WOODHOUSE LABOUR SOCIETY

A P R I L E D I T I O N

C O N T E N T S

Inside the Party (8th March – 22nd March) – pg2 Opinion Piece: The Thucydides trap or the Golden Arches of Conflict Prevention Theory? – pg5 Opinion Piece: Safeguarding the public or curtailing their rights? – pg7 Recommendations – pg9

People involved in the creation of this newsletter: Archie Ryan Alesia Laci Moulika Shome James Dumonbreville

1 Inside the Party (8th March – 22nd March) – Archie Ryan –

8th March Sarwar demands £12 hourly wage for social care workers in the Scottish Budget • has announced that it would be willing to back the Scottish government’s Budget “if it delivers a fair deal for social care workers” • This means increasing pay to £12 an hour, planning to raise it to £15 in the next parliament. • The challenge comes after a GMB trade union survey revealed that 98% of social care workers feel underpaid and 52% undervalued by the Scottish government

9th March unveils strategy to push 2024 Labour platform leftward • Left-wing group Momentum has published a strategy to create “broad alliances for socialism” in an effort to “retool” the organisation and “push the Labour Party to contest the 2024 general election with a socialist policy platform • The strategy outlines three key focuses: building left power within the party; campaigning in communities and supporting working-class struggle; and popularising socialist ideas

10th March Starmer demands MPs vote on NHS pay as new figures show NHS staff saw pay slashed by the conservatives since 2010 • At PMQs, called on the Prime Minister to give MPs a vote on NHS pay amid mounting anger at the Government’s proposed NHS pay cut • Accounting for inflation, Labour’s research shows that since the Conservatives took power in 2010, some NHS workers have seen their pay slashed by thousands of pounds (e.g. Since 2010, the average salary of nurse and health visitor has seen a real terms cut of £2,379 per year)

11th March Labour urges Johnson to correct the record after false claims regarding an NHS funding vote • Labour is urging to “set the record straight” after the Prime Minister falsely claimed that the opposition had voted against a proposed 2.1% pay rise for NHS workers in England

12th March Rachel Reeves responds to news that Britain’s exports to the EU were down more than 40% in January - the largest monthly fall in goods exports since records began in 1997 • “These figures make it clear just how many British businesses have been struggling with the new reams of costly red tape and bureaucracy this Government has wrapped them in” – Rachel Reeves

2 13th March Not-so “inside the party”: Liz Truss promises a ban on gay conversion therapy • Whilst not-quite loyal to the name of this section (quite the contrary) not much really occurred within the Labour Party this day and so I felt that this was certainly worth a mention since this is a fight that has been consistently fought by the members of the party for years and if woven firmly into legislation, there is cause for much congratulations!

14th March David Lammy: Labour will be voting against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill • “The tragic death of Sarah Everard has instigated a national demand for action to tackle violence against women. […] This is no time to be rushing through poorly thought-out measures to impose disproportionate controls on free expression and the right to protest” – David Lammy

15th March Sarwar puts “national recovery plan” at the heart of Scottish election campaign: • Anas Sarwar has declared that a “national recovery plan” for will be the centrepiece of the Scottish Labour election campaign • Delivering his first major speech as Scottish Labour, he announced five themes to the election campaign: “a jobs recovery; an NHS recovery; an education recovery; a climate recovery; and a communities recovery” • “We can’t rely on Boris Johnson’s Tories to deliver a recovery that works for everyone. They are happy to return to the failed economic model pre-Covid […] We can’t rely on the SNP to prioritise recovery because they’ve already made clear that they will prioritise a referendum this year.” – Anas Sarwar

16th March Labour votes against anti-protest bill but it passes by a majority of 96 votes: • The House of Commons passes controversial legislation proposed by the government that would hand police tougher powers to crack down on protesters, a contemptible disgrace to democracy and political participation • Labour voted against the bill at its second reading tonight and attempted to stop its passage, saying it fails to tackle violence against women and girls and restricts the right to protest

