Israel Recognized by Gulf States

By Maha Butt

In a recent turn of events, UAE and Bahrain recognized Israel and established full diplomatic ties with the state in a deal brokered by the US. So far, Israel only had peace treaties with two of its neighboring countries; Egypt and Jordan, which took place in 1979 and 1994 respectively. Egypt and Jordan share borders with Israel and have both fought wars with Israel in the past.

Israel and the Arab leaders in the Persian Gulf had been quietly cultivating ties for years, united by their common antipathy toward Iran and worries about a vacuum in the region because of American retrenchment.

For the gulf states, Israel is a hedge against the declining role of the United States in the region, as well as a rich trading partner with a high-tech economy. For Israel, ties to the gulf ease its isolation and are a way to counter pressure from the Palestinians to negotiate a new state, since the backing of fellow Arabs is an essential element of the long-term goal.

After UAE and Bahrain signed formal agreements in the White House, President Trump said he expected at least five other countries to follow suit, without mentioning their names. Yet so far, no other state has taken the same step. According to some analysts, Sudan and Oman are potential candidates. However, Bahrain’s decision is skeptical given its dependence on its much larger neighbor, Saudi Arabia. Bahrain may have agreed to normalization to access to advanced weaponry and the Saudis could potentially follow.

India’s Policy in Afghanistan and the US Withdrawal

By Rohan Rajesh 

Ancient civilizational ties, a rivalry with Pakistan, and a love of cricket have made India and Afghanistan natural partners. India’s development and infrastructure aid and steadfast refusal to negotiate with the Taliban have earned praise among many Afghans. Afghanistan’s internationally competitive cricket team is grateful to India for letting it host Afghanistan’s home games in India. Today, however, the situation in Afghanistan is very different. The Taliban have made significant territorial gains, the Islamic State – Khorasan Province (IS-K) has launched deadly attacks throughout the country, and the Trump administration is engaged in unprecedented talks with the Taliban to extricate US troops from a hopeless stalemate. The Intra-Afghan Dialogue has kicked off in Doha, Qatar, and it could yield a vastly reconfigured political landscape and a recalibrated Afghanistan-India relationship. In this blog post, I will analyze the history of India’s policy in Afghanistan and how this should factor into America’s decision to withdraw from its longest war.

During the Cold War, India recognized the Soviet-backed government in Afghanistan. That government, led by pro-India President Najibullah, collapsed in the face of a US and Pakistan-backed mujahideen in 1992. Among the myriad insurgent groups, the Taliban emerged as the dominant group. They established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in 1996, which was only recognized by Pakistan (India’s archenemy), Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. 

The Taliban’s philosophy is steeped in the traditions of the rural Pashtun regions and fundamentalist Deobandi Islam. The Taliban regime was condemned internationally for its harsh treatment of women. The Taliban were also responsible for the massacre of Shiite Hazaras after capturing the city of Mazar-i-Sharif. When the Taliban entered Kabul, they tortured and publicly executed Najibullah, setting the stage for hostile relations with India. India backed the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance, which would later play a crucial role in overthrowing the Emirate. Meanwhile, India criticized the Taliban policy of forcing Afghan Hindus to wear identification markers. Relations with India reached a nadir when the Taliban destroyed the famous giant Buddha statues of Bamiyan in early 2001. 

The most well-known instance of India-Taliban diplomacy is particularly bitter. In 1999, gunmen hijacked an Indian flight that was en route from Kathmandu, Nepal to New Delhi. The hijackers redirected the flight to Kandahar, then under Taliban control. Although India suspected that the Taliban were helping the interests of Pakistan’s spy agency, the ISI, they opened talks with the Taliban. The Taliban negotiated the safe release of the passengers in exchange for the widely criticized release of terrorists held by India. Worse still, these terrorists were later implicated in several attacks, including the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002 and the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

After 9/11 and the US invasion of Afghanistan, India backed the new, democratic government in Kabul diplomatically and economically and refused to engage with the Taliban. Meanwhile, the Taliban and the Haqqani network (its militant wing) repeatedly targeted Indian infrastructure. The most notable example was the bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul in 2008, which the US and India suspected was backed by Pakistan’s ISI. Currently, the Taliban control a significant portion of Afghanistan’s territory and contest even more.

Today, India’s main concern with Afghanistan is that it should not become a playground for anti-India terrorists. India also desires a stable, friendly government in Afghanistan to encircle Pakistan and deny it “strategic depth.” For the same reason, Pakistan backs the Taliban. Without US military support, the Afghan government would likely not be able to withstand a Taliban military campaign. Several analysts are justifiably skeptical about how committed the Taliban will be to the terms of a possible peace deal and whether Afghanistan would become another South Vietnam once the US withdraws. The Taliban and Haqqani Network’s historic and current ties to Pakistan also concern India.

Despite its difficult history with India, during the negotiations, the Taliban have sought to broaden its diplomatic outreach. To assuage India’s concerns, the Taliban criticized Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s attempt to link the Kashmir dispute with the Afghan peace process, even going so far as to say that what goes on in Kashmir is India’s internal affair. The Taliban have stated to Indian news channels that they would not be hostile to India and would not support anti-India terrorists. The Taliban also claimed they welcome India’s investments in the country.

As much as India is understandably concerned about the Taliban, it has shed its earlier reluctance to engage with the group. India’s point has always been that the Afghan peace process should be “Afghan-led and Afghan-controlled.” Now that the Afghan government is directly engaging with the Taliban, India is willing to support the process: Foreign Minister Jaishankar addressed the inaugural session of the intra-Afghan dialogue, and India sent a delegation to the talks. 

