World politics
Re-reading Hannah Arendt
When Hannah Arendt wrote The origins of totalitarianism in 1950, many saw it as a historical work, relevant to the rise of Stalinism, Nazism and Fascism, but Arendt was also warning about how totalitarianism could arise once again.
Fortunately the postwar era did not turn out as she feared. The era saw extraordinary prosperity in North America and Western Europe, the flourishing of liberal democracy in Europe, and the establishment of an international economic and security order.
Writing in The Atlantic – Why we should read Hannah Arendt now – Anne Applebaum writes that “once again, we are living in a world that Arendt would recognize”. Applebaum’s article is an adaptation of the introduction of a new edition of The origins of totalitarianism.
Arendt was puzzled by people’s passivity towards dictatorship. She saw how authoritarian regimes spread lies and propaganda, and how willing people were to believe those lies and propaganda. She never offered a complete explanation, but she noted that authoritarian regimes strengthened their grip on power by destroying civic institutions that bring people together.
Arendt was writing in an age when technologies were different, when people came together in physical locations. Applebaum asks if
… the nature of modern work and information, the shift from “real life” to virtual life and the domination of public debate by algorithms that increase emotion, anger, and division, hasn’t created some of the same results. In a world where everyone is supposedly “connected,” loneliness and isolation once again are smothering activism, optimism, and the desire to participate in public life.
Ukraine – a different historical perspective
Once a war starts, sharp dividing lines are drawn. One is either pro “The West” or pro Russia and Putin.
The Economist’s editors raised some eyebrows when they devoted one of their rare “by invitation” articles to US foreign affairs realist John Mearsheimer on Why the West is principally responsible for the Ukrainian crisis.
Without in any way justifying Russia’s brutality, Mearsheimer explains that Putin is not trying to re-create some czarist-era or Soviet-era Russian empire. For one thing, Russia doesn’t have the capability to establish and sustain an empire. Because its economy is weak its military capacity is limited (a reality demonstrated in the few weeks since Mearsheimer wrote his article). Rather, Russia’s concern, as its concern has long been, is with its own security, and it sees NATO, particularly an expanded NATO, as a threat. Mearsheimer traces this perception of NATO back to George W Bush’s intemperate push in 2008 to see Georgia and Ukraine brought into NATO. Wiser voices at the time were warning Bush against this push.
The dominant narrative in the West is that “NATO is a defensive alliance and poses no threat to Russia”. That may or may not be true, but it’s not the way Russia sees NATO.
For those who have trouble scaling The Economist’s paywall (it’s really not too scary), there is a New York Times article Why John Mearsheimer blames the US for the crisis in Ukraine. It’s an extended interview between Isaac Chotiner and John Mearsheimer, covering the same ground as The Economist article, but with more detail. If anyone might accuse Mearsheimer of being too dovish, in that interview he takes a very strong hawkish attitude to America’s relationship with China. (Warning: The New York Times generally allows once-off access to an article: you cannot re-load it.)
Writing in The Straits Times – Ukraine war: Where are the peacemakers? – Kishore Mahbubani goes back even further than Mearsheimer, to George Kennan’s 1998 warning that expansion of NATO into areas of the former Soviet Union could set off another cold war. Mahbubani also cites similar advice by former foreign affairs adviser to Malcolm Fraser, Owen Harries, written in 1997 when he was editor of The National Interest. (The Straits Times has a more fortified paywall than The Economist, but the article is reproduced in Pearls and Irritations.)
It is notable that Mearsheimer’s argument about the expansion of NATO seems to leave out the question of the autonomy of Ukraine, or, for that matter, the autonomy of other countries who may or may not wish to join a military alliance. Mearsheimer’s model of NATO seems to be that of a US-dominated and controlled outfit – a 1945 postwar model – rather than a treaty negotiated between equals.
In response to Mearsheimer’s article, The Economist has another “by invitation” contribution from Adam Roberts of Oxford University rebuffing the view that the West is principally responsible for the crisis in Ukraine. Roberts does not dismiss Mearsheimer’s arguments entirely, but he draws our attention to other contributing factors – intelligence failures, and Putin’s fear of a democratic and secular Ukraine showing up his authoritarianism. He also goes on to mention three more general factors – the usual messy and protracted pattern of the dissolution of empires, the dynamics of trust and mistrust in a nuclear-armed world, and Putin’s fear of a “colour revolution” supposedly supported by foreigners.
Timor-Leste
The media has given little attention to Timor-Leste’s presidential election last Saturday.
Although there were 16 candidates, it was essentially a contest between the incumbent, former Fretilin resistance fighter Francisco Guterres, and former president José Ramos-Horta. Also running were deputy prime minister Armanda Berta dos Santos and former defence forces commander Lere Anan Timur.
Ramos-Horta has secured 47 percent of the vote, followed by Guterres on 22 percent and dos Santos on 9 percent. Because Ramos-Horta fell short of a majority, there will be a runoff on April 19.
Reuters provides a basic report on the election. The Lowy Institute has an article by Joao da Cruz Cardosso, written before the election, describing the main political issues: Timor-Leste’s presidential election: watching for generational change. Guterres represents the resistance movement that won the country’s independence, but they are “in the twilight years of their leadership”, while younger people are more concerned with the country’s present economic problems. Another issue in the election has been Ramos-Horta’s dealings with the country’s parliament: it appears that he has exceeded his constitutionally-limited powers.
World happiness
Last week saw publication of the World Happiness Report, a project conducted by The Sustainable Development Solutions Network, with support from a number of organizations including philanthropic foundations and universities, and drawing on Gallup world data. It is a disciplined approach to the meaning of happiness and the variables that contribute to our feelings of well-being or otherwise.
It reports on 146 country results for seven variables – GDP per capita, social support (can you rely on support from personal social networks?), healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity (have you donated to a charity?), perceptions of corruption, and a variable called “dystopia”. This last variable, which shows considerable variation between countries, relates to people’s subjective feelings to the extent those feelings are not explained by other variables. (For example, one may enjoy high income, friendships, good health etc but still report to a survey that he or she feels miserable for other reasons.)
As usual, the Nordic countries come out on top, followed by a number of high-income “developed” countries, including Australia. Among “developed” countries Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong score relatively poorly, but Singapore scores well. African countries are clustered around the lower scores – including Botswana which scores poorly in spite of its relatively high GDP per capita. Russia comes in at position 80, Ukraine at position 98. (Data was gathered well before the invasion.)
It is notable that many materially well-off countries, such as Italy and Portugal, have their scores pulled down by perceptions of corruption.
Visual Capitalist has a global map and regional maps of country scores.