5 billion) equity infusion. Perhaps the largest component of the stimulus was the Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) that provides additional working capital and term loans of up to 20% of outstanding credit. 

      Although the scheme received positive feedback, the initial uptake was slow. On the supply front, bankers fretted about future delinquencies arising out of such accounts as the credit guarantees only covered incremental debt. On the demand side, SMEs were worried about taking on additional leverage when there is uncertainty about economic revival. Moreover, a 20% incremental loan may not suffice to service payrolls and operating expenses and keep business alive.

      Also, while this scheme addressed existing borrowers, the fate of those who are not current borrowers is unclear. While initial traction for the scheme was low, the recent momentum has been encouraging. The finance ministry reports that as of July 15, banks have sanctioned 1.2 trillion rupees ($16 billion), of which 700 billion rupees ($9 billion) have been disbursed largely by public sector banks, although private sector banks have joined in lately.

      Meanwhile, even the largest global economy has struggled with its SME relief program. In mid-March, US President Donald Trump approved a $2.2-trillion package under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act to help Americans struggling amid the pandemic. One of the signature initiatives under the act was the $660-billion Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) aimed at helping small businesses with their payroll and operating expenses. This program was distinct from its peers in its loan forgiveness part, in which the repayment of the loan portion used to cover the first eight weeks of payroll, rent, utilities and mortgage would be waived. 

      The program, though well-intentioned, has struggled with execution issues exacerbated by labyrinthian rules. Matters came to a head when the initial tranche of $349 billion ran out in April. The program had to be refinanced but, by June, it was closed down with $130 billion of unused funds in its coffers. The program was restarted again and extended to August by Congress.

      Worse, the program saw refunds from borrowers who were unclear about the utilization rules. Loan forgiveness would be valid only if the amount was utilized within eight weeks. This stipulation made SMEs wary because their goal was to use cash judiciously and optimize the use of the borrowed amount to last as long as possible. These rules have since been amended by the Small Business Administration. It now gives SMEs 24 weeks to use the borrowed funds and allows them more flexibility on the use of funds. In any case, questions have been raised about capital not reaching targeted businesses and unintended parties benefiting instead. 

      Despite the changes in SBA rules, the jury is still out on whether more SMEs will take out PPP loans. Some are lobbying for full loan forgiveness. However, dispensing of repayment requirements essentially creates handouts that could lead to the lowering of fiscal discipline and increasing incentive for fraud. A recent proposal by two professors, one from Princeton and the other from Stanford, suggests “evergreening” of existing debt, a practice that involves providing new loans to pay off previous ones. Though innovative, it is not quite clear how such a policy would provide better benefits compared to a loan repayment moratorium, especially when it comes to influencing future credit behavior. 

      In addition to the PPP program, the SBA has announced the Economic Injury Disaster Loans (EIDL) program. This offers SMEs working capital loans up to $2 million to help overcome their loss of revenue. The program was closed down on July 13 after granting $20 billion to 6 million SMEs. Maintaining equitability and efficacy in the distribution process has been a challenge, though.

      European Responses

      Europe’s largest economy, on the other hand, has fared relatively better. In early April, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced a €1.1-trillion ($1.3 trillion) stimulus termed the “bazooka.” This constituted a €600-billion rescue program, including €500 billion worth of guarantees for loans to companies. The German state-owned bank KfW is taking care of the lending. The program also includes a cash injection of €50 billion for micro-enterprises and €2 billion in venture capital financing for startups, which no major economy has successfully managed to execute. Notably, the centerpiece of the German program is the announcement of unlimited government guarantees covering SME loans up to €800,000. These loans are instantly approved for profitable companies.

      Berlin’s relief measures were specifically targeted at supporting Germany’s pride, the Mittelstand. This term refers to the 440,000 SMEs that form the backbone of the German economy. They employ 13 million people and account for 34% of GDP. Many of these firms manufacture highly-specialized products for niche markets, such as high-tech parts for health care and auto sectors, making them crucial to Germany’s success as an export giant. Not surprisingly, these companies have seen a contraction in revenues, especially the ones that depend on global supply chains. 

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      The swift implementation of these initiatives, coupled with the resilience of the Mittelstand, is demonstrating that SMEs can survive and thrive in this environment. The Germans have also been preaching and practicing fiscal prudence in normal times, which has now worked in their favor. Germany can afford to inject capital and do whatever it takes to save its SMEs.