However, India’s ability to influence politics in Afghanistan is admittedly limited. It is geographically separated from Afghanistan by its archenemy Pakistan. Thus, should the US fully withdraw from the country, India will look to other regional powers to maintain stability. The most likely candidates are Russia and Iran, who also desire a stable Afghanistan and are friendly to India. Although US policymakers may be reluctant to cede ground to some of its fiercest rivals, I would argue the US should withdraw. The War in Afghanistan has drained American resources and resolve and distracted its attention from the rest of the Indo-Pacific, which is threatened by a revanchist China. In ending this chapter in American policy, the US can focus its attention on the rest of the region where its interests face far greater threats. India is invested in a democratic, inclusive Afghanistan and does not want to see a restored Emirate that breeds terrorism. Now that India has joined the dialogue, the US should place faith in the aspirations of Afghans for security and democracy, supported by the Afghanistan-India partnership, to see American objectives through.

LGBTQ Rights and Policy Globally

By Joshua O’Brien

jobrien3@live.unc.edu

October 11th is National Coming Out Day in the United States. In my own recognition of this day’s importance, I want to turn my attention to LGBTQ issuers in foreign policy. In a realist lens, policies to address LGBTQ human rights violations globally are anywhere from irrelevant to harmful for security goals. But much as the United States has a (spotty) history of advocating for human rights globally, the rights of LGBTQ people should be considered amongst these important issues. LGBTQ rights vary globally, some areas accord more rights to this population than other areas.

The most visible metric of LGBTQ rights is that of marriage equality: of the 195 UN recognized states in the world, 29 of them have legal same-sex marriage. This number has been slowly growing in recent years, but it is not a perfect metric. For example: Switzerland, a relatively progressive European country, has not extended full legal marriage rights to its LGBTQ populations.

There are other metrics for LGBTQ rights globally:

• Approximately 45 have national sexual orientation and gender identity protections for employment.

• Joint adoption by same-sex couples is allowed in 27 countries.

• Roughly 50 countries have some form of hate crime legislation including LGBTQ populations.

• Only 19 countries allow transgender people to serve in their militaries.

• There are 72 countries in the world where same-sex relations are criminalized.

• In 15 countries, the gender expression of trans people is explicitly outlawed, but trans people are targeted in many more countries.

Of course, there are a lot of variables and no one metric is going to be a tell-all about LGBTQ rights in a particular country—especially as many oppressions towards queer people are culturally-sanctioned rather than legally codified. But it is clear that globally, much needs to be done for LGBTQ people.

Unfortunately, I am more pragmatic than optimistic in my assessment of positive change on LGBTQ issues. It takes a lot of political capital to make needed changes in the United States and parts of Europe. It would take much more to demand and instill policy changes globally—especially on issues that will have significant cultural implications. In practical terms, swift change through global advocacy is impossible. But consistent inclusion of advocacy for LGBTQ rights globally in foreign policy and human rights agendas for the United States and Europe are crucial. While it will not bring change quickly enough, it will at least make it known that LGBTQ people are of global concern for human rights, and that we expect each successive generation of queer people to have it better than the one preceding them. While it might seem bleak globally, I do believe that progress will happen. After all, it happened here, in America, for me and so many like me.

Note: I am not an expert on queer experiences of LGBTQ foreign policy. These are just my thoughts. If you would like to engage further on the subject, I would be delighted to receive your thoughts at jobrien3@live.unc.edu. Love wins.

The Greater Fool in International Politics

By Joshua O’Brien

jobrien3@live.unc.edu

A greater fool writes of greater fools.

The greater fool is a financial term. It refers to the idea that it is always possible to make a profit on a security, regardless of if it is overvalued, by selling to the greater fool--that is, someone who is even more gullible and hoping to make a profit. The theory is paradoxical--while investors try to profit off of greater fools, they have to avoid being the greatest fool themselves.

To be a greater fool is to tarnish your credibility in finance. But in international politics? I am not so sure.

Of course, I will not delude myself into believing that every international politician acts in good faith. I have read enough of the bargaining model to know that many politicians and policymakers think in zero-sum terms about power. To pursue security and power is to ensure you are better than the other. That is the normal conception of back-stabbing politics, and it has merit, but it has yet to earn my wholesale subscription.

For clarity, I am a public policy major, not a political science major. Which is to say while I read often about politics and the political system, my driver is policy—not power. And when I think about international politics, I obviously consider the intersection of policy. International agreements, trade, and work through institutions such as the World Health Organization or the Universal Postal Union.

In international politics, the greater fool is the person who seeks to make the world better. Perhaps they are driven somewhat by power, but their ego comes from the thought that they can do better where others have failed. It sounds idealistic, but I think these people exist at least in part. And I think that they have actually made impactful change. The Helsinki Final Act, the creation of the United Nations and the World Health Organization. And yes, perhaps, even the UPU, to bring mail to all.

Perhaps I am the greater fool for believing in these people and their existence. Perhaps international politics is just a zero-sum game of power and greater fools are nothing but optimistic fish swimming against a tide of cynicism. But even if they are, I would like to count myself among them.

India Needs to Support Tibetan Rights

By Rohan Rajesh 

When clashes broke out between Indian and Chinese forces in the Himalayas earlier this summer, Tenzin Nyima, a commander of a hitherto unknown Indian paramilitary unit with Tibetan soldiers known as the Special Frontier Forces, was excited. He told his brother, “we are finally fighting our enemy.” A few hours later, during an Indian army initiative to capture strategic high points on the border with China, Nyima was killed by a land mine. His death brought attention to the oft-ignored Tibetan exile community in India. 