17th March Andy McDonald, Labour’s Shadow Employment Rights and Protection Secretary responds to the announcement that Uber will give its UK drivers a guaranteed minimum wage, holiday pay and pensions: • “It is welcome news that Uber are to recognise their drivers as workers. This announcement is testament to the hard work of the GMB trade unions and drivers, but it should not have taken 5 years of court battles for drivers to get basic rights at work.” – Andy McDonald

3 18th March Keir Starmer and Anas Sarwar demand UK-wide focus on Covid recovery: • Starmer will join Anas Sarwar to demand a UK-wide focus on the recovery from the pandemic • Speaking ahead of a visit to Edinburgh and , the UK Labour Party leader declared that Scotland’s recovery from the health crisis “must be the number one priority for its government”

19th March Local elections offer chance to send message on NHS pay, Labour tells voters: • Jonathan Ashworth, Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, is telling voters that the May elections represent an opportunity for the public to “send a message to the Conservatives” on their decision to reward health service workers with a real-terms pay cu • “Whether you live in London or Lancashire, you can send a message to the Conservatives in May that a pay cut for our NHS heroes is an insult. A vote for Labour is a vote to support our nurses.” – Jonathan Ashworth

20th March Shadow requests a move to a comprehensive hotel quarantine system as European Covid cases rise: • Shadow Home Secretary Nick Thomas Symonds, has responded to rising Covid cases in many European countries by calling for “a comprehensive hotel quarantine system, without further delay” to “protect the made by the vaccine” • “It is too early to say if there can be any changes to travel advice on 17 May, as numbers in many European countries are increasing so sharply. We have to be led by the science, not arbitrary dates.” – Nick Thomas Symonds

21st March Labour calls for “NHS rescue package”: • Today, Shadow Health Secretary, Jonathan Ashworth, this stressed the need to get to grips with rising patient waiting times and cancer care

22nd March Labour calls for ‘level playing field’ between online and high street retailers: • Shadow Chancellor Anneliese Dodds stressed the need to even out competition between giants such as Amazon and smaller businesses • Campaigning in Birmingham ahead of the local elections in May, Dodds said the Government needed to put a stop to online firms paying “little to no tax” and allowing them to “undercut” rate-paying shops, warning that, without action, the “loss of shops and high street businesses that I’ve seen here in Birmingham today will only accelerate”

4 Opinion Pieces *Do note that opinion pieces reflect only the opinions of their creators, not the society as a whole*

The Thucydides trap or the Golden Arches of Conflict Prevention Theory? – Moulika Shome –

The Thucydides trap is a realist theory which suggests that war between a rising power and an existing superpower is inevitable. The idea came from Greek historian Thucydides who studied how the Peloponnesian war (war between Sparta and Athens) had broken out. In this case, Sparta was the existing superpower which was shocked to see Athens becoming a powerhouse of culture, arts, and politics.1 On the Other hand, The Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention by Thomas Friedman says that no two countries that have a McDonald’s restaurants would ever go to war with each other. Professor Graham Allison, a political scientist in Harvard University, had used this theory to talk about the possibility of China and the USA going into war. I personally think that the Golden Arches theory sounds more plausible than that Thucydides trap, in the case of China and USA.

Professor Graham Allison had found through the Harvard Belfer center of Science and International Affairs that there are 16 different situations in which the Thucydides trap was present. Out of the 16 cases, there were only 4 cases where war did not break out between the ‘ruling’ and ‘rising’ powers. This was due to measures taking place such as increased monitoring of each other’s affairs, Allison suggests the Zhou-Enlai, and Kissinger talks are one of the ways where the trap can be defeated. In each case, they tried to find the ruling and the rising powers and see how the Thucydides trap affected each case. According to Graham Allison, Thucydides had suggested that trying to implement ‘Business as Usual’ is what makes countries become more vulnerable to the trap, rather than a sudden attack. A famous case study that the Harvard Belfer Center have found was World War I. World War I had taken place because of rivalry which took place between Britain and Germany. Kaiser Wilhelm II was jealous of Britain’s navy fleet, and so this led to the Arms Race which ran between 1897 to 1914. Yet Kaiser Wilhelm had said that he had ‘adored England.’ (Allison, 2015) Therefore, it is likely that Thucydides would have argued the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie was not the only thing that triggered World War I. Thucydides had also pointed out that the Peloponnesian War had started when war broke out between Corinth and Corcyra. Sparta was allies with Corinth and Athens had backed Corcyra. Similarly, when Franz Ferdinand’s Austro-Hungary declared war against Serbia, Germany decided to take the side of Austro-Hungary while the UK, France and Russia took the side of Serbia.

