Copehenhagen Cynicism

The Copenhagen climate talks, like Health Care reform, seem so detailed and nuanced that a casual reading still leaves a lot unclear. In other words, my head spins a bit when I think too much about it.

This is what I understand; There are two big obstacles: compensation and enforcement. First, enforcement. Developing nations (both poor African/Asian nations and growing behomeths, like China and India) want compensation from developed nations. Many of these nations will feel the adverse affects of climate change much more than Western nations. For instance, Bangladesh and the Netherlands are both low-lying nations, nearly below sea-level. But those smart, well-to-do Dutchmen and Dutchwomen have state-of-the-art dykes which will help them cope with rising ocean levels, while Bangladeshis do not. Similarly many African nations will be hit hard by the dry rivers and more frequent droughts that climate change will cause, while Westerners will just have to pay a few cents more on food products at the supermarket. Famine is thankfully not an issue here.

Additionally, developing nations don't want to hinder their growth by agreeing to emissions caps. Which makes sense; the US and Europe were allowed to industrialize and grow to the economic powerhouses they are today (all the while massively polluting the world) without any stringent emissions caps, so why should developing nations have to? And the responsibility of poor, developing nations is to improve the quality of life of their citizens--to give them jobs and cars--not to shackle themselves to any agreements that Western nations never had while they were industrializing. So developed nations should compensate the developing world, it's just a question of how and how much.

Secondly, enforcement is an issue. The only thing tougher than agreeing to emissions caps is actually living up to them. The US or China can boast they'll cut carbon emissions by X%, but there's currently no way to see that they meet their goals. And even if they don't meet their goals, there's not a whole lot the rest of the world can do. The rest of the world can yell at them a bunch and tax their products, but that's not that scary.

So, I'm pretty pessimistic about any major agreements happening in Copenhagen. As Bruce Bueno de Mesquita writes, it's extremely difficult for 170+ disparate nations to agree to anything--even if the health of our planet is at stake. Either the problem will have to become drastically bigger--to the point where we're standing on the cliff's edge--or clean energy will have to become cheaper and more accessible. In other words, the costs of change will have to go down or the felt impact--the fire's breath on our necks--will have to become impossible to ignore. I'm all for multilateralism, but sadly I think that chaos or luxury are the most likely ways to jolt disparate interests into alignment.

What's going on...

Last Thursday night, Dadis Camara, military leader and de facto ruler of Guinea was ambushed and shot in an assassination attempt.

Although junta leaders have stressed that Camara's injuries are not serious, he was flown to Morocco. As junta officials have released more information about the assassination attempt, the situation seems increasingly precarious. Camara is apparently recovering from a gunshot wound to the head, which knocked a splinter of bone into his brain. Sounds serious. I haven't heard of too many non-serious gunshot-wounds-to-the-head-with-bone-splinters-in-the-brain injuries, but then again I haven't heard of any such injury. Junta officials say Camara is stable and that he is recovering well. But who really knows. I guess it's not much of a surprise that the military would try to downplay this assassination attempt and occlude details. Releasing more information might destablize an already extremely unstable situation. Guinea's junta leaders have, however, arrested a man suspected in the attempted assasination.

What's more, on Friday BBC's Africa Today podcast said that the top 3 CNDD officials (the National Council for Democracy and Development, the junta which Camara heads) were out of the country. In the last few days, however, General Sekouba Konate, Camara's second-in-command, has apparently returned from Lebanon where he was last week.

I don't fully grasp the details of this. From just a superficial reading of the events I can conclude the obvious: there is a serious crisis at hand. The Camara junta may be losing control, and a serious fight (between factions of the military?) for rule of the nation may be under way. But that's just a guess. What is more certain, however, is that the prospects of this upcoming January's presidential elections took a serious blow. Camara's post-coup vow (from last December) to "return to the barracks" after these elections now seems unlikely. Camara (or his assassin-successors) will now view elections as to risky to their tenuous hold on seized power.

The Hostage Industry

Odd way to describe it, but New America Foundation fellow, Nicholas Schmindle's article on global kidnapping-and-ransom was an enjoyable read. Kidnapping-and-ransom, known in the biz as K&R, is one of the few industries booming in the tough economic times. While the price of oil may fluctuate, rich oil men seem to be reliably valuable commodities that bring plump returns. As a result, K&R insurance plans have become more ubiquitous for foreign companies operating in less stable nations, and K&R insurance premiums continue to rise. Strange.

Schmindle really captures how much of a business K&R. Here are some quotes that I liked:

If there’s any consolation to being abducted in Nigeria, it’s that kidnappers there seldom get violent. It’s purely business. “Someone’s going to pay them something; that they know,” Mark Courtney, a South African kidnapping-and-ransom consultant, recently told me. K.& R. consultants almost never get on the phone and haggle with kidnappers. Their expertise is devising the “target settlement figure,” taking into account numerous factors. Is the victim carrying anything that identifies him as working for a specific company? Are the kidnappers experienced? What was the amount of the previous ransoms paid in that city or state? “You go by what you know to be the going rate in that particular region,” Chase, of AKE, said.

The kidnapping-and-ransom-insurance industry thrives in a morally ambiguous space. But what is the alternative? “Fire insurance has been known to stimulate arson, and life-insurance policies have led to quite a few homicides, too,”

Three years ago, De Don graduated from college with a degree in political science. He considered “The Prince” his favorite book. While at school, he joined a campus gang known as the Greenlanders. When he couldn’t find work after graduation, he tapped into the Greenlanders’ alumni network and asked for help. Soon he was living in the creeks with fellow Greenlanders, part of a kidnapping syndicate.