      Since its first stimulus, Berlin has followed up with an additional €130-billion package consisting of tax, SME loans and spending measures aimed at stimulating demand. This included a €46-billion green stimulus focused on innovation and sustainable projects such as e-mobility and battery technology. In keeping with the German tradition, the SMEs who make the Mittelstand have stayed agile as well. They are diversifying their customer base and pivoting their business models to more recession-proof sectors. 

      The UK, another major world economy, also launched an array of relief measures, including the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) worth £330 billion ($420 billion). This was designed to support British SMEs with cash for their payroll and operating expenditure. It also announced the Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS) focused on smaller businesses. This enjoyed a better launch than CBILS because the latter, with its larger loan quantum, required more vetting and paperwork.

      Loans from the CBILS initiative, although interest-free for a year, are only 80% guaranteed by the government. This makes banks less willing to lend during these troubled times because they are afraid of losing 20% of the loan amount. This slows credit outflow and starves SMEs of much-needed capital. As of July 15, less than 10% of the allotted capital had been utilized, which banks blame on an inadequately designed scheme. By mid-July, only £11.9 billion had been disbursed to 54,500 companies through the CBILS and £31.7 billion to 1 million smaller firms through the BBLS.

      Businesses have sought modifications from policymakers to existing schemes. These include hiking government guarantees for loans to 100% and waiving personal guarantees for small loans. The Treasury has agreed to some of these demands. Critics also point to structural deficiencies in the system. They believe the administrative authority for SME loans should be a proper small business bank instead of the British Business Bank, which was not designed for SMEs. Already, the UK government has warned that £36 billion in COVID loans may default. More drastic measures seem to be on the way, including a COVID bad bank to house toxic SME assets.

      Responses Elsewhere

      Economies around the world have been responding to disruption by COVID-19. It is impossible to examine every response in this article, but Japan’s case deserves examination. The world’s third-largest economy had been battling a recession even before the pandemic. Declining consumption, falling tourism and plunging exports were increasing the pressure on an aging society with a spiraling debt of over $12.2 trillion. The pandemic has strained Japan’s fiscal health further.

      In response to the pandemic, the Bank of Japan announced a 75-trillion-yen ($700 billion) package for financing SMEs, which included zero-interest unsecured loans. Additionally, the National Diet, Japan’s parliament, enacted a second supplementary budget, which featured rent payment support and expanded employment maintenance subsidies for SMEs.

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      The execution of these programs has been tardy. The government’s 2015 digitalization drive is still incomplete, impacting the distribution of subsidies and the implementation of other relief measures. Of the more than 400,000 applications for employment adjustment subsidies, only 80,000 companies received aid by mid-June. Application procedures are unnecessarily complex, adding to the woes of SMEs.

      Any discussion on SMEs in the global economy would be incomplete without examining China, which was the first country to deal with the COVID-19 disease. In February,  the government announced a 1.2-trillion-renminbi ($174 billion) monetary stimulus. Large state-owned banks were ordered to increase lending to SMEs by at least 30% in the first half of 2020. Three of these banks alone were supposed to lend 350 billion renminbi ($49.7 million) to small businesses at preferential rates. In addition, Beijing encouraged local policymakers to provide fiscal support to keep SMEs afloat.

      China’s stimulus seems more understated compared to other major economies and their own 2008 bailout package. After controlling the first COVID-19 wave in March, the Chinese have focused on restarting the economy and reopening businesses instead of relief measures and bailouts.

      In February, surveys in China showed that 30% of SMEs had experienced a 50% decline in revenue. Surveys also found that 60% of SMEs had only three months of cash left. At the end of March, almost half a million small businesses across China had closed and new business registrations fell by more than 30% compared to last year. The resumption of work has been an uphill struggle. In April, the production rate of SMEs had crossed 82% of capacity, but the sentiment had remained pessimistic. Notably, the Small and Medium Enterprise Index (SMEI) had risen from 51.7 in May to 53.3 in June, indicating that SMEs are slowly reviving.

      With the easing of lockdown measures, domestic demand in China has picked up, driving SME sales. In turn, greater demand is increasing production activity and accelerating capacity utilization, causing a mild rise in hiring. The green shoots of recovery of Chinese SMEs should encourage authorities worldwide. 