For most of its history, Tibet has been an independent country. The only time Tibet was controlled by Beijing was during the Mongol Yuan dynasty and the Qing dynasty. Between 1912 and 1950, Tibet was a de-facto independent country. Tibetan culture is also quite distinct from Han Chinese culture: Tibetans largely practice Tibetan Buddhism (which was introduced by the Indian Buddhist master Padmasambhava) and believe that the Dalai Lama is their spiritual leader. Ties between Tibet and India go back millennia, and the similarities between Indian and Tibetan culture are profound. As Dhundup Gyalpo, a civil servant in Dharamshala, put it, “The depth of Tibetan affinity with the Indian people appears even greater when it is juxtaposed against the sheer lack of it between the Tibetan and Chinese peoples — apart of course from a handful of culinary dishes.”

In 1959, Tibetans launched a failed rebellion to overthrow the control of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The Dalai Lama fled to India, and the Indian government reluctantly allowed him to establish a Tibetan government-in-exile in Dharamshala, India. Many Tibetans have since fled to India, forming the Tibetan exile community. India’s harboring of the Dalai Lama and border issues led to the 1962 Sino-Indian War. India lost the war, but the Line of Actual Control (LAC) between India and China did not change. Since 1959, the CCP has committed grave human rights violations in Tibet to prevent any dissent. It has also sought to stamp out Tibet’s indigenous culture and subsume the region into the Han majority. China views Tibet as strategically vital because, through Tibet, China controls the flow of critical rivers in Southeast Asia and Northeast India. Tibet is also home to an abundance of natural resources and precious metals. Because China’s culture is foreign from that of Tibet, and China exploits Tibetan resources, China’s control over Tibet is essentially imperialism.

Tibet has recently gained international focus due to a recent report by the Jamestown Foundation, which revealed that China has been building huge concentration camps for Tibetans similar to the ones it has already built for Uighurs in Xinjiang. The CCP’s endeavor in Xinjiang meets the UN’s definition of genocide, and the same could happen in Tibet. Incredibly, the CCP has the audacity to try to curry favor amongst the world’s Buddhist community on the basis that China has the largest Buddhist population of any country despite the fact that the CCP’s human rights record and philosophy run counter to every belief in Buddhism.

The Indian government, however, has historically not helped the Tibetan cause as much as Western governments. Beyond letting the Dalai Lama establish a government-in-exile in Dharamshala, the Indian government has largely been obsequious to the CCP’s sensitivities concerning Tibet. India has a great history of supporting anti-colonial movements and is the land of the Buddha but refuses to associate itself with Tibet’s struggle for and recognized Tibet asghtspart of China in 2003. Tibetans in India find it difficult to obtain sought-after government jobs except in the military. Essentially, the Indian government allows Tibetans to die for India but not work in India. In 2018, India’s government issued a directive that prevented Indian bureaucrats from joining events organized by the government-in-exile to mark the 60th anniversary of its establishment in India.

Luckily, things seem to be changing. The recent clashes left 20 Indian soldiers (and an unknown number of Chinese soldiers) dead. Indians are furious with China for breaking the status-quo, and some have talked about playing the “Tibet card.” Although no Indian government official attended Nyima’s funeral, in an unprecedented move, the National General Secretary of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Ram Madhav (a close aide of PM Modi) paid respects by laying a wreath on his coffin at a ceremony that awarded him full military honors. The coffin was draped with the flags of India and Free Tibet. The crowd chanted, “Long live Mother India” and “Long live the Tibetan nation.” Madhav later referred to Nyima as a “martyr” in a tweet. 

While these are steps in the right direction, if India actually wants to help Tibetans and put pressure on China, it needs to do much more. China has proved that it does not care about the status quo and is willing to do anything to crush criticism of the CCP in China and abroad. India should not continue appeasing China because China has returned that appeasement with the blood of Indian and Tibetan soldiers. India (and other Western countries) should pressure China on its human rights record and bring up the cause of Tibet at every international forum. India also needs to give more rights and access to resources to Tibetan refugees. Finally, India should not idly stand by and let China claim one of India’s greatest gifts to the world; India should reclaim its role as the center of the dhamma and advocate the most basic Buddhist principles: human rights, freedom of thought, inclusiveness, and the ending of suffering.

An American’s Experience in pre-Pandemic Beijing

By James McClure

In our current age of socially distant-induced isolation, it can be hard to imagine a world in which one can easily get on a plane and fly across the world to an entirely different country. Luckily, I was able to take this opportunity nearly a year before the pandemic, on a trip to Beijing after my senior year of high school with my three best friends. Although I may never understand why our parents let four 17 year old recent high school grads fly more than 5,000 miles away from their home country for 10 days, I am forever thankful for this privilege.

While our ten day trip to Beijing was an extremely enjoyable and enriching experience, it was not without difficulty and feelings of discomfort from being in an entirely new cultural context. Traveling in a country where the large majority of people look completely different than you and speak a foreign language is daunting, and caused me to feel culture shock sporadically throughout the trip. When we visited monuments such as the Great Wall or the Forbidden Palace, many people wanted to get pictures with me and my Caucasian friends, because seeing a tall, red-headed guy in China is a rare sight. My friends and I were forced to trust my good friend Richard to communicate with most people we encountered during our trip, as he was the only one out of the four of us who was fluent in Chinese. Towards the end of the trip, Richard caught a cold that left him bedridden for the last few days of our visit. The three of us decided Richard’s illness would not stop us from enjoying Beijing, so we embarked out on our own to visit malls and restaurants near us. While traveling without our chief translator and tour guide was stressful, it forced us to be resourceful and figure out how to navigate a city where we could not easily communicate with most people. When ordering food at restaurants, my friends and I often had to result to charades and utilization of google translate to decipher the menu in front of us, and order from a waiter who did not speak any English. In one instance these tactics resulted in us receiving random dishes of meat that included cow brain, pig intestine, and an egg dish that looked and smelled far too old to be edible.  