AIDS and troop buildups (Depressing things)

SA's Youth Communist League issues a statement calling Mbeki accountable for SA's AIDS "debacle". Verashni Pillay offers a smart response on why stating the obvious isn't helpful.

As much as I grapple with the decision to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, I find my feelings on the decision unresolved. Were I president (and, in this case, put in the same unenviable situation as Obama), I believe I would have made a similar decision. There are just so many unknowns and sending a short-term surge of troops seems like the easiest and safest option (amongst a list of extremely tough and dangerous options).

But I'm still unresolved. (Like I was last year around this time).

There's no question that if the US pulled out, the short-term risks would be greater: Karzai's government would likely fall to Taliban forces and al-Qaeda would likely have a sanctuary (although it's perhaps possible that moderate strands of the Taliban would come to power and would be fed up with the Western intervention that al-Qaeda brings). What's more nuclear-armed Pakistan's security might be put in real danger, which is most terrifying.

But perhaps this short short term (18 month) action provokes greater long term problems. This article certainly provoked these thoughts for me.

Perhaps life in war time makes us myopic. Perhaps the troop build up is counter-productive and causes more resentment against the US. Perhaps we are putting a band-aid on a wound; committing the US to chase al-Qaeda to any weak/failed state it hides in while hurting our economy, our soldiers, our long-term national defense, and our moral bearing.

While I agree with Obama's tough decision, I hope that he isn't loosing sight of his long-term US foreign policy goals: not committing too many troops to one part of the world (it's dangerous in case of other attacks) and not relying too much on hard power over soft power. I don't doubt though that he's considered my above anxieties and many more.

Africa to (Latin) America

Today, NPR had an interesting segment on the increasing number of Africans immigrating to Latin America--specifically to Brazil and Argentina. This is a phenomenon I had no idea about. I'm so used to hearing about immigration in the US context--a divisive and polarizing issue--so it's surprising and disorienting to think that immigrants would emigrate to countries other than the US and Europe. But it makes sense. Lusane and Mundra say that many African immigrants are drawn to Latin America by economic factors--seeking better jobs. Considering Brazil's economy grew by nearly 6% in 2008 this makes sense. They also mention Argentina and Brazil's relatively lax immigration laws and the fact that a large portion of Brazil's population is of African descent as further incentives for African immigrants.

Immigration and the movement of people in the world really interests me. The idea of Somalis refugees dhow-boating to Dubai or educated Congolese seeking jobs in Brazil are fascinating vectors I've never thought about.

Pirate Oasis and Mswati III

Interesting article on Baraawe, Somalia: Pirate Oasis.

Just watched, Without the King, about the Africa's last monarch, King Mswati III of Swaziland. I was excited for the subject matter, but the movie itself was nothing special. Highlighted and repeated same points for an hour and a half. King Mswati has an exorbitant amount of wealth in a nation that has the highest AIDS prevalence rate in the world and where the majority of people live in extreme poverty. Film contrasted this poverty with Mswati's fleet of luxury cars, and the high AIDS rate with Mswati's 13 wives (poor tone to set when your AIDS prevention policy is abstinence). Sad stuff.

News links

Here are some links from yesterday. At least one construction project is behind schedule in South Africa's plans for the World Cup next summer. An air-tram taking visitors from the airport to the city/stadium/hotels will be not be finished until (at least) 2 weeks after the World Cup's start. With so many other construction projects rushing to get done, having one not finish on time isn't a huge deal. It's a bit disappointing because I want to hear that everything is on schedule, and will run like a dream. But that's unrealistic. I hope, however, that this is not indicative of other projects; one setback shouldn't accrete into many. The ANC briefly considered paying their contractors to rush the air-tram construction so it would be done in time, but in the end the price tag for doing this was too high. Understandable. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if this gets pushed back further--seems like contractors always later than they predict in construction.

Big news in Zimbabwe: Tsvangirai ends his government boycott. Derek Catsam is right on the mark arguing that maintaining the status quo benefits Mugabe. There is now a new deadline on the agreeing and implementing some of the details of the GNU (government of national unity). Mugabe wants Tsvangirai to act as the PR person to aid-donors in the west. And Tsvangirai wants formative change in the government structure so that he is a legitimate partner.

I'm working on a post with some quick thoughts on China's role in Africa (in light of China's summit with African leaders this week).

Cope-ing with bad news

As part of an effort to keep up with current affairs in Sub-Saharan Africa, I'm trying to read an article or two in the Jo'burg-based Mail & Guardian every day. I know this gives a somewhat narrow look at African current affairs since it focuses mostly on South African domestic issues. But, M&G follows the Zimbabwean crisis very well, and continental affairs quite well too. Plus I like reading the comments that South African readers posts, and there ain't many other English-text newspapers in Africa.

The big news in SA right now is the resignation of Allan Boesak from the Congress of the People party. Cope emerged with a big bang last fall when ANC dissidents formed it. I for one thought this was the inevitable finally happening: the emergence of a strong and competitive opposition party to the ANC. (I thought that at the very least Cope would supplant the DA as the main opposition party.)

Boy was I wrong. And with Boesak's resignation, Cope's really does seem like an empty party--both in its dwindling membership and ambiguous ideology. It seems that their strength was just a mirage built on the wishful thinking of those craving a multi-party democracy. Infighting and opportunism have further weakened their weak political core.

I'm interested in whether this means yet another opposition party will emerge before the 2013 elections? Or will this act as an example, tempering the possible departure of disgruntled ANC members?

And if a different opposition party emerges, will they share Cope's moderately-conservative right-of-ANC ideology? Or will they be an independent SACP-Cosatu party that many have predicted emerging for years?