      Policy Lessons for the Future

      Governing nation-states is an arduous task at the best of times and especially so in a nightmarish year of dystopian proportions. No wonder governments worldwide have appeared underprepared to combat the COVID-19 crisis. Whilst predicting a global pandemic of this scale would be next to impossible, there were early warning signs that severe disruptions to global health care, supply chains and business models were imminent. Yet scenario planning and stress testing of economic models has been flawed, impacting the swift rollout of relief measures.

      The crisis has also underlined the importance of fiscal discipline when economies are doing well. Countries that do so can build a robust balance sheet to leverage during troubled times. This crisis also brings home the importance of evaluating and reevaluating the efficacy of the entities that deal with SMEs. Policymaking is an iterative process, especially when it comes to SMEs and bodies that oversee them must be overhauled periodically.

      Importantly, policies pertaining to SMEs must have inputs from those with domain expertise. Structures must take into account execution capabilities and speed of delivery. Instant loan approvals with suboptimal due diligence have to be constantly balanced against longer vetting but slower turnarounds. Similarly, policymakers have to analyze the various types of instruments, fiscal and monetary, that can be used for SMEs. What works in one country may not work for another. 

      It is important to remember the nuances of different policy measures, such as guarantees, forgiveness, monitoring and moratoriums. Guarantees are a sound instrument for relief but are potential claims on the government’s balance sheet and contingent liabilities. They also have little economic value if capital is not promptly delivered to SMEs. Forgiveness provisions have their own issues. They may be important in a crisis but could incentivize subpar credit behavior in the future. Similarly, monitoring is important but is impractical when millions of SMEs are involved. There is no way any authority can keep a tab on the intended usage of funds. Finally, moratoriums have their own problems. Businesses could misuse moratoriums, putting pressure on banks and making accounting difficult. They were cheered at the onset of the crisis but further extensions could be costly to the ecosystem. 

      Going forward, governments need to prepare for the long haul. The consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic will stay with us for the foreseeable future. What began as a liquidity crisis might well become a solvency crisis for SMEs despite the best attempts to avoid that eventuality. If that does happen, governments will need to plan for efficient debt restructuring. They will have to institute insolvency management processes while figuring out how to handle bad asset pools. In simple language, governments will have to make tough decisions as to distributing gains and losses not only among those living but also future generations.

      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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      Are We Ready to Drop the Term “Islamist” in Reference to Terrorism?

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      On July 20, The Times released a report indicating that UK police held a forum to explore a request to change the terminology surrounding terror attacks now commonly defined as “Islamist.” The discussion, which included the head of Counter Terrorism Policing, Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu, and some 70 individuals with personal or professional experiences with terrorism, came as a result of the National Association of Muslim Police’s (NAMP) initial request for the abandonment of terms such as “Islamist” and “jihadi” on the grounds that they adversely impact public perceptions of the Muslim community.

      Far-Right Terrorism Is Now Britain’s Fastest Growing Problem

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      Proposed alternatives to present terminology include “faith-claimed terrorism,” “adherents of Osama bin Laden’s ideology,” “terrorists abusing religious motivations” and “irhabi” — an Arabic term common in the Middle East to reference terrorists. The mere suggestion of a change has since sparked passionate debates online, which reveal a great deal about public perceptions of terrorism and how it is policed in the UK.

      Finding the Right Words

      As the initial report stated, according to the NAMP, the existing lexicon has contributed to Islamophobia, itself on the rise in recent years. Among the reported comments was one that noted how far-right terrorist Anders Breivik, whose 2011 attacks in Norway killed nearly 80 people, mostly children, and others have invoked Christian imagery relating to the Crusades, yet their attacks are not identified as “Christianist.” Presently, counterterrorism experts employ the terms “Islamist extremism,” “extreme right-wing” and “Northern Ireland-related” when discussing terrorist ideology.

      News reports included lines such as “The police emphasized to The Times that the reform was not certain to go ahead,” and Chief Superintendent Nik Adams also stated that “We have no plans to change the terminology we use at present but welcomed the debate and contributions.” Yet within hours of the article going to print, news outlets around the world have covered the story, opinion pieces have been printed, and thousands of comments have been posted online arguing about the implications of a name change. Notably, many of the reasons against any alterations evidence troubling narratives circulating in society.