Even though international travel may never be as convenient as it once was in the post-COVID era, I urge everyone who can to take the chance. My trip taught me how to quickly problem solve in uncomfortable contexts, and gave me a desire to get out of my comfort zone and try new things. Whether it be an international internship, study abroad program, or even a casual trip with friends, I encourage everyone to find a way to see the world, whenever it is safe!

On The Uighur Genocide

By Zoe Hatsios

As global citizens, what can we do with the knowledge that the Uighur Muslims in China are undergoing an attack which now formally meets the UN definition of genocide? Some take to Instagram, and others condemn the Chinese with a higher intensity, but it is necessary that we both learn more about the facts of the situation and spread awareness far and wide.

At least 1 million (and up to 1.5) Uighurs have been sent to internment camps, or “re-education centers” as the government calls them, since 2017. Given that they don’t make up a significant part of the Chinese population to begin with, this says a lot. In these camps, women particularly are forced into mass sterilization and abortions to prevent population growth, and there are many accounts of abuse. People in the camps have told stories of being beaten and interrogated because of their religion. All of this to say, it is minimally celebratory that 22 countries reported this activity to the UN Human Rights Council in July 2020, and terribly inhumane that just four days later, 37 countries claimed to defend China’s “achievements in the field of human rights.” TLDR: We are getting nowhere as a global community, and millions of lives are being sacrificed because of it. 

More notably, how can the Holocaust be marked down in history as unacceptable, while the Chinese government has been ethnically targeting this specific group for years, going unnoticed? First - major companies, like Adidas, Amazon, and Nike, have all been linked to Uighur labor. Second - the United States, a world leader, has taken an anti-Islamic stance, especially during the Trump Administration, signaling that types of policies which exclude Muslims are acceptable. For these reasons, the most powerful global actors are encouraging this type of exclusionary behavior which has perpetuated the actions that led and continue to allow this genocide to occur. 

If this small dose of information leaves you with anything, let it be that silence is a killer, and the cost of misinformation from the Chinese government will be minority lives. The Uighur genocide is just one of the many reasons that the United States has adopted a heavier containment strategy against China, and blatant human rights abuses going unnoticed and unpunished are a simple display of the economic power it holds in the global sphere. 

A Danger of Nationalism

By Emma Holmes

The scene: Around 21:00 on a weeknight, sitting in my host family’s living room in Osjek, Ilidža. N1 was reporting on the television as I sat cutting the peel off of the largest orange I have ever eaten in my life. My host dad sat across from me, also using a knife to peel his orange, but it was late enough that my host mom had already retired to her room to watch an episode of a Turkish drama before going to sleep. The news was in Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), but it was from America; the announcement that a controversial politician would be put on trial had shocked the world. I gestured to the news and asked my host dad in broken BCS (he did not speak English, in fact the only English word I ever heard him say was “Sprint” and upon hearing it I was so shocked I forgot its meaning) what his thoughts were on the politician. I’ve remembered his response since then. “On je nacionalist. Nacionalisti su loši. Ne sviđa mi se.” He is a nationalist. Nationalists are bad. I do not like him. This comes from a man who was one of many refugees that fled to Germany during the ‘92-’95 Bosnian War. A war caused by poignant nationalism of three ethnic nations; the Croats, Serbs, and Bosniaks.

Bosnia and Herzegovina has a complex and long history. The small southeastern, European country has been a part of numerous empires, it’s own medieval kingdom, and a member of both the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and Communist Yugoslavia. Throughout this time, under different regimes, some ethnicities would be given more privileges than others, giving leaders reasons to create grudges among followers. In the Ottoman Empire, Muslims (Bosniaks are Muslims, Croats are Catholics, and Serbs are Serbian Orthodox) were given more rights, while in Communist Yugoslavia the hierarchy was Serbs first and Bosniaks last. My language teacher told me an example about how the best apartments were given to the Serbs but the Bosniaks got the ones with the least insulations. This might seem to be a strange example, but if somebody has health issues in the harsh Bosnian winters and without widespread electric heating --my host family in the winter of 2020 used our fire stove for central heating-- it can cause long term problems.

After Bosnia left Yugoslavia, leaders used these grudges in propaganda schemes and so the war began. It was this war that brought about the term “ethnic cleansing.” Around 100,000 people were killed and over 2.2 million were displaced. The Srebrenica Genocide occurred in a UN “safe zone.” The Siege of Sarajevo was the longest of a capital city in the history of modern warfare, lasting from April 5, 1992 to February 29, 1996. The country has not been the same since. The government is full of corruption and with three parties --one for each ethnic majority-- that hate each other and keep a check on each other a little too well, nothing occurs. There is a large diaspora of Bosnians leaving for hopes of better lives in Germany, France, and other more economically stable countries. Politically and economically, Bosnia was destroyed by the war and they still have not recovered.

Socially, Bosnia and Herzegovina is home to some of the nicest people I have ever met. Talking to an elderly lady at the bus stop gave me a friend that allowed me to experience a little of Serbian Orthodox Christmas. Getting to know the owner of a sandwich shop got me a free dessert on New Year’s Eve. And the younger generations seem to have lost the hatred that was rampant during the 90’s; through student activism some schools have been desegregated and my friends have close ties to people of a different ethnic nationality than them. I hope that over time these ethnicities can grow closer and lose the toxic nationalism that caused the war in the first place.

Conceptions of Citizenship and Culture

Joshua O’Brien

Anise seed has a distinct aroma. I cannot describe it, other than to say it is steeped in culture for me. Anise seed is the key ingredient in ciamella, a braided ring-shaped bread my nonna makes. Ciamella is one of the cultural imports my nonna and her son—my late grandfather—brought to America in the 1950s. I saw that side of my family rarely—my mom had moved away from New York and her father and travelling to see them was expensive. Yet I still learned to love my nonna’s cooking, and I learned fragments of Italian. Mostly, I learned the swear words.