Now, Professor Graham Allison had mainly used the Thucydides trap to talk about the likelihood of war breaking out between China and the USA. Allison pointed out that China was the ‘rising’ power while the USA being the ‘ruling’ power. He had his students compare 20 different indicators between both countries and they had found that China was already

1 The Atlantic News article, ‘The Thucydides Trap: Are the U.S. and China Headed for War?’, Graham Allison, link: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/09/united-states-china-war-thucydides- trap/406756/, published: 24.09.2015, date of website accessed: 22.03.2021

5 ahead of the USA in each of them. This was Allison’s way to show that China poses as a substantial risk to the USA’s power, hence it was unsurprising that former President Donald Trump had taken an ‘America First’ approach. He knew that China was becoming more competitive than the US in many fields such as in technology and innovation, and so decided to impose a trade war. In 2019, the USA had implemented $360 billion’s worth of tariffs on Chinese goods while China gave tariffs of $110 billion on US products coming to China.2 Moreover, in August 2020, Trump signed an executive order to ban TikTok in the US if it did not sell its US shares to another company within 45 days.3 According to Trump, this was because of national security concerns, though it was clear that the main intentions behind this move was to protect American tech firms such as and Instagram. This shows that war between the two countries is likely due to increased levels of competition between the two countries.

Although, the Golden Arches theory would counterargue that this is the main reason China and the US are going through a trade war, and not a physical war. For context, China has 3,383 McDonald’s restaurants, making it the country to have the second largest number of McDonald’s after the USA.4 The Golden Arches theory would suggest that both countries, the USA and China, have adopted capitalist traits which means that they have common interests than differences. Both countries also have a large middle-class and this means that physical war would supply less of a purpose for the middle-classes in both countries, since war would destroy their wealth and reduce their incomes dramatically. Moreover, American Transnational Corporations (TNCs) like Apple have also created extensive GPNs or Global Production Networks which make the US and China both interdependent on each other. Apple is known for having the iconic slogan ‘made in China, designed in California’, and production in China supplies jobs to many Chinese people. From the American perspective, this global shift had meant that American corporations like Apple were able to make larger profits by gaining cheaper labour and becoming more prominent in the global stage. Even though, it can be argued that many Americans were disadvantaged, especially in Detroit where many of these jobs have been outsourced to China. Trump used this to his advantage in his 2016 election campaign, by saying that he will create more jobs and bring them back to the USA, increasing tension between the two countries.

Overall, the Thucydides trap is starting to become more obsolete since the world has become more interconnected and cooperative between each other. Globalisation has caused the time-space compression to reduce, so it is easier to watch the movements of each country. As like mentioned before, Professor Allison had mentioned that out of the 4 cases where war did not occur, there were lessons to be learned. One of them being that

2 BBC News article, ‘A quick guide to the US-China trade war’, by BBC News editors, link: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-45899310, published: 16.01.2020, date of website accessed: 22.03.2021 3 article, ‘Trump administration to delay enforcement of TikTok ban’, by Kari Paul and agencies, link: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/nov/12/tiktok-trump-administration-justice- department#:~:text=The%20US%20government%20has%20announced,battle%20against%20the%20Trump%2 0administration.&text=In%20August%2C%20Trump%20signed%20an,US%20operations%20in%2045%20days, published: 12.11.2020, date of website accessed: 22.03.2021 4 Investopedia article, ’10 countries with the most McDonald’s Locations’, by Sean Ross, link: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets-economy/091716/10-countries-most-mcdonalds-locations- mcd.asp, updated: 2.03.2020, date of website accessed: 22.03.2021