      One of the most frequent points employed by critics of the proposal resides in the belief that “Islamist terrorism” and “jihadism” are the most fitting terms because they recognize the centrality of Islam to these group’s ideologies and motivations. A significant portion of comments agreed with the assessment that the current vocabulary may prove harmful to their Muslim neighbors and colleagues. Nevertheless, they claimed that, as terrorists justified their actions in relation to Islam, the description of their actions should be identified as such. Also, worryingly, in many instances, such arguments spiraled out to present Islam as an inherently or even uniquely violent religion. Some writers posted snippets of Islamic texts that appear to reference the use of terror or how to treat non-Muslims. Others responded to the news by arguing that Islam and democracy or its values are mutually exclusive.

      Emblematic of others, one advised that the UK should establish “an enquiry into why so many Muslims become radical; terrorists; grooming gangs etc. The scriptures/teachings must be challenged, not terminology watered down.” Meanwhile, comments such as “As far as I’m aware, the Jews don’t have a section that advocates genocide of unbelievers. Neither do Christians, or Sikhs or the Hindus. Neither do the atheists. This is a uniquely Islamic problem” and “What other religion does this? Genuinely…which?” can be found repeated across the internet.

      In particular, many commenters took issue with the National Association of Muslim Police’s observation about the double standard at play in failures to identify certain far-right terror attacks as linked to Christianity. Exemplifying arguments found repeatedly across various platforms, one widely-liked tweet argued that “We don’t talk about ‘Christianist’ terror because there’s no such Christian movement.” This narrative defies reality. As noted by some online, the Troubles in Northern Ireland had a clear sectarian Christian element, Catholic identity played a fundamental role in the Spanish Falangist movement, and the attacks on abortion clinics and providers by groups such as the Army of God were motivated by a particular view of Christianity. These are just the tip of the iceberg.

      Christian Identity

      The Christian identity movement has been in operation for upward of a century in the United Kingdom and around the world. Its vitriolic anti-Semitism and racism are rooted in an alternative interpretation of Biblical stories. In the United States, the iconic cross-burning of the Ku Klux Klan has served merely as a symbol of the organization’s long history of a particular racist Protestant theology, and the knights of the Ku Klux Klan’s party envisions the establishment of a “White Christian government.” Other groups known to have engaged or encouraged violence in relation to a hybrid Christian, racist ideology include White Aryan Resistance, Aryan Nations, The Order and the National Alliance.

      Bible passages were cited as justification by the suspected perpetrators of both the Tree of Life and Poway synagogue shootings. Meanwhile, Anders Breivik’s manifesto shows his ideology to have been anchored in his interpretation of Christian beliefs. He viewed himself as part of a crusade against the multiculturalism he viewed to be destroying Christian European culture. Brenton Tarrant, whose two attacks in Christchurch killed more than 50 people last year, likewise published a manifesto with references to his as a crusade and citing quotations from Pope Urban II, who is widely considered to have orchestrated the First Crusade. One of the most famous neo-Nazi authors, James Mason — who has been of significant influence to extremist organization Atomwaffen Division — wrote a book linking Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” to the Bible.

      The reality is that each of these groups uses or has used Christian symbols and religious writings to justify their violence and racist aspirations. They have also done so while claiming to be the true expression of Christianity. Literally hundreds of people have died, and many others been injured, at the hands of those claiming that they were acting in the name of Christian values.

      While debates may and can be had about the fact that certain terrorist organizations do identify with terms such as “jihad” or self-identify as “jihadis,” and that, thereby, counterterrorism’s use of the term is merely mirroring terms on the ground, it is important not to claim that Christianity has no links to extremism and terrorism. This leaves aside arguments about the lack of violence perpetrated in the name of other religions, of which there are also ample examples.

      PC Culture

      The other potential worrying element to the critical narratives surrounding the proposal are those about why such a discussion happened. Hundreds of users have cited it as evidence that the UK has fallen victim to politically correct, or PC, culture. Charles Moore’s Telegraph opinion piece, for instance, implies this, linking Basu’s participation in this terminology discussion with his previous comments about media’s role in radicalization or about Boris Johnson’s comments likening women in niqabs to letterboxes. “You might think Mr Basu would eschew political or media disputations,” Moore observes. “Not so,” he goes on, before concluding that the name should not change and that “AC Basu should forget this elderly argument and get back to proper work.”