My grandfather was naturalized as an American citizen sometime in the 1970s, and along with his naturalization, the Italian government stopped viewing him as a citizen. He was no longer an Italian national legally, though I trust he still identified as Italian, along with the rest of my family in New York.

My own story contrasts, funnily enough. I am Italian, but I do not speak the language. I do not live with my Italian family. I have never been to Italy. But I can claim Italian citizenship. Rome let's descendants of Italian emigrants claim citizenship within certain parameters. Since my grandfather was naturalized after my mother’s birth, I can claim citizenship through her. Part of me is giddy about this development—I can claim citizenship to a European country! I can claim a small piece of familial legacy and culture, formalized in paper.

And that is where the other part sets in—the cognitive dissonance. With the generational removal from Italy, I never felt fully Italian. Amongst my family I always had an ounce of imposter syndrome. I am a dearly loved and forever welcome member of the family, but I always felt just a little closer to a member that had married into the family than a member born with the full rites and honors of an Italian citizen. Of course, the ability to claim an Italian passport legitimizes my feeling and my heritage to me. I may not speak the language, nor know the full traditions, but I am Italian. The Italian government thinks so! Or…they will if I ever fill out the paperwork.

The Russian Factor in India-U.S. Relations

By Rohan Rajesh 

The recent brutal clashes on the China-India border in June, which left 20 Indian soldiers and an unknown number of Chinese soldiers dead, have led Western media to expect that India will turn to the US in its hour of need. After the clashes, India banned several Chinese apps, including TikTok and WeChat, citing national security concerns. These actions match the efforts of US President Donald Trump to do the same. While India will certainly strengthen its ties with the United States and regional US allies like Japan and Australia, India will continue to maintain “strategic autonomy” and not enter a treaty alliance mainly for one reason: Russia.

Throughout the Cold War, India shared close ties with the Soviet Union while it had more antagonistic and distant relations it had with the US. India, having just gained independence from the UK, was far more sympathetic to the socialist ideals of the Soviets than to the capitalist ideals of the US and the imperialist ideals of its European allies – after all, India was conquered by a European corporation. When India annexed Portugal’s Indian territories in 1961, the Soviet Union vetoed a US-backed resolution condemning India’s move. During India’s 1971 war with Pakistan – which occurred while the Pakistani military was committing genocide in East Pakistan (today Bangladesh) – the US (an ally of Pakistan) sent the Seventh Fleet into the Bay of Bengal to dissuade India from declaring war on Pakistan. The fleet was closely pursued by a Soviet fleet. Thus, the US was unable to aid Pakistan and prevent its disastrous defeat to India. Even after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the warming of India-US relations, Russia continued to shield on the global stage far more consistently than the US. When India conducted nuclear tests in 1998, Russia refused to support US sanctions placed on India. India, in turn, refused to condemn the Soviet Union’s brutal crackdown on the protests in Hungary and Czechoslovakia. It also did not support a UN resolution condemning Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory. The friendship was most recently highlighted by India’s adamant refusal to abandon its purchase of the Russian S-400 missile defense system despite the threat of US sanctions. India also pledged a $1 billion line of credit to invest in Russia’s resource-rich Far East.

Overall, India views Russia as a more reliable partner because Russia does not hinge its relationship with India on India’s internal politics. Meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers (and some Republican ones) widely criticized the Indian government’s imposing an internet ban and jailing of Kashmiri political leaders. They also were uncomfortable with the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act passed by India’s Parliament. While much attention has been focused on the “bromance” between President Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, even that relationship has faced tensions over issues like trade, immigration, and the war in Afghanistan.

 India is not likely to break its long, deep relationship with the Russians despite both India and the US facing a rising, authoritarian China. Instead, India will continue to pursue its policy of strategic autonomy between the US and Russia while using the resources of both countries to push back against a revisionist China. Thus, if the US truly believes that India is an important counterweight to Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific, it is going to have to put up with close Indo-Russian relations. Further, the US should temper its criticism over India’s trade policy and the recent restrictions placed on the immigration of Indian citizens. Finally, the US should also limit its criticism of India’s “internal” human rights affairs and trust in the Indian democratic process to sort these issues out eventually. After all, the US was by no means the embodiment of human rights when it was 73 years old, and the US has been and continues to be bedfellows with far more brutal and authoritarian governments for the sake of realpolitik.

Feminism in East Asian Film

By: Anyi Li

For centuries, women in the East Asian countries enjoyed few legal rights over inheritance, marriage, and personal liberty. That is not to say they had no rights protecting their interests at all, but their rights were very minimal. Though marriages in countries like China, Japan, and the two Koreas are monogamous in most circumstances, the legal existence of concubines and their sons’ rights to inheritance decided the ancient East Asian marriages were polygynous in nature. In fact, polygyny in China was not banned until the founding of the current People’s Republic of China.  Women under these ancient feudal societies were expected to fulfill men’s image of ideal women: humble, submissive, reserved, chaste, faithful, devoted, voiceless, fertile, and absolutely unjealous. Though there were a few talented, incredible, independent, and powerful women in every dynasty, the overwhelming majority of women skewed their self-awareness and self-worth to become compatible with societal expectations to survive in a men’s world. 

Such distorted psychology generates long-lasting impacts until today. Many families, especially among the under-educated population, favor sons over daughters. Parents even name their daughters “Zhaodi” (means “attract a little brother”) or “Laidi” (means “come a little brother”). In dramas and movies, the theme of a handsome, strong, intelligent, and wealthy male lead appears, falls in love with the innocent female lead, and protects from every adversary and hardship in her life is prominent in the plotlines. The definition of successful women in these thematic productions always involves attracting an unfailing love interest, gaining acceptance from her love interest’s family, and producing a son. Many scriptwriters and novelists use rape and have a cheater husband to punish female characters they define as villains. Some dramas even portray sexual harassment, kidnap, and rape as love. Not only that, but systematic discrimination’s against women also continue to exist. On the ground of upholding imperial traditions, the Japanese imperial family bans princesses from claiming the throne whatsoever, and they have to forfeit royal status if they choose to marry a commoner. Empress Consort Masako, whose husband ascended to the throne in 2019, was barred from attending the enthronement ceremony.