6 there should be mutual understanding between the two countries, or else keeping business as usual levels could cause misunderstandings between the two countries. He also pointed out that there should be intense monitoring so that there is no sign of war taking place. The Golden Arches Theory shows that interdependence helps with intense monitoring of another country’s affairs since there would be regular communications between branches in distinct parts of the world.

Safeguarding the public or curtailing their rights? – James Dumonbreville –

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill (hereafter referred to as the “PCSC”) is a new Bill that is currently in its passage through Parliament. It is a piece of legislation that the Ministry of Justice promises will be instrumental in ‘reforming the justice system’. It will introduce a wide range of reforms – including; life sentences for drivers who kill behind the wheel, ‘whole life orders’ for the premeditated murder of a child, 10-year sentences for criminal damage to memorials and new police powers on protesting). It is the implications on protests that this article will focus on and discuss.

The status quo is set out under the Public Order Act 1986. The police can place restrictions on protests in circumstances where they develop into “serious public disorder” or where there may be “serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community”. Putting abuse of this power aside, one can reasonably conclude that it has stricken a relatively fair balance between upholding the right to protest and safeguarding the public. Worryingly, the new Bill seeks to tip this balance – taking it, in my opinion, so far as to result in tipping past the safeguarding of the public and into the territory of unreasonably curtailing the right to protest.

Changes to protests (and, by extension, public assembly) are dealt with in Part 3 of the Bill. These changes mean that the police will be able to put more conditions on static protests – allowing, inter alia, the imposition of a start/finish time and the setting of noise limits. It also enables these rules to apply to demonstrations even if they are carried out by just one person.

Part of the substantial ‘reasoning’ of the Bill was set out by the Secretary of State for Justice, Robert Buckland - “we’ve got to think about the sometimes-huge inconvenience caused to other people going about their lawful business” .

It therefore engages the balancing exercise between upholding the right to protest and safeguarding the public – the Government is following the reasoning that the scale should fall heavily on the side of ‘safeguarding the public’ – and, consequently, these new powers are justified. When put plainly like this, it seems acceptable but when looking to what the Bill would identify as ‘safeguarding the public’ it appears to pertain to noise and even low level public disruption.

This demonstrates that the high threshold for engaging protest restrictions is being significantly lowered by this Bill. The 1986 Act set this as a relatively high hurdle – with the

7 intended purpose of curtailing protests only when the danger to the public is severe. Differently, this Bill lowers the hurdle to such an extent where, as has been reported by the BBC, “an individual holding a protest placard, while blasting out their views on a speaker… could be fined up-to £2,500… for refusing to follow police directions over how they should conduct their protest”. The lowering of this hurdle, to such an extreme extent, should serve as a warning for us all – protests are central to the improvement of society; they bring us much needed awareness on forgotten topics, help expose injustices facing marginalised groups and are a key part of scrutinising the Government. We should make no mistake that this is a direct attack on our right to protest and can take no comfort in allowing this to happen.

The issue all comes down to the balancing exercise of human rights and public safety. I am of the view that there are occasions when the risk to the public is so great that departures from the European Convention on Human Rights (“ECHR”) are not desirable but are acceptable. I believe such occasions pertain to serious crime and terror (among other things to that severe nature). I do not believe that circumstances, such as noisy public disruption, should be enough to infringe on the right to protest – it makes a mockery of this very balancing exercise, which should only be reserved for use as a justification for infringing upon rights in very severe situations (where the public are at a true risk of harm).