      Embed from Getty Images

      Others take this to a greater extreme, viewing the news as a sign that the UK is now in the hands, or at the mercy, of dangerous ethnic and religious minorities, or that those in charge of counterterrorism policing are weak-willed, apathetic or even side with the terrorists. References to George Orwell’s “1984” abound.

      “The police are now part of the Islamist problem,” one user wrote. “They have been extensively ‘Common Purposed’ and are riddled with fifth columnists.” Another asked: “Who is representing the majority white population of the UK? The majority is the least needy; the country revolves around minorities.” Frequently, Basu and other senior law enforcement officers, as well as politicians, are urged to quit or are called out by name as being unfit for service based on accusations that this discussion signals their pandering to the Muslim population.

      At times, these accusations amount to declarations that a change to the terminology would make the UK less safe. Many claim that this discussion could be linked to the UK’s “grooming gangs.” As one user posited, this mentality was “the same sort of PC mindset that let child abuse rings thrive in this country.” While not often fleshed out, the apparent logic relies on the idea that a police force, unwilling to specifically name the nature of a terrorist’s ideology for fear of perceived discrimination, would also be less capable of policing and preventing crime.

      Debates about the use of terms such as “jihad,” “Islamic” and “Islamist” are not new. Since at least the inception of the war on terror, law enforcement officers, scholars, media and community advocates have clashed over the best terminology to employ when discussing terrorism. As only one more moment in this ongoing dialogue, UK law enforcement’s discussion this summer is not yet set to change anything, and even if law enforcement changed its classification, this would by no means ensure a change in media reporting or popular vernacular.

      Yet thousands of people took to the internet to express their opinions, and that fact must be viewed as significant. In particular, the rush to criticize the police for even entertaining such an idea, as well as the commonality in the rhetoric used to defend existing terms, is illuminating. They point to implicit (or potentially willful) blindness about who perpetrates terrorism in the name of religion, outright racism and Islamophobia, and genuine distrust of major government institutions. These reactions, in fact, implicitly reinforce the argument made by the National Association of Muslim Police that vocabulary does make a difference.

      *[The Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right is a partner institution of 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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      London’s “Mega Mosque:” Islamophobia in the COVID-19 “New Normal”

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      During the lockdown, the US-based news service, Breitbart, ran a story about plans for a new “mega-mosque” in central London. Proposed for the historic Trocadero building near Piccadilly Circus in the heart of London’s entertainment and theater districts, Breitbart claimed that plans had been submitted to Westminster’s local authority to convert parts of the building into a mosque with a capacity to host around 1,000 worshippers.

      Having been widely shared on social media, the Breitbart story not only claimed that local residents were shocked by the size of the mega mosque, but so too was it alleged that some had voiced concerns about the increased risk of terrorism, that worshippers would try and enforce an alcohol ban in the surrounding area, and that there would be a conflict with those frequenting Soho, London’s gay quarter.

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      While some of those lodging complaints about the mosque will no doubt have had legitimate claims, the Breitbart article clearly acted as a catalyst for the radical right in Britain to jump on the opposition bandwagon. By using the term “mega-mosque,’ Breitbart reverted a tried and tested trope that has been successfully deployed in other parts of the country by various radical-right groups to derail plans for other new mosques. While this affords an opportunity to consider how the radical right have focused on size when it comes to opposing mosques, so too does it give us a timely insight into how the radical right’s campaigns of Islamophobia might change in the “new normal” of a post-COVID-19 world.

      The “Old Normal”

      Standing on the corner of Shaftesbury Avenue and Piccadilly Circus, the Trocadero was built in 1896. Home to a restaurant until 1965, the building remained largely redundant until the early 1980s, when it was renovated and relaunched as an indoor entertainment complex, housing the UK’s first IMAX cinema and various other attractions, including the gaming arcade Segaworld. With every new initiative, however, came failure, and the building eventually became derelict in 2006. A year beforehand, Criterion Capital had purchased it along with another nearby building. Since then, the Trocadero has undergone significant changes: Today, for example, it houses a 740-bedroom hotel with a rooftop bar.

      Embed from Getty Images

      The man behind Criterion Capital is Asif Aziz. He also established the Aziz Foundation, an education charity for British Muslims that has its headquarters near Piccadilly Circus. The foundation was behind the plans submitted to the local authority to request permission to convert the basement and part of the ground floor into a prayer space and community center. With the intention of serving Muslims who live and work in the area, the plans state that it was likely that the prayer space would only attract near-capacity attendance for Friday prayers; on all other days, the plans claimed that no more than 100 worshippers would be in attendance. When the public consultation closed, nearly 9,000 comments had been filed about the plans. While the majority were supportive, a flood of comments opposing the mosque appeared once the mega mosque story was “broken” by Breitbart.