However, in recent years, progress has occurred. There is now a more significant emphasis on personal improvements and women’s inner strength. Dramas and movies, the reflection of societal philosophical shifts, instead of presenting women as dependents of men, show women’s inner psychology, strength, struggles, independence, and aspirations. More movies and books begin to teach women how to protect their legal rights and advocate against sexual harassment. In general, the East Asian society is changing its views and perspectives on what defines a remarkable woman. However, systematic discrimination, such as the Japanese succession issue is still in debate. There are still many battles that need to be fought by women in East Asia to achieve gender equality.

Hinduism and Hindutva

By Rohan Rajesh 

The use of the terms “Hindu nationalism” and “Hindutva” are widely used to describe the current political situation in India. The BJP – the ruling party in India – is India’s most prominent Hindutva party, and recent actions (legislative and otherwise) by the BJP are part of the broader Hindutva agenda. It is thus essential to understand Hindutva and its relationship with Hinduism because Hindutva is an important part of India’s complex political landscape. I will neither argue for nor against Hindutva; this blog post is simply an explainer to educate everyone.

First, let us define Hinduism. The term itself was originally an appellation used by non-Indians to describe the various systems of belief that have developed in the Indian subcontinent over the past four to five thousand years. However, the term “Hindu” or anything like it does not exist natively in any Indian language. The reason is that there really is no such thing as “Hinduism.” Hindus do not have a unified religious leadership; a universally agreed-upon sacred text; common festivals, traditions, and rituals; or even a unified belief in God. Broadly, Hindus can be broadly described as “astika” and “nastika.” An astika generally accepts the authority of the Vedas, the Upanishads, and that there is a relationship between an individual’s “Atman” or soul and the universal “Brahman.” A nastika does not believe those things. Some examples of nastika philosophies are Buddhism, Jainism, and Charvaka (an ancient atheistic and materialistic philosophy that espoused empiricism). The existence and acceptance of agnosticism and atheism in Hinduism is why many people do not consider it a religion at all. Even the pervasive and notorious caste system has been subject to debate over the millennia. Several prominent philosophers like Adi Shankaracharya (a major proponent of Advaita Vedanta whose teachings are famous throughout India and the world) and Basava (the founder of Lingayatism) rejected caste and saw equality in all living things. It is because of this diversity that Hindus have largely been tolerant and accepting of other faiths from within India and without for thousands of years. This acceptance and diversity are best summarized by this quote from the Rig Veda, “There is one truth; the wise describe it in many ways” (Rig Veda 1.164.46).

Hindutva (which in New Sanskrit roughly translates as “Hinduness”), on the other hand, is a contemporary political ideology akin to Islamism and Christian fundamentalism. It is a synonym with the term “Hindu nationalism.” A Hindutvavadi (the Hindi term for a supporter of Hindutva) believes that Hindus have been dominated by foreign religions (first the Muslims and then the Christian British) for the past thousand years because Hinduism is fundamentally weak. Due to the aforementioned lack of structure, they believe that Hindus have been subjects of the more organized and conversion-focused Abrahamic faiths. Thus, Hindutva seeks to unify Hindus so that they can better defend themselves from foreign religious encroachment, whether that be Muslims in Pakistan and Bangladesh (and India) or Western Christian missionaries. Ironically, to protect Hinduism from proselytizing Abrahamic faiths, Hindutva seeks to make Hinduism more like those faiths. Hindutva also seeks a unifying language for all Hindus – the Sanskritized Hindi spoken in North India – and oppose the official use of English, which Hindutvavadis associate with “foreign” liberal ideas. Many Hindutvavadis also believe that India’s constitution is too foreign for India because it was written in English and espouses “Western” ideas like secularism.

Of course, the experiences of Hindus under Muslim rule differed significantly by region and time period and is a complex historical issue that deserves a separate blog post. But, in the mind of Hindutvavadis, Muslims have consistently betrayed India by destroying and looting temples, forcibly converting Hindus, implementing discriminatory Jizya taxes, or attempting to implement Sharia law. In their view, the ultimate betrayal was the partition of India (whose very geography is sacred) into a Muslim-majority Pakistan (which at the time included Bangladesh). The forced expulsion of Kashmiri Hindus in the 90s from their homeland by Pakistan-backed Islamist extremists in the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley further fueled this fire. Hindutvavadis also point to what they see as “appeasement” for Muslims in India’s Constitution. For example, Muslims in India have a separate personal religious code that permits polygamy for Muslim men. Until recently, triple talaq – the controversial practice whereby Muslim men could divorce their wife by saying the word “talaq” three times – was also permitted. Another example was the autonomy given to the erstwhile Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir. In the Hindutva view, this was yet another example of preferential treatment for Muslims that Hindus do not get. To a lesser extent, Christians often face the ire of Hindutvavadis. In particular, they take issue with foreign missionaries operating in India. Hindutva demands that Muslims and Christians in India abandon the “foreign” elements of their faith and integrate into Hindu culture.

Hindutva is best understood as the political expression of resentment amongst certain Hindus who feel they have been dominated by Muslims and Christians for the past one thousand years. This resentment is mainly prevalent in the Hindi-speaking heartland of the north but not amongst everyone in the region. Although Hindutva is unlikely to fundamentally transform Hinduism (simply because of the latter’s sheer diversity and timelessness), it is still a potent electoral force to reckon with, something American foreign policy experts should take into account.