It is no surprise that police chiefs, such as , have supported the Bill – it follows their personal frustration in not being able to lessen the impact of demonstrations that have taken place over the past years. These past years have seen a multitude of protests, on a wide range of issues – for example, Extinction Rebellion for climate change, Black Lives Matter for racial injustice and, recently, a vigil in memory of Sarah Everard. These demonstrations were (and are) truly needed, and that cannot be overstated. No reasonable individual can deny the importance of the right to protest and, therefore, a Bill that serves to curtail this right is plainly wrong.

To conclude, I think it is evident that this Bill is a direct attack on our fundamental rights, as defined in the ECHR. It will be interesting to see whether challenges are brought on the basis of the Human Rights Act 1998 or even under the ECHR itself. I form the view that this Bill, quite frankly, is a step too far. Of course, the police should have the power to protect the public when protests get out of control and pose a risk – this is already expressly covered by the 1986 Act. This new Bill, however, simply serves to be an unnecessary overreach of police power and a direct attack on our democratic right to protest – all connected together with a fraudulent attempt to engage the aforementioned balancing exercise as ‘reasoning’.

8 Recommendations: Book, Documentaries, and Resources – Moulika Shome –

Hi everyone, Here are some of the resources that I used for my first opinion piece ‘ vs Animal Farm’. Personally, I think these resources work well with the A-Level Politics specification and they also give good contextual information on the political situation throughout the 20th century. They may also come to use for personal statements and university applications, especially if you disagree with the authors’ viewpoints!

➢ Book, ‘Animal Farm’ by George Orwell – A satirical fiction book which is an allegory of how the Bolsheviks took over the Soviet Union.

➢ Documentary, ‘The Rise and Fall of ’, presented by Andrew Rawnsley – A documentary which focuses on how Tony Blair’s premiership unfolded and went off steam. This documentary covers topics such as the Northern Ireland Peace Agreement, the death of Princess Diana, the Kosovo War, and . The documentary is split into two and is available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/vmoNO9Bi8-Q , https://youtu.be/b7GUO10dLaE

➢ Political film, ‘The Deal’, directed by Stephen Frears – This film is revolved around Tony Blair and ’s relationship and how it soured during the run up to the 1994 Labour leadership contest. It looks at the Granita Pact and the events which lead up to it. Please bear in mind, however, that this film has been adapted for dramatic purposes. Some of the conversations or scenes in this film may not reflect the actual events which took place. It still gives a good overview on how this difficult relationship progressed over time. It is available for free on Channel 4’s website.

➢ Book, ‘Beyond the crash’, by Gordon Brown – Take a look into how the 2008 Financial was handled by Gordon Brown’s government and Alistair Darling’s treasury. Brown gives an insightful point of view on globalisation, as well as an alternative to the TINA (There Is No other Alternative) factor, which was used by classical economists to justify the free-market approach.

9 ➢ Book, ‘A Journey’, by Tony Blair – Blair’s autobiography. This book allows people to see Blair’s stance on social issues as well his time as labour leader and eventually prime minister. Just a small warning, this book was not written in the best prose… In case, if you are not too interested in New Labour, here are some other resources that I would recommend: ➢ YouTube documentary, ‘The $1,000,000,000 North Korean Bank Heist’, by Kento Bento – This documentary talks about the 2016 Bangladesh Bank Heist. It shows how economic globalisation disadvantages lesser economically developed countries. In this case study, SWIFT (a military grade application which connects the world’s banking institutions) puts LEDC countries like Bangladesh at risk of cyber-attacks as it requires them to have up-to-date technology (the Digital Divide).

➢ YouTube documentary, ‘Has McDonald’s conquered Asia’, by Kento Bento – Explains how the process of McDonaldisation (a form of westernisation) is taking place in Asian countries. It also briefly talks about the Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention by Thomas Friedman (the idea that no two countries which have a McDonald’s would ever go to war with each other). This brings the question of whether the global shift towards Asia is really taking place? I hope to have been of some help. Please feel free to email me at [email protected] or ask other members of the Labour Society for some more recommendations! If you have some recommendations, we would love to hear them! Moulika

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