      Among these were a number of tropes that the radical right have been deploying about Muslims and the religion of Islam for some time: from changing the “character” of the area to the mosque being a potential “Islamist hotspot,” from Islam not being welcome in a “secular” society to the mosque being evidence of the further “Islamification” of Britain. Of course, the size of the mosque was also routinely cited as a problem.

      Under the “old normal,” the radical right have been scaremongering about the size of mosques for almost two decades. As the simple yet effective narrative goes, the bigger the mosque the bigger the threat posed. This was used to good effect in Dudley, a town on the outskirts of Birmingham in the West Midlands. While much was made of the size of the prayer hall, it was the height of the proposed minaret adjoining the “super-mosque” that garnered the most opposition.

      Alleged to be taller than the steeple of the town’s oldest church, opponents claimed Muslims were doing so in order to claim the supremacy of Islam over Christianity. Prompting more than a decade of radical-right protests, including some of the largest by the anti-Islam street protest movement, English Defence League, the plans for the mosque were withdrawn in 2018.

      Three years prior, a similar outcome met plans to build a 9,000-capacity “mega mosque” in Stratford, East London. There, more than a quarter of a million people signed a petition opposing the mosque following radical-right groups campaigns alleging that those behind the mosque had links with the 7/7 suicide bombers.

      The “New Normal”

      In the “new normal,” while various radical-right groups have jumped on the anti-mosque bandwagon, it has been by former anti-Islam political party and vigilante group, Britain First, that has led the way, at the time of writing acquiring near 125,002 signatures on its online petition to block the plans. Most interesting, however, are the reasons Britain First cites for opposing the new mosque.

      Alongside all of the old-normal reasons for doing so, it is the new attribution to the size of the mosque that is most insightful. As it states: “Local people have strongly objected to the application on the basis that the area was already heavily overcrowded even before the coronavirus pandemic introduced the need for social distancing – and that adding another 1,000 people, congregating in and around the mega mosque during prayer times would cause serious [problems].” As such, the new mosque should be opposed because it will increase the risk of spreading COVID-19 and thereby poses a threat to the health of local residents.

      While much has been made about the new normal that will ensue in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, what the Trocadero mosque shows is that some elements of the old normal will not only survive but will continue to thrive. As was the case in the old normal, mosques are problematic, the size even more so. Irrespective of any pandemic, little would appear to have changed.

      What does seem to have changed in the new normal, however, is how size is problematized. While the simple yet effective narrative technique used to be “the bigger the mosque, the bigger the threat posed” could, in the wake of 9/11,  always be understood as being either cultural or violent. As regards the former, this typically focused on the “takeover” of Britain, its values, way of life and so on. For the latter, this typically focused on terrorism and radicalization. Post-COVID-19, if Britain First is anything to go by, a more insidious dimension to that threat might now emerge. As the petition infers, the threat now posed by the mosque is also a biological one.

      Irrespective of whether such claims are true, one can see how effective and immediate this kind of claim could be among local people who are already fearful of the effects and impact of an invisible virus. Reshaping the narrative to “the bigger the mosque, the bigger the biological threat posed” may have the potential to be an even more effective means of mobilizing and opposing in the new normal than it was before. If Britain First is successful, expect others within the radical right to rapidly follow this new narrative technique in anti-mosque campaigns and other forms of Islamophobic mobilization throughout the UK.

      *[The Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right is a partner institution of 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 World Politics

      Opposing Repressive Regimes in the Middle East Is a Death Sentence

      by

      The ruling by Bahrain’s top judicial body, the court of cassation, on July 13 to uphold the death sentences of Mohammed Ramadhan and Husain Moosa has been decried by human rights organizations, condemned in the UK House of Lords and questioned in the British Parliament. Whether any of that will save the men from execution is debatable.

      The men were convicted and sentenced to death in 2014 for the killing of a policeman. That conviction was overturned when evidence emerged that they had been tortured into giving false confessions. Despite that decision, the death penalty was reinstated and subsequently confirmed by the court of cassation. An official in the public prosecutor’s office defended the court’s latest ruling while denying the accusations of torture, claiming that medical reports showed that the confessions were obtained “in full consciousness and voluntarily, without any physical or verbal coercion.”