Short-changed: The Fallacy of Partition

By: Rohan Rajesh 

“You have thrown us to the wolves!” cried an anguished Abdul Ghaffar “Bacha” Khan when the Indian National Congress (INC) acceded to the All-India Muslim League’s demand for an independent homeland for Indian Muslims called Pakistan. Khan, popularly known as the Frontier Gandhi, was the leader of the Khudai Khidmatgar, an organization of Pashtuns (from what is now Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province) who nonviolently supported Indian independence and stridently opposed the Pakistan Movement. Khan was not unique in his opposition to the creation of Pakistan – many Indian Muslims then and now have criticized the Pakistan Movement and with good reason: Partition arguably hurt the subcontinent’s Muslims more than any other group.

Pakistan, separated from its hearth in the subcontinent, has strayed decisively away from the vision of its founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Jinnah desired a secular state that happened to have a Muslim majority. Instead, Pakistan became the world’s first Islamic Republic, and non-Muslims form a mere 3% of Pakistan’s population today from 23% in 1947. It perpetrated one of the world’s worst genocides since the Holocaust in what is now Bangladesh (then East Pakistan). The persecution of minority Muslim sects and non-Muslims in Pakistan has continued unabated. Pakistan’s perpetual obsession with India’s larger population and more advanced military has ruined the country. Pakistan’s fear that India wants to conquer it has led to a bloated military budget when Pakistan should be focusing on economic development. Even with this over-allocation, the military has never gained Indian-administered Kashmir despite instigating three wars over the region; it lost East Pakistan even after committing a horrific genocide there; it continues to back terrorist groups in Afghanistan (most notably the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani network) and in Indian-administered Kashmir in the hopeless goals of gaining “strategic depth” and “bleeding India with a thousand cuts.” If India really wanted to annex Pakistan, it would have done so a long time ago. In 1971, India wrested control of East Pakistan and could have probably annexed Pakistan-proper as well but chose not to and probably never will because India is far more focused on developing its economy and ensuring prosperity for its citizens than waging war with a nuclear-weapons state.

Meanwhile, Indian Muslims have been quite successful in a variety of fields and have made India proud. One of India’s most popular presidents, APJ Abdul Kalam, also pioneered missile technology. Azim Premji, the chairman of Wipro and a czar of Indian IT, is one of India’s most respected businessmen and philanthropists. AR Rahman is one of India’s most celebrated musicians, having won several awards in India and the West. Indian Muslim actors, singers, music composers, and lyricists continue to draw die-hard fans irrespective of religion. Muslims in India take pride in their country just as much as Indians are proud of their achievements and contributions. Muslims in India, despite being a minority, have much better economic and societal prospects than their counterparts in Pakistan.

That said, I understand that many people, including Indian Muslims, are concerned about the direction in which India is headed under the ruling Hindu nationalist BJP government. However, the BJP’s electoral success at the national level is less about a supposed rise in support for Hindu nationalism in India since 2014 than it is about the failures of India’s “secularists.” The previous government led by the INC was marred by corruption scandals and accusations of nepotism, which the INC has not gotten over. For all the talk about the “saffronization” of India, the BJP’s mass-appeal mostly lies in Prime Minister Modi’s charisma and an agenda of increased economic development and national security. No society is perfect, and, just as in Western societies, tensions will always remain in Indian society. Perhaps the greatest testament to the success of India’s pluralism despite its growing pains is that 200 million Muslims have consistently chosen to stay in India even as many Muslims and non-Muslims have left Pakistan.

The Partition of India was meant to improve the political situation of India’s Muslims. Instead, the subcontinent’s Muslims find themselves divided among three countries with their loyalties often questioned. In Pakistan and Bangladesh, authoritarianism regimes have disenfranchised their citizens, including Muslims. In India, despite having better protections and enfranchisement, Muslims are an even smaller minority than before Partition and have less of a say in Parliament than they would have had in an unpartitioned India. Had India not been partitioned, nearly 600 million Muslims (including Bangladesh) would have coexisted with 900 million Hindus and other religious groups. Muslims would have held significant political sway, and puritanical Islamism and Hindu nationalism would have been weakened by each group counterbalancing each other. In the end, Muslims were short-changed by the Muslim League.

International Mail

By: Joshua O’Brien

Because I am one of the only people in the world who would find international postal policy interesting

Three stamps. I need three stamps to cover the postage to my Norwegian best-friend. Two more than the domestic one, but that’s okay. Typically, I just affix three stamps to the envelope, drop it in the box, and forget about it. But this week, on my drive back from the Post Office, I realized how little I know about the international mail system.

I figured, vaguely, that the USPS would forward it to an airport, where it would hop the Atlantic to Oslo. From there, Posten Norge would handle the rest after the letter cleared Customs. I’m still guessing something like this happens, but the actual diplomatic development of that system has a surprising history.

Back in the 19th century, when romantic authors exchanged smutty letters, mail rates and transport were governed by postal treaties. All of these treaties were bilateral, so little uniformity existed in the system. And often, trans-Atlantic letter rates varied based on the ship carrying the mail.

Then, in 1879, the Treaty of Bern! The Treaty of Bern established the Universal Postal Union, which allowed for uniformity in international mailing and rates across Europe and the North Atlantic. It sounds incredibly boring, but on some level, it was the diplomatic equivalent of a massive trade deal at the time.

Today, the Universal Postal Union (UPU) exists as a United Nations Specialized Agency, with headquarters in Bern. It still coordinates international postal policies across nations and is surprisingly involved in modern economics. For instance, the UPU convened an Extraordinary Congress in 2019 after the United States threatened to withdraw from the body to terminal dues with mailings to China. The UPU Extraordinary Congress moved to allow self-declared terminal rates up to 70%. While I do not know exactly what that means, it warms my nerdy heart that there is mail diplomacy. Heated mail diplomacy.

This is only what I’ve learned with a half-hour of Google searching. I had to stop myself from going further down the rabbit hole, because I might not leave until I’m an expert on international mail policy, and in-line to be the UPU’s next Director-General. If I find anymore gems in the history of postal diplomacy, I will be sure to follow-up in a future blog post. But for now, I will contain my obscure nerdy interests to this post.

The 2020 U.S. Election: Poll-Workers Unite

By Jennings Dixon

What tumultuous times these are. It seems as though with each new day, some different part of the world is burning (in some cases, literally) and it feels like there is nothing we can do. 2020 has become a nightmarish fever dream that none of us expected nor wanted. It stresses me out, and I’m sure you are just as stressed. So, let’s just take a moment right here to close our eyes, take the deepest breath you can, and try to release as much tension and anxiety that I know you have. Feel slightly less existential? I hope so.

    As I just mentioned, it feels as though there is nothing that we can do to prevent 2020’s grand finale from becoming the long expected apocalypse. Well, that’s not exactly true. There is one thing that we all can do, and that is to vote. Voting is one of the most sacred hallmarks of a democracy, and it’s a beautiful thing to know that you can help decide who gets to lead. Whether that be at the local level, state level, or national level, if you can vote, you should. It’s as simple as that. If of course, it wasn’t 2020.

    Leaving the US for a short bit, let’s look at elections around the globe. COVID-19 is a brutal force to be reckoned with, and unfortunately for some nations, it has altered the state of their upcoming elections. Around 70 countries have had to postpone or cancel elections this year because of the pandemic, including New Zealand, Nigeria, and Brazil. Canada has moved some of their elections to May 2021, and Ethiopia’s parliamentary elections, which were supposed to be this month, won’t take place until August of next year. Some countries like Switzerland and Uganda have postponed theirs indefinitely.

    There are two potential outcomes with postponement: there is either democratic resilience, or there is authoritarian opportunism. Democratic resilience gives countries the ability to work together to come out of this crisis with an intact democracy. By postponing, countries can assess the best options for voting, make sure that elections are fulfilled in the safest ways possible, and accumulate as many resources to ensure that everyone can vote. On the other hand, some countries and their leaders are exploiting the pandemic by postponing, allowing current administrations to keep power indefinitely. They are using COVID-19 as an excuse to shrink political space, and leverage future elections to their advantage. In these situations, democracy is in jeopardy. That’s a scary thing.

    How does any of this pertain to the US? Well, as we all know, we are not postponing our election. It will happen on November 3rd, 2020, and there’s nothing that can change the fact. What is malleable about our election is whether or not we can emerge with democratic resilience. I’m not talking about potential mail-in fraud, USPS scandals, or the integrity of either major candidate. This is a nonpartisan thing, and I want to make that very clear. What I’m talking about is whether or not every single person eligible to vote can vote. This means that more people need to sign up to be poll workers.

    On a usual election, the majority of poll workers nationwide are over the age of 60. However, because of COVID-19 and the fact that older people are at higher risk for contracting the virus, they just aren’t signing up this year. That’s a major problem. We are less than a hundred days away from November 3rd, and we are a quarter of a million poll workers short. What that means is less polling sites, which results in longer drives for some, long lines, and the potential for delayed results. Marginalized communities, especially communities of color will be hit the hardest. They were during the primaries, and the same should be expected for November. Unless you sign up to be a poll worker.

    Regardless of who you think should be president, or governor, or senator, etc., it’s important to understand that in order to keep our democracy intact, we need to facilitate a fair and safe election. Becoming a poll worker may not seem incredibly impactful, but by you signing up, it might mean the difference of an entire community getting a proper chance to cast their ballots. That’s an incredible thing! So, sign up, get involved, and make a difference in your community and country. Maybe then 2020 won’t seem so bleak anymore.

Brief Thoughts on Democracy: America or Not

By Joshua O’Brien

Warning: This post contains the mildest of spoilers for a 15-year-old episode of The West Wing.

On Wednesday, September 2, 2020, famed pollster Nate Silver shared a forecast of the probability Joe Biden wins the electoral college, based on how many percentage points he wins over Trump in the popular vote. Journalist Evan Osnos commented “If I read about this system in, say, Turkmenistan, I’d pity them.” I am not sure if this journalist was aware, but they hit an academic issue pretty well—the ideal of what a democracy is and should be on the international stage and at home.

The knee-jerk reaction among Americans is to point to our own system—the oldest continuous constitutional system in the world with all of its checks, balances, and idealistic appeal. Constitutional scholars will detest this, and with good reason. The presidential system is slow, and by removing the need for majority legislative support, lends itself to authoritarian turns in executive functions. Parliamentary systems, with their speed and need for legislative support, might be better suited for countries without deep democratic traditions, though the academic debate makes such a definitive statement difficult. So much so, that the discussion has spilled into television, becoming a plot point of “The Wake Up Call” episode of The West Wing. In this episode, one of the White House staffers in the fictional Bartlet administration gets into heated debate with a group of Belarusian democrats rewriting their country’s constitution. While the Belarusians argue for a strong President, the staffer opposes the idea, labeling the Presidential system as one of America’s “most dangerous exports.”

The tweet just highlights the point of the debate—the American system is not universally understood as the best form of democracy, and depending on the context, might not even be a particularly good one. And some facets of it are criticized even here. Presidents of both parties have made unpopular actions through executive orders that a Parliament would have shot down, with an attached no-confidence motion. Some consider the Electoral College to be a quirky subversion of democracy, rather than a nuanced instrument of state will. While examining democratic functioning honestly can help inform larger global political forces, perhaps it can open a more nuanced discussion on what democracy should be at home, too.