      In Bahrain, Justice Is Still a Far-Off Goal

      READ MORE

      That confounds the earlier court decision to throw out the convictions, which was based on an investigation undertaken by the Bahraini government’s own Special Investigation Unit that showed the men had been tortured. However, in the contorted reality of the kingdom’s politicized judicial system, the court of cassation decided that the convictions were not based on evidence extracted under torture but rather on other evidence.

      “Close and Important Relationship”

      Amnesty International denounced the latest verdict, saying: “The two men were taken to the Criminal Investigations Department where they were tortured during interrogation. Mohamed Ramadhan refused to sign a ‘confession’, though he was subjected to beating and electrocution. Hussain Ali Moosa said he was coerced to ‘confess’ and incriminate Mohamed Ramadhan after being suspended by the limbs and beaten for several days.”

      Moosa has said that, after his genitalia were repeatedly beaten, he was told that if he signed a confession implicating Ramadhan his sentence would be commuted to life: “They were kicking me on my reproductive organs, and would hit me repeatedly in the same place until I couldn’t speak from the pain. I decided to tell them what they wanted.” His repudiation of the confession was ignored by the courts.

      In UK Parliament, four days prior to the court of cassation ruling, the Conservative MP Sir Peter Bottomley had asked Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab for a statement on whether he would use what he called “the UK’s constructive dialogue” with Bahrain to publicly raise the cases of the men. In reply, the Minister for the Middle East and North Africa James Cleverly spoke of a “close and important relationship” with an “ongoing, open and genuine dialogue” with Bahrain. The minister averred that “this dynamic” enabled the UK to raise human rights concerns, adding “the cases of Mr Moosa and Mr Ramadhan had been, and would continue to be, raised in conversations with officials in Bahrain.”

      Embed from Getty Images

      Earlier this month, it was revealed that another heavily politicized judiciary, this time in Iran, had upheld the death sentences of three young Iranian protesters who had been arrested in November of last year during countrywide protests that saw hundreds killed by security forces. Though moving swiftly to convict the men and sentence them to death, the authorities have done virtually nothing about investigating the killings carried out by the state in suppressing the protests. Amongst media highlighting their case is the Saudi news site Al Arabiya. It noted that a hashtag trending in Iran, “#do not execute,” has had over 2 million tweets. On July 19, Iran halted the executions, according to one of the lawyers for the accused.

      In 2019, Saudi Arabia executed a record 184 people, including six women, many for drug-related offenses. Some were crucified after being beheaded. At least one was a minor. In April, the kingdom announced it would no longer execute juveniles; rather it would sentence them to a maximum of 10 years in a juvenile detention center. It is unclear if the decree will save the life of Ali al-Nimr, who was 17 when arrested and 19 when sentenced to death. His uncle Nimr al-Nimr, a prominent Shia Muslim cleric and critic of the ruling family, was beheaded in 2016.

      State-Sanctioned Arbitrary Killing

      In Egypt, more than 2,000 people have been sentenced to death since Abdel Fattah el-Sisi came to power in 2013, with nearly 200 executed. At least 10 children have been sentenced to hang. In the country’s prison system, there is another kind of death — by deliberate medical neglect, as was the case with the country’s first democratically elected president Mohammed Morsi. He was repeatedly denied medication for his diabetes and collapsed and died in a Cairo court on June 17, 2019.

      On November 8 last year, a panel of UN experts led by Agnes Callamard, the special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, concluded that Morsi’s death “after enduring those conditions could amount to a State-sanctioned arbitrary killing”. The case shed light on the horrific conditions in Egypt’s overcrowded and brutal prison system, a situation that has been severely exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

      On July 13, prominent Egyptian journalist Mohamed Monir died from COVID-19. He had been arrested and held in pre-trial detention for criticizing, on the Al Jazeera news network, the government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis. The charge against him was broadcasting false news. The 65-year-old suffered from heart disease and diabetes, and was therefore at high risk of contracting the disease. After falling ill Monir was released to hospital a week before he died. An influential critical voice was silenced. Surely that was the intention — death, be it by medical malfeasance or by execution, is a powerful weapon in the hands of authoritarian regimes.

      *[This article was originally published by Arab Digest.]

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